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Excerpt from Merlin’s Wood
The First Book of The Battle of the Trees
The Tree of Hands
“Murder?” Holly whispered. She frowned, turning aside to look out of the bus window at the sun-scorched fields and the blurring heat haze on the distant mountains. The roadside went up and down, but the sleepy drone of the bus’ engine remained undisturbed by each bump and jolt. “It’s true,” Reece insisted. “That’s what she said she saw.” He lowered his voice and leaned. “By midnight tonight, he’s going to be arrested for murder. Our murder.” Holly turned angrily. “Be serious, Reece!” she snapped, loudly and sharply enough for the bus driver to cast a brief glance over his shoulder. Her voice dropped once more. “Gran wouldn’t say that! And even if she did, you’ve never believed a word of any of her stories.” She jerked her head away to gaze out the bus window once more. She blinked. From the highest reaches of the sky, through the shimmer of summer air, a rainbow was spiralling straight down, spear-like, into the shadows of the distant hills. Holly caught her breath, momentarily distracted by the brilliance of the colours. Then she realised that it was just a trick of light, reflecting from the window glass. “The delusions of grandma are just that – delusions,” Reece admitted quietly, tugging at her sleeve to gain her attention. “But this is different.” “It’s delusions of grandeur,” Holly corrected. “Those, too,” Reece said, grimacing. “How could anyone except gran believe I’m the sole heir to an ancient title and vast estates?” He glared. “But this is different,” he insisted again. Holly returned the glare. He’s just making it up to see if he can scare me, she thought, unsettled nonetheless by her brother’s apparent sincerity. I don’t believe everything gran says, but she’s uncanny the way she knows things sometimes. Trying to put Reece’s words out of her mind, she stared ahead at the road as it disappeared into the hills. In the smelter of late afternoon, the road rippled with heat and the dusty fenceposts seemed to sink momentarily into the summer haze. Then, up ahead, a pair of ghostgums materialised out of a wavering shimmer of air and with them an old painted milk churn that served as a mailbox. Reece was on his feet even before the bus jerked to a halt. “’Bye, Mr. Jenkins,” he said to the driver as he swung down the front steps of the bus. “’Bye, Reece,” Mr. Jenkins said. “Happy holidays! Are you and your folks going away?” “I am,” Reece said, turning back for a moment and winking slyly. “Don’t know about Mum and Dad. My time machine’s only built for two, you know. And I’ve promised Retro he can have the first trip.” “Now, hold on a minute!” Mr. Jenkins laughed, shaking his head. “Retro can just join the queue. How many years ago was it – five, six? – when you said I was down for the very first trip. History, you said, would remember my name.” “That,” said Reece with a glare belied by the twinkle in his eyes, “was when you promised to invest in it.” Mr. Jenkins snorted and rolled his eyes, before smiling at the dark-haired girl behind him. She was awkwardly clutching several plastic bags as she followed Reece from the bus. “’Bye, Holly!” he said. “’Bye, Mr. Jenkins!” the girl said, returning the smile. “Do you need some help with those bags?” he asked, eyeing the plastic dubiously. “Oh no,” Holly said. “They’re not heavy.” Her smile softened. “It’s only paper.” “Well, then.” Mr. Jenkins revved the bus engine. “Have a lovely Christmas, lass, and make sure you keep that ratbag brother of yours out of trouble!” Holly waved as the bus roared off, puffing cloudlets of smoke behind and hurtling down the road like a hornet released from a trap. She sighed, coughed, then blinked as her eyes were stung by the spirals of dust blowing backwards. Mr. Jenkins, she thought, you’ve got to be more careful or you’ll lose this bus run. Some of the parents think you drive like a maniac all the time, not just when the last kid is gone. Rubbing her eyes, she suddenly saw the rainbow spear again, coiling and twisting, red over blue over green, as it shafted down from the highest reaches of the sky. It was no reflection off glass this time, but a writhing serpent of colour. Holly blinked several times, before it