Part 19 (1/2)
The wolf turned and walked back the way Hazel had come. Hazel followed behind, trying to move as stealthily as the creature. Up ahead there was another flash of light, just as before. The wolf moved a few steps toward it, then stopped. It looked at Hazel, and then looked ahead.
”You want me to go there?”
The wolf gazed at her another moment, then disappeared into the night.
Hazel crept on ahead. She had decided to throw her lot in with the wolves, and there was no going back now. She followed the dimming light into a clearing and back onto the path.
There was a girl a few years older than Hazel sitting on a tree stump next to the big path. She did not belong out here on this cold night. All she wore was a patched-up thin brown dress, a little shawl wrapped around her shoulders, and slippers. She was visibly s.h.i.+vering.
The girl did not notice her. She had in her hands a lit match and was staring into the flame as if it held wonders.
She must be bewitched, Hazel thought. Someone had caused her to be so confused she'd wandered half-naked into the middle of the woods. She was hypnotized by the light and didn't know the danger she was in. Someone had done this to her, and Hazel was not going to leave this one behind. The wolves would not let her.
She approached the girl carefully. ”Are you all right?” she asked, trying to keep her voice steady.
The girl looked up at Hazel with dull eyes. She had dead-looking blond hair and a too-thin shadowy face. Her skin had been blanched by the night's cold, and her cheeks looked blue-black. Her body trembled against the air as if the sky scared her. She looked like a blotchy, fading ghost.
”Hey,” Hazel said, keeping her voice soft. ”Are you okay? Did someone do something to you?”
The girl blinked at Hazel. ”I'm fine,” she said. ”Where am I?”
”You're . . . you're in the woods. How did you get out here?”
”Oh,” said the girl, her voice thin and vague. ”I live back near the village.”
She nodded to a place somewhere beyond them.
”Come on, we have to get you home.”
”I can't,” said the girl, her eyes on the fading match. ”I can't go home until I've sold all the matches.” She nodded to a bunch of long matches in her dress pocket. ”I was selling all night, but- Oh!”
The match in her hand had gone out. She dropped it, and in one motion grabbed another one from her dress and struck it against a small tinderbox. A flame burst from it into the night, and the girl stared into it and exhaled.
Hazel grabbed her arm. It was shaking. ”It's freezing. I'm sure they didn't mean-”
”Oh, he meant it,” the girl said, still staring into the flame, and in the match light Hazel noticed that her arm was covered in bruises.
No one is from here, Nina had said. Once upon a time this girl lived in the real world, and she came into the woods looking for something. And what she found was this.
”I'll buy them!” Hazel said. ”How much do you need?” She began to shrug off her backpack.
”Fifty kroner,” the girl said.
”Oh.”
”It's all right,” said the girl. ”The matches are magic.”
”They are?” Hazel asked warily.
”Yes. I never knew. But look!” She stared back into the flame.
Hazel followed her eyes. She saw nothing but dancing fire against a blue girl. ”What are you looking at?”
”That's my grandmother,” the girl said, voice hushed, eyes glued to the flame. ”She's made dinner. She makes the most wonderful turkey, do you smell it?” The girl was staring into the fading flame as if inside it was the secret truth of the world. But they were ordinary matches, and her visions were the deluded comfort of a dying mind.
Hazel could feel her heart lose its solidity and diffuse slowly in her chest. She had a strong urge to grab a chunk of her own hair and pull it as hard she could. ”Don't you see it?” asked the girl, voice suddenly wavering.
Hazel wanted to tell her no, to tell her to stop wondering at phantoms, because she was freezing to death and maybe starving, and they needed to find someone who could help her. But . . .
”Yes,” she whispered. ”I see it. It's beautiful. Where does your grandmother live?”
”Up there.” The girl pointed to the sky.
”Oh,” Hazel said again.
She looked at the girl and the matches. They had been real, useful things once.
And then Hazel knew what she had to do.
”Stay still,” she whispered.
She removed her green jacket, then gently took the smoking match out of the girl's hand. She dressed the girl in the jacket, one arm at a time, and zipped it up. She pulled off her hat and mittens, then placed the hat on the girl's head and the mittens on her hands.
The girl hugged the jacket around herself. Her eyes widened and she stared at Hazel.
”It's warm, right?” Hazel said, trying to control her voice. ”It's a nice jacket.”
The girl nodded slowly. ”Aren't you cold?” she whispered.
Yes. ”No,” she said. ”I don't have much farther to go.”
”Why are you doing this?” The girl looked so bewildered, like kindness was unfathomable to her, and that broke Hazel's heart more than anything.
”Here,” Hazel said, handing her one of the energy bars. ”I have one more. You need to eat it.”
The air had no trouble working its way through Hazel's s.h.i.+rt, and she felt the bite of cold on her bare hands. She blinked it away.
”There's one more thing.”
Hazel reached over to the jacket and put her hand on the zipped-up pocket, feeling the familiar outline of the whistle. She unzipped the pocket and gave the whistle an almost invisible caress with her thumb. Then she blew into it three times, just as she learned to at school, and presented it to the girl.
”Blow on this,” she said. ”Three times, every few minutes. A boy will come. His name is Ben, and he'll help you. You tell him what happened. You tell him I gave you this. He'll take care of you. You can trust him.”
Those were all the real things Hazel had left, other than the baseball-which was just a fantasy, really.
The girl blinked at her, and then thrust the bunch of matches into her hand. ”Take these,” she said. ”It's the only payment I have.”
”No, you have to sell them.”
”Please,” she said. ”Take them. Please take them.”