Wonderland End

Chapter 5

Beatrix awoke laying on something cold and damp. A strange smell creeped through the dewy air. It was not quite revolting, the strangest part was the fact that Beatrix couldn't even possibly pinpoint something remotely similar to it. She lay there, focused on the smell, and a curiously long moment had passed before she realised that her eyes were open. They were peering upwards towards a sky of leaves. They were grey and aged. Dry, tired from the time and years they had seen, from the countless cycles of the moon rising and setting. Still a peculiar sparkle surrounded them. A sparkle that emulated moonlight, twinkled and whispered the same way it did. Icy air enclosed Beatrix all over. She breathed in, planted her hands on the grass beneath her and awkwardly pushed her body upwards.

A cool fog laid gently settled near the ground. Some leaves and flowers peeked through it. They were strange flowers. Some pitch black, others clear like glass, some milky white and dewy. They all looked curiously sullen. The branches of the trees and hedges formed swirls and patterns unlike anything Beatrix had ever seen or even imagined. It was like Wonderland. Except it was foggy, dark, cold, and brooding. It seemed to sigh with misery in sync with Beatrix. Sigh as though it wanted to cry out and sob, but it had already done that so much to the point that it was far too exhausted to continue.

Beatrix made her way to her feet. The cold of the grass beneath her numbed and poked at her feet. The moon was nowhere in sight, but the moonlight was still present. Present in the leaves and flowers. In the dewdrops hanging suspended from the frail branches. It twinkled, subtly illuminating the solemn greyness.

The girl spun her head around, but found no sign of the tunnel she had been in just a moment ago. But was it really just a moment? It felt as though it might have been a very, very long time. If it had been seconds or years was a complete mystery. Her memories were blurred, smudged together, weaving and intertwining like the branches of the trees in this mystic Wonderland. A sliver of Beatrix supposed that perhaps she had lived here her entire life, however she knew that was impossible. It had to be.

Beatrix stepped forward. Her left foot sunk into the damp mud, and then her right foot. She made her way through two thick trees. Their trunks were carved with strange symbols. Spirals, crosses, dancing patterns. They reminded Beatrix of the ancient celtic art she had read about as a little girl.

She made her way through the trees but it all seemed exactly the same. No different. The spiral was nowhere in sight. She turned on her heel and started tracing back her path. Through the trees, the ones with strong, thick trunks and burly roots, and the ones with marcescent branches draping from their feeble mothers. Sombre, moon-coloured mushrooms peered out at Beatrix as she scurried past them. The thin fog waltzed flabbily around her. She tripped on stones and roots, leaving her feet bruised and calloused, and still nothing remotely familiar had met her eyes.

Beatrix plopped down onto a cold, mossy stone and forlornly whimpered into her palms. She curled her head into her knees and bound her body with her weak, tired arms with the remaining strength and warmth that they had left. Muffled sobs sounded from her throat. Despondent, lost. Perplexed was a dire understatement.

Beatrix began rewinding the events she could recall, however she was brusquely roused from her thoughts interrupted by a loud breath that blinked passed her ear and knocked her shook her upright. The source of the sound was nowhere in sight, yet she suddenly realised something; she was not alone. Whether that was a source of hope or danger had yet to be discovered though.

"Hello?" Beatrix called out over a suppressed cough, "Is anybody there?"

Silence. She stood up and silently flinched at the pain that returned to her feet.

"Say something," she repeated, almost angrily. She swung around her head, trotted through some of the trees, but received no response. Beatrix stood in silence, leaning against a moss-coated trunk. Her head began to throb again. A hammer smashing her brain. She grunted in a troubled ardour and squeezed her eyes shut, and then heard a sound. A quiet — pleasant, even — little murmur. Like that of water. A creek.