Chapter Eight

Things got a little confused once Eoin, Freya and Serena jumped through the cracks into the fractured ice dome. Willow, standing in the middle of the circle, was grinning with pleasure to see her brother and sister again, while all around her the ice from the dome was folding in on itself with the same screeching noise that Eoin and Freya had come to dread. Shapes seemed to appear, stretch, twist and collapse all around them. The bright sunlight hitting the dome was refracted into innumerable points of colour which danced on the ground and made it hard to see.

Freya was first through, but as she reached out to Willow a section of ice directly above her fell loose and instantly liquefied. Freya was hit by the deluge and fell, sopping wet, to the ground by Willow's feet.

"No!" cried Eoin, but as he started forwards to help her, he glimpsed another slab of ice falling. He raised his arm to fend it off and it shattered harmlessly on his forearm, but as he tried to step forwards again he found his feet would not move. The ice had crept around them and frozen into one solid block, anchoring him to the ground. "Freya!" he called, but Freya was slumped, dripping and weak, all her energy washed away. 

Serena ran in after them. Blocks of ice rained down on top of her, narrowly missing her as she dodged randomly from side to side. She grasped Eoin's right ankle and heaved in vain.

Willow's little face was scrunched up in anger. "Walter!" she was shouting. "Stop! Naughty!" She raised her arms and thrust her hands forwards, and was instantly hit by a blast of air which knocked her off her feet. She stood up and waved her arm around in a circle, and this time the torrent of air swirled round her. She made another motion, pulling in towards her body, and the flow of air intensified abruptly. The shards of ice nearest her were swept away and Serena had to grasp tightly onto Eoin's leg to stop being blown away. The buffeting of the wind sounded like a continuous rumble in Freya's ears and she realised that she was rapidly drying out. A wall of wind seemed to form around the centre of the circle, with Willow and Freya at its centre, and it moved out and intensified again, swirling around outside Eoin and Serena and creating a circle of dry warm air inside. The ice round Eoin's feet fractured and he yanked his feet free and pulled Serena into the centre of the circle. He was going to grab Willow but checked himself before he broke her concentration.

"It's a tornado, Freya!" he shouted over the wind. "Willow's made a tornado, and we're right in the middle."

It was hard to see through the wall of wind surrounding them. It looked almost like water, blurring their vision, but still clear enough to make out the circle of iceotaurs which had formed outside the tornado. All around them more pale shapes appeared, staring at them through the tornado, waiting for the winds to abate.

"If we're really lucky they might get bored and wander off, do you think?" called Serena hopefully.

Freya shook her head. "We need to get rid of them ourselves. You two stand well away from the tornado." She felt all her strength return as she dried out, and could even feel the heat travelling up and down her forearms as though it were inside her blood. "Keep blowing, Willow!" she shouted and walked up to the wall of air. She held her hands out, just as she had done when she'd dried Eoin, and felt the flames surge out of her hands and into the tornado. She focused as hard as she could, trying to raise the temperature of the air as high as possible until the whole tornado became scorching hot. "Now, Willow!" she cried. "Make it bigger. Bigger, Willow, bigger."

Willow waved her arms as though shooing away an angry goose, and abruptly the hot air blasted outwards in all directions in an explosion of wind. In a fraction of a second the noise faded to nothing and the four of them found themselves standing, sweating, on a bare rocky island in the bright sunshine. 

There was no sound. No movement. For a brief moment it felt as though time itself had stopped. 

The Ice was gone. The blast of super-heated air had vaporised every last water molecule, and the iceotaurs were now no more than clouds in the sky. The island stood alone in the middle of the dried out mud plain where the lake had once stood, now slowly cooking in the midday sun.

"We've done it," said Freya, her voice shockingly loud in the silence. "We've defeated the Ice."

"Not fair," said a voice from behind them. At the edge of the island was a rock, and slumped against the rock was a small boy. He was about the same size as Willow and got moodily to his feet and glared at them.