disappeared. “Reece, did you see…?” But as she looked over her shoulder, her eyes watering, she found that Reece was already halfway along the track to the farmhouse. She stood beside the milk churn for a moment, staring after him and gathering her plastic bags around her. Her sapphire-dark shadow pooled on the roadside with the fainter blue shadows of the ghost gums. Gran didn’t say it, she thought obstinately. But you’re getting far too good at dressing up the truth, little brother. I almost believed it. A horde of flies suddenly appeared, circling about with a taunting buzz, as she began the short climb home. She could still see Reece up ahead, trudging away. A flattened rippling in the dry bone-coloured grass was the only sign that he was being stalked. There was complete silence. Holly watched, fascinated, as the grass seemed to pause in its deliberations, waiting. Waiting… Retro sprang. With a flash of black snout and a wild wagging of his tiny tail, the puppy dashed out of hiding, leaping straight for Reece’s gangly legs. As Reece lost his footing and tumbled forward, Retro scampered around him, yipping with delight. “Retro!” Reece yelled, lunging for the little dog. But the puppy was nimble and avoiding him easily, sped off down the hill. Reece, laughing, set out in pursuit. By the time Holly reached the house, she was tired, sticky and dusty. Surrounded by bob-dancing flies, she could already hear Retro and Reece splashing and belly-flopping in the cool muddy waters of the dam. She opened the screen door to the sitting room. “Hello, honey,” her mum called from the kitchen. “How was your last day?” “Fine,” Holly called back, carefully hiding her plastic bags on the floor behind a long-faded curtain. “Retro finally got Reece. Snuck up on him a beauty. You should’ve seen it.” “Sorry I missed it.” Her mum’s laughter echoed down the hallway from the kitchen. Holly dumped her school sack on the floor and was turning towards the hallway when, out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed a darting beam of parti-coloured light. Curious, she took a step closer to the window. A lancet of red, blue and green shimmered through the glass, angling down onto a display cabinet where Reece kept the best of his rock collection. Holly stared where the light had fallen. Part of a fossil fern had melted into a slush of mud. Half the fossil was solid rock, the other half was brown sludge with green tips of fern-frond showing. Holly was so startled, it took her a moment to realise that the once-perfect fossilised dinosaur egg next to it had cracked and the end of a claw was showing. Her shriek was so tiny it was almost soundless. “Mum!” Holly raced to the kitchen. “The fos…sils…!” she exclaimed in a strangled voice. “Yes, I know,” Mum said, shaking her head. Her hands were white with flour as she rolled out a sheet of pastry on the kitchen bench. “I don’t know what’s wrong with Reece these last few days. I’m sick of the boy’s practical jokes – and the mess they’re causing.” Practical joke? Holly thought, her heart still thudding. She suddenly wanted to thump herself. Fell for another one, she thought ruefully, as she opened the ’fridge to look for water. “Time for chores,” Mum said, as Holly poured herself a cold drink. “Where’s Reece now?” “Down playing with Retro in the dam,” Holly said. “Cooling off.” She reached for the biscuit tin. There were only two biscuits left. She bit into one of them, then hesitated only a moment before palming the other. Going to the screendoor at the back of the kitchen, she pushed it open and stood, listening for the groans of a tractor in the distance. “Don’t let the flies in,” Mum called, flipping a pastry cover onto apples in a pie dish. “Sorry,” Holly said, closing the door behind her. “Reece!” she yelled at the top of her lungs. “Chores!” There was no answer. “Reece!” Well, she thought, see if I care when you get into trouble. She scowled. Practical joke! She was angrier with herself for falling for it than with Reece for devising it. As if a dinosaur would be hatching! She took a bucket of feed to the chickens in the hen house, checked the water troughs, found one empty and the chickens obviously distressed, rotated the pump. You owe me, Reece, Holly thought, vexed. The sun was a giant red eye, taking one last indifferent