Hob
They couldn’t keep me out of the forest. The very next day after Father banned us from going into the forest I was back in there, but I had to go alone, as neither Beauty nor Milady would come with me. I tried to find my way back to the cottage, but the path was lost among hundreds of other tiny trails in the forest and I could not work out which one it was. It was strange being there on my own. I always liked being alone, but I liked it better when it was my choice.
My sisters were waiting for me when I came back out of the forest. I had only been gone for an hour or so, although it seemed far longer to me.
“I didn’t promise,” I said.
“I know you didn’t,” Milady said. “You won’t go back in there again, will you?”
“No,” I said reluctantly. “It wasn’t the same. But I don’t see why we suddenly aren’t allowed to go into the forest anymore.”
“You should ask Mother or Father, then.”
“I did. They both said I should just do as I was told and not ask questions.”
“Oh.”
“Are they still angry?” Beauty asked.
“They aren’t angry at you, Beauty,” Milady reassured her.
“I think they are cross with each other,” I said. “I wish we knew why.”
“We just have to wait and hope they sort it out,” Milady said. “Hopefully they will let us go back in a while. We just have to be patient.”
“But I’m not a patient person - it’s against my nature,” I argued.
“We know,” Milady said, a picture of perfect patience. “But you will stay out of the forest for a while, won’t you?”
I nodded.
“What are we going to do while we can’t play in the forest?” Beauty asked. “Where are we going to play?”
“In the attic and around the house and we still have the gardens,” Milady said. “We manage when it is too cold or wet for the forest.”
We did, but it is one thing to stay in a place by choice and quite another to be forced into it. The attic, once such a thrilling place to play, was now dull to me and the games of my sisters did not interest me in the slightest. The world I lived in had shrunk – it was contained in the walls and ceiling of the house, in the boundaries of our lands. Beauty and Milady did not seem to mind this forced contraction so much and within a week or two had almost forgotten that we had ever lived any other way, but I was always looking over towards the forest and my mind wandered there, even if my body could not. I think Mother felt the same – whenever we were in a room with windows that faced that way she would sigh and try not to look that way at all.
I found a way of enlarging my world by breaking one of its boundaries. Although the attic had ceased to interest me, the world outside the windows did not. One afternoon, while Beauty and Milady were out in the garden and I was staring out towards the mountains on the horizon it occurred to me that I could probably open the windows. I had always been too small before, but this time when I tried I could reach the stiff latch and I managed to force it open.
The fresh air rushed into the room and for the first time in weeks I felt able to breathe properly. I wanted to feel the wind on my skin and I thought I could probably manage to climb out onto the roof, so I did.
I crawled out onto the sloping tiles before I really thought about it, and when I looked down and saw the garden so far below, I panicked. The wind felt as though it as trying to push me off the roof and for a moment I lay absolutely still, not daring to move a muscle except to cling onto the roof. I looked down into the garden and I saw Milady and Beauty walk out along the path. I thought about shouting down to them and waving, and I pictured the look on Milady’s face if she saw me and I laughed. Suddenly I wasn’t afraid anymore and I have never been afraid of heights since.
