The Book Man, Chapters 47-48 (Revised)

47 NUTS AND BERRIES

Narodnaya’s voice followed him for a long while after she vanished behind him, ringing in his head even as the mountain range and the forest before it grew large in his sight. By the time he reached the edge of the forest, the sun was setting and he was chilly from spending the day in damp clothes. At least his pounding heart had slowed, and he would not have to spend another night sleeping on the bog.

He nestled against the base of an oak tree right on the edge of the forest. The bark was rough, but the trunk was curved inwards in a way that fitted his body perfectly, and the grass beneath him was soft and (more importantly) dry. He still wanted a fire, but this would do for now.

Christian watched the sun sink lower on the horizon until his stomach rumbled; he had eaten nothing since Mr. Catcher’s stewish concoction. His jaunt in the Otherworld would be much longer than he had planned for, but he had no food and no inkling of when he would come across people.

He stood up and stretched; faint evening sunlight slanted through the woodland. Perhaps he could find some nuts and berries to eat for his dinner. With that thought in mind, he headed into the trees.

The forest was old growth, full of knotty trees so tall and spreading there was hardly any undergrowth. The light shone dim through the pillars of the trunks. Christian kept in sight of his oak tree; he did not see a path marked. Eventually he would have to go through the forest anyway, but for now he preferred not to get lost.

Christian knew where in the woods to find edible plants thanks to his collection of field guides, but it was difficult to identify the plants he found by the lessening light of the sunset, especially without a book in hand to direct him. These ones, growing right on the edge of the bog, might have been wild carrots, but they might also have been poison hemlock, and in the dim light he could not tell which. He sighed and continued looking.

After a while he had a good collection of blueberries, blackberries, elderberries, and walnuts. He ate slowly in the hopes another magical creature would appear out of nowhere and help him somehow, although he would prefer if the next magical creature was not so frightening as Narodnaya.

No magical creature, however, frightening or otherwise, appeared to him. Large black squirrels scampered overhead and peered down at him, taking the walnuts he offered (he couldn’t open them). Birds sang in the distance, a final chorus before they bedded down for the night. For a while he tried to identify the birds by call, when he could hear them over the squirrels’ quarreling, but he had never been able to figure out how bird calls were supposed to sound from the way they were spelled out in his field guides. Even so, it was nice to sit beneath the oak tree, listening to the birds as the squirrels fought over the walnuts.

Had his heart not palpitated now and then in anxiety over Liza, he would’ve had a pleasant time of things. He comforted himself with the thought that she might have come out in the Sunforest as they had meant to and found her husband already—perhaps she and Conrad had returned to the park by now. Wherever they were, he hoped they were as safe and comfortable as he was at present.

Exhausted by his adventures, he fell asleep quickly, but he shivered awake sometime just after dawn. His clothes had never fully dried out and now the early-morning breeze moved through them and chilled him. His limbs felt even stiffer than the night before. He arose with a cracking in his spine and arms, stretched, and wandered into the woods for his breakfast. As daylight grew, he found edible berries more easily than he had the night before and took pleasure in the way walking through the trees provided his legs with relief from their stiffness. He was still cold, but he thought if he walked long enough he might warm up; so after his breakfast, he headed on his way.

After only a few minutes of walking, however, he found himself by the oak tree again. Well, he thought, at least he hadn’t gotten lost. He turned and went back into the forest. But within half an hour he was back at its edge.

The third time, Christian thought he was making real progress. He was still in the forest after an hour, two hours, three hours. But toward the end of the fourth hour, he saw (with a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach) an elder tree he thought was the one he’d raided for his breakfast. Sure enough, five minutes later he found himself back where he’d started.

He sat beneath his oak tree, defeated. The squirrels descended upon him, sniffing for food. Slight comfort he had not become more lost in his wanderings, when his second day in the Otherworld was nearly half over and he was no closer to finding Liza, her husband, or Morrow—no closer, in fact, to putting Narodnaya’s cheerless lands behind him.

His stomach rumbled. He stood up and dusted himself off. At least he knew he could find more berries for his dinner, although he would have preferred something more substantial. Some kidneys, maybe, or perhaps salmon poached in a lemon-butter sauce.

The thought of fish made him realize how thirsty he was. The only water nearby was that of the bog, but he wasn’t sure bog water was safe to drink. When he remembered the hand he’d seen beneath the sphagnum, he felt so queasy that he thought he might never be thirsty again.

The chattering and calls of the squirrels and birds rose to a crescendo at sunset and then died away. Christian was still picking berries as darkness fell. He was hungry, and between him and the animals most of the low-hanging branches near his oak tree had been stripped of their fruits. He ate as he picked, but when he headed back to the tree his hands were still full of berries—until his foot caught on a fallen branch and sent him sprawling into the dirt. Berries flew from his hands and rolled away as he landed on his stomach. Something hard rolled out of a trouser pocket and collided with his knee.

“Ouch,” he said. He sat up, rubbing his knee, and felt around for the thing that had hurt it. His hand closed on something hard and misshapen. It was bumpy at one end and all through the middle, pointy at the other end. He had a feeling he knew what it was, but he brought it back to the oak tree to examine it.

One of the garden gnomes had climbed into his pocket again and was frozen in statue form in his hand.

“If only you were alive,” Christian said to it. “I’d be glad of some company.”

A familiar (and rather unwelcome) female voice sounded in his head.

Then ask for it.

48 NARODNAYA

Christian leapt to his feet, banging his head on a low-hanging branch. His eyes watered.

“Ouch,” he said again. “What are you doing here?”

Narodnaya floated before him, glowing faintly green in the darkness. Her eyes shone so bright they dimmed the stars overhead.

Escorting you out of my lands. Though you seem to be having so much trouble leaving that I wonder if I should not escort you farther.

“No, thank you, that won’t be necessary,” Christian said hastily. “I’ll be leaving in the morning.”

I thought you were leaving this morning.

Christian blushed to think she had seen him going in circles. Perhaps he should ask her for help after all, but he was embarrassed by his own ineptitude.

“I changed my mind,” he mumbled.

You got lost three times.

Christian blushed harder, but he sat back down, folded his arms, and said, “Tomorrow I’m really leaving. Now, if you don’t mind—” Narodnaya arched her eyebrows at him and he sputtered, “That is to say, if you’ll forgive me, I am incredibly tired.”

Of course.

He felt her watching him as he leaned back against the trunk of the oak tree with his eyes closed. He hoped she would not stay long; then he remembered not to hope that, because she would hear it and might be offended. Her presence made him uneasy until he heard the shuffling and scurrying of nighttime creatures. All around him they prowled, but none came too close. If they did, Narodnaya hissed at them like a demented cat, sending them scampering back into the trees.

Eventually he fell asleep, but he woke up near dawn with a parched throat and a tongue heavy from dehydration. He couldn’t see Narodnaya and thought she might have returned to her bog. Then her voice came from the darkness behind him.

Would you like a drink?

His tongue got in the way when he tried to speak. He thought yes as hard as he could.

Narodnaya sounded amused. There’s no need to shout at me. You’ll make your head explode, thinking that hard.

She drifted in front of him. Cupped in her hands was a massive mushroom cap, overturned and brimming with water. Christian took it and drank eagerly, though he shuddered when their fingers touched. Narodnaya’s skin was as clammy as a dead man’s.

She drew away and gazed at him coldly.

“Thank you,” he stammered.

She pointed off to the northwest and said, There’s a stream that way. If you find it, you can follow it all the way through the forest.

Without so much as saying goodbye, she vanished.