Shadow Tree (21 page)

Chapter 36: The Knothole

“Come on,” said Alfonso. “We have to find a tree to climb – that's our only chance.” He broke into a sprint, charging down the path toward the wolves. The others followed him unquestioningly. After three or four minutes of running they came to a clearing. Here the tunnel of fog opened up into a bigger space, about the size of a tennis court. The snow was firmly packed and solid to walk upon.
It was also covered with thousands of bones. Some were small enough to have come from rodents; others were much larger. Mixed into the debris were a few human skulls. Apparently, this is where the fog wolves dined on their victims.

In the center of this clearing stood, an enormous tree, whose trunk continued upward through the ceiling of fog above. Alfonso led the way through the graveyard of bones and over to the base of the tree. Even though the tree was made entirely of stone and resembled a pillar from afar, it looked quite different up close. The tree's exterior had a rough surface – with many furrows, cracks, and crevices –
that resembled bark. The tree also had a series of small, stone bumps, each the size of a doorknob, which formed a pattern that spiraled its way up and around the base of the tree
like a string of Christmas lights.

The surface of the tree, with all of its bumps and cracks, made it readily apparent that the tree could be easily climbed. Although they had never seen her climb a tree, Korgu bounded up, jumping from one crack to the next until she paused on the lowest limb. She growled at them to follow her. Without saying a word, Marta and Alfonso both simultaneously reached out to touch the tree.

“No,” hissed Kolo, “Not a good idea.”

“We don't have a choice,” said Marta.

“They won't like it,” said Kolo, almost in a whimper.

Marta was startled to see the boy, who had so recently been such a bully and a tyrant, now reduced to a sniveling child.
Why was he so spooked? What had he seen in this forest?
The whole thing was unsettling.

“You can stay here if you like,” said Nathalia. “But we'll take our chances climbing.” With that, Nathalia began climbing up the side of the tree with great agility. Alfonso and Marta followed closely behind her. Leif waited for a moment with Kolo; he couldn't help but feel a small measure of sympathy for the boy. It was hard to explain why. On some level, Leif knew that Kolo had seen or witnessed something terrible – perhaps many things – and that this experience had taken a toll on him, twisted him even. The thought of this weighed on Leif. “We've got to go,” said Leif kindly, “Come on Kolo.”

“No,” said Kolo resolutely. “If the trees don't get me, your son will.”

“It's going to be okay,” Leif said as calmly as he could. “Alfonso will not harm you, I promise. Now come, follow me.” Leif turned to the tree and began to climb it, gesturing for Kolo to follow. He was just a little ways up the tree, when the wolves drew near. There was a great clattering sound, as if all the bones on the floor of the clearing were trembling. Kolo turned to Leif, his face stricken with terror.

“Come on!” screamed Leif.

Kolo shook his head. For a moment, it looked as if he would simply stand there and let the wolves devour him, but instead he scrambled across the clearing and dove head-first into the fog. And then he was gone – vanished – enveloped by the fog.

Leif was out of time. The only thing to do now was climb. He clamored upwards as quickly as he could. Leif proved an able climber and soon reached the ceiling of fog, which they pushed through, and continued upward. The fog was damp and cold and it made the climbing more treacherous so everyone went slowly. Visibility was nil. Leif climbed for many long minutes, and it seemed clear that in this part of the forest, the fog was especially thick. Eventually he caught up with the others. Someone asked where Kolo was. Leif shook his head grimly and explained, “He wouldn't come.”

They were all still in the thick of the fog, struggling upwards, when the wolves returned en masse. Everyone heard them all at once because the animals made quite a ruckus. There was no growling or howling or anything like that. The only sound from below was the sickening snapping and crunching of bones. The wolves were feeding. Then, at last, there came a cry; but it was not that of a wolf, but of a person. Someone below was shrieking and they all knew it was Kolo. High above, in the fog, clinging to the tree, everyone pressed their faces to the stone bark and gritted their teeth.

“May God have mercy on him,” said Leif softly.

