by James Erith
‘Old Man Wood!’ Daisy cried, giving him a hug.
‘Aw, ow! Gently now,’ he said, as he opened his eyes.
His accentuated wrinkles formed a smile and his eyes shone like jewels in the candlelight. ‘Apple juice,’ he said. ‘And a little bit of Resplendix Mix, if you don’t mind.’
‘Yes! Of course,’ Archie said. ‘Where is it?’
Old Man Wood forced saliva into his mouth. ‘Coat,’ he said. ‘In the boot room.’
Archie switched on his torch and tore off downstairs, returning with the strange medicine and a bottle of Old Man Wood’s apple juice.
‘Here,’ he said, offering the golden liquid of the Resplendix Mix to Old Man Wood’s lips. The moment it touched them, colour began to return to his cheeks. Old Man Wood blinked and sighed and then ooh-ed and ah-ed and grimaced as the healing medicine went to work.
Archie took it over to Isabella and did the same. Just a drop, like Old Man Wood said. The bottle opened for her and, before long, Isabella’s eyes were wide open.
Then Old Man Wood smiled, a look of intense happiness on his face. But, as footsteps creaked up the stairs his expression quickly turned to alarm.
The children froze. Then slowly they turned to face whatever was coming up.
A voice rang out from the dark beyond them. ‘What, in the Devil’s name is going on?’ it said. ‘I don’t know what’s got into you lot. Making every effort to totally destroy the house, huh! What a terrible din, the likes of which I can’t remember.’
Mrs. Pye peered into the dark. ‘Been lighting fires have you? Well I hope there’s a good reason for all this queer behaviour.’ She shook her head. ‘Your tea’s on the table, or had you forgotten?’
She trudged slowly back down the stairs, tutting.
The four of them sat on the landing, chuckling like naughty schoolchildren.
Archie was the first to speak. ‘What happened? What were those toadstool things?’
The old man sat up and slowly stretched his arms out wide. ‘All I can say is that it’s not every day you get poisoned with Havilarian Toadstool Powder. It’s the most deadly powder known to ... well ... certain things. If I am in fact alive, which I suppose I must be, then I’m probably one of the few that has ever survived. So how did that happen? Who or what do I have to thank for saving my flesh?’
‘You’d better thank Isabella,’ Daisy said, clapping her hands. ‘She did it and I have to say, it was wicked!’
‘Well, I never,’ Old Man Wood croaked. ‘And how—?’
‘Using a cocoon of pink light and energy,’ Archie said. ‘But your cool wooden TV panels got smashed to bits.’
Old Man Wood seemed unconcerned. ‘We needn’t worry about that now. What’s important is that we’re here and I reckon we’ll be a good deal stronger for it.’
He shuffled over to Isabella and helped her up into a sitting position, and then wrapped his arms around her. ‘Thank you, littlun,’ he said into her ear. ‘I owe you.’ Then he picked himself up off the floor, stood up and ran his arms high above his head. ‘Right, as Mrs. Pye said, tea is on the table and I for one, am famished.’
OLD MAN WOOD’S body tingled as though it had been crammed full of electric-tipped feathers and his head fizzed with excitement as if a firework had exploded in his brain.
Right now, his secrets, his magic and even his purpose were pouring back to him as though a chain had broken opening the locked gates of his mind.
The time had arrived, no doubt about it. The opportunity to help the Heirs of Eden plot a return to the Garden of Eden had come at last. Finally, just as he’d quietly suspected, the chance had come to re-ignite the sparks of creation.
The children had been given the Great Dream and, it appeared, the legendary Gifts of Eden. Old Man Wood shut his eyes and smiled; that was enough thinking for now.
First, he needed nourishment. Then he would let the memories fill his head.
NINETY-TWO
A LESSON FROM THE PAST
‘Why did those toadstools make you so nearly die Old Man Wood?’ Daisy asked as she scraped her fork around her plate. ‘You said something about Havilarian Toadstool Powder but we’ve never heard of it before. Did you poison yourself?’
Old Man Wood chuckled, his chest heaving up and down. ‘It is no mystery, my littluns,’ he said, ‘and, no I didn’t. You see—’
‘But what exactly was it?’
