Beyond the Deepwoods Page 9

  The banderbear turned. ‘Wuh?’ it said. Suddenly its wide eyes grew narrow and its wispy ears began to flap. ‘WUUUH!’ it roared, and made a lunge at the boy.

  What was the matter now? Had the banderbear gone crazy again?

  Twig turned on his heels and leaped out of the way of the massive beast as it hurtled towards him. It could crush him without even meaning to. The banderbear crashed to the ground, flattening the vegetation. ‘WUH!’ it roared again, and swung at him savagely.

  The blow caught Twig on the arm. It sent him spinning round. His hand opened and the pearly berry flew off into the undergrowth. Twig landed on the ground with a bump. He looked up. The banderbear was towering above him menacingly. Twig went to scream. As he did so, the other berry – the one in his mouth – slid back and lodged itself in the back of his throat. And there it remained.

  Twig coughed and spluttered, but the berry would not shift. His face went from pink to red to purple as he gasped for air. He staggered to his feet and stared up at the banderbear. Everything was beginning to swim in front of his eyes. ‘Can’ bre’!’ he groaned, and clutched at his throat.

  ‘Wuh!’ the banderbear cried out. It grabbed Twig by the ankles.

  Twig felt himself being hoisted upside down into the air. The banderbear's heavy paw began pummelling his back. Again and again it thumped down but still the berry would not budge. Again and again and…

  POP!

  The berry shot out of Twig's mouth and bounced across the ground.

  Twig gasped and gulped at the air. Panting uncontrollably, he squirmed and wriggled upside down in the banderbear's grasp. ‘Down,’ he rasped. The banderbear scooped Twig up with its free arm and lay him gently on a pile of dry leaves. It crouched low and pushed its face up close.

  ‘Wuh-wuh?’ it said.

  Twig looked into the concerned face of the banderbear. Its eyes were open wider than ever. It frowned questioningly. Twig smiled and wrapped his arms around the banderbear's neck.

  ‘Wuh!’ it said.

  The banderbear pulled away and looked Twig in the eye. Then it turned and pointed at the berry that had so nearly choked him. ‘Wuh-wuh,’ it said angrily, clutched at its stomach and rolled on its back in mock agony.

  Twig nodded solemnly. The berry was also poisonous. ‘Not good,’ he said.

  ‘Wuh,’ said the banderbear, leaping to its feet. ‘Wuh-wuh-wuh!’ it cried, and jumped up and down, up and down. And, as it continued to pummel and pound the offending berry, the trampled vegetation all round was shredded and the ground beneath flew up in clouds of dust. Tears of laughter streamed down Twig's face.

  ‘It's OK,’ he said. ‘I promise.’

  The banderbear came over and patted Twig gently on the head. ‘Wu … wu … Fr … wuh. Fr-uh-nz,’ it said.

  ‘That's right,’ Twig smiled. ‘Friends.’ He pointed to himself again. ‘Twig,’ he said. ‘Say it. Twig.’

  ‘T-wuh-g,’ said the banderbear and beamed proudly. ‘T-wuh-g! T-wuh-g! T-wuh-g!’ it said, over and over, and it stooped down, seized the boy and swung him up onto its shoulders. Together, they lurched off into the darkening woods.

  It wasn't long before Twig was foraging for himself. He wasn't as skilful as the banderbear with its giant claws and sensitive nose, but he learned quickly and the Deepwoods gradually became a less frightening place. All the same, in the dark black night, it was a comfort to feel the great heaving bulk of the banderbear beside him, its gruff snores soothing him back to sleep.

  Twig thought about his woodtroll family less and less. He hadn't forgotten them exactly, it was just that there didn't seem any need to think much about anything. Eat, sleep, eat some more…

  Every now and then, though, Twig was jolted out of the Deepwoods dream, once when he saw a sky ship in the distance, and a few times when he thought he saw the caterbird in the dappled branches of lullabee trees.

  But life went on. They ate and slept and yodelled at the moon. And then it happened.

  It was a crisp autumnal evening, and Twig was once again up on the banderbear's shoulders. They were searching out a sleeping place for the night when suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, Twig saw a flash of orange. He glanced round. Some way behind them was a small furry creature, like a ball of orange fluff.

  A little further on and Twig looked round for a second time. Now there were four of the fluffy little creatures, all frisking about like hammelhorn lambs.

