Where the World Turns Wild Read online

  PRAISE FOR WHERE THE WORLD TURNS WILD

  “Some books are excellent story telling, and some books broaden your knowledge and mind, and some just ought to be written and this book is all three. I loved it.”

  Hilary McKay, author of The Skylarks’ War

  “A brilliant adventure that pulls you headlong into Juniper and Bear’s world, where survival dependsupon finding the wild.”

  Gill Lewis, author of Sky Hawk

  “I’ve raced through Where the World Turns Wild… I think it truly is a fabulous debut with a powerful ecological message that could not be more timely. The plot and characters kept me gripped […] and I can’t wait to see what Nicola writes next!”

  AM Howell, author of The Garden of Lost Secrets

  “Nicola Penfold’s Where the World Turns Wild is a journey between extremes of grey and green, propelled by a bold and timely concept, and written with sharp, intelligent prose. A truly heartfelt and very striking novel.”

  Darren Simpson, author of Scavengers

  “A beautiful, memorable story about all the important things – love, family, loyalty, and courage – contained inside a brilliant adventure, Where the World Turns Wild can’t fail to enthrall any reader lucky enough to encounter it.”

  Sinéad O’Hart, author of The Eye of the North

  For Matilda, Daisy, Freddie and Beatrice, and the wild in all of you.

  I wonder what would happen if every human on the planet were to fall asleep for one hundred years like the princess and her courtiers in Sleeping Beauty. The mass extinctions would end. The forests would return… Will [the trees] miss us when we’re gone? And who would tell them how beautiful they are?

  From Oak and Ash and Thorn: The Ancient Woods and New Forests of Britain by Peter Fiennes

  Contents

  Title Page

  Dedication

  Part I: City

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Part II: Wild

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  Chapter Fifty

  Chapter Fifty-One

  Chapter Fifty-Two

  Chapter Fifty-Three

  Chapter Fifty-Four

  Chapter Fifty-Five

  Chapter Fifty-Six

  Chapter Fifty-Seven

  Chapter Fifty-Eight

  Chapter Fifty-Nine

  Chapter Sixty

  Chapter Sixty-One

  Chapter Sixty-Two

  Chapter Sixty-Three

  Chapter Sixty-Four

  Chapter Sixty-Five

  Chapter Sixty-Six

  Chapter Sixty-Seven

  Chapter Sixty-Eight

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  Copyright

  Once upon a time, almost fifty years ago, climate change and deforestation and humans ransacking everything good and beautiful, had driven our planet to breaking point. Nature was dying – plants and trees, animals, birds, insects – new species disappeared every day. But then the ReWilders created the disease.

  It was grown in a lab by their best scientists and let loose in a population of ticks – eight-legged little creatures that hide in the undergrowth.

  The beauty of the disease was no animal or bird ever got sick, only humans did. Humans got so sick they died. Lots of them. And the disease was so complex, so shifting, it was impossible to treat and impossible to vaccinate against. The only way for humans to survive was to live enclosed in cities, shut away from all other living things. And that, of course, had been the ReWilders’ plan all along. For in the abandoned wastelands outside the cities, nature could regrow, and it grew wilder and wilder. Wilder than ever.

  It was humans or the Wild and the ReWilders chose the Wild. I would have chosen it too.

  The glass tank is slippery in my hands and my cheeks burn red as I walk down the corridor from Ms Endo’s room. Stick insects. One of the city’s few concessions. Therapy for wayward kids. For us to concentrate on, to control our out-of-control imaginations. The Sticks are the last remedy in this place.

  Before you’re sent to the Institute. That’s the next step. The cliff edge. There’s no going back from that.

  There’s a whisper around me. Kids in my year and Etienne too, though he’s calling my real name – “Juniper! Juniper!”

  They’re not going to forget this in a hurry. Juniper Green, getting the Sticks. But if I concentrate hard enough I can shut them out. I can shut them all out.

  I grab my bag and storm past everyone – through the door and the playground, and across the road that separates Secondary from Primary. Bear will be glad of the insects at least.

  But my brother’s not in the surge of bodies rushing out of his Year Two classroom. I catch the teacher’s eye quizzically and she beckons me over. “I’m sorry, Juniper. He’s in with Mr Abbott. You’ll need to go and collect him.”

  I gulp and my eyes sting with held-back tears. Not Bear too.

  Ms Jester looks at the tank. “Your turn for the stick insects, huh?”

  She puts a hand on my shoulder. She was my teacher once. One of the good ones.

  I nod vacantly and make my way down the corridor, keeping my gaze straight ahead. There are fractals on the walls either side – repeating patterns that are meant to be good for your brain. Soothing or something. Usually the fractals are OK, but today the grey geometric patterns leading to Abbott’s room make my eyes hurt.

