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And just think—here in the network, I'm really nothing but a living brain. A brain with a bad case of heartache. . . .
The Stone Girl scraped her foot against the ground, swaying a little. Clearly it was difficult, even painful for her to wait once the Witching Tree had told her what to do. "I really have to. . . ."
"I know," said Renie. She took a deep breath. "I'm coming. I'm coming with you."
I don't have any choice, she kept telling herself, but it felt exactly like treachery. !Xabbu and the others might never have made it out of that gray . . . whatever it was. They might have been tossed into another part of the network, or they could even be. . . . It was almost impossible even to consider it. I could look for them forever. And this could be my last chance to help Stephen.
Of course, that's assuming I can do anything for him even if I find him, she thought grimly. Considering I can't even get myself offline, that's a pretty big assumption.
"Are you angry at me?" the Stone Girl asked.
"What?" Renie realized they had been walking for a long time without speaking. She had a sudden recollection of what it meant to be with an angry adult, thinking that she was the cause, and was ashamed. Even in the days before her mother had died, her father had been prone to sullen silences. "No! No, I'm just thinking." She looked around at the sparkling trees that still surrounded them, an endless series of leafy tu
"The Witching Tree isn't a place, it's a thing." The Stone Girl was clearly relieved: even Renie's invincible ignorance did not draw the usual look of disbelief. "There are lots of places it can be—that's why we had to go look for it."
"And we found it . . . where?"
"Here. I told you, it's always in the Wood."
"And where are we going?"
The Stone Girl considered for a moment. "I don't know for sure. But I think we'll have to go through More Very Bush and maybe even Long Done Bridge. It's really hard to cross there."
"Cross. . . ?"
"The river, silly." Renie's companion frowned. "I just hope we don't have to go through Ji
More Very Bush and Ji
The Stone Girl put her hand up to her mouth. "I don't want to talk about it. We don't want to go there. But there are Ticks and Ji
Ticks and Ji
"What are Ticks? Are they as bad as Ji
"Worse!" The little girl gave a theatrical shudder. "They're all starey. They have too many eyes."
"Ugh. I'm convinced. So if we have a long trip ahead of us, shouldn't we stop and sleep? I'm tired, and you, if you'll excuse me saying so, are definitely up past your bedtime."
Now her small guide did indeed put on a look of disgust. "Go to sleep in the Wood? That's a stupid idea."
"Okay, okay," Renie said. "You're the boss. But how far do we have to go before we can get some sleep?"
"Until we find a bridge, silly."
Properly told off, Renie subsided.
As the flying-saucer moon hovered overhead, showing no signs of moving toward a horizon, they walked deeper and deeper into the forest—deeper, Renie knew, because the trees got taller and taller around them. They had long since left the black lake and its sentient tree behind, but Renie could not help feeling observed, although she was not sure whether by the small, secretive eyes of invisible forest dwellers or by some larger, more godlike entity. The clearings, with the branches arching cathedral-high overhead, glittering with fairy-lights like a sky full of bright stars, seemed particularly watchful. The weird, cartoonish beauty of the setting could not overcome the hackle-raising sensation of traveling through enemy territory.
Well, why shouldn't it feel this way? she thought. If I'm right, I'm not just inside the network any more, I'm inside the operating system itself—right in the belly of the beast.
Pulling her blanket-cloak tighter around her to ward off a forest breeze, Renie suddenly touched the lumpy shape of the lighter underneath her top, pressed against her breast.
"Oh, no! I called Martine. . . ." In the unceasing strangeness since then, she had completely forgotten her distress call from the hillside, with the Ji
The Stone Girl stopped, eyebrow dents raised in astonishment, to watch Renie pull the small shiny object from inside her clothing and speak into it. "Martine, can you hear me? Martine, this is Renie, can you hear me?"
No answer came back to her. Renie shook the lighter as though it were a stopped watch, conscious even as she did so how stupidly RL the gesture was. It made no difference, anyway: the lighter remained as silent as a stone.
They walked on, Renie adding the horror she must have visited on Martine and anyone else with her to her list of sins.
It's getting to be a long list, she thought. Failed to find my brother, didn't do anything useful to interfere with the Brotherhood's plans, deserted !Xabbu and Sam, and also called my other friends and made them think I was about to get killed.
Yes, but you really were about to get killed, she reminded herself. Ease up, girl.
As they walked on through twinkling trees and woodland dells carpeted by dark grass that wavered without wind, studded with circles of pale, dully-shining mushrooms, Renie began to feel a different kind of liveliness to the Wood. She began to hear rustles in the foliage and once or twice thought she saw shadows just disappearing around a bend of one of the long open pathways before them. She mentioned it to the Stone Girl, who nodded sagely.
"Other people going to the Well," she said. "The Ending is coming fast, I guess."
"So they're not . . . Ji
The Stone Girl managed a tiny smile. "We'd know."
The vast moon had still not moved noticeably from one side of the sky to another, but Renie had just decided that it had perhaps slipped a bit lower when they saw the camp-fire on a small knoll ahead of them through the trees. The Stone Girl hesitated for a moment, peering at the flicker of light, then lifted her stubby finger to her mouth for silence and led Renie forward. Strange shapes were clustered around the flames. The Stone Girl slowed again, leaning forward and squinting, then straightened.
"It's just dwarfs," she said cheerfully, taking Renie by the hand.
A sentry shape at the edge of the knoll lifted a stick and said, "Who goes there?" in a high, querulous voice.
My God, Renie thought. More children. Is everyone in this place a child?
"We're friends," the Stone Girl a
The creatures huddled around the fire watched their approach warily. Renie was at first secretly pleased to see that the dwarfs numbered exactly seven, but discovered a few moments later that she was a little less comfortable with how they actually looked. They might be someone's idea of dwarfs, but as with so many things she had seen lately, it was a very curious kind of idea.
The little men were all dwarf-high—the nearest, the stick-wielding sentry, stood no taller than Renie's hips—but although the Other, if it was indeed the creator, apparently understood that dwarf meant small, it had accomplished this not by miniaturizing a normal person, but by leaving out or rearranging parts. The dwarfs had faces that grew right out ol their chests, and after she had studied the awkward gait of the sentry, who had fallen into step beside them, she realized that his legs ended at the knee: there was no joint in the middle, which made the little fellow walk something like a penguin. His arms, however, were of normal length: he used them to aid his movements, knuckle-walking like a chimpanzee.