"Walter! Naughty!" said Willow.

"Wanna play," said Walter grumpily. "He said I can play. Not fair." He kicked at the rock angrily.

"Are you... Is this... our brother?" said Eoin, but Freya ignored him.

"Who said?" she asked, putting her hands on her hips. "Who said you can play?"

Walter scowled at her. "Not fair," he said again, and folded his arms.

"Walter," said Freya in her most severe voice. "Who said you can play?"

Walter muttered something that the others couldn't hear.

"What was that?" asked Eoin. "Freya, what did he say?"

"He said 'the volcano man'," said Freya in confusion. "Does he mean Father Tim? Why would Father Tim tell him he could play with us?"

Serena snorted. "Yep, that sounds like Dad. He'll have started this whole thing. Probably trying to get you all out the way again so he can leave the volcano. That's probably why you've got no memory. He's a bit evil like that sometimes." She shrugged her shoulders, as though having an evil Dad was just something you have to live with. "That's why I don't see him much. When I was little he used to..."

"Serena," Freya interrupted, "why would a blind man that lives in a volcano be trying to make us fight each other?"

"Because..." Serena frowned. "Well, what do you expect when you trap the most powerful element under a pile of rock for all eternity?"

"The most powerful... What do you mean?" said Eoin.

"Ahh." Serena gave a gasp of realisation. "You don't know who he is, do you? And that's why you keep saying his name wrong."

Freya and Eoin glanced at each other uncertainly. "So... what is his name?"

"It's not Tim. It's Time. Father Time. I thought that was obvious. The four of you trapped Time forever in the volcano. So he keeps resetting your memory to make you fight each other. He's trying to get rid of you."

"He sent us to Nullie," gasped Eoin.

Serena nodded. "Sounds about right. Lucky for you, you found me as well. Lucky for all of us, in fact."

"Why?" asked Freya. "What will he do if he leaves the volcano?"

"Stop time, I imagine," said Serena.

"Stop time?" cried Freya. "But he can't do that! Can he?"

"What do you mean," asked Eoin, "by keeps resetting our memory? Has he done this before?"

Serena nodded. "I don't know how many times but this definitely isn't the first time. When he realises it hasn't worked he'll just do it again. Maybe next time he'll separate Willow. Or the two of you. Or all four of you. See what works."

Freya shook her head angrily. "I don't like this Eoin. We've got to go back there and stop him."

"I don't think it's going to be that simple, Freya. At least now we've found Walter..." He looked around for Walter, but Walter was no longer on the island. "Where's he gone now?"

Serena jumped onto the rock and, without looking, pointed in a random direction. Eoin scooped up Willow and hopped up beside her. Walter was running away across the dried mud, his chubby little legs pounding the ground furiously.

"We need to go after him," sighed Freya. "Before he finds some water and starts 'playing' again." The three of them jumped down onto the lake bed and hurried off after Walter.

After a few strides Serena stopped abruptly. She held a hand up and Eoin and Freya stopped too. "Something's not right," she said. "This feels really unlucky. We should go back."

"We've got to get Walter," insisted Eoin and strode on after the little figure.

"But Eoin..." began Freya. She broke off as something in the distance caught her eye. There was a dark patch ahead in the valley, as though a cloud was passing in front of the sun, but when she looked up, there were no clouds overhead. The dark patch was moving towards them, and something else was moving inside it. "Eoin, what is that? Can you see? Is there something moving?"

Eoin shaded his eyes and squinted at the darkness. "They look like trees," he said. "Like a whole forest waddling towards us. I don't know, it's really dark there. How can that be happening?"

"There's something else," said Freya. "Other things. In between the things that look like trees."

"They are trees," said Serena. "Looks like they're after your little brother."

Walter didn't seem to have noticed the trees but kept stubbornly running across the mud. The dark patch swept forwards without a sound and by the time he looked up and cried out it was already too late. The darkness swept over him and he disappeared inside the army of trees.

