Chapter 22
Between those tall trees air grew very dark very quickly. After a few minutes they could only find each other by shouting, listening for the weird echo and watching the others dim glow. Two dragonflies flew for miles through the creepy forest, desperate to see what this unnatural darkness was all about. Lucy seemed able to see in the dark better than him, so Lawrence followed her carefully.
Soon the friends crossed a tiny stream glittering with jewels and dressed with silver pearls. Tiny fish the size of pins blinked pretty patterns along the bed. Because it looked so beautiful neither heard an invisible barrier spring up behind.
Strewn around the forest floor strange light and dark shafts spiralled up through the trees, touching the crimson sky. Wispy white fog swirled between the beams like a winding brook, and mysterious energies built below, humming, spitting and jolting fiery cracks through the bumpy ground.
Lawrence noticed a dark, thin shape flitting from tree to tree high above. Luckily he didn’t have to move his head much to get a good view. Lucy darted into a light beam. In seconds her body swelled to four times its size.
“Look!” she squealed in delight. She flew round excitedly, making faint shapes when the twisted creature dropped towards them very quickly. Lawrence realised it was some sort of deformed bird, and knew they regularly ate dragonflies. He quickly flew into the nearest light beam, growing almost as big as Lucy. The freaky bird squawked in surprise and flew off in a flutter of feathers. On reaching higher branches it disappeared.
“That was lucky,” Lucy said, flying into a dark beam where she shrunk back to normal size.
Lawrence copied her, because it wasn’t easy flying while being so heavy.
“Clever,” Lucy admitted, checking the suspicious spots over again, “I wonder who made them and why?”
“I hope we find out,” Lawrence said, saying they should keep looking for clues.
Lucy had a brainwave. “You know what I think, friend? We can enter other animals too,” she cried, giggling at the idea.
“That would be strange, but fun. Although we should probably weigh up the advantages and disadvantages of our choices first,” Lawrence said sensibly, deciding the trip to the pleasure beach could wait till next week. This was a ride he simply couldn’t pass up!
Lawrence and Lucy swerved between lights racing each other, darting past a tall, slippery cliff dotted with sharp stones. Lawrence felt a blow to his side that knocked him off course. It happened again and again, quicker and quicker, so he cried out to Lucy to slow a little. Neither could work out what had happened. Meanwhile invisible missiles kept coming, hitting the weird, bendy trees with loud, menacing hisses.
Suddenly the forest grew lighter, then dark again in confusing, stuttering stages. Lawrence spied suspicious shadows lurking near the light beams. While he watched these dark flurries carefully black, twisted triangles swarmed out hidden caves behind, swooping in massive threatening circles. There were hundreds of them! Far ahead thin slithers of amber peeped through the bendy trees.
“Head for the light!” Lawrence cried, flying as fast as he could. They were only able to avoid being attacked by swerving, flying up and backwards and darting randomly. Finally both dragonflies burst out the forest, weaving between heaving shafts of dull yellow light.
The breathless flies saw a wide river wound ahead. Shoals of weird fish leapt out the thick water to feed on blurry blue lights skipping across the surface. Out there in the open towering black rocks crashed down from the blurry, jagged sky. Ones that landed in the light melted into twisty pools of bubbling black. Others shattered into haunting smoky faces, shaking the shadowy land that rippled in time with the river.
Behind the friends, an army of fiery red glows gathered menacingly at the forest’s edge. Large sections split off and dived after them, exploding in a shower of sparks. Luckily those nasty creatures couldn’t follow them here. In a last wild rush Lawrence and Lucy reached the river’s hungry fish.
“Dive on them!” Lucy shouted. Within seconds she’d nudged a colourful main fin and taken the fish over. Lawrence fell in head first, and was promptly swallowed by a large one, whose body he took over. Lucy’s fish was young, colourful and fast, whereas Lawrence’s was old, dull and slow. Both were swept downstream till they learnt to use their new bodies, leaving two very confused dragonflies sitting on the bank.
Fins on either side were used for sharp turns, leaving smaller ones on the bottom of the belly free to make little adjustments. Of course their tails pushed them forwards, and raising their main fin on top helped slow them down. One good thing was because the water supported most of their weight, they could float along without using any energy. This would have been lots of fun if they’d had longer to adjust.