  The head teacher’s room is right at the top of the school – a glass observatory from where he can survey not just Primary and Secondary but the whole of the city almost. I take a deep breath, but even before I knock Abbott’s voice rings out from behind the door. “Enter!”

  I go in, leaving the stick insects outside so he doesn’t have another reason to gloat. The Sticks are Ms Endo’s thing. Abbott wouldn’t allow them if he had his way. They’re not meant as punishment – Ms Endo’s our pastoral support worker and she’s not like that – but still everyone knows. I’m on my final warning. One more slip up and I’ll be sent to the Institute.

  Bear’s curled in a plastic chair – his eyes rimmed red, his cheeks blotchy and swollen. I rush over. “Bear! What’s happened?”

  “Your family is surpassing itself, June.
Twice in one day,” Abbott chimes, signalling an empty chair. But Bear’s not going to let me disentangle myself now, so I sit on the same chair and Bear folds himself into me, his head pressed against my chest. He’s shaking.

  “I’m afraid it was another disruptive day for your brother,” Abbott says, frowning at Bear, who’s completely turned away from him, his hands over his ears.

  “OK,” I say, wary, stroking Bear’s long dark locks. The curls the other kids rib him for.

  “I’ve made several attempts to contact your grandmother.”

  “She’ll be in the glasshouse. She never hears the phone in there.”

  Abbott glares at me – his porcelain face cracked, like the vases you get in the Emporium, the old junk store just around the corner from our block. “Then make sure she checks her messages. We have to come up with a plan. Your brother’s becoming increasingly difficult to control.”

  Use his name, I shout silently at Abbott. It’s because he hates it, the same way he hates mine. Animals, trees, flowers – our city forbids them all, so I’m always June to Abbott. Plain, ordinary June.

  “What happened?” I ask instead.

  “Your brother threw a chair. It could have hit another child.”

  “It didn’t?”

  “That’s not the point. He’s wild.” Abbott leans in closer and I can smell the carbolic. It’s coming right out of his pores.

  “He’d like to be,” I say, nervous, wishing Annie Rose was here. She wouldn’t hold back. Not when it comes to Bear. Well, of course he won’t sit at a table all day and be quiet. He’s a child. He needs to be outside more!

  Abbott looks astonished. To him any defence is just impertinence. “I think we’ve heard enough on that subject for one day!”

  The whispered hiss of the other kids comes back to me.

  It’s coming up to fifty years since the city declared itself tick free and our citizenship class had been asked for essays. ‘Reasons to be proud’. The best ones were to be read out before the whole of Secondary. I should have known Abbott would get involved. Get involved and twist everything around.

  What was I even thinking? ‘The beauty of the disease’. ‘Choosing the Wild’. I gave Abbott a plate of gold when I handed in that essay.

  “Bear wouldn’t want to hurt anyone,” I go on, quieter now. If you knew him, I think. If you could see him with the plants in our glasshouse.

  “Perhaps you’d care to see a clip of him this afternoon.”

  “No,” I say quickly. “I don’t need to.”

  But it’s already playing. On the white screen Abbott has waiting on his desk for the ritual shaming, the humiliating rerun of misdemeanours.

  Bear’s a different person on that screen. Like a caged animal, if we even knew what that looked like any more.

  “I’d really rather not watch,” I say. I can feel Bear’s heart racing – fast, fast, too fast. His fingers are pale from holding them against his ears so tightly that not one decibel goes in. I want to pick him up and carry him away, but I’ve had enough warnings today about where rebellions lead.

  I wish I could shut my eyes, like Bear has, but Abbott’s gaze doesn’t leave my face. He’s watching my reaction. He’s enjoying this.

  On screen, Bear’s thrown a pot of crayons across the floor – scattered them, like a broken rainbow. Ms Jester’s come over, smiling, but cautiously. The other children have formed an arc. Leering around him, they’re laughing, expectant.

  “Why did he do that?” I ask. “Bear loves drawing. Something must have upset him.”

  Abbott remains silent. I can hear the chant through the speakers.

  “Through the city storms an angry bear.”

  The on-screen Bear is bristling. If he was a bear, all the hairs on his body would be raised.

  “Shall we pick these up?” Ms Jester’s saying. She’s kneeling down to help him, but the chant’s getting louder.

  “An angry bear

  With his long brown hair.

  Send him back! Send him back!

  Send him back to the forest!”

  “Class, please! Quiet!” Ms Jester’s begging them but Bear’s already starting to shriek. Hands over his ears, he’s opened his mouth as wide as he can and he’s screaming.

  The children explode into laughter – they’re pointing and coming closer. It’s not an arc any more, it’s a circle and Bear’s in the middle of it – screaming, lashing out.

  “Please turn it off,” I say to Abbott. My tears are coming now.

  “This is the part, here,” he says dispassionately.

