Page 37 of Hansel and Gerhardt
He waited, kept it burning, intent on destroying the thing, or at the very least inflicting some sort of pain on it.
But nothing. No sizzle, no slit, no juice, and no break.
“Fuck!” Gerhardt shouted. He fronted up to the tree, next to Hansel again, who had never moved, only waited patiently for him. “Well, how does it eat us, then? It’s not like I’m just going to crawl into that mouth.”
Hansel concurred. “And those vines haven’t reached for us yet. It makes no sense.”
“Why can’t I burn it?”
“Magic?”
“That’s your answer for everything.”
“You’re in a magical—”
“Argh! Fuck this fucking forest!” Gerhardt yelled. With a decided stomp of his foot, he made for the tree, bravely, stupidly. “Alright, you fuck! How are you going to try to eat me? Because I’ll tell you now, I’ve survived worse than you.” He swept his flame menacingly towards the thing, as though it might flinch back. It did not. Gerhardt threw at it, “Just as I thought. A coward!”
Hansel took a step forward. “I don’t think you should make it angry.”
“Fuck this tree!” And with that, he took up the sharpest stick in his vicinity and threw it directly into the jagged hole.
A gurgling sound vomited out of the tree, as though a great gullet had been set to spasm, and the long stick flew back out, turned mid-air, aimed directly at Gerhardt’s heart. Hansel shoved him aside, but still it caught Gerhardt’s shoulder, splashing a line of blood across Hansel’s face.
Gerhardt fell to the ground, his still-burning torch rolling away from him. He put all his weight on one arm to push himself up, then flopped back to the earth as the forest floor crumbled beneath him. Skinny roots wrapped around his wrist and fingers, and it was only because he recoiled with such extreme horror that they didn’t get a hold.
He rolled to the side, unaccountably towards the tree itself, where the dirt collapsed behind his shoulder blades, sinking him into a thousand grotesque, white and stringy fingers that clamped down on his shoulders, twisted around his biceps, and moved him.
Working as one huge and foul organism, the roots rolled in unison to drag Gerhardt irresistibly towards that waiting mouth. As one thick clasp unwrapped, so another took hold further down, thighs and ankles retained, taking him foot first to his doom.
Gerhardt was terrified into incoherence. He groaned out the only sounds he could manage, some conglomeration of ‘no’ and ‘fuck’ and ‘why’ and ‘fuck I hate this fucking tree’, but it was all perfectly useless. If the tree heard, it cared not, and it wrenched Gerhardt in as unfeelingly as a bear might disembowel a bunny.
Up went his feet with terrifyingly swift efficiency, the click and lash of hairy roots filling the air as they swished over his body, pulling him, pulling him, one foot disappearing into the mouth.
Hansel dived without restraint or caution, locking fingers with Gerhardt’s just before his foot went into the cavity. He pulled so hard they almost broke before he slammed another hand around his wrist.
Gerhardt cried out in pain as his body was stretched out long, then, over the hurt, he yelled, “Save yourself, Hansel!”
“I’d rather die!” Hansel shouted. He flipped his body around, bracing himself with a heel in the dirt as they were both wrenched in.
Gerhardt kicked at the trunk. “There’s no point us both—argh!—dying! Hansel, go!”
“Never!” Hansel searched the ground for anything, desperately wishing they’d had a second to plan their escape—had taken a single weapon. There was nothing but the carcass. The carcass that sat there with the portion of its head still attached, dead eyes staring at him, mouth gaping open.
Hansel wrapped a leg beneath Gerhardt’s arm and locked it across his chest, while his other foot skidded hard into the ground. He reached both hands across to grab the face of the dead boar. Ripping the mouth in two, the lower jaw came off inhis hand. He turned, he slammed it down, and the boar’s incisor ripped into the root that held Gerhardt’s thigh.
Red splashed up Hansel’s arm, onto his face, and the treescreamed. A high-pitched cry came from the mouth of the thing, and the root he’d attacked uncoiled.
“Hansel!” Gerhardt exclaimed in terrified delight.
Hansel lifted the boar’s jaw and wielded it again, with deadly precision, stabbing a thick root that had hold of Gerhardt’s waist.
Another screech, and the root pulled back. Hansel made fast work stabbing and slashing where he could, loosening one bind then another, on and on, cutting away the tendrils that tried to claim his own limbs, until there was only the remaining root which held Gerhardt’s ankle. They worked together, grunting, straining, scraping at dirt with fingernails as they inched their way back onto safe ground.
Then, very suddenly, as if furious, the tree seemed to gather strength. It snapped out one long root, which wrapped around Gerhardt’s chest, turning him, and it yanked back its dinner.
“Hansel!” Gerhardt cried as he was ripped from Hansel’s grip. His arm flung out for him, sending the jaw bone flying into the trees, out of sight and out of reach.
Hansel froze, in shock at the power of the tree, knowing full well that to follow meant only death for them both. His hands settled into the dirt as he prepared to stand and fling himself back into the fray. But his left fingertips met fur.
