Into the Wild

  “Basted or broiled?” the witch said.

  “Grandma . . .” Her throat clogged. Oh, Grandma! Seeing her like this . . . it was wrong. Yes, Julie knew the stories, but they were Grandma’s past. She’d left this behind centuries ago. She wasn’t evil anymore. She was Julie’s grandmother—fun and smart and sweet and wild.

  Julie held out the dish, and the witch reached for it. Instinctively, Julie gripped the bowl. “Can you hear me, Grandma?” She searched the witch’s red eyes. Somewhere deep inside the witch was Grandma. She had to be. Julie refused to believe she was gone. “I know you’re in there. Grandma, it’s me, Julie. Rapunzel’s daughter. Remember Zel?”

  Gothel’s face contorted, and Julie held her breath—did she remember?—then the expression vanished. Julie’s heart sank. The witch yanked the dish out of her hands and threw it against the wall of the house. Lentils spilled over the floor.

  “There are a thousand pearls hidden on the forest floor,” the witch said. “You must gather them for me.” Grabbing hold of Julie, the witch pulled her onto the broom. Julie yelped as the broom zoomed out of the doorway and then burst up through the branches of the trees.

  Julie and the witch skimmed low over the leaves. Gripping the broom, Julie tucked her feet up as branches slapped her ankles. “Ow, ow, ow!” Without warning, the witch pointed the nose of the broom down, and they dove straight between the trees. Shrieking, Julie shut her eyes as the ground raced up at them. Inches from impact, the witch pulled the broom straight and they zipped over the ground. Dodging trees trunks, they flew along the forest floor.

  The witch pulled to a stop, and Julie slid over the front of the broom. She clung to the tip, and the witch rapped Julie’s fingers with knobbed knuckles. Julie released the broom. A foot from the ground, she landed hard.

  Cackling, the witch flew off into the forest. Slowly, Julie’s heart rate returned to normal and her stomach settled down from her throat. She looked at the surrounding forest, silent and waiting. I could run, she thought. Grandma was gone, and she was out of the chicken house. She could escape this fairy tale and go back to searching for Mom.

  Or go get caught in a different story.

  If only she could’ve made Grandma remember, then Grandma could’ve rescued Mom and they’d all be home by now.

  Julie heard a soft clink at her feet, and she looked down. The ants were piling pearls into a mini-pyramid. She’d get another chance, she realized. She could try again. The witch would return when the ants were done.

  Should she stay? Grandma had almost remembered. Julie was sure of it. If she’d just had a little more time, she would have broken through.

  She had to try.

  Julie looked up at the sky, waiting for Grandma to reappear as the ants completed the second impossible task.

  The witch cackled as she landed beside Julie. “Do you have my pearls?”

  Julie scooped up the pearls and carried them to her grandmother. She poured them into the witch’s waiting hands. “You’re Dame Gothel Marchen,” she said as she poured. “You own the Wishing Well Motel. You guard the wishing well. Someone made a wish for the Wild to be free, and you were trapped . . .”

  The witch frowned at her. “Motel . . .” For an instant, Julie thought: It’s working! It’s working! But then the witch shook herself. “No nonsense from you,” she said. “As I flew across the forest, a ring fell off my finger and landed in one of the streams. You will find it for me.”

  Was it her imagination, or did the witch sound less certain? Was Julie reaching her? In a swirl of cape, the witch leapt onto her broom and flew up into the treetops. Leaves rained down on Julie below.

  She’d have one more chance, she told herself, once she found the ring.

  The ring was in a stream, the witch had said. Julie listened for running water. She walked toward the sound and found a fish waiting patiently for her. He poked his mouth out of the water. “How can I be of aid?” he asked.

  She wasn’t surprised to see him. He was the third animal helper; this was his task. The Wild pulled no punches when arranging coincidences. Was this how it trapped people? By making its stories inevitable? “I need the ring that the witch dropped into one of the streams a few minutes ago. Can you find it for me?”

  “Consider it done,” the fish said. With a regal bow (for a fish), he ducked back under the water. Soon, she saw schools of fish swimming toward him. He swam against the tide, and she heard the burble of fish voices as he asked the other fish about the ring. Fish after fish shook their fish heads, until the water wuffled above them.

