The woods are lovely, dark, and deep

"So, er, these candles," stammered Rory. "Are they –?"

The boy smiled and helped him to his feet. "Representative of the lives of people? Yes."

"Right. And, uh, when one goes out…?"

"Somebody dies. Yes. Well, no, actually. Technically, somebody dies, and then the candle goes out. For example:"

Jean took a step forwards and deftly picked up a candle. Before a horrified Rory could do anything, he had blown it out.

"Did you just kill someone?"

The boy smiled. He seemed to be counting under his breath. As Rory stared, the candle relit, and the boy replaced it on its stand. "You see? The candles don't control anything, They are merely symbols."

"Oh. Right. Um. What now?"

"Wait here." Rory stood, obedient, as the boy hurried off into the ranks of candles, picking here and there. Returning, the boy showed him five candles and propped them up on the ground.

"You are all rather unusual, aren't you? Something beyond the box. Pushing the letter."

"Outside the box. Pushing the envelope." Rory murmured, absently, his eyes fixed on the five candles. Only two of them were actually flickering, though. The other three had a flame that seemed frozen in place. Bizarrely, it didn't seem to more at all. Of the remaining two, one was normal, but the other one had run very thickly with wax. The flame swung wildly as if caught in a draught; in fact it even looked like the candle had two wicks, though if Rory looked closely he could see and not see them. Hmm. Confusing.

He frowned. "Why are you showing me these? I mean, those frozen candles are pretty cool, and Franken-candle there is just weird, but why –"

He broke off. Jean waited. Rory's mouth opened and closed a few times. His eyes widened, and he clenched and unclenched his fist. Then he knelt down by the candles, examining them closely. He looked up, stunned, at the boy. "Are these – are these ours?"

Jean nodded, trying to conceal his impatience. "Yes. Those are yours and your friends'. Interesting, are they not? Three of you, frozen in time for ever. Of course, because your candles are frozen, when you die, they shatter. As you can see from this one."

Jean picked up the left-most candle, and handed it to Rory. At first, he couldn't see any difference, until he ran his hand over the smooth, cold surface, and found it lined with a lot of raised ridges. Looking carefully at it, he saw that it was a mass of flakes put together, as if it had been smashed and then painstakingly reassembled.

With a gasp, he juddered backwards, sending the candle flying, to be neatly caught by Jean. Rory's eyes glazed over, and he involuntarily put a hand to his chest. That was his candle. From when he had – died. The, er, second time.

Jean watched him placidly, waiting for him to recover. "I imagine that it was quite a job reassembling that candle."

"Not nearly as difficult as getting resurrected…" muttered Rory.

"I suppose it wouldn't be," said Jean. "Now, having shown you those candles, just really for your entertainment, Rory, then I should take you to find the rest of your friends. Come on."

With an imperious gesture, he started towards an exit.

"Hey, wait!" called out Rory. "What about these?" He pointed to the candles.

"Leave them here. It's where they belong. I only showed you them to help you understand what they were, and that your friends were still alive. If, by the standard of the candles, rather odd."

Deciding to trust the mysterious boy, if only because he had no-one else to trust, Rory stepped over the little pile, and followed him towards the next tunnel.

"So, do they really represent the living and the dead?"

"In the story, at least," said the boy, smiling. "It's up to you whether you think it's real."

"But – but how can they not be?" exclaimed Rory. "I've just seen them!"

"But are they only real because you're in the story? Do they actually apply outside of the forest?"

Rory frowned. This was too confusing. "I – I – I don't know…" he admitted.

"Good. Neither do I," said Jean, striding away. "Follow me!"


"You know, Ethan…" said Benny, stretching and settling himself into a more comfortable position of the sofa. He trailed off into a contented silence when his friend didn't seem to respond.

"Yeah… Go on…" murmured Ethan, eventually opening one eye lazily, from where he was slumped over the arm of another, half-eaten, sofa.

"Well, I was just thinking how good it would be if our supernatural adventures ended up like this more often."

Ethan sighed happily. "I know what you mean." He patted his stomach gently and closed his eyes again. "It would be very, very nice…"

There was another peaceful silence. "Benny…?"

"Mmm…?"

"Put another log on the fire, would you?"

"Sorry, E., but I can't."

"Why not?" asked Ethan, a flash of irritation sparking, but only for a moment, before sinking back into his drowse.

"I've eaten the last one. Sorry."

"Oh, well. Silly Benny," mumbled Ethan. He stifled a burp. "Probably too warm in here any – way… Starting to drift off to slee – to slee – to slee –"

"-p," finished Benny for him, yawning.

"'xactly. Off to –p. Sleeeep."

"Night, night, Ethan."

"G'night, Ben –"

Ethan suddenly sat bolt upright. "What was that?" he whispered, now alert.

"What was what?" grumbled Benny groggily, looking across at Ethan.

"Shh!" hissed Ethan, urgently. "Listen!"

