The Last Days Of The Edge Of The World by Brian Stableford

did get there.
    He soon found out, however, that the time of day was irrelevant inside the forest itself. Most of what Coronado had said Ewan had dismissed as superstition and rumour, but one thing, at least, was true. Once within the shadow of the trees the light faded dramatically.
    Even though he had given Coronado’s dire warning little credence, Ewan had had the good sense to take one elementary precaution. He had brought a lantern, consisting of a candle mounted in a glass casket with a hole on top to let the smoke out. As soon as it became obvious that the great canopy made by the foliage of the trees would let little or no light reach the forest floor, Ewan lit the candle.
    The wan yellow light seemed to make the shadows that gathered around so much more dense and menacing, but another half-furlong would leave the last tiny rays of sunshine long behind, and candlelight was infinitely preferable to Stygian gloom. Ewan leaned forward to stroke the mare’s neck reassuringly, and the mare turned to look at him over her shoulder. She looked apprehensive.
    “It’s okay,” he assured her. “If there are any trolls and the like, which I doubt, it’ll have been so long since they saw a boy or a horse that we’ll probably scare them half to death.”
    The mare grunted non-committally.
    The road across the magic land had so far been a good one—better than the dirt track that ran this way from Jessamy. It had once been firm and polished, but the times of strife had seen it cracked and worn, and it was hardly as good as new. Nevertheless, it was easy to follow and offered secure footing for a horse. In the forest, though, the road ended, and there was nothing at all beyond it to mark a way: not even an animal track.
    “It isn’t going to be easy to find a signpost where there aren’t any roads,” observed Ewan, chewing his lower lip. The mare made no comment.
    The world inside Methwold forest was not as he had imagined it might be. In his mind the word “forest” was associated with greenery and birdsong, the rustle of small creatures in the grass, and tall, round-boled trees. He had expected an enchanted forest to be a little less pleasant, but not so totally different. Inside Methwold, the basic colour was grey. The trees were gnarled and twisted, their trunks and branches made up of thin elements coiled and bundled together. No birds sang, and where there was the noise of movement near the ground it was always the sound of slithering.
    The trees were living, as was proved by the uncannily rich foliage which they produced, but seen from beneath they seemed as if they were being slowly consumed by decay. Their bark looked soft, and was overlaid by some greasy substance. As well as a multitude of little wrinkled leaves the branches were festooned by silvery networks like garments spun by giant spiders.
    All in all, it was quite unearthly.
    On either side of Ewan’s path, as he picked his way between the trees, was a tangled network of plants which grew, at first, only as high as the horse’s withers, but which seemed higher and denser the further they progressed. It looked very soft, and was certainly not impenetrable, but as time went by Ewan got the distinct feeling that it was forming walls on either side of him, guiding him. He contemplated turning aside to force the mare through it, but hesitated because of an uncomfortable suggestion somewhere at the back of his mind that it would suck him in like quicksand, cling to him and hold him fast. It looked like a mixture of cobweb and candlewax, and he was afraid of it because he did not know what kind of plant could grow in perfect darkness.
    He looked carefully around and saw that this gentle barrier did, indeed, form a kind of corridor into which he had been unwittingly guiding the mare. Because he could not overcome his reluctance to defy its guidance and crash into or through it, there seemed to be little option but to follow it further. So he did. And as he