  Julie saw a tiny streak of silver—a guppy racing through the water. “Wait! I’m here! I’m here!” the guppy cried. Gulping, she braked with her tail fin. In a formal voice, as if reciting lines, she said, “Please accept my apology. I would not have been late, except as I was swimming, a ring fell out of the heavens and struck me.”

  “You have done well,” Julie’s fish said. “Can you lead us to the ring?”

  Julie followed onshore as the school of fish stretched into a long parade. As the stream became shallower, some of the fish had to leap over rocks to avoid stranding themselves. The forest filled with the sound of breaching fish.

  Finally, the guppy halted. Julie bent over the stream. Wedged between stones, the ring sparkled in a shaft of sunlight. She reached into the cold water and picked it up. A band of carved leaves of pink and yellow gold, the ring winked in the sun as she turned it over in her hand. She felt a lump in her throat. She knew this ring: her mother had given it to Gothel for her birthday two years ago. If Julie couldn’t make Grandma remember this time . . .

  Cackling, the witch soared overhead, and the fish scattered, swimming up and downstream as fast as their fins would take them. The witch landed.

  Julie held out the ring. Snarling, the witch reached for it, but Julie snatched it away. “Do you remember this ring?” Julie asked, waving it at her. “It was dwarf-made. My mother gave it to you. We had chocolate cake, and it was covered in so many candles that we melted the frosting.” Remembering, she wanted to cry. Julie saw the witch’s gnarled hands were shaking. “You can do it, Grandma,” Julie said. “Fight the Wild. You used to babysit me. Remember? You used to make shadow puppets on the wall, entire scenes of shadows with your hands. You used to let me stir your cauldrons. We gathered newts together. Remember. You gave me a talking frog for my fifth birthday, and I brought it in to show-and-tell, and Mom made you change it back into the mailman. Please, remember. Where’s my mother?”

  “Julie?” Gothel said.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Reminders

  Gothel bear-hugged Julie. “Oh, Julie, Julie, my little Julie.” Julie hugged her back just as hard. Grandma remembered! She was free! Bony fingers dug into Julie’s shoulders, and Gothel pushed her to arm’s length. “You shouldn’t be here,” Gothel said fiercely.

  Julie couldn’t have agreed more. “I’m sorry!”

  Gothel relaxed her hold on Julie’s shoulders. “Suppose I should have expected it, given who your mother is.” She smiled at Julie. “She used to be the one to bring me back to myself.” Hobbling nearer to the stream, Gothel eased herself down onto one of the boulders. Julie nearly shrieked—what was she doing? They didn’t have time for sitting. They had to rescue Mom! Gothel continued, “She was the one who found the trick of it, you know: leaving reminders for herself, jump-starting all our memories every time each of us forgot.”

  What was she talking about? “Grandma, we can’t stay here.” She tugged on her hand. “We have to find Mom and get out of here. The Wild’s practically across Northboro already.”

  Gothel stayed seated on the rock. “You are so like your mother,” she said.

  She wasn’t at all like Mom. Julie didn’t understand half of the things Mom said and did. Like having the dwarves over for dinner. Or caring about her stupid hair salon. Or not understanding why Julie was miserable at school and miserable at home. Or worst of all: leaving Julie alone while the
Wild took over the world. Julie wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Her cheeks felt stiff, and she had a sour taste in her mouth. “Grandma . . . I wished she wasn’t my mother.”

  “Zel knew you didn’t mean it,” Gothel said.

  She thought of the look on Mom’s face and knew that Grandma was just saying that to make her feel better. She took a deep breath. “I did mean it,” she said. “When I said it, I meant it. But I didn’t mean . . . for this . . .” She waved her arm at the thick trees, blocking the sky.

  “That’s the beauty of the real world,” Gothel said. “Wishing doesn’t make it so. Outside the Wild, it’s actions that matter. Your choices matter.” Her grandmother reached over and squeezed her hand. “This isn’t your fault. Your wish didn’t make any of this happen.”

  Cindy had said the same thing—it wasn’t possible that her wish had caused this. It wasn’t a magic wish. Julie already knew that. But what if Mom thought that Julie wanted her back in the Wild? What if Mom believed that Julie truly wanted her gone? “Grandma, where’s Mom?”

