by Jon Herrera
stood up and in his anger he seemed taller than before.
Emma cowered back a step.
At that moment, there was music. It was a symphony, a cascade of sound that inundated the room.
“Why are you being so difficult lately?” Mr Wilkins said, still yelling.
Emma looked around frantically. “Don’t you hear that?” she said.
“Hear what? Stop playing around, Emma. First this obsession with the forest and now I get a call at work that you have detention. What is wrong with you?”
He was shouting. Lucy Leroux was looking at the floor, trying to disappear. The music filled Emma’s head and her thoughts were in a jumble. Lucy had betrayed her again. Mr Clarence had also broken his promise and now she was in a heap of trouble. Her father was yelling at her and she couldn’t remember ever seeing him so furious.
“I’m sorry,” she shouted and tears began to flow. She brought her hands up to her ears but she couldn’t stop the music. It grew and grew until she could no longer hear what her father was saying to her.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” she said, and it was all she could do.
She dropped to her knees, feeling betrayed by everyone except Jake, who was now lost. She took a glance to her side and saw that Will was standing in the hallway. He appeared to be shouting something at their father. Emma could hear nothing but the music.
She looked back at Mr Wilkins and saw him take a step toward her. She ran.
Out of her house and into the night Emma ran.
7 A Girl and a Tree
Emma ran.
Pink slippers slapped the cold, wet street as she ran. It wasn’t raining anymore but the clouds that lingered shrouded the light of the moon. The street lamps shone feebly and their light glinted off a parked car here and there.
She was halfway to Lockhart Road when she stepped in a puddle and sent water spraying up all over her pajama bottoms. As she slowed down, she saw that there was a dog on the side of the road and he was staring at her. He was a small dog with big ears.
“What?” she said, but she couldn’t hear her own voice over the music.
The little dog tilted his head. He barked twice, though Emma could not hear him, and then rushed toward a house where a woman was standing just inside the door, waving him in.
Emma put her head down to avoid the gaze of the woman. She walked on and, before she knew it, she found herself facing the darkness of Glenridge Forest.
“The music!” she said.
She tried to calm down and think things through. This could be the the music that she had heard once before, and it could be the music that Andrew Milligan claimed to have heard. But it was so loud that it was almost painful. It hadn’t been that way the first time around. The first time she had heard the song of the tree, it had been sweet and it had made her happy. Maybe this was something else.
Just as she was thinking this, the intensity of the music relented and it didn’t feel as though her head was filled with it. The music wasn’t everywhere at once anymore but it seemed to be coming from a particular direction. It was as though the source of the music had read Emma’s thoughts and, where before it had had a great sense of urgency, now it was content to let Emma figure things out.
“You wanted me to come?” she said.
Emma could follow the music if she chose, and maybe if she did, she would find out what had happened to Mr Milligan and now, possibly, to Jake.
Emma took a step forward. The image of a man with horns flashed in her mind. She remembered that night in the rain when she had seen something in the forest and it had frightened her. She imagined a horned monster taking Jake away and she shuddered. She knew that it was ridiculous, that there was no such thing as monsters or men with horns but, in the dark, in the middle of the cold night, it was hard to shake away the feeling of fear that filled her stomach.
It occurred to her that the music may not last for long and that if her friend was in there then it was her responsibility to find him. She took a deep breath and walked under the cover of the trees.
Emma took two steps and then looked back to where she had come from. She couldn’t see the road. The light from the street lamps had disappeared. She walked back a few steps and found only more forest waiting for her.
She sat down where she was and waited for her eyes to adjust to the darkness. From far away there came a long howl. The noises of night drifted to her as gradually as her night vision did. It took a long while but eventually she could see the dark outlines of the trees and of the undergrowth in every direction. There was nothing she could do but follow the music now.
As she walked, the normal sounds of the night were joined by a different sound altogether. It was the deep groan of strained wood, like a log being bent, and it was coming from everywhere around her. She couldn’t see what was causing the sound but her mind conjured up the inevitable image of walking trees.