look across the darkening heat-hammered hills as Holly finished the chores. Puffing and sweating, she reached the back door just as Reece came along, shirt over his arm, his hair dripping with water. Retro, his sleek wet fur like polished coal, was following quietly at his heels. “You owe me the washing up,” she said. “Do not,” Reece snapped. “Do so.” “I didn’t agree to anything.” “Doesn’t matter.” Holly pushed the door so that the screen slammed back in Reece’s face and flounced through the kitchen, ignoring her mother’s disapproving look. “I did his jobs,” she said. “Fair’s fair.” As she went into the hallway, opened the top drawer in the dresser and removed a pair of scissors, a yell came from the kitchen. It was Reece. “Holly, ya lousy thief, where’s my biscuit?” he demanded. “It was down-payment on those jobs of yours I did,” Holly shouted back, scrutinising the scissors as she opened and closed them several times. Satisfied that they weren’t stiff, she headed for the sitting room. “It was full payment,” Reece bellowed. “I’m not doing any washing up for you now.” “Says who?” “Says me.” “And whose army?” Holly retorted belligerently. “Oh stop it, you two.” Their mother’s exasperation was plain. “Reece, thank your sister. You’ve enjoyed yourself while she’s been working. Now get yourself ready for dinner.” Holly waited, one ear cocked and listening intently in the hope that Reece would get more of a dressing down, and wondering why Mum didn’t mention the mess in the display cabinet. Her other ear was alert to the sounds of sunset. Crickets had already begun to rasp their songs to the night; a hunting owl hooted overhead; the signal calls of marauding foxes echoed between the hills. When Reece’s ‘thank you’ failed to materialise, she shook her head without surprise, then went to the faded curtain, and pulled out the plastic bags from behind it. Sitting down in gran’s armchair, she reached into the first bag, took out a piece of paper and began cutting out the design on it. Reece came to stand, legs apart, hands on his hips, under the archway where the hall joined the sitting room. Retro crouched between his feet wearing the same pugnacious, snarling expression. “Oh, grow up and show some maturity and gratitude,” Holly said, without bothering to look up. For a moment, Reece’s face reddened with anger, then he came to stand in front of her and shook his head. Droplets of water flew from his hair. “Go away!” Holly screeched, screwing up her eyes and hunching over to protect the paper she was cutting. “Away!” But Retro bounded up, shaking himself wildly in imitation of Reece. “Stop it!” she yelled, infuriated. “Go away, both of you! You’re ruining my tree.” Something really is wrong with you, Reece, she thought. You’ve been acting as if you’re spoiling for a fight for the last two days. What’s eating you? “Tree?” Reece stopped, suddenly curious. He looked closely at what Holly was cutting out. “That’s not a tree,” he sneered. “That’s a hand.” “I know it’s a hand,” Holly said, in an exasperated tone. She turned the paper over momentarily to have a look at the name written there. “As a matter of fact, it’s Lissa Wheeler’s hand. But it’s going to be part of a tree when I’m finished with it.” Reece eyed his sister doubtfully. “You expect me to believe that you went around all lunch hour tracing people’s hands and collecting signatures just to make a tree? ” His eyebrows narrowed, coming together in a dubious, disbelieving frown. “C’mon, sis, the truth now.” Holly sighed. The only reason you don’t know the truth when you hear it, she thought, is because you’re always busy improving on it. “I am making a tree. A Christmas tree, if you must know,” she said, trying not to sneer as she looked up at her brother. Trying too not to refer directly to the fact that they had both overheard their mum and dad talking quietly about not being able to afford much of a celebration this year. “I got the idea from Nerida. Everyone had to make a card for their final art project, showing what Christmas meant to them. She got all her tribe to put a handprint on a piece of bark. Then she made the hands into the shape of a tree. I know it doesn’t sound much, but it was just fabulous.” Holly smiled to herself. “It was the best by far.” “Hmpph,” said Reece, glowering as Holly