Chapter
Sixteen: The Beginning of the Journey
“Alright, let’s head out,” Carol
said as she heaved her pack upon her shoulders.
“Yes, let’s move before it gets too
dark,” Lilli replied.
The girls had decided to travel by
day, but now they had had a late start, and though they paid little attention
to Kumarain’s warnings, about how the evil was weaker by day and stronger by
night, they were confident everything would be fine.
They trudged on until they were very
tired and came upon a little cottage that had a fire inside, and looked rather
welcoming and hostile at the same time. “Well, come on! We might as well see,”
Lulu said as she scooped up Kumarain and bravely trotted towards the cottage.
“Is anyone here?” she said as the fire seemed
to get duller and duller until there was no fire.
Then came the reply. “No. No one is
here, now move along, before…” the voice coughed and became gruff sounding.
“Just get out.”
The girls stared in amazement.
Suddenly Lulu bent down and took something out of her pack. A little book,
titled Lulu’s Journal was produced.
She began flipping very quickly through the pages until an entry appeared. Lulu
read.
October
16th, 2011
Dear
Journal,
I
have decided that I will record all that goes on here in this really rather
beastly little world that Lilli, Carol, and I are half stuck half stranded in.
I must say, the weather here is just as horrible as the rest of the place, so
the weather and world rather match themselves in horribleness. The strangest
turn of events happened today. The beavers (little animals we are traveling
with, and though helpful, I do think that the annoying alpha-beaver would make
a stunning hat for Carol’s little brother!) (She omitted the
part about the hat for Kumarain’s sake.)
anyway, as I was saying. The beavers led us to a little cottage where a
slightly annoyingly vague voice decided to pass on a rather cryptic few
sentences. His words were “No. No one is here, now move along before…just get
out.”
Here Lulu stopped reading and looked
up at the others whose mouths were wide open. “What does it mean, Lil?”
“I-I-don’t know. Carol?”
“Well, don’t expect me to know all!
I do not know what it means, but I have a feeling we’ll find out soon!” Carol
replied.
All the girls were rather scared,
and wondered who exactly the person behind the voice was. “That was terrifying,
but what a coincidence!” Lilli said what everyone was thinking.
Carol grunted in frustration. “I
can’t believe this is happening!!!”
“I just wanna go hooooome!!!!” Lulu
burst out in utter fear.
“Yeah, well join the club.” Lilli
responded sarcastically.
“Thanks, Lu.”
“My pleasure, of course!” Lilli
stuck out her tongue at her sister.
“Alright, lovebirds. Come on, let’s
get some shut eye.” Carol interrupted.
Soon they were all huddled under a
tree, with a steady fire going six feet off, cozy and warm. Soon they were all
asleep, but suddenly Lulu woke up because she heard a noise.
“What’s that?” she whispered to
Kumarain. She realized the Kumarain was already awake, and huddled close to her
in fear.
“Shh!” she hissed. “It’ll hear you!”
“What’ll hear me?”
“The ehut. Ehut’s like this one
crawl around, looking for helpless people who they might take to Lukinfer. Come
on, help me build a fire! Ehut’s hate fire!”
Lulu nodded, then she helped the
little beaver build a fire. The noise woke up Lilli and Carol, who were
restlessly sleeping anyway. They noticed them making the fire.
“Why are you making that? Is there a
problem? Are we in danger? Lulu, I must insist you explain,” Carol said.
Lulu shook her head and then looked
at her. “Well, we are trying to scare something, and yes, we could possibly be
in danger. There! Now the fire is going, and we should be alright.”
Carol was silent for a while,
thinking about her mother, and if she was wondering where she was. She wondered
if her little brother, Zach, was wondering where she might be. She wondered
about her little sister, Rachel. “Oh well,” she sighed.
Eventually, the ehut left them, much
to Lilli’s surprise. She figured it
would never leave. “See? I told you, they ha-a-ate
fire.” Kumarain said.
“Yeah, they sure do,” Carol agreed.
“Alright, we better leave for
Nakking Cave, now. Remember though, remember what BL said about the weather?
Sometimes burning, sometimes freezing.” Lulu reminded them of their current
circumstance.
“No,” Kumarain disagreed.