  ‘Sweet,’ he said.

  ‘Wuh?’ said the banderbear.

  ‘Behind us,’ Twig said, tapping the banderbear on the shoulder and pointing back.

  The pair of them turned. By now there were a dozen of the curious animals, all bouncing along after them. When it caught sight of the creatures, the banderbear's ears began swivelling round and round, and from its mouth came a soft but high-pitched squeal.

  ‘What is it?’ said Twig and chuckled. ‘You're not going to tell me you're frightened of them!’

  The banderbear only squealed all the louder, and trembled from the ends of its ears to the tips of its toes. It was all Twig could do to hold on.

  ‘Wig-wig!’ the banderbear bellowed.

  As Twig watched, the number of fluffy orange creatures doubled, then doubled again. They scampered about in the twilight glow, this way and that, but never getting any nearer. The banderbear grew more and more agitated. It shuffled about nervously from foot to foot, squealing all the while.

  Suddenly, it had had enough. ‘Wuh-wuh!’ it cried.

  Twig gripped the banderbear's long hair and held on tightly as it lurched forwards. It trundled blindly through the forest. Bump, bump, bump. It was all Twig could do not to fall off. He glanced behind him. There was no doubt about what was happening: the orange balls of fluff were giving chase.

  Twig's own heart was racing now. On their own the little creatures had looked sweet, but as a group there was something curiously menacing about them.

  Faster and faster, the banderbear ran. It crashed through the woods, flattening everything before it. Time and again, Twig had to duck down behind its huge head as branches and bushes came hurtling towards him. The wig-wigs simply followed the path the great beast was carving – and it wasn't long before the ones at the front were catching up.

  Twig looked down anxiously. Four or five of the creatures were now leaping at the banderbear's feet every time they touched the ground. Suddenly one of them clung on.

  ‘Sky above!’ Twig gasped as the fluffy ball split in half and two rows of savage teeth like the jags on a bear trap sprang into view. The next instant the teeth slammed shut on the banderbear's leg.

  ‘Wuh-ooooo!’ it screeched.

  With Twig still clinging on for grim death, the banderbear leaned over, tore the wig-wig off, and tossed it away. The ferocious little beast rolled back over the ground, only to be replaced by four more.

  ‘Squash them! Crush them!’ Twig screamed.

  But it was hopeless. No matter how many of the wig-wigs the banderbear sent flying through the air, there were always a dozen or more to take their place. They clung to its legs, to its arms; they crawled up its back towards the banderbear's neck, up towards Twig!

  ‘Help me!’ he screamed.

  The banderbear jerked abruptly upright and stumbled over to a tall tree. Twig felt its huge paws round his waist as it pulled him from its shoulders and placed him high up into the branches of the tree, far out of reach of the bloodthirsty wig-wigs.

  ‘T-wuh-g,’ it said. ‘Fr-uh-nz.’

  ‘You climb up too,’ said Twig. But as he looked back into the banderbear's sad eyes, he knew that would never be possible.

  The wig-wigs bit into the banderbear's legs again and again until finally with a low moan, the huge beast toppled down to the ground. Its body was immediately covered with the vicious creatures.

  Twig's eyes filled with tears. He turned away, unable to look. He clamped his hands over his ears but couldn't shut out the cries of the banderbear as it battled on.
/>
  Then the Deepwoods fell silent. Twig knew it was all over.

  ‘Oh, banderbear,’ he sobbed. ‘Why? Why? Why?’

  He wanted to jump down, knife unsheathed, and kill every single one of the wig-wigs. He wanted to avenge the death of his friend. Yet he knew all too well that there was not a thing he could do.

  Twig wiped his eyes and looked down. The wig-wigs had gone. And of the banderbear, there wasn't a trace to be seen, not a bone, not a tooth or claw, not a single scrap of mossy fur. From far away there came the forlorn yodelling call of a distant banderbear. Time after time its heartrending cry echoed through the trees.

  Twig held the tooth around his neck tightly in his hand. He sniffed. ‘It can't answer you now,’ he whispered tearfully. ‘Or ever again.’

