Lauren Child - Ruby Redfort Catch Your Death

THE GIRL OPENED HER EYES AND BLINKED UP AT THE SKY . From where she lay, curled on the pine-needle floor, she could see pure blue, vivid behind a latticework of black branches. Sensing that she was alone, the girl sat up and looked around. She listened for footsteps, voices, but heard no human sound at all, just the hot lazy birds and insects buzzing and zithering. The picnic things were still laid out and a chain of ants was busy deconstructing the leftovers. She picked up the novel that lay where her father had sat, The Abandoned One A Thriller, and she began to read.

But an hour later and almost halfway through, her parents still had not returned. Had there been some emergency? Was her father looking for help? Her mother waving at passing planes? Had they both been devoured by bears or some other wild thing some terrible beast that lurked in the faraway forest? Or had they simply forgotten her, left her here? Her four-year-old imagination began to run wild, egged on by the pages of the book.

She calmed herself and took deep breaths, inhaling the forest aroma. The scent of the pine was a comfort, reassuring and familiar, and her common sense drifted back to her. She was aware that the most likely explanation was probably the actual one: her parents had gone to the river to fetch water and had gotten sidetracked.

She waited, stayed exactly where she was, remembering this was the advice given by the yellow survival manual that sat on top of her fathers bureau. But time ticked on and night began to fall and no one came back. She stood up and pushed her feet into her boots, tying them carefully, doubling the knot so they would not come undone.

She pulled on her red waterproof raincoat with its sensible hood, just in case the weather broke in the wilderness you could never be sure. She took the winding path down to where the river must certainly be, and as she walked she breathed deeply, filling her tiny lungs with pure forest air. And as she inhaled she smelled a smell so delicious, so like perfume, she couldnt help but follow where her nose wanted to lead her.

She left the path and twisted through the dark trees and the tangles of briars and fallen branches, and came to a place where the moon could reach if only the clouds would let it. Ahead of her was deathly dark, and so it was with great caution that she stepped into black. As she did so, she felt her coat snag on something sharp; she pulled, but it pulled back the tiny girl was now caged in thorns.

Trapped.

She sensed something ahead of her, quite near. Something alive, something dangerous, something bad. The clouds moved, the moon shone, and the girl gasped. For barely three feet away, staring at her with the palest blue eyes and the sharpest glistening teeth, was a wolf.

The girl stood very still, watching the beast, its gaze fixed upon her. She waited; she closed her eyes to block it out. Her heart was beating fast and her breathing was shallow and unsteady. She listened to the creature and heard the same sound, the same panic, the child and the wolf both locked in fear.

Slowly, the girl began to unpick herself from the brambles, pulling the thorns one by one from her legs, twisting out of her little hooded coat until it was all the briars could claim. She stepped out of the thicket and saw what held the wolf; it was trapped in an ugly mouth of iron teeth. Her four-year-old instinct took hold: it told her to free the desperate wild thing and so, picking up a rock, she struck the trap over and over until it gave, and the bleeding paw of the wolf was released.

For a moment the beast looked at the girl, its eyes in hers, hers in its, and for just a second they knew each others thoughts.

In the distance a voice called out, two voices. Ruby, Ruby! Where are you?

The wolf held her gaze just a second longer. Its beautiful eyes, crystal blue and ringed with violet, gleamed; then it turned and melted into the darkness of the forest.

And the wolf, like a wisp of smoke, was gone.

WHEN RUBY WAS SIX , she was entered by the Junior Chess Club, known as the Pawns, in a local city tournament. Game one, she found herself drawn against Mr. Karocovskey. Not the opponent anyone would wish to be sitting opposite for their very first public game, at least not unless that person wanted to get home early so they could watch Tiny Toons. Mr. Karocovskey had been a big champion in his heyday and had played chess against many famous Russians. Now he was an old man with a sharp brain. Not as sharp as it had been, but he was still a grandmaster and the best chess player in the state.

Ruby looked at him across the table. He had a nice face; his eyes, watery and gray, looked like they might have seen the woes of the world. This man knew what it was to yearn for something and struggle to get it.

She could see what he was going to do ten moves ahead. She lost the game skillfully. Mr. Karocovskey was very generous about his win; he smiled kindly, shook her hand, and thanked her for being such a challenging opponent. He was a gracious winner, a good sport.

Seventeen-year-old Kaspar Peterson smirked. He wasnt surprised shed lost. He didnt see there was any way this squirt of a six-year-old girl was going to win against a champion. She wasnt going to win against anyone. Ruby Redfort challenged Kaspar to a game. He casually accepted.

She beat him in five easy moves. He was an ungracious loser, a bad sport.

Ruby had been reluctant to beat old Mr. Karocovskey; she had no such qualms about thrashing Kaspar Peterson.

THE ONLY THING TO FEAR IS THE BLUE ALASKAN WOLF , which, by the way, doesnt exist.

These words were spoken by Samuel Colt, a former special agent turned environmentalist. Now he had taken up work as a Spectrum survival trainer. He was a tall, well-built man, getting on in years, but still in good shape. The kind of guy you wanted to have on your side, the kind of guy you would be relieved to have show up, and the kind of guy you would hope to see standing on the horizon if you found yourself lost unless, of course, he was the reason you had tried to get lost in the first place. If so, your heart might sink more than a little.

Colt had a large gray mustache and shoulder-length hair. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and clothes that gave him the look of a trapper he wouldnt have looked out of place had he traveled back in time a hundred years. He had seen it all and survived it all, and he knew what he was talking about. There was nothing unfriendly about Sam Colt a little straight talking, perhaps, but never cruel.