Birdie's Book - Andrea Burden [38]
“Change happens. Life happens.” Kerka stared at me. “Death happens. … ”
That hit me like a ton of bricks. Kerka’s mother had died, and here I was complaining about moving across the country, still complaining about my own mom. I was mortified. I took a deep breath. Then, all of a sudden, I recognized that this was the power of the shadow at work. I moved my hand to my heart and was filled with warmth again.
“You’re right, Kerka,” I said quietly. “I’m sorry. I’m just scared.”
I could see Kerka struggling with something, and then she put her hand on her heart, too. I saw her body relax, and she closed her eyes.
She opened her eyes after a few moments. “Let me help you,” she said. “Just imagine that the bugs are fake, plastic toy bugs. I bet you are good at imagining things.”
“Okay,” I said. That sounded like it might be possible. “I can do that.”
“Take my hand, and we’ll just go,” said Kerka. “Don’t think too hard about it. And be careful. Remember how scared I was to go swimming, and it all turned out okay? This will, too, I promise.”
She held out her hand, and I took it, trusting her as I had trusted Mo the first time I crossed her bridge. Kerka pulled me onto the bridge, just like that. I marched behind her, eyes on the slats, thinking, plastic bugs, plastic bugs, and when I felt a few crawl on me, I thought, wind-up plastic bugs, wind-up plastic bugs.
We reached the other side, and Kerka stood back as I screeched my head off and shook bugs every which way. When they were all off me and I stood quivering, I saw that Kerka was laughing.
“Oh, Birdie, I am sorry,” she said. “But you are so funny! All that jumping and screaming!”
I laughed weakly, seeing her point. “I swear, I am not usually such a scaredy-cat,” I said, shivering from the cold now. “But I really hate bugs—and heights.”
“So do a lot of people,” said Kerka. “One of my sisters doesn’t like heights, and my mother hated bugs, too.”
“I like worms,” I said, trying to redeem myself a little. “And bees and butterflies are nice.”
“Well, then you must be okay,” Kerka said, grinning. “Shall we continue now?”
I nodded. We turned toward the maze and the dark tree that loomed at its center. The wind blew leaves in little whirlwinds down a path that wound through the thorny bushes and vines, right to the entrance of the maze.
Lightning cracked over the tree, and thunder rumbled. But there was no rain, no soothing, healing rain.
I pulled my cloak around me. Kerka held out her Kalis stick like a tennis racket (I guess she was going to whack away anything she saw). We stepped onto the path. Nothing moved except the wind, so we kept going. Kerka let me lead, so I saw the lights first, just as we reached the maze.
The maze walls were ten feet tall here in Aventurine, and the lights came through them, moving like the stars had outside of my bedroom window. I stopped, and Kerka bumped into me. “What are they?” I whispered.
Kerka looked up and saw them.
“They must somehow be the Shadow Tree’s helpers,” whispered Kerka, sounding as scared as I felt.
“Kerka, we have to run as fast as we can,” I said. I knew if the lights saw us, they’d attack us. I don’t know how I knew, but I did. “I think I can find the way through the maze.”
“I’ll be right behind you,” Kerka whispered.
I ran, choosing my way by pure instinct. I forced myself not to question but just to feel. Finally, I knew we were close to the middle. I went from running to trotting, then walking, until I stopped. Kerka stopped, too.
I thought we needed to rest before we actually tried to do what we needed to do next. What that was exactly, I didn’t know. From where we were, we had a clear view of the tree; the lights rested on the tips of the tree’s barren branches. They seemed to be waiting for something. The dark clouds hovered like smoke over the tree.
“It knows we’re here,” whispered Kerka. “The Shadow Tree knows we are here.”
“How do you—” I began.
Suddenly the lights flew from the tree like a swarm of bees. They dove for