And the Trees Crept In(48)
indoor
mist.
“Eleanor!”
I scream, rushing on, but the trees are growing and before I can even think, she is in that thing’s arms, her own around
his
neck
and he has carried her off into the depths of La Baume, which is now the thickest part of Python Wood.
I step forward—get her back, get her back!—right into the yawning black hole.
BOOK 5:
Rooted Fire
Three little girls
knelt by an alder
to summon a man
to be their protector.
the little girls found
their game hard to bear
when their protector turned
and gave them a scare!
20
kansas
Hold on tight
we’re going for a ride
toward a light
on the other side!
BROKEN BOOK ENTRY
Okay, fine. I’m a little afraid. So? I’m even angry. But anger and fear aren’t going to feed her. To clothe her. I could even argue that he’s the one who might kill her. But relying on someone—anyone—is useless. I know that now. It’s one of the many mistakes I’ve made. Day turns into night turns into day, and still I wait. Waiting is pointless. And it’s too late to go now.
Memories come.
I am five, wearing a yellow skirt that I will love fiercely and keep until it becomes so short that Mam calls it obscene and burns it.
A straw doll at seven, which I pretend to love to please her.
A sunset on my eighth birthday when Father locked me out of the house.
Nori’s birth when I am ten.
My pride.
My terror.
Some things pass with a storm, loud and vexing. Full of drama. They are delightfully, dramatically disruptive. They blunder past like shouts of thunder and shrieks of lightning, and are always a brilliant spectacle.
Other things whisper by.
So it is that Gowan saves me from the Stygian pit.
I wither in his arms, like a wilted flower. And I shudder.
“I lost her. I lost her.”
Maybe he knows I am falling away from him, because he holds me firmly and kisses me fervently, trying to rouse me from the haze Nori’s abduction has left me in.
He got her.
I shake my head, squeezing my eyes shut against the awful afterglow of that image. Nori, her hand in his, walking away with him.
She went with him.
It’s over.
Everything is over.
All over.
All gone.
I lost her.
I close my eyes and lose myself.
I wake to a new world.
My head aches, and as Gowan helps me up, I can’t, at first, recall why I feel so scared.
“What happened?”
“You nearly walked into that hole. I pulled you back but you were freaking out a bit and you knocked your head.”
I can feel the bump.
And then it comes back.
“Nori, oh God—”
“She’s gone. He took her into the… woods.”
“What do you mean into the woods—they were down the corridor, just there—”
I point and then freeze. Because the corridor is not a corridor. La Baume is utterly changed. The trees that were holding us under siege have now penetrated the walls entirely, growing in from I don’t know where, twisting and tangling like those roots upstairs that stole Cathy away. They are growing through the house, out of the walls, through the floors, up to the ceiling, draped in thick moss.
We are invaded.
The entire manor is an eerie forest, too still to be real, fallen leaves landing on wooden floorboards and Persian rugs, trunks towering up into and through the ceilings, branches skimming paintings.
La Baume is laughing at me. But the laughter is silent, slow, and eerie. I am on the ground floor, facing the corridor that Nori vanished down. Only now it is a forest path, carpeted and surreal. I recognize the paintings that hang from the branches as those that were on the walls.
“This… isn’t happening.”
The floor—the wooden floorboards—are now draped with roots thicker than my arm. I take a step into this strange manor-wood and feel my breath catch. I turn to Gowan.
“This can’t be… real.”
Gowan stares into the trees. “I don’t think we’re exactly in Kansas anymore.”
“I have to get Nori back. I have to.… He’s got her.”
For a moment, the world closes in—too overwhelming to live in—but then Gowan’s hands are wrapped around mine and I know I can do this.
“I’m going to find her. Find the answer. This is some kind of family… thing. A debt, maybe. A curse. So, basically, it’s all connected to Cath, to Nori. And me.”
“Are you ready?”
I nod.
He lifts a hand and points down the corridor. Into the woodland path that stretches into… I don’t know where.
“That way.”
I have no choice. No more running. It is no longer an option. I’ve hidden in this damned house for too long, afraid of the trees and of… him. Well, now the trees are here, and he’s got Nori, and hiding is not a choice. I am Silla Mae Daniels. I am sane. I am afraid.