They continued upward and, just a few minutes later, broke through the fog and emerged into the clear, crisp air of night. There was a half moon in the distance that offered a fairly good light.
Alfonso reached into his coat and took out a small pair of binoculars – the ones he had found in the airship. What he saw was breathtaking. All around, as far as he could see, were the stone shafts of the other trees, emerging from the fog and stretching up into the sky. Those trees with branches on top looked spectacular in the moonlight – somewhat skeletal like ordinary deciduous trees in winter – but their long delicate limbs were more silver in color, almost iridescent, shimmering and ghost-like in the moonlight. Alfonso noticed that all of the trees had the same curious pattern of bumps, resembling door knobs, which spiraled up their trunks. There was, however, no time to dwell on such matters. From down below, Alfonso could still hear the frenzy of the wolves mashing their food. The only sensible thing to do right now was to keep climbing until, perhaps, with a little luck, they could find a ledge or perch on which to rest.

They climbed for another ten minutes or so before coming upon the giant knothole. Alfonso had, of course, seen knotholes in ordinary trees – hollow spaces in the side of a tree where a branch had decayed and fallen off – but he had never seen one like this. The knothole was a great dimple in the side of the tree, so large, that it almost resembled a cave, the depths of which were shrouded in dark shadows. Alfonso clamored into the space, sighed exhaustedly, and slumped to the ground. The others soon arrived as well and, together, they all collapsed. They were so exhausted, they could barely move – even to unclench their aching fingers. No one spoke. Everyone simply pondered their predicament, trying to think of a way out. Far below, they could hear the sounds of the wolves still gorging themselves.

The wind began to pick up and everyone made their way inside the knothole – everyone but Korgu, who remained perched on the ledge. She refused even to look inside, and kept stretching a paw to see if there was some other place to go. She made no sound at all, which was very unusual. The innermost hollow of the knothole was both dark and surprisingly warm. The air was moist and smelled oddly boggy, ripe with the scent of decay. The ground here was softer, more like clay than hard stone. It was a relief to be in a sheltered place and yet there was something spooky about being inside the tree.

“Alfonso,” said Marta, with a glimmer of hope in her voice, “Can't you climb the fog – you know, like you did in Jasber – when you rescued my parents from the roof of their house?”

“Yeah, I have been thinking the same thing,” said Alfonso. “I'm pretty confident that I could make it all the way to Dargora.”

“By yourself?” asked Nathalia.

Alfonso nodded.

“Forget it,” said Leif. “That's not an option.”

A tense silence ensued.

“Has anyone brought food?” asked Marta finally. “I'm famished and I've always fancied having a picnic inside a giant stone tree.”

“We have some food,” replied Leif, who was eager to change the subject. He reached into his backpack and pulled out a round, wooden container of tough biscuits, known as hardtack, which he had brought with him from the flying ship. As he was passing the container to Marta, the container slipped through her hands, fell to the floor, and wobbled deeper into the knothole. It eventually toppled over and came to a rest in one of the shadows. Marta chided herself and sighed. She wasn't eager to venture any deeper into the knothole, but her hunger got the best of her. Slowly, she tiptoed after the container of food. What happened next everyone present would remember for the rest of their lives. The stone wall at the back of the knothole split open in the middle, with the upper half of the wall folding upward and the lower half dropping downward – opening much the way an eyelid would – revealing a gelatinous, quivering, ten-foot-high, bloodshot orb. Marta stared at the thing for a moment before grasping that it was, in fact, a giant eyeball. This wasn't a knothole, she realized, it was an eye socket.

“Uh, ah-,” stammered Marta. She was too terror-struck to scream. The others looked over towards the strange noises she was making. Leif reacted first. He lunged for Marta to pull her back. They all scramblied out of the knothole. Korgu, who was in a frantic state, was now trying to get inside to see what was going on. In the chaos, Leif tripped over Korgu and lurched forward, slamming into Nathalia. Everyone struggled to regain their balance, desperately reaching out to grasp something – anything at all – but for Nathalia there was nothing to grab and she stumbled backwards. For a moment, it looked as if Nathalia might steady herself, but her momentum was too strong and, instead, she pitched backwards off the ledge.

What no one saw at the time was that, at the very moment that the giant eyeball opened, the stone tree instantly transformed itself; indeed, all of the many doorknob-like bumps on the tree's stone bark slid outward and formed a series of curved steps that wrapped upward around the trunk of the tree like a magnificent spiral staircase. After free falling downward for a hundred feet or so, Nathalia landed with a sickening thump on one of these steps. Korgu simply seemed to vanish.