‘A terrible substance, no doubting it,’ he said, studying their blank faces. ‘Must be something close by, but how it got there is indeed a mystery. In any case, whoever did it must have tried to put us off – to stop you lot making it to the other worlds—’
Archie dropped his fork and it clattered over his plate. ‘What other worlds?’ he said. ‘I didn’t know there were other worlds. I thought all we had to do was find three tablets. How many worlds are there?’
‘Three,’ Old Man Wood replied calmly and without pausing. ‘There were five, but two of them blew themselves to pieces. Now, if I remember rightly, those ones were called Cush and Assyria – though I don’t reckon there’s much there any longer. They got a little too clever for their own good and forgot what Nature was all about.’
He leaned back in his chair and rubbed his chin. ‘Without sounding too miserable, it might be that Earth is heading the same way. But anyway, where was I? Ah, yes. The other two planets are Earth and Havilah. Yes,’ he said, thoughtfully, ‘those two are the last remaining ones. Of course, there’s also the Garden of Eden, but no one knows what’s happened there. It’s been closed an awful long time, since the great flood—’
‘The Garden of Eden?’ Isabella interrupted, suddenly wide-awake. ‘The Garden of Eden,’ she repeated, ‘with the flood? That Garden of Eden?’ she leaned across the table. ‘You’re talking about the Biblical place, with Adam and Eve, the serpent, Cain and Abel, Noah ... you know, Genesis ... animals going in two by two?’ She fixed the old man with her hardest stare. ‘It isn’t a real place, you know. Everyone knows that!’
Old Man Wood frowned. ‘Well, er ... no. I mean, yes. Oh appley-deary me. In the books, it’s not quite the same thing ... only a smidgen of it—’
‘Look,’ Isabella said. ‘Those Bible stories succinctly explain life before the records that come after it. If you carry on like this, Old Man Wood, we’re going to have to think again about putting you in an old people’s home.’
Daisy rolled her eyes. ‘Bells, I thought you’d left all that behind?’
‘There’s no way in the world that Genesis and Creation could have physically happened.’
‘It’s worlds,’ Archie corrected her.
Isabella glowered at him. ‘Life on this planet evolved, everyone knows that.’
‘Ah,’ Old Man Wood said. ‘I was getting to that bit—’
‘There’s more?’ she said.
‘Oh yes, littlun. You see, once upon a time, there really was a great flood on the Earth – like the one we’ve got now I suppose—’
Isabella slumped back in her chair. ‘And now, it’s a nursery story.’
‘Back then,’ the old man continued, ‘the “Rivers” flooded and remained flooded so nothing could travel from one world to another—’
‘Rivers?’
‘Oh yes. The Garden of Eden and Havilah are like Earth in a geographical, roundabout kind of way.’
Isabella massaged her temples. ‘This is completely and utterly crackers,’ she said. ‘No known life forms in the universe have ever been found. And, furthermore, you’re damning a whole civilisation of believers.’
Old Man Wood laughed, ‘Bella, this isn’t going to be easy—’
‘Easy—?! The Bible and those other religious texts are sacred books, worshipped globally—’
‘But the beginning holds the clues to what’s going on NOW,’ Old Man Wood argued. ‘How else were they going to pass on the knowledge, the special secrets—?’
She glared at him. ‘Entire cultures begin with this story!’
Old Man W
ood shrugged. ‘Well, no-one knew it’d be quite such a popular story at the time. And, anyway, it seemed like a good place to start—’
‘Oh my God,’ Isabella said, slowly. ‘This is deeply, deeply flawed,’ she said, shaking her head.
‘What are Rivers?’ Archie interrupted. ‘I take it these aren’t real rivers are they? And anyway, isn’t Assyria somewhere in Africa? I’m sure Mum and Dad mentioned it last time they were back.’
Mentioning their parents made the children suddenly a little reflective and an uneasy silence hung in the air.
Old Man Wood turned to Archie. ‘I haven’t explained it properly, have I?’ he said, relieved to move away from Isabella’s grilling. ‘But you’re absolutely appley-right about one thing! Rivers are the connections between worlds—’
‘Like wormholes?’ Daisy said, as though a little spark had burst into a flame. ‘Portals that transcend space, and all that stuff.’
