{ELEMENTISTS OF WILLOW FOREST BOOK V} The Journey Across Water

Thomas and Nina

20: Thomas and Nina

One night.

I wasn't exactly planning on going anywhere in particular, really. I just wanted to get away, you know?

I'd shut myself in this room for weeks, so nobody could get to me. It had been stuffy, it had been stained, it had been dull. And suddenly I was running away, free. Not sure what I was free from, but I was certainly free from something, and it felt amazing. Fresh, cold air. Tall, grey buildings, inky blue sky, stars beaming down at me, harsh, knobbly, uncomfortable pavement beneath my feet. Wow, pavement beneath me feet. Air. I didn't care that my hair was knotted and messy, or that I hadn't brushed my teeth for far too long, or that, if I got caught, everyone might not be so lenient.

Oh, right. I'd been banned from leaving the Care Home. And now I was running away from it in whatever random direction my feet felt like going in.

You know what?

W

H

A

T

E

V

E

R

This was my night of freedom, and drama, and adventure. It reminded me a bit of the night I had turned ten; the last night I'd been outside in the dark. I didn't care what happened, or what went on, or anything, because I'd be back through the window into my room of self-isolation, soon.

Just one night.

*

When it got to the point I couldn't run any longer, (so, it must have been, what, a few hours after I'd left Care Home Number Eight? (Les Serpents Rouges, remember, Olivia)), I wound up in some sloppy side-alley. There was next to no light but that which came from far-off lamps and windows, and the buildings either side of me were tall and close, so it was like walking through a tunnel, or a sewer.

No. Mustn't think of Les Serpents Rouges. Mustn't think of them.

It was like a telescope, the buildings. They gave me a channel vision of looking up, so I could see all the stars winking at me, shrouded in clouds of pollution. They were cool, those stars. Like fireworks. All bright, and shiny, and, if you looked real close, you could see that some of them were different colours. Some were bright icy white, of course, but some were more reddish, like rust, or bronze. And there was a big gold one, and a few silvers, and one which was almost kinda green, and-

CRASH.

Les Serpents Rouges!

No, of course it wasn't Les Serpents Rouges. It most definitely couldn't have been Les Serpents Rouges. See, they were in France, and I was most definitely not in France, so it really couldn't have been them, and...

Voices.

And footsteps.

Coming nearer.

"Thomas!"

"It wasn't me who knocked it over. You walked into it."

"So?"

I scrambled behind a pile of rubbish.

"Nina, I was there. They were there. You tripped over the toothpaste and walked into the crates."