Alfonso was the first to see where Nathalia landed. He raced down the steps as quickly as he could, practically leaping the entire way. As soon as he reached her, he knew that she was gravely injured. Her body lay in a crumpled mass and her breathing was quick and shallow.

“I'm going to pick you up,” Alfonso told Nathalia. “We'll go back up. Don't worry. Everything is fine.”

She smiled slowly. “That's what I would have said,” she whispered. “No, I can tell. It's too late... too late for all that.”

“I won't leave you.”

“Yes... yes you will,” she wheezed.

Alfonso heard a pattering of steps from below. Something was coming up the
stairs. He turned to see what it was – it was Korgu. Apparently, she had landed a flight or two below with no obvious injury. But now the wolf was growling and yelping loudly. Alfonso's heart sank. He knew what it meant. Sure enough, a few seconds later, he heard a series of high-pitched growls and yips. The fog wolves were coming up the stairs. There wasn't much time. No wonder it was impossible to survive in the forest by climbing the trees. The trees were alive, and when they wished to, they allowed the fog wolves to climb up and grab anyone who was hiding in their branches. It was a perfectly symbiotic relationship, and in this case, it meant that the fog wolves were probably less than a minute away. There was no time – for anything.

“I'm so sorry,” gasped Nathalia. “So sorry, so sorry...” Her eyelids fluttered for a moment and then her eyes went lifeless. Alfonso felt her pulse.

She was gone.

The first wolf appeared on the steps just below them. It was perfectly white, down to its claws. Only its nose and eyes were another color – jet black. In another context, the wolf would have been considered beautiful. It looked at Alfonso, Nathalia and then Korgu with great interest. Alfonso became momentarily hopeful. Perhaps a miracle would happen and the wolves wouldn't attack. This hope was dashed seconds later when the wolf sprang towards Alfonso. In the blink of an eye, the wolf had covered the ten feet separating them and had slashed its fangs into Alfonso's shoulder.

Alfonso screamed and fell to one side, his legs coming up to protect his core. Korgu launched into the wolf and tore open its neck. The mortally-wounded wolf clung to Korgu and the two of them began tumbling down the stairs. Korgu was much bigger than her foe and the fight was over quickly. The fog wolf's bloody body fell down several more steps, directly in front of the main pack. At least twenty of them seemed to be crowding the stairs, and only Korgu prevented them from rushing Alfonso. Korgu let out a tremendous howl, and lunged towards them. The wolf pack was confused by the death of their leader, and retreated. Korgu continued to chase them down the steps.

By this point, Alfonso was standing, and realized that Korgu had bought them a few precious minutes, but not much more. He pushed Nathalia over to the side of the stairs, in a vain hope that her body would be protected. Then he spun around and began sprinting back up the stairs. At the knothole, he told Leif and Marta about the situation – that Nathalia was dead, and Korgu had bought them a little time before the fog wolves came back. Father and son locked eyes. Nothing was said, but they both knew how dire the situation had just become. Marta stood on the steps with her crossbow pointed downward.

“We'll have to use hypnogogia to climb across the fog,” said Alfonso hurriedly. “My dad and I will carry you, Marta. We'll have to go slowly, but we can still make it to Dargora.”

“No!” said Leif. Then he struggled to regain his calm. “Son, you have to listen to me,” said Leif. “You can't step foot in Dargora.”

“It's too late for that now dad,” said Alfonso. “You must see that. Nathalia is dead. She can't fulfill the prophecy.”

“Please,” said Leif. He took a step toward his son. Alfonso turned and locked eyes with Marta. She knew implicitly what he was asking. From below, they could hear the sound of the fog wolves coming. Leif took another step toward Alfonso and extended his arm. Alfonso spun around so that he was facing the foggy abyss and crouched as if he were preparing to dive off the tree. Leif grabbed at Alfonso's coat, but Alfonso roughly broke his father's hold. He sprang off the ledge, headfirst, and plummeted down into the fog below. As he fell, he relaxed his mind and let himself slip into hypnogogia. Meanwhile, up above, Leif leaned over the edge and screamed for his son. He did not turn back or even respond.