Into the Wild (16 page)

Julie wasn’t the third son or the youngest of seven daughters. She didn’t have butter-yellow hair or skin as plastic smooth as Barbie’s. What would the Wild make her be? What if she was forced to play a stepsister? Or a stepmother? Or a serving maid who displaced a princess?

Breathe, Zel told herself. Most likely, one of the others had saved her. Julie could be in Florida with the fairy godmother right now. Or she could be in Cindy’s car, fleeing across the Midwest. She could be at a McDonald’s in Indiana.

Or she could be trapped in a gingerbread house.

Or inside a wolf’s stomach.

Or at the bottom of a well.

Zel resumed her pacing. She hated this. She had hated it centuries ago, and she hated it now. All she could do in this idiotic tower was think and worry. She wanted to scream. She wanted to hurl herself at the Wild and tear it apart branch by branch.

Been there; tried that. Was she doomed to repeat it all? Would she ever see her daughter again? She thought of her husband, and suddenly it hurt to swallow. It could happen, she realized. She could lose them both. She wouldn’t get to see Julie grow up. She’d never see her graduate. She’d never attend her daughter’s wedding. She would never see the time come when Julie was ready to be friends, not just mother and daughter. Some idiot had made a wish and, in seconds, taken it all away from her.

No, not an idiot: someone who knew exactly when Gothel would be away from the well, someone who knew the three bears would be guarding it, someone who knew their habits and weaknesses. All the evidence pointed to one of their own kind. But how could anyone who knew this world as it truly was want to return to it? No matter how many years passed, no matter how bad their lives were outside the Wild, how could anyone forget that “fairy-tale perfect” was a lie? Maybe an ordinary person, someone who didn’t know firsthand, could glorify the Wild Wood, but Zel could not imagine how bad life would have to be to knowingly choose this endless oblivion—and to knowingly condemn everyone to this hell. Yes, hell. Zel closed her eyes and took a deep, ragged breath, trying to stay calm. It couldn’t be one of their own who did this. She knew that much.

Beyond that, she knew little else. After she’d tried and failed to call Ursa, Gothel had left for the motel. She had told Zel to stay home with Julie. Most likely, there wasn’t a problem, she’d said. But when she didn’t report back, Zel followed her—and arrived too late. The Wild had already begun to grow. Zel knocked on every door and evacuated all the guests she could find; then she went into the motel office, where she found the three bears asleep over the drugged porridge. Gothel was nowhere to be seen. Zel went out the back door into the overnight-ancient forest, intending to go straight to the well and undo the damage. But the Wild, of course, had other plans, and Gothel dragged her off to a tower. Just like old times.

At first, the “tower” was nothing more than the motel office, its doors and windows sealed with vines. But the Wild grew fast, and soon she was taken to the top floor of the old town hall, then to the steeple of the Unitarian Church, then to the clock tower of the Worcester court-house. Finally, the Wild moved her here, to a place that seemed custom-made for her, the Shakespeare in the Park tower. Built to resemble a miniature feudal castle, it already had a turret, arrow slots, and a portcullis when the Wild came. All the Wild had to do was add another three levels and seal the doors into solid stone, and the park monument made a perfect Rapunzel’s tower. It would remain usable for centuries with minimal additional effort from the Wild. The Wild would barely have to change anything for Zel to reenact her story. How convenient. How expedient. How lucky.

Zel heard a pop from outside. What was that? Was it the witch already? Please, not yet. She wasn’t ready yet. She crossed the room in three steps. “Is anyone there?” She looked out the window.

“Mom?” she heard.

No, it couldn’t be. Zel leaned out the window so far that her feet lifted off the floor. “Julie?”

Julie came running around the corner of the tower with Boots behind her. He was in full Puss-in-Boots regalia, and he had a wand poking out of one boot. She was in ordinary jeans and a sweater, plus those ridiculous sandals. “Mom!” she shouted.