finished one cutout and, putting it safely on her lap, reached inside the plastic bag for another. “You didn’t ask to trace my hand.” “You,” said Holly, “are not in my class. Besides, I can get yours any time. Sometime between now and never I’ll ask for it.” Reece was instantly incensed. “This is stupidest idea I’ve ever heard of,” he snapped. Turning on his heel, he disappeared down the hallway. Holly had just finished her tenth cutout when he arrived back, dangling a piece of silver baking foil from his upraised hand. “Da da,” he sang, “drum roll please. I have the piece of persistence.” “It’s pièce de résistance,” Holly said, staring at the flickering foil. “What is that?” “It’s my hand,” Reece said, “in silver. The perfect decoration for the top of your tree.” “Get out,” Holly said, a grimace wrinkling her face. “What makes you think I’m putting your ugly hand anywhere?” Reece grinned at her. “’Cos I’m not doing the washing up unless you do.” He put the silver hand down on the wing of the armchair by her side, before going off whistling happily. In the sudden silence Holly heard the sound of the tractor coughing its way up the hill. “Dad!” she exclaimed, jumping up and running to the door. Just then, the phone rang. A few seconds later, her mum’s voice rang out from the hallway. “Reece, Holly, it’s your gran. Come quick – she’s only got a few minutes.” Holly raced to the phone, but Reece was already there ahead of her. “Of course I got your postcard, gran,” he was saying. “So that’s my castle, is it? … and is it still snowing on it?” His utterly serious tone contrasted with the mocking gleam in his eye. “How many degrees below zero?” he asked. “Oh, wow! What’s it called? Really? After little old me?” Reece could no longer check the derisive edge in this voice. “And you hiked all the way to the top?” He cradled the phone between his ear and shoulder. “Better have photos, gran, or we won’t believe you. Maybe we won’t even believe you, then, you old fraud.” Reece laughed, leaning back against the wall. “Of course I’ll be careful, gran. You know me.” He winked, almost conspiratorially, at Holly. “’Bye, then,” he said, handing the phone to his sister. Holly didn’t know what to make of Reece’s wink. “Hello, gran,” she said. “Is that you, Celyren dear?” There was a background buzz of static. “Yes, gran,” Holly said, grimacing. She never used her real name, but gran always insisted on it. An old name on our side of the family, gran would say with pride. Always given to women of great courage and daring. But Holly had never been interested in either her heritage or ancestors. “Where are you today, gran?” she asked. “Have you visited any more Welsh castles?” “Oh no, dear. I’ve been doing something much better. I’ve finally done something today I’ve always wanted to do. I’ve climbed Cader Idris and stayed overnight on its summit. It was freezing. But it’s my last chance to stand where Merlin once stood and catch a little of his magic.” “Merlin was there?” Holly asked. I bet she told Reece she climbed it just because he’s named after Merlin, she thought, and he’ll be unbearably smug – or, with luck, maybe it’ll be in one ear and out the other. She raised her eyebrows at Reece as he lounged, one hand behind his back, against the wall, observing her closely. Oh no, she thought. It’s smug. “Of course Merlin was at Cader Idris,” the husky voice came down the line. “Some call it Arthur’s Seat, but there’s no round table anywhere in sight.” Gran chuckled a little at her own joke while Holly groaned inwardly. “Anyway it was worth it, dear. Even though I’ve got a bout of arthritis you wouldn’t read about. The winter gremlins have certainly been working overtime on the frost lately.” “Send some cold down here then,” Holly said, smiling even as she kept a wary eye on her brother. “It’s been a sweltering day. A real scorcher.” “Well, I would if I could, dear, you know that! Oh I’m so very glad that I’m in Wales again, even though I miss you all very much. But it won’t be long now until I’m back on the plane again. Only five sleeps to go, Celyren!” Holly stifled a groan. If there was anything she found worse than being called by her rightful name, it was being treated like a baby. Five ‘sleeps’! Oh please! “So what are you doing right now?” gran went on. “Dad’s