Like an upturned beetle, I rolled onto my back, allowing my head to rest on leaves, twigs, and unlimited piles of worm shit. The thought of porridge in the great hall was incredibly appealing, not helped by the fact my stomach was growling from missing breakfast.
My hand touched the root of the tree. Thick and sinewy ropes spread out like clutching fingers. Travelling my gaze from the roots I sought out the tree which had tripped me up. It was hard to tell, they were all so close together, tightly clustered as if they were hiding something.
I screamed when a prod moved my leg. Scrambling back, I glanced, searching out some rabid wildlife, lurking, ready to eat me alive. But it was just me and the trees.
“Crap,” I grumbled under my breath. I need to get out of here. The only other person I knew in these woods was someone who wanted to kill me.
Cursing and muttering, I rolled over onto my knees, expecting the deep cut to sting like a bitch. I was glancing down to find out why it hadn’t hurt when I was thrust forward head first into the gathering of tight trees by a sharp push from behind.
With a screech, I toppled forward, landing in ivy and small, white wild roses. Scrambling, my hands scraping on sharp thorns, I staggered to stand. Winded and with my pulse thumping in my veins, I turned to find who’d attacked me. I thought it would be Prince. Unable to resist, who’d come to finish what he’d failed to do the night before.
It was the trees.
Crazy. But the only things around, despite me straining to see anything else which would make logical sense, were trees. They were closer, tighter, suffocating. A soft tap nudged my foot and I glanced down, a scream ripping from my lungs.
A long bone lay across my foot. Shrieking, I turned, trying to run away, but the trees were too tight, blocking any available path. My hands flung to the side as I tried to keep my balance, my fingers landing on a smooth hard surface beneath the ivy. “What the hell?” My exclamation was strangled and muted by the wall of green trapping me in. Ignoring the bone as best I could, which was near on impossible, I brushed at the ivy, peeling it away in grasping fists. The stone was smooth and grey, ancient and worn, its surface dimpled and scored.
With my heart racing, I cleared the clinging weeds and flowers until the long rectangle of solid rock was free from its covering. Scrambling, I pulled at some more as sweat dripped down my face and I dashed at it with my arm. The trees watched on as I cleared the stones. Five of them; they were like the stones I’d seen once on the History Channel. Similar to the tapestry hanging on Mrs Cox’s office wall. Instead of standing proud in a circle, they were tumbled down as if they’d been knocked over by a passing giant. It wasn’t the ad hoc positioning that drew my eye. It was the bones. Two human skeletons lay wrapped together tight.
Mae.
I whirled. Who called my name?
With shaking legs and trembling fingers, I crept closer. I should have been screaming and running back for the school, yet the trees seemed to be circling me, supporting me during my gruesome discovery.
Were these what Phil’s parents were searching for? Yet I’d found it with no skill. In fact, I’d fallen over them.
Dropping to my knees, I placed my hand on one of the stones. Deep within its surface a deep rumble met my touch.
“Who are you?” I stared at the bones, my hands itching to reach forward and touch them. “Why are you here?”
A faint glimmer from within the tumble of legs and arms shone in a shaft of light, filtering through the green canopied roof.
Mae.
Leaning forward, I held my breath, my entire being suspended as I reached within the depths of the huddled skeletons.
My palm warmed as I gently eased the gem from the depths of its macabre safe. If breathing wasn’t automatic, surely I would have forgotten.
It was the necklace from the girl in my dreams. The purple, the violet glimmer, was the exact same shade, undisturbed by time. The chain was darkened but still complete. Like it had happened to myself, I could remember the grey-haired Heather giving it to her. I tried to recall the words the woman had spoken, but they were hazy, muddled, as if I were hearing them from under water.
It was impossible. I’d watched enough archaeological programmes on the television to know things didn’t survive like this. Not buried only under plants.
I dropped it around my neck. The most natural action in the world. The most natural thing I’d ever done.
It hung there, glimmering against my white shirt. Above my head the trees shook their leaves.
Impulsively, I covered the stones and the tragic remains that they contained. I wanted to know who they were. I knew the remains were of the girl I dreamed of, and the boy so similar to Tristan Prince. With a heavy heart, I suspected they hadn't had a happy ending. But how, or why? And why above everything else, was I dreaming about them?
Slow tears dripped down my cheeks
