Chapter 6

Your Heart’s Desire

There’s a moment of pure silence before Alice lets out a groan. “No. I can’t just disappear. Not without any explanation.” Her head drops down and a small sob shakes her body. “I knew we should’ve gone back. Mum needs me….”

Guilt hits me like an arrow to the heart. I thought Alice wanted this adventure – this escape from a life I never chose – as much as me.

Turns out I was wrong.

She stands and looks around wildly, her braids swinging back and forth as she twists her head. “Where’s the exit?”

Doubt slides its fingers under me and starts to pull. “I…don’t know.”

She runs to the wall, bangs on it with her fists then stops suddenly and stares at it. “That’s weird. It’s like…”

I put a hand on Alice’s shoulder. “I felt that too. Like there’s loads of choices you didn’t even know you’d made.”

Her muscles tense.

I chew my lip and stare down the endless corridor. Its white walls lead off into the distance, sliding gradually into a black so powerful it’s there and not there at the same time.

My stomach twists.

I need to make this right. I need to get us back

“You go check out the corridors that way,” I tell Alice, pointing behind us. “I’ll go the other way.”

She nods and stares at her dad’s flowers, rearranges them then heads down the corridor.

The first side corridor I reach takes my breath away. It’s plain walls lead off for a while until they reach some kind of hologram – a living 3D projection that casts a pale blue light on the corridor around it.

The image inside shows a vast expanse of water, smooth and still; sunshine rippling across it.

There’s an ocean at the end of this lane.

I tilt my head and just like a hologram the image shifts, morphing into another scene: similar, but not the same. Waves crash against one another, spray flies in the air, fish jump and the salty tang of seaside fills my nostrils.

Guilt crashes over my happiness like a wave on the beach. Thoughts of Alice and her mum swim upwards threatening to pull me under.

I take a deep, calming breath and the image morphs again into a softly undulating seascape. It’s beautiful but it’s not where we’re going right now.

I’ve got to focus. Got to get us back.

I move on.

Each side corridor has a different scene at the end. In the next, volcanoes erupt, spewing a superheated red glow into this nowhere place; the third shows silver trains hurtling over huge arched bridges, emerging from tunnels and speeding across deserted landscapes; in the fourth, a castle stands high on a hill, an ever-shifting blanket of stars behind it.

So many paths to explore, so many choices still to make.

The scene in the fifth corridor sheds a ghostly green light onto the walls. This must be the corridor De Silva went down, but I can’t see him. At the end of this lane many trees become one, and one tree becomes many. Images overlap images. Oak trees blown in the breeze, Christmas trees covered with light frost, Willow trees lashed by the rain.

They’re all there.

Together and not together.

Parts of the whole.

I put one foot into the side corridor and the scene flickers like a download on a bad connection. It stutters then resolves. And there he is: De Silva, stood in a woodland glade. My heart leaps at the sight of him. He draws his foil and looks around. Our eyes meet but he seems to look right through me before turning and heading off down a muddy track into the trees, passing a huge grey boulder and disappearing from sight.

I gulp down some air before sprinting back along the main corridor to where Alice is stood.

She’s staring into one of the side corridors, seemingly lost in it. At the end I can see a meadow of wildflowers swaying in the breeze. It seems to go on endlessly to the horizon, under the bluest sky I ever saw.

Her eyes shine as she turns to me. “It’s beautiful.”

“You need to come.”

“Where?”

“I saw him. De Silva.”

She stiffens. “Where?”

I point back towards the side corridor. “Think about it, he’s come here before and got back.”

Alice shakes herself, like an athlete warming up. “It’s pretty easy to walk an unknown path when you know the way back, but the hardest thing in the world to keep going when you feel truly lost. That takes real bravery.”

Our eyes meet. “And that’s why I think you’re one of the bravest people I ever met,” I tell her.

Her smile sends a pleasant warmth through my chest.

“Which corridor?” she asks.

“The green one. With the trees.”

She darts past me and heads off towards where I pointed, barely casting a glance down the other side corridors. She stops before entering and beckons me. “Come on!”