  · CHAPTER NINE ·

  THE ROTSUCKER

  Twig stared down into the twilight shadows beneath him. He couldn't see any of the wig-wigs. They had co-ordinated their deadly attack in silence, neither squeaking nor squealing throughout the entire operation. The only sound to be heard had been the crunching of bones and slurping of blood. Now the vicious little beasts had slipped away silently and were gone.

  At least, Twig hoped they were gone. He sniffed again, and wiped his nose on his sleeve. He couldn't afford to be wrong.

  Above his head the sky turned from brown to black. The moon rose, low and luminous. The stillness of dusk had already been broken by the first stirrings of the night creatures and now as Twig continued to sit and stare, unable to move, those sounds of night-time grew. They whooped and wailed, they shuffled and screeched: invisible but no less perceptible for that. In the darkness you see with your ears.

  Below Twig's swinging legs the forest floor steamed. A fine coiling mist wove itself round and around the trunks of the trees. It was as if the Deepwoods were simmering; with peril, with evil.

  ‘I'll stay up here,’ Twig whispered to himself as he pulled himself to his feet. ‘Till morning.’

  With his arms outstretched for balance, Twig made his way along the branch to the trunk of the tree. There he began to climb. Higher and higher he went, looking for some configuration of branches that would both support his weight and offer some comfort in the long night ahead.

  As the leaves around him grew denser, Twig's eyes began to sting and water. He plucked a leaf and looked at it carefully. It was angular and glowed a pale turquoise. ‘Oh, banderbear,’ he sighed. ‘Of all the trees you could have chosen, why did you have to place me in a lullabee tree?’

  There was no point climbing any further. The upper branches of the lullabees were notoriously brittle. What was more, it was cold so high up. The biting wind was turning his exposed arms and legs to gooseflesh. Twig shifted round to the far side of the trunk and started back down again.

  Abruptly, the moon disappeared. Twig paused. The moon remained hidden and the wind plucked at his fingers. Slowly, slowly, guided by the touch of the rough bark on his feet, Twig climbed carefully down. Wig-wigs or no wig-wigs, one slip and he'd crash down to certain death below.

  With both hands gripping tightly to the branch by his head, and his left foot, leg bent at the knee, resting in a knothole in the trunk, Twig eased himself down. Droplets of cold sweat beaded his brow as his right foot probed the darkness for somewhere to stand.

  Lower and lower he stretched. His arms ached. His left leg felt as though it was about to be torn from its socket. Twig was on the point of giving up when, all at once, the very tip of his big toe found what it had been looking for: the next branch down.

  ‘At last,’ Twig whispered.

  He relaxed his elbows, released his toegrip in the knothole and swung down till both feet landed on the branch. His toes sank deep into something soft and fluffy.

  ‘No!’ he yelped, and recoiled in horror.

  There was something on the branch. An animal of some kind. Perhaps the wig-wigs were able to climb trees after all.

  Kicking out blindly, Twig tried his best to pull himself back up to the safety of the branch above his head. But it was no use. He was tired. He heaved himself up, only to find his arms were too weak to take him quite far enough. His hands were beginning to lose their grip.

  Suddenly, the moon burst brightly through the forest canopy. It sent flickering silver darts shooting down between the windblown leaves. Kite-shaped patterns of light played on the tree trunk, on the suspended body of Twig, and on the forest floor, far, far below him.

  Twig felt his sharp chin pressing hard against his chest as he strained to see directly beneath him. His eyes confirmed what his toes had told him. There was something – two somethings – on the rough bark. They were clinging to the branch like the furry paws of some great beast which was climbing up to get him.

  Tentatively, Twig lowered his legs and prodded them with his toes. They were cold. They did not move.

  Twig eased himself lower onto the broad branch and crouched quickly down. Close up, the two objects were not furry at all. They looked more like two balls of gossamer thread that had been wound round and round the branch. Twig inspected beneath the branch. His body quivered with excitement.

  There, suspended from a silken rope, was a cocoon. Now Twig had seen cocoons before. Taghair slept in one, and he had been present in the lullabee grove when the caterbird had hatched. He had never, however, been so near to one. The long pendulous object was larger, and far more beautiful, than he had ever imagined.

  ‘Amazing,’ he whispered.

  Woven from the finest filaments of thread, the cocoon looked as if it had been spun from sugar. It was broad and bulbous, and shaped like a giant woodpear which, as it swayed to and fro in the wind, glistened in the moonlight.