The old man clapped his big hands together. ‘Why, that exactly!’ he said. ‘Wormholes, portals, Rivers – they’re one and the same thing. And yes, those places here on earth, Assyria, the Garden of Eden, Cush and Havilah, many others – were named in memory of their own worlds far, far away in other universes a long, long time ago.’
Daisy continued, intrigued. ‘So, you said that people stopped travelling from planet to planet through these “Rivers”. Why did these worm-holey things close down?’
‘Hmm. Now, that’s a good question,’ Old Man Wood said, his face deeply lined in thought. ‘War and a difference of opinion, I suppose. You see, those stories, like that Genesis one, were nearly right,’ he said, his face darkening. ‘But, oh, what a terrible time, even if it did save Earth and Havilah.’
‘I don’t understand. How could a massive flood save Earth?’ Daisy asked, confused. ‘Didn’t everyone die apart from Noah? And anyway, what happened to this Garden of Eden place?’
Old Man Wood hummed as he thought about his answer. ‘As far as I can remember, hordes of bad folk found a way of going back through the Rivers and into the Garden of Eden because, up until then, you could only go out of the Garden and not in. As a result, the Garden found itself being poisoned; its structure eroded and destroyed, and then ... war.’
Old Man Wood’s eyes filled with tears, his brow deep and furrowed. ‘A terrible war. People tried to make a claim on the Garden of Eden, and when the fighting finally stopped, blood covered the worlds, rivers ran red, flames singed the land, bitterness ran through veins, treachery mastered minds. Hatred and anger everywhere. A horrible time.’
Old Man Wood wiped his eyes and pulled himself together a little. ‘To put it to an end, there was a moment of extraordinary sacrifice, one moment that alone is worth the Garden of Eden coming back to life.’
For a while, silence reigned as Old Man Wood stared into the distance. The children hardly dared to breathe.
Isabella took a deep breath. ‘OK – so if what you’re saying has some truth to it, what made this Garden of Eden so special?’ she asked quietly. ‘Why did it matter?’
Old Man Wood regarded her, his face deadly serious. ‘Because, my dear little Bells,’ he said, ‘it’s where everything began. That’s why—’
‘Everything?’
‘Yes, everything. How do you think all these billions of things that make up the world around you actually started?’ He studied their puzzled faces. ‘Everything – dinosaurs, people, trees, fish, bugs, flowers, bacteria, clouds, particles, atoms, matter, energy – even your dreams – were all started in the Garden of Eden. From there, each creation began to grow and mature or die, or, as you lot say, evolve.’
Isabella shook her head. ‘But I thought life began on Earth from a collision involving a meteor or a comet?’
The old man leant back in his chair and roared with laughter. ‘Big-bangs, lumps of rock in space colliding with each other,’ the old man said. ‘Oh, yes, those life-givers did happen, but a long time before the living things came about. And it took an awful lot of knocking and banging them together to make the right kind of place. And who says they won’t come again?’
Isabella’s face had turned the colour of milk, Archie glumly stroked his foremost hair spike and Daisy massaged her temples.
Old Man Wood clapped his hands. ‘But enough of all that. It’s complicated – and anyway, weren’t we talking about Havilarian Toadstool Powder?’
The children nodded.
‘Well, young ‘un’s,’ he continued, ‘Havilarian Toadstool Powder is a very rare powder that blends itself to look like anything it’s mixed with: liquid or solid – so it’s hard to know how I digested it. It’s so deadly that it’s the only thing that can nearly kill me ...’
‘What do you mean?’ Isabella queried, her voice barely above a whisper. ‘Nearly kill you. Does that make you ... I mean ... are you ... please, don’t tell me you can’t ... actually ... die?’
‘I’ll die if I return to the Garden of Eden, one day,’ Old Man Wood said slowly. ‘But if I don’t, then I suppose I’ll carry on like I have done, indefinitely.’
Isabella coughed and looked as if she were about to vomit all over the floor.
Daisy, on the other hand, shut one eye and ruffled her hair deep in thought. ‘You’re saying you’ve been alive ... forever?’
Old Man Wood smiled back a little warily. ‘Yes, littlun.’
‘Blimey,’ and then she swore, ‘… sorry, WOW!’ Daisy squealed. ‘You’ve really lived ... that long? Forever, and ever, amen?’