In the hush, they heard, quite distinctly, a scraping sound, as if someone was trying to open a door at the back of the house somewhere.

Ethan leapt up, steadied himself briefly, and then stared wildly around the room. "We can't be caught like this!" he breathed, staring at Benny. "Come on!"

Benny looked confused. "Caught like what –?" he said, trying to get up from his comfortable position. With a surprised cry he overbalanced and fell with a thump to the floor.

By now, Ethan had gone very red. They were going to be found – and by what? And – and this thought wouldn't go away – why was it taking the person so long to get in the back door (not that he was complaining)? His eye caught on a wardrobe. It looked pretty solid, even if made of biscuit.

Grabbing Benny by the arm, he hauled him to his feet. "In here!" he said, giving him a shove. Still slightly baffled by what was going on around him, and by now really feeling the effects of having demolished a fairly large amount of the room, Benny obeyed, in a slightly shambolic way. Ethan, panting slightly, clambered in after him and pulled the door to. Or, almost. He looked down and flushed. The cupboard was a little narrower than he'd thought…

Taking a breath to pull his stomach in, and, with a prod, encouraging Benny to do the same, Ethan managed to pull the door all the way shut. Pretty uncomfortable, he peered out of the crack in the hinges and hoped that nothing bad was going to happen.

After a few moments, a figure in a chequered dress and shawl came into the room. Ethan couldn't help thinking that it walked rather oddly, and also didn't seem the slightest bit concerned at the fact that their living room had been mostly eaten. Just as he was about to whisper this to Benny, he felt him start forwards next to him.

"Grandma!" he said, under his breath, and went to push the door open.

Instinctively, Ethan grabbed his arm and pushed him back. "No it isn't!" he whispered as quietly as could while still making it imperative.

Thankfully, Benny stopped in an unusual show of obedience. Ethan put his eye to the gap again. He couldn't make out what it was, but he had no idea how Benny had identified it as his grandmother. It turned and came a little closer. The shawl hid a lot, but, to Ethan, it seemed to have very big eyes. And big ears. And big teeth. It was – a wolf? They had to be absolutely silent.

He was about to relay this to Benny, when, beside him, he felt Benny nod, very slightly. How had he know? He hadn't said anything to him. Benny was trembling. Well, so was he, but this felt different. He gripped Benny's hand, and –

Suddenly he was seeing through a different gap, and there, in the same clothes and shawl, was Benny's grandma –

Ethan blinked and quickly let go of Benny's hand. That was what he was seeing? Oh. Not good. He went back to his own gap, ignoring, for the moment, how he had been able to see what Benny was seeing, and watched the wolf snuffle around. These stories really were persistent. But, hopefully, if they were really quiet, it would go away –

The tense silence was suddenly broken by an extended gurgle. Ethan snapped his head around automatically to glare at Benny, when, as he was doing so, he noticed Benny staring at him, a shocked look on his face. Ethan felt the blood rush to face again as he realised that it had been his own stomach that had made the sound. Hoping that everything was going to be OK, he put his eye back to the hole – to see the eye of the wolf staring straight back at him.

Ethan's mouth dropped open in horror as, with a snarl, the wolf ripped the door from its hinges. Was this how he was going to die? After everything, here he was, bloated, embarrassed, and about to be eaten by a wolf?

There was another green flash, and the wolf simply evaporated into a spray of red droplets right in front of him. The shawl fluttered to the ground in way that would have been comical, had it not been quite so horrific.

Breathing heavily, Ethan turned to look at his friend, who was very pale. "Benny – you saved me – again."

Benny nodded, his eyes still fixed where the wolf dressed as his grandmother had been. He'd just disintegrated his grandmother – no , he'd destroyed the wolf. He shook his head, and looked at Ethan. He tried to smile. "Well, what are boyfriends for, eh?"

Ethan stepped down, shaken, from the cupboard, over the red mess, and noticed the blood-spattered book. It was now shining with an odd blue light. "We shouldn't have stopped here, B."

Benny nodded. "Yeah… There'll be more like that, won't there?"

Ethan nodded. "I'd say." He picked up the book.

"Ethan – why couldn't I see the wolf?"

Ethan looked thoughtful. "I suppose it makes itself seem like your grandmother. How else would Red Riding Hood not have noticed, in the story?"

"So why didn't you?" asked Benny, biting his lip.

Ethan shrugged and smiled sadly. "My grandparents died before I was born. I wouldn't know what to see."

"Oh. I wondered why I'd never met them."

Ethan nodded, and then looked into Benny's eyes seriously. "Thank you. Again. I know that doing that must have been awful for you."

Benny nodded curtly, and there was slightly awkward silence between them. Ethan broke it.

"Right. We'd better get going." He put a hand to his stomach and winced. "But slowly…"

Benny nodded, and then looked embarrassed. "Uh, Ethan, you've got, um, stuff on –"

But just as he was saying that, Ethan put a hand on his elbow to lead him out of the room, and, at the same moment, the book flashed, and the pair of them disappeared.