  “Right where I put her,” Gothel said.

  “Really?” Julie said, feeling a smile spread over her face. Grandma had kept Mom safe! It was going to be over soon. It was all okay.

  “I’m afraid so,” Gothel said. “She’s in her tower.”

  Or not “all okay.” Julie let go of her grandmother’s hand as if it had stung her.

  Gothel sighed. “It’s a new tower. She’ll have to make new reminders. She’ll have to be clever with them—the Wild knows all her old tricks.”

  “Reminders?” Julie asked.

  “The Wild doesn’t transform everything every time; it only changes what’s necessary for the story to happen. So Zel used to leave clues for herself to trigger her memories. She called them her ‘reminders.’ Sometimes she wrote letters to herself on the walls of her tower, different stones each time. Sometimes she left clues in her embroidery. Sometimes she shaped hints out of strands of her hair. Near the end, she wrote messages with her own blood.”

  Mom did that? Wrote in her own blood? Julie couldn’t imagine her dainty mother doing anything like that. “Why?”

  “When you end a story, the Wild locks you down deep inside yourself and forces you to reenact the first event of that story. That beginning is all you know, until and unless someone or something makes you remember,” she said. “That’s how it traps you.” She smiled wanly at Julie. “You are fortunate that this isn’t a sequence at the end of a story. If it were an ending, you too would have lost your memory and you’d now be the poor stepdaughter sent into the woods on your stepmother’s whim. You wouldn’t remember ever being anything different.”

  If that was true (and she believed everything except Mom and the blood), there was no time to waste. Had Mom ended a story? When Grandma rescued her, would Mom remember Julie? Julie wasn’t sure she could stand it if Mom didn’t know her. Julie took Grandma’s hand. “But now you do remember, and we can go find Mom.”

  Gothel extracted her hand from Julie’s. “It’s not that simple.”

  But . . . but she remembered! Now she could come with Julie, rescue Mom, shrink the Wild, and leave. There was nothing stopping her now. “Why not?”

  Her red eyes sad, Grandma said, “Oh, Julie. I can’t be free. No matter how I believed I’d changed, no matter how many years passed . . . I’m the witch. The Wild knew my role as soon as I entered—it owns me. Even if I were to try to escape in between events, the Wild would simply find another story bit that suited me. There are a dozen different tales that could trap me.”

  Julie felt her hopes crumble. “But . . . But . . .” She had an idea, and she grabbed it as if she were drowning: “But what about my reward? This story bit says I get a reward. I want you to . . .” Julie began. The witch waved her hand. “. . . rescue Mom,” Julie finished. A rose and a diamond fell from her mouth. “Ow!” A sapphire popped onto her tongue. She spit it out. “It hurts!” she wailed. “Make it stop!” Her gums bled from the thorns as roses tumbled over her lips.

  Gothel waved her other hand.

  “That was terrible,” Julie said. No jewels or flowers fell out. She wiped the blood from her mouth on her sleeve. “Why did you do that?”

  “It is what I do,” Grandma said sadly. “All the years outside the Wild, all the years of not playing the villain . . . yet here I am again, and this is what I am. Maybe it’s what I’ve always been.” Overhead, the wind blew through the leaves, as if agreeing with Gothel. Maybe it was.

  “You’re not a villain. You shouldn’t listen to stupid, evil trees.” She spat bloody saliva at the foot of the nearest tree. “Can I have my mother for my reward?”

  “I can’t do that,” Gothel said. “I don’t have that power. Only a wishing ring can take you to her.”

  Julie thought of all the items in her backpack. Had one of them been a wishing ring? If only she hadn’t lost it! “Can you give me one?” Julie asked.

  Gothel shook her head. “There’s only one. The magician keeps it on a chain around his neck while he’s awake and in his mouth while he’s asleep.”

  “Can you take me to the magician?” she asked.

  “Only the ogre can take you there.”

  Julie rolled her eyes. “Okay. Can you take me to the ogre?”

  “You must cross the endless ocean.”

  Of course the Wild wouldn’t make it easy for her. Witches, ogres, magicians . . . Julie felt her stomach flip-flop. She wasn’t getting out of a story; she was getting deeper in. “Can you help at all?”