Old Man Wood shifted, turning pink.
‘Then, that makes you ... you’re ... you’re immoral?’ Daisy squealed.
‘It’s immortal, not immoral, you numpty,’ Isabella snapped.
‘Yeah, yeah. Whatever,’ Daisy said, nodding. ‘Pretty awesome.’
Archie was visibly trembling. ‘But you can’t be—’
‘Look carefully,’ Old Man Wood said. ‘That’s me in all those pictures you’ve pulled off the walls.’
‘I told you so, I told you so,’ Daisy said, squealing with delight. ‘Does that make you, like ... God?’ she asked. ‘Please say yes!’
Old Man Wood smiled. ‘I promise you,’ he said ‘my situation is nothing more than a terrible curse. A burden that is heavier than you can possibly imagine. I was telling you about the poison…’
But now that he studied the children’s expressions, Old Man Wood realised they deserved more of an explanation. ‘If you must know, I’ve watched you humans develop for an awfully long time.’
The children looked at each other and then at Old Man Wood with their mouths ajar. The enormity of these words not lost on them in spite of their young years.
After a long and very awkward silence, Isabella spoke. ‘Look, this is a bit of a head-fry, and I’m still not sure I really, truly grasp what you’re saying. So let me recap: You’re saying that Rivers are connections between worlds? Yes?’
‘Indeed,’ Old Man Wood replied. ‘They are the routes between Earth and other planets. Daisy has already experienced one when she visited the atrium.’ He smiled warmly at Daisy.
‘And you’re saying that the Garden of Eden really did exist, right, like a huge laboratory?’
Old Man Wood agreed.
‘And the Garden of Eden is a planet, and not actually a garden – with flowers and berries and veg?’
‘That’s right.’
‘And that every living thing came from there?’
He raised his eyebrows.
‘And then these other places went to war, and in so doing shut it down. And you’ve been around for the whole time since?’
The old man nodded.
‘And now, we’ve got to discover three tablets by way of five random poems on five mangy old rugs to get to these other worlds – particularly the Garden of Eden?’
‘Hmm, well, yes, I suppose.’
Isabella screwed up her face as though she was on the verge of bursting into tears. ‘You’ve got to agree it is utterly irrational,’ sh
e muttered. ‘Why?’
‘To open the Garden of Eden, of course,’ Old Man Wood said. ‘It’s a source of incredible power. The power of creation is something you here on Earth can barely imagine.’
‘But why now and, more importantly, why us?’
Old Man Wood stretched his arms out wide. ‘Something has shifted in the universe and, as a result, you have been given the Great Dream. And it’s you lot, because your direct family line happens to have been under my care for thousands of years. It is a test, I believe, like those examinations you have at school, only a little bit more important.’
He rubbed his chin, thinking. ‘Not all my brains have returned inside here,’ and he pointed at his skull, ‘but as far as I remember, this test was put in place to see whether those chosen on the planet were ready.’
‘Ready for what?’
‘To survive and move mankind on to its next stage.’
Isabella didn’t like the sound of this. ‘And if they aren’t ready and fail, then what?’
‘Hmm, good question,’ Old Man Wood said. ‘Let me think. I believe the species on the planet will be done away with.’
‘Done away with?’ Isabella said. ‘You mean killed?’
Old Man Wood shrugged.
‘Like the dinosaurs?’
The old man hummed. ‘Yes, I suppose you’re right. Those horrid scaly things were a terrible nuisance. But you see, when the universe had something better planned it got rid of almost all of them except crocodiles and birds and a few others. The universe changes – it just does that, you know. A new time is upon us and it’s going to try and do it again.’
‘Didn’t an asteroid hit the earth and wipe them out?’ Daisy said, quietly. Her bones ached, and her head throbbed. She remembered the cave paintings, and the final panel. Now, the puzzle was coming together.
Old Man Wood continued. ‘It’s not the first time, and it certainly won’t be the last. There have been all sorts of new types of mankind—’
Isabella butted in: ‘Homo habilis, homo erectus, Neolithic man and now us, homo sapiens,’ she rattled out. ‘Dad taught me. But I thought they came one after the other, in some kind of order?’