just come in and we’re about to have dinner,” Holly said. “Dad’s just come in…” Gran repeated Holly’s words in a strange, dull monotone. There was a long silence from the end of the line. “You still there, gran?” “Yes, dear.” Gran’s voice was still strange. “I’ve been thinking today, Celyren. Worrying about something.” There was a crackling pause. “Did Reece tell you? About the death in the seeing? I didn’t know what to make of it, but I… I… well, I couldn’t say nothing, you know.” Holly felt as if she had turned to stone. “Gran?” she asked anxiously. “I had such a strange night last night, Celyren. Up on the mountain. I thought that perhaps the seeing was wrong, but …” There was another pause, followed by a static burst. Then the line was abruptly clear and free of all disturbance. “Celyren, there are things you should know. You’re old enough to handle the truth. Ask your mother who your real father is.” Holly stood there, the phone at her ear, all expression wiped from her face. Real father? she thought. Old enough to handle the truth? She felt suddenly faint, dizzy enough to fall. Gripping the phone so tightly her knuckles went white, she stared at Reece who was still patiently standing there, one hand behind his back, looking elsewhere now. “Celyren – are you still there?” “Yes, gran,” Holly managed to say. “Be careful, dear. So careful. Trust…” A long burst of static drowned out the next words. “…and then the mountain said he would kill time … time itself…” Suddenly gran’s voice seemed to return to normal. “I’m going on to Cardiff this evening, Celyren. I’ll be in touch as soon as…” The connection timed out, cutting the call mid-sentence. Holly replaced the receiver slowly, her thoughts reeling. At that moment, Reece struck. Whipping out a water pistol from behind his back, he fired, squirting straight between her eyes. “Arghh!” Holly squealed, darting after him as he fled to the kitchen, putting the entire length of the kitchen table as well as his mother between himself and her. “Now come off it, you two. Just what’s going on here anyway?” Dad demanded, coming up behind Holly and folding her into the protection of his arms. “She wanted to get cool,” Reece said. “She said so to gran. I was just trying to help.” “Help?” There was a sarcastic edge to her dad’s voice that was a great comfort to Holly. Reece wasn’t usually caught out like this, red-handed and defensive. Right now, standing in the circle of Dad’s arms, she wanted nothing more than to forget what gran had said. “Sometimes, you know, I forget that you two are twins,” their dad went on, glaring at Reece. “Start acting your age, son, and not your shoe size. Have you done your chores, young man? “They’re done, Dad.” Holly’s head tilted as she glared at Reece, daring him with her eyes to tell a less slippery truth. Reece stared back, a look of complete innocence on his face. He didn’t say another word. “Holly did Reece’s jobs,” Mum revealed. “They’re still done!” Reece maintained, a mutinous scowl on his face. “And I’m going to do the washing up instead.” “I’m here to make sure you do, young man,” Dad said firmly. Then he sighed, shaking his head, and went to sit down on his favourite chair. “Now what did gran have to say for herself?” he asked to the twins. “Gallivanting around at her age, I still find it hard to believe she’s gone back to the home country at this time of year.” “She climbed Cader Idris and took photos of moonrise on the snow,” Reece offered. “Cader Idris?” his mum asked. “Really?” She smiled at her husband. “That’s a mountain in Snowdonia National Park, dear. Legend has it that, if you spend midsummer night on the mountain, in the morning you’ll be either mad or a poet. A poet good enough, perhaps, to win the coveted Silver Chair of a Chief Bard at the National Eisteddfod.” “Don’t know if I could handle your mother being a poet, Mrs. Morgan,” Dad mused. “And where would we put a silver chair?” Reece’s brows beetled into a solemn frown. “I can’t understand it,” he said in apparent worry. “She’s been on about this castle of mine long before she went up the mountain.” “You’re afraid she’s gone mad?” Mr. Morgan asked with a chuckle. “No fear of that, son. You put your finger right on it when you said ‘long before she went up the mountain’. She’s been off her rocker for