  Twig reached down under the branch and grasped the silken rope. Then, taking care not to slip in his eagerness, he slid over the edge and lowered himself, hand over hand, until he was sitting astride the cocoon itself.

  It felt like nothing Twig had ever felt before: soft to the touch – impossibly soft – but firm enough to hold its shape. And as Twig plunged his fingers into the thick silky wadding, a sweet and spicy fragrance rose up all around him.

  A sudden gust of wind sent the cocoon twisting round. Above him, the brittle branches whistled and cracked. Twig gasped and clutched hold of the rope. He looked down giddily at the dappled forest floor far below him. Something was there, scratching about noisily in the dead leaves. He could neither go up, nor down.

  ‘But then I don't need to,’ Twig said to himself. ‘I can spend the night in the caterbird cocoon.’ And as he spoke the words, his entire body tingled. He remembered the caterbird's words: Taghair sleeps in our cocoons and dreams our dreams. ‘Perhaps,’ Twig whispered excitedly, ‘I, too, might dream their dreams.’

  Mind made up, Twig twisted himself round until he was facing the cocoon. His nose pressed against the springy down. The sweet, spicy smell grew more intense and, as he lowered himself still further, the silken cocoon caressed his cheek. Finally, his feet came to rest on the matted rim, where the emerging caterbird had rolled back the fabric of the cocoon.

  ‘Ready, steady … go!’ said Twig.

  He let go of the rope and dropped inside. The cocoon swung wildly for an instant. Twig closed his eyes, petrified that the rope would not hold. The swaying stopped. He opened his eyes again.

  It was warm inside the cocoon – warm and dark and reassuring. Twig's heart ceased its frantic pounding. He breathed deeply of the aromatic perfume and was overwhelmed by a feeling of well-being. Nothing could hurt him now.

  Twig curled himself up into a ball, knees bent and one arm folded beneath his head, and sank down into the padded softness. It was like being immersed in warm, scented oil. He felt snug, he felt safe and secure, he felt sleepy. His tired limbs grew heavy. His eyelids slowly closed.

  ‘Oh, banderbear,’ he whispered drowsily. ‘Of all the trees you could have chosen, thank Sky you placed me in a lullabee tree.’

  And, as the wind rocked the wonderful cocoon
gently to and fro, to and fro, to and fro, Twig drifted off to sleep.

  *

  By the middle of the night, the clouds had all disappeared, carried away on winds, which had themselves now dropped. The moon was once again low in the sky. Far away in the distance, a sky ship, sails all hoisted to catch the sluggish air, sailed across the moonlit night.

  The leafy surface of the Deepwoods canopy sparkled like water under the moon's glow. All at once a shadow passed across it: the shadow of a flying creature which glided low over the top of the forest.

  It had broad and powerful black leathery wings, scalloped at the back and tipped with vicious claws. The very air seemed to tremble as the wings flapped, ponderous yet purposeful, across the indigo sky. The creature's head was small, scaly and where the mouth should have been a long tubular snout stuck out. It slurped and snuffled, and a foul-smelling vapour puffed into the air with every wing-beat.

  Little light from the sinking moon penetrated the forest now, but the creature was not deterred. Raised brassy-yellow eyes cast two wide beams of light which scoured the shadowy depths. Round and around it flew, back and forth. It would not give up until it found what it had come for.

  Suddenly its luminous eyes locked on to something hanging from the branch of a tall turquoise lullabee: something large and rounded and glistening. The creature let out a piercing squawk, folded its wings and crashed down through the forest canopy. Then, with its strong stubby legs extended, it landed heavily on the branch of the tree and hunkered down. It cocked its head to one side and listened.

  The sound of gentle breathing floated up towards it. It sniffed at the air and its whole body trembled with anticipation. It took a step forward. Then another. And another.

  Designed for flight, the creature walked slowly, clumsily, gripping hold with one clawed foot before releasing the next. It walked right round the massive branch until it was hanging upside down.

  With its talons digging into the rough bark above it, the creature's head was level with the opening to the cocoon. It poked inside it and prodded around with the bony tip of its long, hollow snout. It trembled again, more violently than before, and from deep down inside its body came a gurgling sound. Its stomach convulsed and a stream of bilious liquid spurted out of the end of its snout. Then it withdrew.