  That’s when Bear breaks free of me. He runs out of the room and down the stairs, and I go after him, I have to, only just remembering to pick up the Sticks on my way. So I never see Bear picking up that chair. I never see whether he meant to hurt anyone. I wouldn’t blame him if he had.

  “Bear! Wait! Slow down!”

  He’s fast, my little brother. In a couple of years he’s going to be way faster than me. He’s over the playground already, hurtling across the Astro to the school gate.

  “Wait, Bear! I’ve got the phasmids! I’m bringing them home.” Despite himself, Bear starts to slow at that. “The phasmids, Bear! Like you wanted!”

  He turns around, his eyes on the tank in my hands. The vivarium.

  “Wow, Ju. What did you do?” he asks breathlessly. There’s a gleam in his eye.

  “I wrote something they didn’t like.”

  “I drew something they didn’t like,” Bear says, proudly now.

  “What did you draw?”

  “Trees. In the city. What did you write?”

  “Something about the ReWild. I tried to defend it.”

  “Ju!” Bear’s look jolts me. I’ve gone too far even for him. You can’t say the things I wrote in that essay – you can’t have those views. The ReWilders can’t be anything but bad. Terrorists. Traitors to their own species. Only sometimes you have to stand up for what you believe in. Last night, something had turned in my brain and I just couldn’t write an essay of lies.

  “But you got the Sticks, Ju!” Bear says, peering into the vent. “How many are there?”

  “Five, Ms Endo said. But I’ve only seen two so far.”

  “What will you call them, Juniper?”

  “You can help me choose.”

  “Can I?” He looks at me, completely grateful and excited. I love him so much it scares me.

  “Let’s get out of this place, Bear.”

  “Skedaddle?” he says.

  “Scarper,” I join in, and we ping back all the words we can for leaving as we wind our way through the estates to the south edge of the city where our apartment is.

  Bear’s amazing for six. He knows as many words as me, he just won’t write them down. The only mark-making he’ll do at school are his drawings and then he always gets into trouble for drawing the wrong things.

  Trees in the city. Make-believe.

  By the time our leave-takings are all used up – the fleeing and the bolting and the bunking and the disappearing – we’re almost there.

  You can spot our building a mile off because of the tall glass dome at the back. We call it the Palm House. That’s what it was once, for the old Victorian mansion block where we live. We have a tiny apartment on the ground floor where the entrance to the Palm House is. There are no palms now. They’re banned species. They need too much water. It’s just cacti and sedums. Succulents. The plants that require least water of all and could leach nutrients out of a stone if they needed to. Still, they’re the best things about this city.

  My grandmother’s a licensed Plant Keeper. People need to see green things. It’s a medical fact. So the Keepers are tasked with growing safe species – plants adapted for dry, desert conditions, plants the ticks would never go for – to be distributed through all the estates. Into the schools and workplaces and hospitals. A fix of green for people’s windowsills.

  “Annie Rose!” I call as we go into the Palm House. She doesn’t st
and for being called Grandma or Nanny or anything like that – she’s always just wanted to be Annie Rose. “We’re home!”

  “Juniper berry! Bear cub!” Annie Rose’s voice sings out. “Come find me!”

  I’m thirteen now but I still love this game. This must be the best place in the city for hide-and-seek. Old towering cacti, dense mats of sedums, we creep through them. Bear runs ahead silently. He’s learned to pad.

  I know from Annie Rose’s squeal when he’s found her. I see his tousle of hair lifted up, triumphant – black against her beautiful silver-grey. “How was your day, Bear?”

  Bear grunts and pulls away, and a shadow falls across Annie Rose’s face though her eyes stare blankly ahead like always. “Not good, huh?” she asks.

  “I hate school,” Bear growls.

  “You’re home now.” She reaches out to find him.

  “I’m going to be sick tomorrow.”

  “No, Bear!” I say, pleading. “It just makes it worse.” He’s had too many days off already. Any more and we’ll have Educational Welfare coming round, asking questions.

  “Come into the kitchen,” Annie Rose says gently. “Let’s make tea.”

  “No,” Bear says. “Never!” And he’s off through the plants – howling, squawking, screeching. Every animal noise he knows.

  “You come then, Juniper.” Annie Rose sighs and puts her arm out for me to take. I try and manoeuvre the tank to one side so she doesn’t notice, but it’s wide and the edge clangs against her. “What’s that?” she asks, feeling the smooth surface with her hands.

  There’s no point lying. The school always leaves a message when anyone gets the Sticks. The beeping on our answer machine will be furious today if Annie Rose hasn’t already silenced it.

  “Ms Endo gave me the phasmids,” I say quietly.

  “Oh, Juniper.” Annie Rose sounds sad but there’s not a hint of anger. This is what I love about her most. She’s always on our side.

  “How could a piece of writing get you in so much trouble?” Annie Rose asks, when I tell her about Abbott’s reaction to my essay. “You write so well. All those words you know.”