“Julie!” She could have wept. Her daughter, here, in the flesh . . . in the Wild. “What are you doing here? You should be miles and miles from the woods! Why didn’t you run?”

“I came to rescue you!” Julie said.

Oh, no.

On his hind legs, Boots waved up at her. “Hello, Rapunzel!”

Julie called, “Let down your hair, Mom!”

“Oh, Julie,” Zel said. “I cut my hair five centuries ago.”

She watched her daughter’s smile fall. It felt like a fist in her heart. “But the witch said the ogre . . . and then the magician . . . I crossed the endless ocean! I did the impossible tasks! I won the ring!” Julie held up her hand, but her finger was bare. With its use, the ring had disintegrated. “It’s gone!”

Zel closed her eyes. “Oh, pumpkin, you’ve been tricked. You’ve been used. The Wild used you for its stories.” Just like old times. Only in the old days, it hadn’t been her daughter that it had in its grip.

All the pain, all the loss—the whole escape had been to save Julie. Zel had done it all so her child wouldn’t grow up a slave to the stories, so she could be her own person. She had even asked Gothel to use her magic to delay Julie’s birth until she was sure they were free. We
were
free, she thought. It wasn’t fair.

Julie should have run. What had she been thinking, playing hero? She was just a little girl. Zel’s little girl.

Zel opened her eyes and looked out again, afraid she was gone. Hands clenched, Julie was staring at the forest. Zel felt déjà vu as she watched the transformation come over her daughter. Julie’s back straightened and her chin lifted. She looked up at her mother with a fierce expression on her face, an expression that Zel had never seen her wear. For an instant, Julie reminded her of herself. Was that how she’d looked when she’d fought against the Wild? “How do I stop it?” Julie said.

“You don’t,” Zel said firmly. “You get out of here. Run as far away as you can.”

Just as firmly, Julie said, “I’m not leaving you.”

“It’s too dangerous.” Believe me, she thought. I know what I’m talking about. She’d seen the horrors: red-hot iron shoes, barrels full of nails. Once, she’d seen a woman thrown into a cauldron of vipers. “I want you to leave these woods.”

“How? It’s not going to let me waltz out.”

Julie was right. For a long moment, Zel stared out of the tower at the vast expanse of the Wild Wood. She’d been in the woods for hundreds of years before she was able to face the Wild. Julie was only twelve. But twelve or not, the Wild would make her a character, and there was only one character she could be if she wanted to escape. “You’ll have to hurry,” Zel said. “The Wild is in chaos now because it’s growing. But the same chaos that makes it possible to switch from story to story also makes it possible for the Wild to present you with trap after trap. The longer you take, the more chances the Wild will have to surround you with stories—eventually, it will trick you into a story ending, and you’ll forget who you are. That’s how we lost the Great Battle. You will have to move quickly, and you can’t stop. And above all else,
you must avoid story endings
.”

“Where do I go?” Julie asked.

“You need to make a wish,” Zel said. “You need to go to the Wishing Well Motel and make a wish. But it has to be the wish that’s dearest to your heart or the Wild will find a way to make it come out wrong.”

“I’ll do it, Mom,” Julie promised.

“You have to beat the Wild at its own game. It’s the only way to defeat it,” Zel said. Battles, tricks, persuasion, none of it had worked. “The Wild has to play by its own rules. Remember that.”

“I will,” Julie said. “I love you, Mom!”

Zel’s throat clogged. There were a thousand things she wanted to say . . . First was: Don’t go. Sending her daughter off . . . She’d already lost her husband; she couldn’t lose Julie too. “Julie . . .”

“Yeah, yeah, I’ll be careful.”

“Have an uneventful day,” her mother said.

Julie waved and plunged back into the forest.

“I love you!” Rapunzel called after her.

The forest swallowed Julie and the cat without a sound.

Chapter Nineteen

Goldilocks and the Beanstalk

Out of the sun and away from her mother, Julie didn’t feel so brave. She was in Worcester now—a solid fifteen-minute drive from the Wishing Well Motel, when the highways weren’t covered in moss and griffins. At a walk, it would take hours. Lots of opportunities for ogres and witches and wolves to make life difficult. For the first time ever, Julie found herself wishing for Cindy and her Subaru.

