Clearheart by Edrei Cullen Page B

above his startled, freckled face like a baby porcupine’s prickles.
    â€˜Magic’s speed be with you,’ he said, his delivery sure and steady. ‘Remember, Nature is your greatest ally. Trust yourselves and all will be well. And the clothes you wear, they may feel silly, but they will protect you, I assure you. DO NOT TAKE THEM OFF. If the Prophecy unfolds as it should, the Lord of Gommoronahl will provide you with all you need.’
    With that, he pushed the children up the staircase, towards the rippling liquid sky above them. ‘Don’t forget to think ofme, Ella, if you need me at any moment. I will be watching for you.’
    Charlie instinctively took Ella’s hand in his and marched up ahead. The moment his head touched the sky they were pulled up into its mysterious watery midst and then vanished.
    Don Posiblemente shut the staircase behind them. ‘Do not let me sleep, woman, whatever you do,’ he said to Carmen. ‘I will be waiting by my Waterway constantly and will make contact with Samuel the moment I sense true danger.’

    For the second time that day, Ella found herself travelling at a speed that made her cheeks wobble and her mouth pull back in an exaggerated smile that would scare the ghouliest of ghouls. Only this time when she stopped twirling through water she didn’t land at the top of a staircase in a warm house in Spain.
    No. This time, she and Charlie found themselves bursting headfirst out of a huge dewdrop on the leaf of a tree. Though only Ella knew that was what they had sprung out of, for Charlie couldn’t see anything at all. They landed smack wallop onto hard ground in the middle of a plain, goodness only knows where, with the sun beating upon them like a million desperate hands on a pair of bongos. A vast wilderness speckled withspinifex bushes spread out before them.
    The first thing Ella had to do was get all these clothes off! She began to unzip the red and white striped anorak Don Posiblemente had lent her. Charlie yelled at her to stop.
    â€˜We can’t take the clothes off, remember? Don Posiblemente told us we mustn’t.’
    As he said this, both anoraks blew up as though their puffy bits had been filled with cool air. Charlie pulled the hood of his blue and white striped anorak over his head and immediately felt as if he had stepped into a cool room. He pulled the hood of Ella’s anorak over her head too, grateful now to Don Posiblemente for doing whatever he had done to his glasses to combat the glare of an unforgiving sun, for they turned darker at once. It was hot as all jiggery-pokery out here. He pulled Ella’s sunglasses out of the pocket of her anorak and handed them to her. He popped a Candlefloss into Ella’s mouth and another in his own. The Candleflosses became cool at once, regulating the children’s temperatures so that they were chilled from the inside against the overwhelming heat.
    â€˜Thanks,’ said Ella, grateful to have a shield for her eyes from the glare of the sun.
    Charlie felt about for Harold, who he found in one of the big pockets of his anorak. Pulling the frog up in front of hisface, he appealed to the amphibian to make some sense of his situation.
    â€˜Have I done the right thing agreeing to let Ella come here, Harry?’ he whispered to the frog as Ella looked up dreamily at nothing, her mouth agog. ‘I know I’m her Protector and everything, but it’s one thing trying to do my best to protect her from Gloria at school. Now we’ve been flung out the end of a staircase into the middle of a plain, dressed up in two bouffy anoraks like a couple of striped Michelin men, who knows what I’m meant to do.’
    Harold hopped out of Charlie’s hand and up into his hood so he was resting in the cool next to his ear. ‘It is clearly all part of your destiny, young man,’ he said philosophically. ‘Just listen to your heart the way Ella does and you