Through a Tangled Wood
* * *
The coldness of metal bars pressing against her face woke Gretel up. Bright lights assaulted her eyes, and she waited for her vision to adjust.
All around her, Gretel saw bars as thick as her finger. Above her, below her, and to every side. She was inside a cage, larger than the dog cages her neighbors used but not quite large enough for her to stand upright. The cage was inside a room as large as her family’s home, and there was nothing else inside except for more cages, some stacked on top of others. Almost all of the cages, however, were empty. The only other unoccupied cage held her brother’s still form.
“Hansel!”
The boy turned, hitting his arm against the side of his enclosure. Instantly, he woke up. Startled by his surroundings, Hansel stammered, “What? Where?”
“Hansel,” Gretel repeated. When her brother’s focus finally found her, she asked, “Are you all right?”
Hansel ran a hand through his hair and rubbed his eyes. “I think so. What happened?”
“The old woman made us fall asleep.”
“The old woman? She put us in here? Why?”
“I don’t know.”
Before she could add more, the door to their room opened, and the elderly woman stepped inside.
“Finally awake, children?”
She approached Hansel’s cage first. The woman squinted at him as if to assess his condition. Nodding slowly, she walked toward Gretel. She reached inside her pocket for a set of keys. The woman tried to fit one into the lock without success, then fumbled for another. The second key unlocked the cage’s door.
As soon as the door opened, Gretel burst out, but the old woman brought her hand up to Gretel’s arm.
The girl screamed in pain and fell to the ground.
“Gretel!” Hansel shouted. “What have you done with her?”
Instead of answering, the old woman bent down at the waist to address Gretel. “Don’t try anything else, girl, or it’ll be even more painful next time.” She held out the source of the punishment for Gretel to see.
The device was unlike anything Gretel had encountered before. It was small enough to fit in the woman’s hand and roughly rectangular with two prongs at the end. Obviously Old World tech. Not wishing to endure the excruciating pain again, Gretel nodded her comprehension of the woman’s warning.
Reaching into another pocket, the old woman pulled out a spool of twine. She thrust the spool into Gretel’s hands. Holding her torture device at the ready, she said, “I’m going to open your brother’s door. I want you to go inside and tie him up. Make sure he’s bound tightly. If not, I’ll stun both of you. And don’t even think of trying to escape. Got it?”
“Yes,” Gretel replied weakly. She still felt woozy from the first dose the old woman gave her.
On her initial try this time, the woman successfully unlocked Hansel’s cage. Gretel and Hansel shared a quick look, both agreeing to follow the woman’s commands for the time being. Gretel unwound the spool and began binding her brother. She didn’t tie him up as tightly as she was asked to, but she hoped the old woman’s failing vision wouldn’t allow her to see that. For added effect, Hansel complained about how Gretel cut off his circulation.
Once satisfied that the girl accomplished her task, the elderly woman let both of them out of the cage. She directed the siblings out of the room, down a short hallway, and into another room.
This room didn’t have a door, and it was larger than either of the other two other rooms that Hansel and Gretel were in before. A large box-shaped island stood near the far wall. Its metal exterior gleamed under the lights. An inverted funnel sat above the box, its chimney-like pipe leading up to the roof.
A counter with a sink lined one wall, and other appliances lined another, forming an L shape with the counter. Gretel decided that they were in the kitchen, although she wasn’t familiar with all of the appliances present.
Unexpectedly, the old woman pressed her device against Hansel’s neck. He yelped, his body shook, and then he collapsed to the ground.
“What did you do?” Gretel shrieked.
“He’ll be easier to manage if he’s unconscious,” the woman calmly replied.
“Easier to manage?” Gretel feared what the woman meant.
“Yes, to cook.”
The blood drained from Gretel’s face. Even under the worst scenarios she played out in her mind, she hadn’t imagined what the woman proposed. She originally thought the woman was somehow associated with a band of criminals, and she was holding the two siblings captive until the rest of her group returned. Now, Gretel didn’t dare imagine what kind of monster the woman truly was.
“Are you insane? You can’t cook him!”
Without any trace of repulsion, the old woman answered, “Of course, I can. A lad as big as him will make for good eating for days to come. I haven’t feasted on human flesh in ages.”
Gretel recalled what the woman said about eating animals that she captured in her trap. Was that what they were, trapped animals destined to become the woman’s dinner?
Her first instinct was to run. Even armed with the Old World tech, the woman couldn’t harm her if she couldn’t catch her. But Gretel also couldn’t leave her brother in the house knowing what the old woman intended to do.
Instead, she asked, “After you eat Hansel, will you eat me too?”
“Eventually,” the woman answered casually, as if the girl had asked about the weather. “It depends on how you behave. I’ve needed a servant for a while, since I ate my last one.” She chuckled at the thought. “If you’re good, I’ll keep you around. Maybe you can attract other people to this house, and I won’t need to eat you for a long, long time.”
Gretel swallowed hard. “What do you want me to do?”
The elderly woman walked toward the metal box, and Gretel followed. “First, we need to start up the grill. It’s been a while since I last used it, so it might take some work to light.” She pointed to the lid of the box. “Lift the cover.”
Gretel did as she was asked, revealing an opening atop the grill large enough to fit her brother. She bent over the side and peered into the opening. There was a pit three feet deep. A rack sat at the bottom of the pit, and under it was a layer of ashes. Gretel didn’t want to think of where the ashes came from.