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As we walk into the green corridor single blades of grass start to stick out from the plain white floor; further on, tree branches begin to fill the endless nothing of the walls. The more steps we take, the more the image fills in.

Colouring by numbers.

The solitary blades of grass at our feet become clumps that eventually become a blanket of soft, green turf. The light changes slowly; softening, deepening, until we’re stood in a woodland clearing with no sign of the white corridor in front or behind us.

My heart leaps. We’re back.

“Which way’d he go?” Alice whispers, staring around at the trees. “And where the heck are we now?”

I swallow heavily. “We’re not back?”

She shakes her head. “No. I’m not sure what type of trees these are, but we’re not in Bledgley.”

Like a single drip from a tap, uncertainty hits my gut and ripples through me. “I saw him turn and go down the path, past that large rock there.”

“Was the rock on his right or his left?”

“His left.”

“We’ll make a human compass out of….” She stops suddenly. Her eyes flick first left, then right. “Can you hear that?”

I shut my eyes and there it is. Josh’s voice. Calling to me:

Brad! Mum just dropped me off. You gonna show me around your new place? And after, we can fire up the PS and open a can of whoop-ass on some orcs.

It’s like someone reached into my chest, grabbed me by the heart and stuffed it full of happiness. My eyes snap open. Alice is already running down the path ahead yelling, “Where are you? I got you some flowers!”

A grin spreads over my face. Josh didn’t text back ‘cause he wanted to surprise me. He’s always pulling stunts like that, my mate. I can’t wait for him to meet Alice. We can all hang out together. It’s gonna be the best.

I start to run down the path through the wood, following Alice. I feel lighter than I have since we moved. It’s like someone took a cloth and wiped away all my worry.

It’s amazing! Josh is here!

The bitter taste of woodsmoke fills my nose and mouth, fogging my brain. I feel like I just woke from a dream. Doubt creeps up my spine and sits on my shoulder. My pace slows a little. He wouldn’t just come like that. His mum would call mine first. I shake my head and my brain wobbles inside it.

Something’s wrong.

But then I hear Josh’s voice again:

I’m just up ahead mate. Love these woods. Next time I’ll bring my bike and we can rock and roll all over the place.

My heart lurches and I jog reluctantly forwards.

Why doesn’t this feel right? It’s my best mate.

It’s Josh.

The trees begin to thin out; the tang of woodsmoke stronger now. Alice is only a couple of steps ahead as we burst out into a sunlit clearing.

The ashes of a fire still smoke in the centre.

To our right there’s a woman. She seems to be hugging a tree. She’s got her back to us, but I can tell she’s holding on tight, her shoulders tense.

Cold spreads from the top of my head right down to my feet. “Be careful,” I say, drawing my foil and removing the red rubber safety cap. “I got a bad feeling.”

Alice waves the flowers at me. “Good job I kept these! I get to give them to Dad now!” Her smile is radiant: it should warm me but actually just makes me colder.

“Stay here,” I say.

She takes a step forward. “But Brad!”

I hold a hand in front of her as she pushes against me. “Please Alice, just a minute.”

She shuts her eyes and sways a little. “You gotta come and meet Dad.”

Fog swirls in my brain. This is all so wrong. “Wait here for me and I will.”

Alice’s cheek quivers, like there’s some weird battle going on behind her eyes, but she stays still.

Slowly I approach the woman by the tree. “Hello,” I say. “Are you ok?”

She doesn’t answer. She doesn’t even move.

Two more tip-toed steps forwards and my stomach heaves. I cover my mouth with the back of my hand and desperately fight back the urge to puke.

The woman’s eyes are pure white and her cheek, where it touches the trunk, is stuck to it: the skin rotten and decaying. Her lips have almost disappeared revealing brown teeth that grin horribly at me. The contents of my stomach rises again, and I swallow heavily, pushing back the metallic taste in my mouth.

Something snaps above me. Click-clack and my chest tightens.

I don’t want to look up, but I do.

The leaves on the tree are like tiny mouths. They remind me of a Venus Fly Trap, but they’ve got teeth. Actual teeth: pointed and vicious looking.

