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warble.
           Greg flinched as Maria's nails dug into his palm and she pulled him back towards the trees.
           "What?" he asked, following his wife. "I saw something move near the ferns," Maria explained in high pitched, clipped syllables.
    Greg tried to slow her down, but Maria snatched her hand free and began running towards the undergrowth.

           "Ryan… Courtney!" Maria screamed as she ran.
           "Mummy." Courtney's reply came back, weak and tearful.
           "Courtney." Maria stopped in her tracks and searched the tight fern growth. "Where are you honey?"
           "Courtney," Greg sighed. "Daddy's here."
           "I want to go home now." Courtney stepped out of the bushes and Maria's legs nearly gave out, but not with relief.
           Courtney stopped in front of them, her face a smeared mess of mud, grass stains and blood. Her pale pink shorts and matching t-shirt looked almost black and clung to her tiny frame, wet and heavy. In her hands she held the tattered remains of the green top Ryan had been wearing when they'd set off less than fifteen minutes ago.
           Greg knelt down next to Courtney and attempt to take the remains of Ryan's t-shirt away from her, but she refused to let go.
           "Please give it to Daddy," Greg asked softly, trying his hardest not to let the horror of what he was seeing swallow him alive.
           "No," Courtney snapped. "I wouldn't give it to them."
           "Give it to who darling," Greg asked.
           "They took Ryan, but I wouldn't let them take this," she stammered, her body shivering.
    Greg took his daughter in his arms and picked her up, turning to face his wife. "Maria, take Courtney back to the van and call for help."

           Maria stared emptily into space. Greg turned Courtney's head away, not wanting her to see what he did next. He slapped Maria hard around the face and her eyes slowly came back into focus. She looked at him, her bottom lip trembling.
           "Take Courtney." Greg kept it simple. "Get help."
           "Wha…wha…what about you?" Maria asked.
           "I've got to find Ryan."
           "You won't find him," Courtney whimpered. "They took him away."
           Greg passed the child to his wife, waiting until they had reached the point on the shore level with the van. Only then did he face the woodland.
           "Ryan!" Greg shouted, the plea followed by an unbearable silence.
           Greg waited for what felt like an eternity, scared for his son and scared of what he might find when he left the security of standing in the sun. He called twice more and then followed the trail Courtney had made through the ferns.
           The smell of rotten plant life was suffocating and tinged with a secondary aroma that Greg couldn't place. The narrow pathway Courtney had trampled flat was winding and, the deeper into the woods it went, the darker it become. The trees here were growing closer together and the towering heads of green foliage where like a curtain across the sky.
           "Ryan," Greg called out the name again and again.
    The heat was unbearable, a sticky humidity that slicked Greg's forehead in sweat. He raised an arm to wipe across his brow and stopped dead in his tracks. His lower arm was covered in dark streaks of glossy red. He looked down at himself and felt his stomach revolt at the sight of the blood that had rubbed off the ferns and onto his lower half. Both arms and everything from the waist down was covered in a fine coating of red wetness.

           "Ryan!" Greg screamed, running forward as the worst thoughts started to become truth.
           Greg's foot caught on an exposed root and he went down, arms flailing pointlessly. He hit the ground hard, the unforgiving impact forcing the air from his exhausted lungs. He could feel the burn of grazed knees and knew he'd taken the skin off his