LEAFHOLD WAS SURROUNDED BY A WIDE STRIP OF WITHERING vegetation. Trees with bare, twisted branches were dying between the desert which was encroaching on the forest and the giant trees which seemed to owe their survival to that sacrifice. Still covered by Invisibuls, Oksa Vertiflew until she was about a hundred yards from the first colossal trees, then dived towards a sand dune, where she hid and watched, the soft, warm body of the Lunatrix still clinging to her.
In the foreground, it was impossible to ignore the soldiers in leather armour patrolling the perimeter of the tree city, both in the air and on the ground. Oksa hesitated: which camp did these men belong to? Were they Felons in Ocious’s pay or inhabitants of Leafhold anxious to protect their own?
“My Young Gracious should encounter the necessity to examine supreme precaution,” whispered the Lunatrix, banishing her doubts. “The soldierly density assumes dependency on the orders of Ocious, the hated Docent.”
Instinctively, and despite her invisibility, Oksa pressed even flatter against the damp sand and continued to watch. The extraordinary oasis of green foliage could have been plucked from the fertile mind of an imaginative, megalomaniac botanist and had a distinctly surreal quality. Between the trees, some of which were so huge that their tops couldn’t be seen for clouds, an impossibly intricate network of bridges, walkways and aerial corridors linked the houses built among the branches. With darkness descending on the forest city, hundreds of tiny lights sparkled brightly among the branches from inside the houses, while a moving beam appeared on every platform.
Apart from the soldiers, who were keeping the city under constant surveillance, Oksa couldn’t see any signs of life. And yet, she could sense intense activity going on in the depths of the thick forest.
“There is some practical information my Young Gracious should know,” said the Tumble-Bawler, landing on her shoulder.
“I’m listening,” whispered Oksa, keen to find out more.
“Leafhold covers a circle which is four miles in diameter. It stands above one of the last groundwater tables in Edefia, which is the reason for the city’s survival. Three hundred and forty-eight people and five hundred and twelve creatures currently live here, not to mention the two hundred and twenty soldiers in Ocious’s patrols, twenty-three Long-Gulch and Firmhand refugees, four Runaways and eleven creatures who escaped from the Glass Column.”
Oksa stared wide-eyed.
“Four Runaways? Did you say four?”
“That’s right, my Young Gracious,” confirmed the little messenger.
This revelation set Oksa’s mind whirring.
“But you told me that only my father, Abakum and Zoe had managed to escape, didn’t you? So who’s the fourth?”
“I’m terribly sorry not to be able to answer that question,” stammered the Tumble-Bawler.
“My Young Gracious should take delivery of a piece of information which will riddle her heart with happiness,” added the Lunatrix.
Oksa looked at him hopefully.
“The Much-Loved Fairyman experiences the proceeding of a geographic approach.”
Oksa immediately peered through the dense darkness. Apart from the twinkling lights in the trees, and the Polypharuses on the soldiers’ helmets, she couldn’t see a thing. Not a single thing.
“Abakum!” she whispered.
She searched the pitch-black night. Despite the cool air, a droplet of acid sweat trickled down her temple. What if Abakum didn’t see her? She had a great desire to remove the layer of Invisibuls but her fear of being visible was even greater. As long as no one could see her, she had nothing to fear. So she continued to call to Abakum in a sustained whisper, then more loudly.
“Does my Young Gracious have the will to turn her eyes in the direction advocated by her domestic staff?” asked the Lunatrix suddenly.
“Whatever you want!” whispered Oksa, so worried she couldn’t think straight. The little creature then pointed his chubby finger at… nothing. After just a few seconds, though, Oksa realized that this apparent nothingness was deceptive. No one else would have been able to make out a shadow approaching through the darkness over the dunes without the keen sight she and her Lunatrix possessed. It was the Fairyman. The Shadow Man. Barely detectable, like the negative of a photograph, the light grey shape glided over the sand as smoothly and silently as a snake.
“Abakum! I’m here!” Oksa couldn’t help calling.
“I know, sweetheart, I know!” replied a voice she’d have recognized anywhere.
“You can hear me?” asked Oksa, suddenly worried that she’d become audible.
“Have you forgotten my animal side?” teased Abakum.
The shadow came closer and lightly caressed Oksa, who felt the movement of the air rather than his touch.
“I can’t tell you how glad I am to see you, Abakum!”
“Come with me and do exactly what I say. It’s high time we were all back together again, don’t you think?”
