‘Well,’ Mrs Mudd tells them, ‘that’s why we’re here. To make sure the huntsmen create as few dead people as possible.’
‘And we appreciate it,’ Trevor tells her, from Buttercup’s hair.
Mrs Mudd shrugs. ‘You helped us when we needed it. I just hope we made enough of a difference.’
It does make enough of a difference. Hansel’s earlier attempts to contain the fire mean that it’s reasonably easy for a team of villagers and Darkwood creatures to extinguish the worst of it before Hansel and Jack return to rot away trunks and smother with overturned earth until the last of the fire is completely out. With the fire and the flying machine gone for now and the caves no more secret or safe from the huntsmen than any other part of the Darkwood, the decision is made not to bother seeking emergency shelter after all, but to return home and improve defences there instead. Gretel suspects that this is largely because the caves are horrible, dark and damp, but she’s not going to be the one to bring that up. She just wants to go home, at last.
30
Home, At Last
‘Home, at last!’ Buttercup bursts gratefully through the cake cottage’s biscuit door, and into the sugary kitchen within. ‘Henrietta, you did a smashing job of looking after the place; only seven broken plates.’
‘I did my best.’ The Centaur smiles shyly, leaning the magic Mirror safely against a wall.
‘No way,’ breathes Scarlett, following the others inside. She takes in deep nosefuls of the place.
‘Welcome to your new home,’ Trevor tells the Werewolf. ‘You too, Gilde, I’m sure the quadrupeds can scooch beds and chairs around to make room. Plenty of nesting places for Hex, too, and Snow can tell you where the wolf pack and the bears can rest safely.’
‘This isn’t my new home,’ Scarlett tells them, a strange smile on her face. ‘Buttercup, how did you get this place?’
‘Just sort of found it,’ Buttercup tells her, wrapping the tattered remains of her skirt around her hands to safely load logs into the stove. ‘It was already abandoned when I got out here.’
‘This is Little Cottage,’ Mother Goggins exclaims, looking around. ‘Old wood lodge. Or at least, it’s a rough approximation of Little Cottage, made out of marzipan. We used to come down here all the time, back in the day. There was old Mrs Little the Werewolf, had a cape a lot like that one.’ She indicates Scarlett’s tatty cape. ‘With her grandson, the woodcutter lad. But then he went missing…’
‘She was never a “woodcutter lad”,’ Scarlett says quietly.
Mother Goggins regards Scarlett thoughtfully. ‘Aye,’ she says after a moment. ‘I imagine you’d know best, bein’ her… granddaughter, is it?’
Scarlett nods. ‘I moved north after she passed. People were starting to get funny about us. Starting rumours and stuff.’
‘Oh!’ Buttercup straightens up, regarding Scarlett awkwardly. ‘I didn’t… um… I hope you don’t mind my being here. And accidentally turning a lot of it into cake.’
‘It’s fine. It’s nice to be back.’
‘Did…’ Buttercup flounders. ‘Did you want it back?’
‘Oh!’ Scarlett cringes at the very idea. ‘Oh, no, I abandoned it, it’s your home now.’
‘It’s fine.’ Buttercup smiles politely, even though it definitely would not be fine. ‘It would be no problem at all.’ It absolutely would be a massive problem.
‘Honestly no, I insist,’ frets Scarlett, desperate to out-polite Buttercup, ‘I wouldn’t dream of it.’
‘Oh. Well.’ Buttercup relents. ‘Of course, you’re welcome to stay with us, at least. Permanently. Trevor was right, we can all scooch…’
‘She can have my bed,’ says Gretel.
Buttercup’s face crumples a little. ‘Oh. Oh, yes. Right. You’ll be wanting to move back to… yes, of course.’
‘We’ll still see each other all the time,’ Gretel tells her. ‘We’ve got defences to build and a regime to topple. But if the huntsmen now see Nearby as just another part of the Darkwood, there’s no reason why I shouldn’t go back there, to the farm.’
‘Yes,’ sighs Buttercup. She still looks crestfallen.
‘I’ll be around every day,’ Gretel adds. ‘I just… miss my bedroom.’
‘…the bedrooms,’ says Gretel’s stepmother, entering the cake cottage midway through a sentence. She and Hansel have Oi on a stretcher. ‘Hansel, you can stay with… wait, isn’t this Little Cottage, only more spongey?’
‘Yes, Stepmother, we’ve just been over that.’
‘Ah.’ Mrs Mudd turns to Buttercup. ‘Do you have room for a big lad, Miss Buttercup?’
‘We’ve always got room,’ Buttercup tells her. ‘Why?’
‘There’s all together eight badly wounded that I need to keep an eye on for infections and such,’ Mrs Mudd tells her. ‘I’m going to have to make an infirmary out of the farmhouse bedrooms for the time being, I thought Hansel could share with his sister here.’
Gretel deflates. ‘So… I can’t go home?’
‘It’s only a bedroom, Gretel Mudd,’ her stepfather tells her. ‘You’ll get it back when the injured are better. No being a fusspot, please.’
‘I’m not being a fusspot! I’ve already been stuck out here two months.’
‘Gretel Mudd!’ snaps her stepmother. ‘You’ll stay here with your brother and you’ll be grateful.’
‘I already am grateful, Stepmother.’
‘It’s a beautiful home, Miss Buttercup,’ Mr Mudd tells Buttercup graciously. ‘Love what you’ve done with the place. Very original décor.’
And Gretel is grateful, truly she is, once the pang of disappointment at not being able to go back to the farmhouse just yet has evaporated. Before long, she’s just glad to be alive and unharmed and comparatively safe with her family and friends. The cake cottage isn’t that bad, really. Things start looking up even more when Scarlett, Carpenter Fred and Lanky Joe the thatcher make plans to fix the cottage’s leaky sponge roof.
Soon, Gretel is busy organising relief camps for the creatures made temporarily homeless by the fire, and creating teams to deal with medical care, food and water supplies and improving their defences against the next huntsman attack. It takes her a little while to notice that many of the queries coming to her from Darkwood creatures and villagers alike are questions that would usually be asked of Snow. That’s when she realises that Snow hasn’t been seen for hours.
Gretel makes her excuses and steps outside. She passes by Jack, who is sitting quietly amongst a large thicket of nettles, concentrating on a bit of fiddly needlecraft.
‘Seen Snow anywhere?’ she asks him.
He looks up at her briefly, doesn’t reply, and gets back on with his work.
Gretel tuts. ‘What’s up with you?’
‘Nettle-shirt spell,’ says Gilde. She’s curled cosily against the fur of Baby’s giant, sleeping frame. She doesn’t even open her eyes. ‘Fer Sweetiebird. I told him it won’t work, but he ain’t listening.’