“Where are we?” Lawrence asked. His fuzzy voice was dulled by the water, and drifted off quickly on the current.
“I don’t know friend, but this certainly isn’t home anymore. Something changed as soon as we entered the forest.”
“I’ve been thinking about those weird beams Lucy. Perhaps they do different things to different animals?” Suspicious gigantic splashes disturbed their practice. Spinning round they found nothing there. Lucy tried to concentrate on the cause. Unfortunately her senses were dulled here compared to other worlds. Armies of bubbles shot out the bank side, flipping Lawrence upside down. Larger ones blasted out next, exploding with strong, loud bangs. In between volleys all Lawrence could do was cough and splutter.
With a nasty hiss and a long piercing scream a large round fish appeared behind. She puffed her body up so much it looked ready to explode. Spiked fish launched out her gaping mouth, exploding and shooting poisonous spines everywhere. Lucy nudged Lawrence upright and they took off down the river. Despite the vicious fish being so big it was still dangerously fast.
“Head for the light beams!” Lawrence cried, spying many little openings tapering off under fizzing bushes. One small stream slunk back into the woods. Around a tight bend the friends bounced up against the invisible barrier. Only a tiny bit of a light beam lay their side, vanishing as soon as Lucy touched it.
Just round the curve the mad fish’s heavy breathing pushed through the water, sending large waves crashing high over their heads. Much of the water left the stream, becoming trapped on the banks. It seemed to take an age for the vicious hunter to turn the corner. When the fish saw she had them cornered her bloated eyes lit up in glee. Instead of attacking straight away she blew herself up even bigger in a selfish boast.
“I’ll jump into her,” Lawrence shouted bravely.
“No, look, she’s different!” Lucy cried.
While the fish grew fatter her body fizzed and bubbled, draining black shafts of light. Freaky, animal like plants lining the bank whirled apart, withering and dying instantly. Sharp tree branches spun down, stuck to her scales and became long vicious spikes that gleamed evilly in the weird light. Seconds later nothing near was left alive but them, and their enemy had become so big she almost touched the streams sides.
Feeling energised Lucy leapt clear over her, turning gracefully in mid air. Glittering gold slime dripped off her back, dissolving some of the enemy’s spikes. This allowed Lawrence the chance to charge past, scraping the side of the bank and scratching a few of his scales off. Because water was so shallow now, he hoped to make it back to the river before the fat, heavy fish could turn round.
Round the final corner Lucy leapt so high she snapped a large branch off an overhanging tree, which stuck solid across the banks. That should slow the nasty girl down even more.
Back in the river they swam quickly upstream because Lawrence thought this may confuse their mad pursuer, who’d expect them to go with the river’s flow.
“Just what’s going on? I thought this was fun at first!” Lawrence exclaimed.
Lucy still felt puzzled, and fell quiet to think and gain some strength. In a place with so many possibilities no wonder our two adventurers felt confuse
d. Lucy couldn’t ask Caspar for help because she needed to be asleep to contact him. Whilst remembering her magical training, she also hoped her precious kittens weren’t missing her too much.
After swimming for an awfully long time it seemed like the river would never end.
“How can we escape from somewhere if we don’t know where we are, or how we got here?” Lucy wondered out loud.
“There must be more of those beams somewhere. They may be the key to how this bizarre place works,” Lawrence suggested, “or maybe you could use some magic?”
“Perhaps, but my magic seems to be limited to intuition, defence and creating fire so far. Caspar says the year I spent trapped in Brandice’s cottage set my studies back, so it may take some time to catch up. You see two years old is the coming of age for a cat. Now I’m truly an adult all my powers should have shone through by now. By this time most lucky magical cats would have learnt to use them responsibly. When I do learn exactly what they are it’s simply a case of strengthening them through mental exercises, just like you did with your physical body.”
“I see, excellent. Erm, like the dream world there may be some keeper or creator of this land we could head to for answers and a way back home. However, we have very little clues so far,” Lawrence admitted glumly.