years already.” “Sam!” Mrs. Morgan snapped at her husband. “It’s my mother you’re talking about. And didn’t you listen? It’s midsummer night, not midwinter.” “It’s midsummer here,” Mr. Morgan reminded, laughing again. Then he stopped abruptly, seeing the look on his wife’s face. “Just a little joke, dear,” he said, his tone suddenly mild and placating. “Just a joke. The silver chair, too.” He moved his head so that he could look down at Holly. “So what’s all this paper you’re cutting up in the sitting room, Holly Polly?” “I’m making a Christmas tree,” Holly said. There was a lump in her throat that hadn’t been there a minute ago. “Things aren’t so bad that you have to…” Dad began, before breaking off suddenly. “You really are a helpful girl, Cerylen. Just let me have a word to your mother and then you can tell me about your tree.” “Sure,” Holly said a little uncertainly, turning with a smile that didn’t quite reach her eyes. Cerylen, she thought. I’m so glad gran isn’t here right now – she gets so fired up when Dad calls me Cerylen and not Celyren. As she headed back into the sitting room, Retro came out of the corner and immediately assumed a stalking pose. “Don’t even think about whatever it is you’re thinking about!” Holly snapped so crossly at the puppy that it slunk straight back into the corner with a plaintive yip. She ignored the huge brown eyes and tiny quivering jaws and began cutting the traced edges of the hands with swift, savage hacks. So caught up was she in her own misery that she failed to notice that Retro was sidling along the walls, using the curtains as cover, until he was right beside the armchair she was sitting in. He was carefully reaching upwards with his paw just as Holly realised he was there. She snatched the foil hand away at the same moment as Retro swiped. A section of the middle, the shape of a large teardrop, tore in one of Retro’s claws while the rest remained with Holly. “Retro!” Dad exclaimed, as he came into the room. “Who’s been teaching you bad habits?” He hustled the young cattle dog out the door, then turned to switch on the television. “It’s okay, Dad,” Holly said, as a spluttering grey haze appeared on the television screen. “It’s only Reece’s hand. I really don’t need it.” “Worse than ever,” Dad said, glaring at the static. “Ted Wheeler said he’s having reception problems, too.” He sighed and turned back to Holly. “I thought you said this was a tree.” “It is,” Holly said, her voice low and wistful as she explained her idea. Dad picked up one of the plastic bags and peered inside. “So these are tracings of all your friends’ hands? That’s wonderful, Holly Polly!” He smiled. “It makes Christmas into something personal. None of the usual trashy commercialism.” The lump in Holly’s throat tightened. Her thoughts kept spinning backwards, in ragged turbulent fragments, towards gran’s words. Real father? But feeling her dad’s eyes on her, she concentrated on Matthew Murchison’s fingers as if they were the most important thing in the whole world. “It’d be so much more convenient,” he said suddenly, “if people weren’t individuals, wouldn’t it? Then you could put all these paper sheets one on top of the other and cut them all out at once.” Holly said nothing. She was staring at the scissors in her hand, suddenly unable to do a thing with them. “Are you sure something isn’t wrong, Holly?” Dad asked. “You’re really very quiet tonight.” “Dinner’s ready,” Mum called from the kitchen. Holly was grateful for the interruption. She put down the scissors at once and hurried from the room. Dinner was already on the table, the vegetables steaming. Holly sat down. “Lamb chops!” Reece exclaimed, from the other side of the table, licking his lips. “C’mon, Dad! You’re being a slowpoke! We’re gonna start without you.” There was a delay. “Sam!” Mum called irritably. “Dinner’s getting cold.” “On a day like today?” Dad asked incredulously, when he finally sauntered into the room. He sat down, gave thanks and then started to talk about Holly’s tree. “I really like this idea, Holly old Polly,” he said, watching in concern as Holly only fiddled with her food. She left almost all of it on her plate. “What’s up, princess?” he asked finally. “I’m just not feeling well, that’s all.” Both parents looked at her closely. Reece, meanwhile, eyeballed