  Gothel’s face contorted, as if she were fighting with herself. “I am sorry,” she said. “You must go. It’s not safe for you to be near me. Go while you can. Go before the Wild finds a role that suits you.”

  She couldn’t leave her. She couldn’t go on alone. “Grandma, please!”

  “Stay clear of stories. Especially endings.” Grandma hugged her quickly, and Julie tried to cling to her. Grandma pushed her to arm’s length.

  Julie felt like crying. “Grandma . . .”

  “Run. Please.” There was something in her voice. Something strange. Something scary. Julie turned from her grandmother and ran.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Wild Bikes

  Sheer crystal, the glass mountain flashed in the sun. Rainbows danced over the grass and trees. Etched in the slope in front of her, Julie read the former sign: WARD HILL SKI AND RECREATION CENTER. With a sinking heart, she blinked up at the sparkling crystal ski slope. The Wild had grown. She was a full mile beyond where she’d left Gillian.

  Unless Mrs. Thomas and Rachel had reached her in time, Julie was certain Gillian was in the Wild. Somewhere. Julie shouldn’t have let her get so close. Never mind that Gillian had wanted to come—Julie had known better. And now the Wild most likely had Gillian and was making her live out a story. Please let it be a safe story. Please let her be okay.

  She’ll be okay, Julie thought, just as soon as I find Mom and Mom stops the Wild—which would happen as soon as she found the endless sea and the ogre and the magician . . . “We’re doomed,” Julie said.

  As if cued by her words, leaves crackled. Branches snapped. Something fast, furry, and orange darted past her. Julie flattened against a tree as a pack of riderless bicycles raced in pursuit. Near the center of the pack, her own ten-speed bounced over the rocks and roots. Her boots, still tied to the handlebars, flapped against the frame.

  Her bike! Her boots! She needed those! “Wait! Bike!”

  Up ahead, their prey squealed.

  Her bike was hunting. How dare it! “Hey!” Julie yelled. “Bike, get back here!” She chased after it, following the path of flattened bushes and ferns.

  In a clearing, the bikes circled. She saw a huddled shape through the blur of bike wheels. Front wheels feinted toward the creature, and the animal shrieked. They were going to hurt it. Maybe kill it. She couldn’t let her own bike do that! Without stopping to think, she bent down, picked up a stick, and threw it at the tir
es. “Stop it!” she shouted. “Leave it alone!” She threw more sticks and rocks, anything that her hand grabbed.

  The bikes broke out of their circle. Oh, no. Her heart thumped faster. Now the bikes would chase her. They’d run her down. Julie backed against a tree.

  But the bikes simply dispersed into the forest. Julie released a breath she hadn’t known she’d been holding. That was close.

  Cautiously, she came out of the trees. In the center of the clearing, the lump of cloth whimpered. “Are you okay?” Julie asked, bending down.

  The cloth was familiar: it was Boots’s cloak. Could it be . . . She pulled back the cloth. An orange tiger-striped cat huddled in a ball. It was Boots! Wait—what if he was lost in a story? What if talking to him would trap her in another fairy-tale event?

  He raised his head. “Julie?”

  He knew her! She leaned forward to hug him and then stopped again. Just because he knew her didn’t mean he wasn’t in a story. It only meant that he hadn’t reached an ending yet. Grandma had said that only story endings caused memory loss. Boots could still be part of a story that could trap her. “Are you okay?”

  Sitting upright, he began to lick himself. “I lost a bit of tail fur to a talking hedge that I ran through. Everything here seems to have cat on its dinner menu. I think I created several new stories—all of them full of chase scenes. Sheer luck that none of the scenes were endings. If things in here weren’t so jumbled, I would have been doomed.” He shuddered and said, “I’d forgotten how horrible this place is. Can we please go home now?”

  He wanted to go home! “Home” was still with her! Julie scooped him into her arms and hugged him. “I’m sorry I said you were a rat,” she said into his fur. “You are a rotten brother sometimes, but you aren’t a rat.”

  He squirmed. “Hey,” he said, “enough with the mushy stuff. Good to see you too. Thanks for saving my life and all that. Can we leave now? Please? Before my luck runs out? I admit I was wrong, okay? I haven’t found the love of my life; I’ve only found trouble.”