Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Toby had somehow got off to a better start than Lyla-Mae; she suspected it had something to do with gravity having more of an effect on heavier things (I forgot to mention that Lyla-Mae was a very clever child, but it is a good idea to bare this in mind) but she would have to ask mommy later (who was also very clever).  Remembering what her mommy had taught her about sledging, Lyla-Mae leaned backwards – as did Esther and Teddy Radson, but mainly from the onrush of air - and sure enough, she gathered up a lot of speed, her mousy hair and scarf-tails streaming behind her like a knight’s banner charging into battle. Esther’s and Teddy Radson’s hands were in the air, they were enjoying the race too!

 Toby was in front by about ten grown-up steps, but Lyla-Mae was closing in fast.  The world seemed to bend slightly with how fast she was going; the sparse clumps of trees flew by, and she could make out the shouting from the children below now.  None of that mattered, of course – Lyla-Mae kept her eyes on Toby the entire time, who she was just about to overtake.

Surprised to see her suddenly appear next to her, Toby sort of bounced in his seat.

“What are you doing?  How did you do that? You are cheating!” whined Toby in a high-pitched girl voice.

“Who is the bravest?” Lyla-Mae goaded, with a smug smile beaming all across her little face.  And with that, she overtook Toby.

Or she should have, but what happened next was anyone’s guess!  She felt something heavy push against the back of her wooden sledge.  With how fast she was going, it threw her completely off course, and she was now hurtling uncontrollably down Hairy Hill towards a bunch of big rocks half-buried in the snow!

She panicked; like any self-respecting child, she had suffered the scraped knee and the knocked elbow, but hitting a bunch of rocks at a fast speed on a sledge . . . well, that’s going to hurt!  She struggled with the sledge, trying desperately to change course, but it didn’t work.  Just a few seconds before she would crash, she clutched Teddy Radson and Esther close to her, covered both her eyes with her hands and . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

 *creak-THUD*

After what seemed an age, she realised that the sledge was no longer moving.  It had stopped. Have I crashed, she thought to herself.  There was a thud noise, and a bit of a bump, but also a strange creak noise . . . finally, she decided the only way to find out whether she had crashed straight into some rocks or not was to take her hands away from her eyes and look.  Slowly, ever so slowly, she parted her fingers and peaked through.  Where she was looked nothing like where she was meant to smack into! 

She was sat in the middle of a dark tunnel, with light coming from the hole in the top of the tunnel.  The sledge was underneath her, so was a pile of snow.  She stood up, probably a bit too soon, as her legs were like jelly, and her bottom hurt from the fall.  She looked up at the perfectly round hole in the roof.  She could make out the scattered rocks, she had only been about two grown-up steps away from crashing.  What was this tunnel she had fallen into?  Looking around again, she noticed that, attached to the edge of the hole was a big round wooden door with large brass hinges.  That must be it, she thought to herself, pleased to end the puzzle.  There was a door leading from the ground into this tunnel (which was very peculiar, but right then Lyla did not particularly care) and she was lucky enough to have sledged onto it, and it must have opened and dropped her through!

Looking around once more, she wondered to herself whether she really was lucky.  She suddenly realised that she couldn’t climb back out of the hole in the ceiling . . . and it also came to her that she had not won the race to become the bravest child in Daisyfield!  She didn’t know which one upset her more.  Still, she was in one piece, and managed to swap the probability of broken bones to the reality of a bruised bottom . . . it seemed a fair deal, she thought to herself with a nonchalant shrug of the shoulders. 

A tunnel, she thought aloud to herself, touching her chin thoughtfully with one mittened hand, must lead from somewhere . . . and to somewhere.  With that, she placed Esther and Teddy Radson back in the sledge, grabbed the reins and started out, but after a few steps, she noticed the sledge didn’t move properly.  It was hard to see in the darkness, so she ran her little hands along the sledge’s runners.  Yep!  There we go, it was pretty badly damaged from the fall, and the runners were bent out of shape.  Mommy is going to be so mad, she thought glumly.  All she could do right now though, was to keep walking through the dark tunnel.  She noticed a strange orange glow coming from the very end . . . and headed towards it.