"Walter!" cried Willow from Eoin's arms, but there was no reply.

"Come on," said Eoin, "we've got to get him back."

"Seriously?" said Freya. "He tried to kill us, and we've got to rescue him now?"

"Won't be easy," said Serena, jogging to keep up with Eoin. "There's a whole load of minors there."

"Miners?" said Freya. "People who dig underground?"

"No, not miners. Minor elements. Ash is there, he does wood. There's no light or sound coming out, so the twins'll both be there. Libby, she does life, she'll be making the trees move like that. Erm... those things in the trees, what are they?"

They were close enough now to see objects whizzing round and round the trunks of the trees, which had now stopped waddling and planted themselves firmly in the mud as though reclaiming a lost kingdom. The objects were very familiar to Eoin and Freya. They could see pots, pans, parts of a plough, knives and forks, some gardening tools - all made out of metal, and all whirling inaudibly round the trunks of the trees at about chest height.

Eoin stopped in front of the trees. "Give us back our brother!" he shouted.

In response, every single metal object turned abruptly and hurtled towards him. At the same moment he felt Serena's hand on his shoulder. Before he could react, the plough share collided with a spade, and both twisted in mid-air. The smaller implements crashed into them and the whole lot bounced off at awkward angles, showering the ground around Eoin with knives and household objects. The plough share impaled itself in the ground by Eoin’s feet. Not a single one had made contact with him or with Willow, who had buried her face in his chest.

"Thanks," gasped Eoin. "That was close."

"I know," said Serena with a grin, "you're lucky to have me."

Freya marched forwards to the tree line. "Give us back our brother," she bellowed, then abruptly burst into flames. She took another step towards the forest, incandescent. "Or I'll burn the whole lot!"

Abruptly the darkness vanished, and the sunlight streamed back through the trees. An old man with long hair sticking out at wild angles stepped hastily out from among the trees, his hands out wide, placating. "Whoa, cool it, they're just innocent trees, they've done nothing to you."

"Hiya Ash!" waved Serena.

"Serena?" said the man, frowning. "What are you doing here?"

"Saving Earth, Wind and Fire from being skewered by Mel. What's she attacking us for anyway?"

A woman dressed in grey with long, rigid grey locks and an angular face marched forwards from the trees, her face angry, but before she could speak Walter came stumbling forwards, followed by Hope and Frank who ran to embrace Eoin, Willow and Freya, who had put out her flames and was emanating wisps of smoke.

"Mum! Dad! I mean... well, you're not, really, are you?" she stuttered.

Frank frowned. "What do you mean, Freya? Not really what?"

Serena whispered in Freya's ear, "They won't have much memory either. They might not know. Maybe it's not the best time to tell them."

"I've got the book," said Eoin, showing that it was still tucked into his waistband. "What was the message you sent to... to Father Tim?" 

Frank gestured around at the men and women around him. A few more had come out of the trees to stand behind Ash and Mel. "It was about the gathering, of course. About how we were all coming together to help defeat the Ice." He looked down at Walter, who was now playing tag with Willow around their legs, then around at the parched desert that the lake had become. "I guess we didn't need to. You seem to have taken care of it yourselves."

"That's what got him so worried," exclaimed Freya, snapping her fingers and accidentally shooting a flame up into the sky. "He didn't want us all gathering together. So he tried to get rid of us before we could meet up."

"Get rid of you?" said Hope in horror. "Sweetie, what do you mean? Who tried to get rid of you?"

Eoin grabbed Willow's and Walter's hands and started to pull them back towards the waterfall, back towards the sea. Back towards the volcano. "We'll tell you on the way. We've got to go, all of us. We've got to stop Father Time before he realises what's happening and wipes our memories again."

Freya and Serena hurried off after him. The others looked at each other doubtfully. "Come on!" called Serena, and, hesitantly, they began to follow Eoin across the lake bed.