She walked on for a long time and, as she went, she started to notice bright eyes that were staring at her from the dark of the night. She could hear the scurrying of little feet as though the owners of the eyes were moving all around her. There was motion in the trees as well, an almost imperceptible flapping of wings. It was an eerie feeling to be watched in that way by animals that she couldn’t see. She was scared, but the eyes looked small, like they belonged to little critters and nothing that could cause her serious harm.
They walked on in the dark, Emma and the animals and the trees, so she supposed, until the night became cold and Emma had to wrap her arms around herself for warmth.
When the tree appeared, it happened quickly and suddenly. Emma didn’t realize that she was approaching a clearing, and she later thought that it was possible that the clearing hadn’t been there until she had arrived inside it.
It seemed to her as though the trees in front and the clouds above both parted at the same time, the trees to reveal the clearing, and the clouds to let the moon illuminate it. It was as though a curtain had been pulled back and a giant spotlight had been turned on so that Emma could see the source of the symphony. It was in the centre of the clearing: a great, ancient oak.
Emma approached the tree slowly and stood under its brown-green leaves.
“Are you singing to me?” she said softly.
She reached the trunk of the tree and ran her hand against its bark. There was warmth there and she felt as though she was being caressed in return. She knelt down where she was and listened to the music, and felt its caress, for a long while. It put her at ease and made her forget all the bad things that had happened. She wondered if maybe the other people who had disappeared were sitting beside their own trees somewhere and they had simply lost track of time. It would not be hard to forget herself, close her eyes, and sleep and dream long dreams while the tree sang its lullaby.
The music stopped abruptly and the earth shook. Thunder boomed somewhere inside the forest.
Emma jumped to her feet.
“What is happening?” she said to the great oak.
There was a rustling of leaves. It was as if all the branches of the tree were shaking at the same time. She looked up and saw nothing but darkness except when, once or twice, the leaves parted enough to allow a little bit of moonlight through. Even then, Emma could see nothing but leaves and branches.
When the shaking died down, she saw something drop to the ground. She approached it and saw in the moonlight that it was a smooth rod, plain and bare but for a line of holes running up one side.
“A flute?” Emma said.
“Yes,” came the answer from somewhere in the darkness beyond the clearing. There was thunder again and Emma was afraid. This time, the thunder was followed by what sounded like footsteps, huge and furious, at first distant but coming closer and closer.
The girl clutched the flute to her chest and watched as the creature who had spoken stepped into the clearing under the moonlight.
“Be afraid, Emma, but don’t fear me. Fear the one who comes next.”
T
he voice belonged to a man, tall and lean, with horns like those of a ram protruding from his head. His upper body was bare but, as he approached, Emma saw that his lower half was covered in fur and in place of feet there were hooves. His face under the moonlight was frightening. It was human-like but unnaturally elongated and seemingly always on the verge of grinning. When he spoke again, Emma saw that his teeth were fanged.
“Who—” Emma said softly, and it was all she could manage before thunder interrupted her once more.
“Call me Domino,” the creature said. “I’m a faun of the forest. You have little time for he is almost here. You shouldn’t have come at night. I stopped you when you tried once before in the rain.”
“I don’t understand what’s happening,” Emma said, her voice cracking.
The faun sighed. He nodded to the flute that she was holding before her.
“Take care of that,” Domino said. “It is a gift from the tree. But now you must go. Come back when the sun is out and I will explain. Come to the forest and I will find you.”
“How do I leave this place?”
“I can remain unseen whenever I’m in the forest,” he said, “but you must rely on other means until you learn how.”
He motioned toward the great oak as the sound of the giant footsteps drew near.
“He will take you where you need to go,” Domino said and raised his hand toward Emma. She was afraid but the thunder, loud enough to crack the world now, made her take it. The faun walked her up to
