Kestrel knew what they were right away, because they were exactly like the ones in her grandma’s notebook, but bigger. She heard the sea roar in her ears and shuddered. So it was real.
Granmos’s body was as deep as the forest, its eyes as far away as the stars. Kestrel wondered, with dizzying uncertainty, if it was even possible to escape the forest without your grabber. The idea of a secret path, snaking through the trees and toward freedom, suddenly seemed childish. Maybe the forest would only release you if you defeated it in other, more difficult ways.
“All right,” Kestrel breathed, feeling tiny and insignificant. “I guess this is it.”
Granmos, old and stately, with a skirt made of bones and teeth, held out its tiny, elegant hand. It—she—was perfectly still but for the slight wheeze of her breath and the green beetle in the center of her chest, which slowly opened and closed its wing cases like a beautiful brooch. Granmos still wore an approximation of her grandma’s face, old and wise with crooked teeth. Kestrel could almost smell the pipe smoke. Her eyes were fixed on the forest, but they quickly flicked sideways to Kestrel. She was waiting.
The last pieces of regret fluttered in Kestrel’s chest like so many bits of paper. She was full of holes, and she didn’t think she’d ever be able to fill them in.
But maybe that didn’t have to stop her.
She took one last look at the empty forest, the trees still swaying where Finn had swung through them, and turned back to her grabber.
She hesitantly took Granmos’s hand. The grabber’s fingers closed gently over her own. Kestrel knew she was standing with the most dangerous creature alive. She knew that one day, if she wasn’t strong, it would find its appetite again. And she knew that if she took one more step, her life was going to change forever.
Kestrel nodded. Granmos smiled. Together, speckled with the light of a thousand mushrooms, they turned and faced the endless forest.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
I want to thank everyone who made this book possible, starting with all the awesome people at Dial Books for Young Readers and, in particular, the wonderful Stacey Friedberg, editor extraordinaire. Thank you also to my friends and writerly colleagues, whose cheerleading and proofreading skills have saved me countless times; and to my parents and sister, for shouting about my monster-ridden stories to anyone who will listen.
And lastly—but probably most importantly—bottomless thanks (and... apologies?) to the people in my life whose mannerisms and quirks I have shamelessly pilfered. Sorry, they were just too good.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Charlotte Salter lives in England, and has a Master's in Writing. She loves to tell stories and create dark, fantastical worlds.
Copyright
DIAL BOOKS FOR YOUNG READERS
PENGUIN YOUNG READERS GROUP
An imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
375 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
Copyright © 2018 by Charlotte Salter
Penguin supports copyright. Copyright fuels creativity, encourages diverse voices, promotes free speech, and creates a vibrant culture. Thank you for buying an authorized edition of this book and for complying with copyright laws by not reproducing, scanning, or distributing any part of it in any form without permission. You are supporting writers and allowing Penguin to continue to publish books for every reader.
Ebook ISBN 9780735229259
Salter, Charlotte, author.
Where the woods end / Charlotte Salter.
New York, NY : Dial Books for Young Readers, 2018
Summary: Twelve-year-old Kestrel lives in a seemingly endless forest, and in order to escape she will need to defeat her Grabber, a creature that builds its body to reflect her greatest fear.
LCCN 2017043434 | ISBN 9780735229235 (hardcover)
Subjects: | CYAC: Monsters—Fiction. | Fear—Fiction. | Forests and forestry—Fiction.
LCC PZ7.1.S254 Wh 2018 | DDC [Fic]—dc23 LC
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Jacket art © 2018 by Marie Muravski
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