her uneaten chop so steadily that Holly thought he would stare a hole right into it. “Don’t want that to go to waste, do you?” he asked. “There are starving children much closer than Africa who are dying for it.” “Starving!” Dad exclaimed, half-rolling his eyes at Reece. “Dying? As if, son. As if!” He shook his head and said, “Half each, young man. Half.” He divided Holly’s chop in two, and then apple pie followed for dessert. When dinner was finally over, Holly cleared the table and Dad went back to the sitting room. “Where’s Reece?” Mum asked suddenly as she rinsed the dishes ready for the washing up. “Gone to give the bones and scraps to Retro,” Holly said. “Well he’s taking his time about it then.” “I’ll go look,” Holly sighed. She half-wondered if he might have joined Dad in the front room. And suddenly the stone that was sitting in her belly seemed much heavier and larger. But when Holly came out of the doorway into the darkened sitting room she saw something so wonderful that her heart was instantly lightened. “Dad!” she cried. “Nice, isn’t it?” Dad stepped back, surveying his handiwork. “It’s lovely!” Taped to the window, starlight winking through the fingers, half the tree of hands was already up. It’s even better than Nerida’s, Holly thought, utterly charmed. It’s so… so real, she thought. I could almost believe there was a real tree just inside the window, not just a collage of paper cutouts. Reece’s silver hand was on the top, the teardrop hole in the centre of it letting the light of the rising moon chase the shadows through the room. “It’s magic, Dad!” “All the credit is yours,” Dad said. “I hope you don’t mind that I put Reece’s hand on top.” Holly continued gazing upward, enchanted. She did mind, but she didn’t want to argue with anyone – especially Dad. Just for you, Dad, she thought. I’ll put up with his stupid hand just for you. But he better treat me with a bit more resp… Suddenly her mind seemed to seize, mid-word. She told him, Holly realised. Gran’s told Reece already about Dad. That’s what’s eating him… Her skin began to tingle. And as she continued to look up, patterns began to work themselves across the surface of the silver hand – the foil itself seemed to thicken into a three-dimensional gauntlet. It must be a trick of the moonlight, Holly thought. She blinked, trying to clear her vision. But it didn’t clear. A shiver of dread spread up her spine, as cold – Holly couldn’t think why this comparison fixed itself in her mind – as cold as the snow-crusted rocks and the windswept ice on Cader Idris. Cold, she thought, so cold… and in this sweltering heat. Then as Holly blinked again and shook her head, the strangeness in the room disappeared entirely. It was just the front sitting room – as normal as ever. “Has Reece been in here?” she asked. “Trying to avoid the washing up, is he?” Dad asked. “Here you keep on with this while I go find him. He’s not getting out of anything. If it’s not to do with the tractor, he seems to think it’s beneath his dignity these days.” But as soon as Dad had gone, the strangeness returned. As she stared at the tree of hands, she felt more and more overwhelmed with fear every passing moment. She couldn’t move. She was spellbound. The silver hand seemed to have become a living thing. It’s real, she thought. It’s real. But it can’t be. As she gazed at the intricate tattoos, the fingers flexed. A twining helix of light, like the glistening rainbow lance Holly had seen in the sky before sunset, reached out of the hole in the centre of the hand. Frost crystals began to form around the outline of the paper tree. A shrill and sudden crackle startled Holly and as she turned towards the noise, she could have sworn she saw a second taloned claw begin to poke and thrust its way out of the fossil dinosaur egg. Slowly the spiral of light began to unravel, separating into long undulating tendrils and shimmering tremulous threads of moon-white, sun-gold, diamond-glitter began to fill the room, coiling over the furniture, slither-climbing the walls, reaching towards her. Holly turned and ran.
* * * * *
Merlin’s Wood is available from the publisher,
Evergreen Books
1945
Evergreen Rd Peranga 4352 Qld Australia No. Pages: 184 Publication: November 2005
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