of ominous sounds was so near now that the children had no time to lose in fleeing back into the forest. The chilling problem, however, was that they could not ascertain from which direction the threatening sounds were approaching, or whether those making the sounds had actually surrounded them and were rapidly tightening the circle.
“Ewi,” Alex asked, with urgency in his voice, “hwew do we go?”
“Which way, Elli?” asked Beatríz, with a tone of desperation.
“Look!” Jamie yelled and pointed. “The Beast is heading into the woods over there!” The Beast had trotted quickly to the forest’s edge and then stopped and looked back at the children. “I think he knows the way and wants us to follow him!”
“Let’s go!” ordered Elli. As the children headed for The Beast, he padded on beneath the leafy shroud of darkness.
They hadn’t gotten very far into the forest before the darkness was complete, despite the sun being still high in the sky, making listening attentively for the sound of his swift movement in the ancient undergrowth the children’s only way to follow The Beast. Not more than five minutes and about a hundred yards had passed when the children no longer heard the sound of hacking. In its place, however, they heard even louder rumbling accompanied by grunting—as if words were being growled.
The creatures making the sounds were now very close, evidently gathered in and around the clearing, voicing both their discovery of the children’s recent presence and their vile excitement at the thought of an imminent killing or capture. All of the children and The Beast stood still, waiting to learn what the creatures’ next move would be. The children then heard some low and barely audible conversation and bickering before all became once again deathly still.
Then, the rumbling began once again, together with strident screeching and triumphant yelling, as the creatures swarmed toward the children. The Beast continued his leading with greater speed, and the children struggled to keep up. But as fast as they went further into the dense, vine-entwined forest, it was all too evident that the gap between them and the creatures was fast closing, and that it would be only minutes before the enemy was upon them.
Beatríz, still leading the others, stopped suddenly for what was to be only the briefest of moments to listen for The Beast’s movements, but heard nothing, except the approaching creatures and their own panting of panicked alarm.
“Get down on your stomachs everyone, and stay quiet; maybe (just miraculously, she was thinking) they will pass by us,” Beatríz said, with a note of feigned hopefulness in her voice. They all immediately lay themselves down—and waited, in silence. Then, quite suddenly, the sounds coming from the creatures changed, no longer seeming to be approaching them. The children heard the collective hateful roaring of the enemy and, along with it, the shrill screech of a lone challenger summoning them to battle. The children lay frozen in fear as they listened to the roaring and screeching and wailing of pain in the tumult of battle. All four of them wondered, without saying a word to one another, and with tears welling in their eyes, whether The Beast was sacrificing himself to buy them time to escape. Elli wanted to give the order to move on, but she was uncertain about the direction to take now that they no longer had The Beast to lead them. Perhaps, she thought, they should simply remain where they were until they learned what the creatures would do next, but she just as quickly realized the inadvisability of that decision.
All at once, Alex, who just as inadvisably had raised himself in an effort to see what was pursuing them and how close they were to the ongoing battle nearby, said, in a loud whisper, “Ewi!”
“Shhh, Alex!” Elli said, and just as quickly added, sensing he was no longer on his stomach, “And get back down—we don’t know what they can see and how far in the dark!”
“Ewi!” Alex replied, in a louder whisper and more insistently.
“Alex, you have to get back down and be quiet until we all move together!” Elli insisted.
“But, Ewi, thew ah wites ovew thew!” Without hesitation, Elli got up on her knees and looked quickly all about. She saw the lights—perhaps two dozen—in a single grouping, and not far away.
“C’mon, guys!” Elli ordered. “Follow me—fast—toward the lights—over there to the left!” They scrambled to their feet and pushed against the forest toward the group of tiny lights, stumbling and scraping and bruising themselves in their struggle through the woods that seemed resolved to resist any further penetration into their ancient community by the four young strangers. All of the children found themselves becoming increasingly tangled in coiled vines and twisted branches that impeded their progress, and it was impossible in the dark to ascertain what, or how far away, the lights were. The din of rumbling and hacking had not only resumed, but was once again closing in on them.
“Use your knives!” Jamie yelled, no longer concerned about whether the enemy could hear them or not. All of them—except Jamie, ironically—pulled out their knives and began to hack and cut with surprising ease the vines and branches that were entangling them. All except Jamie were now moving, and moving faster than they had ever moved in the forest to this point. They pushed toward the lights that, nevertheless, seemed to be constantly moving away from them while keeping the same distance, as if intending to lead the children. But Jamie, who alone had remembered the knives, was so entangled that he was not able to reach his knife with either hand. “I’m caught! I can’t reach my knife!” Jamie yelled against the noises of the advancing enemy.
The others were by this time far ahead of Jamie, and only Beatríz was able to hear him. “Jamie’s stuck—way back there!” she yelled.
“I’ll double back,” Elli said, “but you two keep going toward the lights.”
“Elli!” Beatríz yelled back. “We don’t even know what the lights are, or even if they’re friendly!”
“They can’t be any worse than what we’re running from!” shouted Elli, as she attempted to backtrack in the direction of Jamie.
Jamie continued to try unsuccessfully to reach his knife. Then, suddenly, before Elli could reach him, the branches and vines were pulling themselves—or being pulled—away from Jamie. When Jamie was finally able to get to his knife, he was already free to move again. “I’m out—I’m coming!” he yelled to the others. In a minute or so he caught up with his three companions who had stopped and were waiting for him.
Elli barked another order. “Okay, let’s keep going—faster, if you can! The creatures will be on us any minute now!” They resumed their push through the heavy growth and seemed, finally, to be getting closer to the lights. The rumbling and hacking behind them, however, was also growing louder and closer. Elli, in the lead once again, noticed the lights had stopped, not more than forty yards ahead. She noticed also, much to her dismay, that they were disappearing, one by one, until there was only a single small light remaining—hovering, barely visible, just ahead of them.
The children could now feel the vibrations from the movement and destructive work of their pursuers. The ground beneath them began to shake from the enemy’s heavy feet, and the children were hearing trees falling and feeling bursts of wind from their crashing to the forest floor.
Finally, when they had nearly reached the light, it moved suddenly away once more, leaving them with hopes quickly dashed. As the enemy forces were gaining on them, Elli noticed the single light move to the right where she spotted, with newfound hope, the other lights. Far from having gone out, they had been hovering in the darkness beside a tall thin beam of light created by some sort of opening that was more than ten feet high and about a foot and a half wide.
The