The mouths open and shut. They chatter like the wind through leaves and in the swish and twirl is Josh’s voice. It wasn’t him calling me at all. It was this…thing. My eyes widen. Alice!

I turn to see her already heading towards the tree, holding the flowers out as if offering them to someone. Her eyes are white and glazed, just like that poor woman’s.

“Alice. Stop!” I yell.

She doesn’t seem to hear me.

“Alice! The tree!”

A small vine snakes down from above and wraps itself around her wrist. She doesn’t react, doesn’t seem to mind, just keeps walking.

Holding my foil high I jump forwards and hack at the vine. The mouths above hiss at me like an angry cat and I hear Josh’s voice again:

Hey Brad. Don’t do that mate. I thought we were friends!

“You’re not him,” I yell.

Summoning all my strength I hit the vine over and over until it breaks. “Come on!”

I try to pull Alice away but another vine snakes down and grabs her arm again. I raise my sword high and feel a vine slither over my skin. It sends a shiver down my arm all the way to the pit of my stomach.

I cry out as the vine tightens around my wrist; desperate to hold on to my foil but the pain is too much and my fingers spring open. My foil drops, landing point downwards in the mud, reminding me of a makeshift gravestone.

I dig my heels in and try to pull away, but the tree is too strong and both me and Alice are dragged forwards. I try to reach for the foil in her belt, but the tree pulls us apart and my fingers close around air. The cruel mouths above spit out a noise like wicked laughter. We’re so close to the trunk, I can smell the bin like stench of the woman. I fight down the urge to puke; my stomach churning, my breath coming in fits and starts.

A light flares up from behind us throwing our shadows dark and heavy against the tree trunk and a man shouts, “Hel addum lichto dex.”

That voice, it sounds like De Silva. Energised, I push my heels harder into the dirt. Behind me the silhouetted figure raises their foil high above their head. “Exum addum desto fin.”

My heart leaps. It is De Silva.

The foil flashes, severing the branch holding me. “Get your foil Sir Atkins,” he barks, putting an arm around Alice.

“I just want to see Dad,” she says, her voice robotic and emotionless.

“This spirit is not your father.” De Silva twirls his foil over his head severing the vine holding her then pushes her gently but firmly towards me.

The leaves above snap in anger and another vine snakes down followed by another and another. De Silva’s foil is a blur as he twirls it back and forth severing each and every one until no more come.

I drag Alice away then return to grab my foil.

“Get to the ashes.” De Silva gestures towards the fire-pit. “Rub some on your ears.”

“What?!”

“Do as I say!”

Tucking my foil into my belt I steer Alice towards the centre of the clearing and kick at the charred logs to make sure they’re no longer hot. They’re not and we both step into the circle.

Alice immediately drops to her knees and begins to cry. “I want to go home. Why did you stop me?” Her face is screwed up in anger and loss.

Guilt grips me tighter than the tree did.

This is my fault. I brought us here.

I put my hand into the ashes then hold back her braids. She tries to push me away, but I manage to get some of the ash on to her ear. After the first touch the fight seems to drain from her, and she lets me continue.

A shadow falls over us and my head snaps up, my heart in my mouth.

“It is just I, Sir Atkins,” De Silva says. “Fear not. Ashes from the wood of the same tree stop the spirit from being able to overpower you.”

Alice dabs her eyes with her sleeve. She takes a shuddering breath and looks up at me. “Thank you.”

I feel the heat of threatened tears in my eyes, swallow them back down and busy myself putting ash on my own ears. I don’t feel like I deserve thanks right now.

As I wipe first my left ear, then my right, a cold calm descends on me. I look towards the dead woman at the tree and then to Alice. I’m not sure why the spell didn’t grip me like it gripped her. I mean, I want my life and my best friend back more than anything. But I knew it wasn’t Josh. I knew it deep down; knew it in my gut. I guess for Alice, getting her dad back will always be the thing she wants most.

And impossible doesn’t matter to your heart.

I shut my eyes and take a breath. Got to be strong Brad. Gotta get back to our lives.

The only ones we have.

I take Alice’s hand and together we step out of the ashes and back onto the path.