“You cannot do this,” Boots said flatly.

“Hey, how about a little optimism here?” Reaching down, she scratched under his chin. He didn’t purr or tilt his head into her hand. “Boots, what’s wrong?”

“You cannot rescue her,” he said. “You cannot make this wish.”

Jeez, with friends like these . . . “You’re on my side, remember? Boots?” He didn’t respond. Staring straight ahead, he sat stiff like a stuffed doll. “Boots? You okay?”

Mechanically he raised his head to look at her like he was a puppet controlled by strings. She shivered. Something wasn’t right. “Boots?” She had the sudden irrational thought that this wasn’t Boots. “Are you . . . Who are you?” she asked.

“I am the heart of the fairy tale,” the Wild said, through the mouth of her brother.

Oh, no. No, it couldn’t be. Julie rocked backward. The Wild wasn’t alive. It didn’t have a mind. Grandma, Goldie . . . everyone had said it was a force. Like gravity. Mom had never said it was alive. She’d never said it could do this.

“This story must not be. You must find another,” the Wild said. “You will ruin everything.”

The Wild was alive. It was alive, and it was speaking through Boots. She turned and ran. “Mom, Mom!” She wove between trunks. Behind each tree was another and another and another . . . Panting, she slowed. The tower was gone. She turned in a circle—thick trees in all directions . . .

The cat sat on the path.

Julie yelped. “Go away. Leave me alone.”

“I am offering a gift: the world as it should be.”

She shook her head. That made no sense.
None
of this made sense. She was talking to the forest? She was talking to the fairy tale? “This is crazy,” she said. “You’re destroying people.”

“On the contrary,” it said. “I am giving them meaning.”

She didn’t understand.

“I give them a beginning, a middle, and an end; a once upon a time and a happily ever after. I give rewards to the good and punishment to the bad. I give order and sense to an otherwise arbitrary existence.”

Oh, God, she thought, it’s crazy. The forest was insane.

With her brother’s paw, the Wild gestured at the shadowy trees. “In here, life is fair. Everyone has a place. Everyone belongs.” With her brother’s eyes, it looked at Julie. Its eyes were matte black. “I am offering you what you’ve always wanted, Julie Marchen. You can belong here.”

Anger flashed through Julie so fast that it made her shake. “You don’t know anything about me or what I want. You put my mom in a tower. You made me grow up without a dad . . .” She swallowed hard as her voice cracked.

“This is how it must be,” it said. “This is how it is.”

“Yeah, well, not anymore,” she said. “Count me out. Not playing. Game over.” She marched past the cat and down the path. She knew it was bravado. How was she going to cross fifteen miles with the Wild actively against her? How was she going to defeat something that wasn’t just powerful but was also intelligent? How had Mom done it? What had happened
after
the Great Battle? Julie wished she had asked. Yes, Mom had said to hurry, but Julie should have asked. She’d been stupid.

Maybe all along, she’d been stupid. Had the Wild been watching her the whole time, sabotaging her? Had the Wild made Boots take her to the griffin, knowing the griffin would dump her into the water? Had it made Boots pick up the ogre’s wand after she won the ring so that she couldn’t use it now? Or was its interference even further back? Was everything a setup? Was this why she had found Boots with the bikes—so the Wild could possess him? Was this why Boots had been able to avoid his story ending? Had the Wild preserved him to be a pawn? She kept walking.

“You can’t escape,” it said. “Inside me, you play by my rules.”

Over her shoulder, she said, “Yeah? Well, so do you.” Suddenly, Julie had the answer. She almost laughed out loud. It was absurd, but it just might work. After all, the Wild had to play by its own rules! As far as she knew, its rules did not include fairy-tale princesses breaking their royal promises. “Cindy, I’m calling in your promise! I could use that ride now!”