The Clearing (Part One)

© 2013 David Jasmin-Green

“Teddy and I demand a bedtime story, daddy,” Helen, Owl and Pussycat's youngest child said as her father tucked her up in bed.

“Well you and Teddy will have to bloody well do without, my little angel,” Pussycat replied, “because you burned all your fairytale books last weekend, remember? You barricaded your brothers in their bedroom and set fire to the door because they beheaded Angelica, your favourite doll, on a jumped up treason charge.”

“You'll have to make one up, then,” the little girl said, a mischievous grin spreading across her face. “No, I've changed my mind, I want a true story. Tell me something that's happened to you, something you've never told anyone before, not even mum or your daft mates down the pub.”

“For your information, madam, my mates are not daft, you pay too much attention to your mother's vacuous ramblings, and she barely knows most of my friends. I can't think of any story worth telling that's happened to me, not anything that I haven't told my friends and especially your mother - I'm no dark horse, I tell my dear wife everything. Anyway, if I did have any interesting stories tucked away I've more than likely forgotten them because-”

“Because your mother dropped you on your head when you were a kitten and the trauma caused occasional memory losses, I know. You'd better think a bit harder, dad, or maybe I'll be forced to tell mum what happened to Mr And Mrs Water Buffalo - their mysterious disappearance caused mum to lose her cleaning job at the big house behind the hat stretching factory. Leading Mr and Mrs Water Buffalo to a grisly end in Blood river backfired on you though, didn't it? After mum lost her cleaning job she had to start working the late shift at the home for elderly sea lions in an attempt to make ends meet, and you have to get off your idle fat arse and look after us instead of snoring in front of the TV all evening or sneaking off upstairs with your laptop and watching films about sexy little minxes who really, really love each other on CatTube.”

“Aah,” Pussycat said, the blood rushing to his face. “How did you know about that, and how did you know about the terrible accident that befell Mr and Mrs Water Buffalo?”

“I know every website you visit, daddy, because no matter how many times I show you how to delete your browsing history you always forget. Oh, and I jumped on the magic scooter you bought me for my birthday and followed you and that nasty Dylan Beetle to Wibbly-wobblyland where you led Mr and Mrs Water Buffalo to the deplorable crocodile that ate them up. It was an awful spectacle for an innocent child to witness, and it's probably caused irreparable mental damage - I've got a good mind to report you to the police and the NSPPC. Unless you can think up a nice, juicy bedtime story exclusively for Teddy and I, of course.”

“You want a story? I'll give you a story, you manipulative little monster, a story so fiendishly juicy it'll make you spew up your supper. I don't know, a six year old girl blackmailing her own father, I don't know what the world's coming to.....”

*************************

“There's a clearing deep in the woods maybe three miles behind our house where, it's whispered in Hog's Bottom when the local busybodies think no children are listening, that the raggle-taggle yokels who live in an assortment of ramshackle cabins in the hills gather for their abominable pagan rituals on dark nights when decent folk are in bed,” Pussycat began. “Stories like that always state that unspeakable things happen on devilishly dark nights, but in real life unspeakable things can happen any time at all. That's why you, Derrick and Alan are told not to play in the woods, though I know you do when you think you can get away with it. Bears and pumas still inhabit those woods and possibly even nastier predators, the Black Forest is no place for unaccompanied children, it's not safe.

When I was a child we were told exactly the same thing by our elders, but we paid scant attention or no attention at all. We thought we knew better, like all kids we thought we were big and bad enough to wander wherever we pleased and no one or no thing could possibly harm us, but our overblown opinion of ourselves was horribly misguided.” Helen wrapped her Pepper Pig duvet tightly around her shoulders and snuggled up to Teddy.

“I was about fourteen years old when my story took place, and my best friend was Vince Tiger. He wasn't a real tiger, but most of his family were stripy gingers or tabbies, hence the name. Secretly I envied Vince because he was a ladies' man, he had the gift of the gab and he always seemed to nab the prettiest girls, leaving me with the fat, spotty mingers, and that's all you need to know about that, young lady..... Vince is a bus driver now, he works for the Magic Bus company and he lives in Kidney End with his llama missus and five kids.

We often played in the woods, but we rarely wandered far from the edge because of the horrible stories we had overheard, but of course we wouldn't admit that. One day we were playing hide and seek. It was Vince's turn to hide, and though I searched high and low after I'd covered my eyes and counted to a hundred – well, eighty five, actually, but don't tell Vince - I couldn't find him in any of his usual hiding places. Foolishly I wandered much deeper into the woods than I ought to have wandered, I should have run home and fetched an adult, but I thought Vince would call me a scaredy cat.

I walked a long way looking inside every hollow tree I came across, I explored every gulley and woodpile, crawled through practically every bramble thicket and even ventured into a narrow bat filled cave, but I couldn't find him. I called his name until my throat hurt, but I received no reply. Once or twice I heard him call me, but he sounded far, far away and I thought my imagination was playing tricks on me..... After a while I heard strange music and the beat of distant drums on the wind, and because I couldn't come up with a more sensible course of action I followed the sound into the dark, wicked heart of the forest.

Eventually I came to the clearing, a roughly circular area surrounded by thick ferns, which provided cover so I could crawl up to the edge without being seen. Vince was in the middle of the clearing tied to a stake behind a big crackling bonfire, and he was surrounded by a bunch of shrieking yokels in black hooded robes like the ones that monks wear.”

“Did the shrieking yokels have pentagrams embroidered on the back of their robes?” Helen whispered, her eyes wide with fear. “And is this a true story, because I have a sneaking suspicion that you're making it up as you go along.”

“It's a true story, and yes, they had pentagrams and moons and stars and weird symbols I couldn't even begin to figure out the meaning of embroidered on their robes, and some of them wore horrid blood red demon masks. The yokels are a mixed bunch, they're outcasts from all levels of society, but the worst of them, the ones that live in the dark, damp, thickly wooded valleys at the edge of the mountains are mostly polecats and pine martens, and it was those devious characters that I saw dancing around the bonfire in front of poor Vince chanting in the old barbaric tongue that my father told me about once when he was drunk, a relic ritual language from the dawn of time that nowadays is only spoken in a handful of isolated places.

I picked out just three creatures who weren't polecats or pine martens. There was an ancient, heavily tattooed albino toad sitting in front of a bloodstained stone altar and a tall statue of a horned deity at the far edge of the clearing. The toad was banging manically on a set of shaman's drums and he had a pair of scrawny crows at his side playing a sitar and a set of pan pipes and singing a plaintive lament that made my flesh crawl even though I had no idea what the words meant. Vince was about to be sacrificed to Old Horny, I was convinced of that, and I offered up a silent prayer to the one true God for guidance.”