“The tricky part of getting the grill going is the pilot light,” the woman said. Gretel didn’t know what a pilot light was, but she didn’t say a word. The old woman continued, “It’s near the bottom of the pit, and you have to manually light it with this.”
She handed Gretel a stick and showed her how to ignite it. Gretel jumped as a small flame appeared at the end of the stick with the push of a button.
“I’m not as agile as I used to be, so you’ll have to reach down and light it. Tell me when you do, and then I’ll turn up the heat from here.” The woman’s hand reached for a knob at the side of the grill.
Gretel took the fire stick from the woman’s hand. She wondered if she could hurt the woman with it and escape with Hansel. No, the flame from the stick was too small and no match for what the old woman held in her other hand.
“Just light it with this?” Gretel asked, stalling the inevitable.
“Yes. It’ll be your first test as my new servant.”
Gretel crawled on top of the grill. She looked around the pit for where the pilot light might be. “I don’t see it,” she called out.
“It’s to your left, on the bottom near the rack.”
Protruding from the ash-covered side of the pit was a pipe that must have been the pilot light. Gretel reached the stick down to the pipe and flicked it on. At first, nothing happened. She was about to inform the old woman when a flame burst to life. It was small, no bigger than the red and orange bulb that sprang from the end of the fire stick.
Then Gretel decided what she had to do. Instead of reporting her success, she said, “It’s not working. The fire won’t light.”
“Move the flame closer to th
e opening.”
Gretel grunted as she pretended to extend her arm to its limit. “I did. It’s still not working.”
“You must be incompetent!” the old woman growled. “I’ve never had a servant who couldn’t even light the pilot.”
“Can you help me?”
“How am I supposed to do that?”
Gretel reached out her hand. “I’ll pull you up here so you can show me what I need to do.”
“I’m not getting up there.”
Gretel sighed in exasperation. “Then I guess we’re never going to cook my brother.”
The elderly woman paused to reconsider. Then she held out one hand. “Help me up, but don’t pull too hard or I’ll stun you.”
“Yes, of course.”
Gretel held the woman’s hand in both of hers. She pulled the woman toward her until most of her body was on top of the grill. Then, hoping the woman wouldn’t notice, she slid off.
“Here, let me help your legs up.” Gretel shoved both of the woman’s legs into the air.
“Not so rough!” the old woman complained.
Ignoring her, Gretel continued to push the woman’s body further onto the grill.
“What are you doing? Stop pushing!”
With one final shove, Gretel threw the woman into the pit. The woman cursed her worthless servant, but Gretel blocked out the noise. She lifted the cover over the grill, sealing the opening. The old woman tried to push and kick it aside, so Gretel jumped back atop the grill. She sat on the lid while the woman banged mercilessly against it from underneath.
Reaching across the surface of the grill but keeping most of her weight on the lid, Gretel turned the knob that she saw the woman playing with earlier.
A scream tore through the room, threatening to shake the walls to their foundations. The banging against the cover intensified. Gretel didn’t know if she could keep it in place.
Then, just as suddenly as it began, the screams stopped. Gretel felt no more movement under her.
She continued to sit on the cover until the heat from the pit became unbearable.
Finally, Gretel scampered off the grill, but she kept the fire burning inside. There were no sounds or movement from the pit.
She ran to Hansel to check on his condition. With a shake of the shoulders, his eyes blinked before closing again. “Don’t move,” Gretel told her brother when he finally regained consciousness. “I’ll cut you loose.”
She searched for a knife in the kitchen. As she went through the cabinets and drawers, Gretel opened a wide pantry door next to the sink. She was amazed at what she found. Piled in neat rows were cans of preserved meat, fruits, and vegetables. Jars of jam, pickled vegetables, and other less easily identifiable foods sat on shelves above the cans. There was enough to feed her family for months. It must be how the woman survived in the absence of human flesh.
“What’s that smell?” Hansel asked when he was free.
“You don’t want to know. But you’ll want to see this.” Gretel helped him to his feet and led him to the pantry. His eyes grew bigger than when he first looked through the window of the house.
As Gretel briefed her brother on what transpired, Hansel’s expression turned from fear to revulsion to relief. Suddenly, his eyes brightened. “With the old woman gone, do you think we can keep all of this for ourselves?”
“I don’t see why not?” Gretel answered. “She said that she had no other living friends or relatives.”
Hansel licked his lips at the thought of tasting the food before him, but there was even more to it. “Think of it. With all of the Old World artifacts inside this house, we’ve stumbled upon a treasure trove. We’re set for life!”
Gretel smiled. She couldn’t agree more. “Set for life is my middle name.”
She hushed him and passed him a can of food before he had a chance to speak.
About H.S. Stone
Even before he could read, H.S. Stone wanted to write a book. Fascinated by the stories that seemed to leap from his kindergarten teacher's books, he went home and wrote his own book, with illustrations and bound by staples. Of course, since he didn't know how to read or write yet, the book was full of gibberish.
Undaunted, H.S. eventually mastered the ABC's and continued to write throughout his grade school years, adolescence, and into adulthood. Despite earning a degree and working in a field not related to writing, he continued to pursue his writing passion.
Numbers Plus Four, a collection of five short stories, was H.S. Stone's first publication. He has since published a Middle Grade novel, George and the Galactic Games, and two Young Adult books, In the Hands of Children and Beyond New Eden.
H.S. Stone lives with his family in the San Francisco Bay Area.
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