Oksa felt as if she were taking part in a slalom event on the way to Leafhold. They first had to weave their way between the scores of tents belonging to Ocious’s squadrons, then bypass troops of suspicious, and highly mobile, soldiers and Vigilians. Matters were also complicated by the unexpected realization that the Invisibuls loathed the flying caterpillars at much as Oksa did. Every time one of those vile creatures came anywhere near them, Oksa felt sick—and the Invisibuls contracted, squeezing Oksa’s body with a strength directly proportional to their disgust.
“I’m going to be suffocated to death,” she grumbled. “How ridiculous is that?”
Sitting astride her shoulders, the Lunatrix puffed with all his might and waved his arms to chase away the caterpillars, but it didn’t work. Her freedom of movement hampered by the physical compression of her body, Oksa kept walking as best she could without taking her eyes off Abakum’s transparent shadow as he led her towards the massive forest.
“Try to avoid going through people!” instructed Abakum. “You might be immaterial, but they’re battle-hardened and may sense your presence.”
It wasn’t too hard to dodge the soldiers, but the Vigilians were another matter. It was an awful ordeal for Oksa to feel hundreds of caterpillars passing through her body! Their wings were beating with a nauseating hissing noise and their tiny cilia grazed her like the wings of a poisonous butterfly. And she couldn’t do anything to stop it; she couldn’t even reduce those monstrosities to small piles of ash with a well-aimed Fireballistico, which was the fate they so richly deserved! Instead, she felt each of them pass through her, as well as having to put up with the involuntary contraction of the Invisibuls, which were having the most trying time of their magical lives. With her nerves stretched to breaking point, she ended up charging straight ahead, screaming and waving her arms, not caring that she looked like a madwoman.
When the barrier of soldiers and the belt of dead vegetation were finally behind them, it took her a few moments to convince herself that the worst was over. The Invisibuls relaxed, she took a deep breath and helped the Lunatrix clamber down from her back and onto the ground. Her heart swelled with affection as her small steward slipped his plump hand into hers.
“Victory wallows in completeness, my Young Gracious, and the mind of her domestic staff is swamped with relief.”
Oksa laughed softly and heard Abakum echo her.
“We’re right behind you, Abakum!” declared Oksa, head held high.
The shadow took a wide, clear path lined with Polypharuses. The illuminating tentacles of the octopuses lit up the trunks of the enormous trees, creating a strangely beautiful, if somewhat eerie, scene. Giant spiral staircases encircled the trees, leading up from their bases. Oksa craned her neck in awe. She could see the light spilling from Sylvabul homes, built on platforms fixed to the junction of several thick branches, as high as sixteen feet from the ground, or even higher.
“Wow!” murmured Oksa.
They continued walking for at least a mile and a half, occasionally passing groups of four or five soldiers.
“They’re everywhere,” grumbled Oksa, hating this dictatorial atmosphere.
The plants lining the path quivered, rustling their serrated leaves, which turned out not to be the effect of the breeze, as Oksa had thought.
“The vegetation performs the manifestation of salutations packed with esteem for my Young Gracious,” explained the Lunatrix.
Oksa stopped dead.
“You mean these plants can see me?”
The Tumble-Bawler and the Lunatrix burst out laughing.
“My Young Gracious makes the expression of comical words! The plants do not discover objects with vision, but with supra-sensory clairvoyance!”
“Er… yes, of course, that’s what I meant,” said Oksa, correcting herself with an amused smile.
Oksa didn’t grow weary of gazing at the forest as they went deeper into it, wreathed in the silence of night, and she was convinced it would be an even more incredible sight in broad daylight.
“When I think that a short while ago I was living a normal life, going to school and rollerblading through the streets of London,” she thought, her eyes moist. “And here I am covered in magic tadpoles, walking through a mind-boggling forest where even the plants are saying hello to me. You couldn’t make it up if you tried.”
The small group soon came to a tree far bigger than any of those Oksa had seen before. It looked like the trunk was at least 160 feet in diameter and its foliage disappeared from sight far above the clouds.
“We’re here,” announced Abakum.
He guided Oksa and her small companions towards the foot of the tree, which made the Young Gracious feel as though she were standing at the base of a skyscraper covered in bark. Looking carefully around, the Shadow Man resumed his physical appearance. The dim light couldn’t hide his pinched face and drawn features, much to Oksa’s concern. Feeling her eyes on him, Abakum turned his head to avoid her gaze, and took from his pocket a fluorescent green scarab beetle—the same one that had locked and unlocked the front door of his house on the Outside.
The living key burrowed beneath the bark of the tree and the dull clatter of countless bolts could be heard. An opening formed in the bark, just wide enough to allow everyone to file inside the giant tree, then closed again immediately.