Page 27 of The Vanishing Place

Effie held the drawing in shaking fingers, the bush breathing around her.

The bush was never fully quiet—there was always the hum of insects and the tweet of birds—but Effie couldn’t hear anything beyond the fierce rush of her thoughts.

Dad was out there. Waiting. Watching. Shackled to the hut and the trees.

Effie steeled herself, then she looked at the drawing again, peering into the mind of a child. Seeing what Anya had seen.

She had drawn the inside of the hut. The sofa.

The kitchen area. The curtain to the sleeping nook.

On the floor, his chest bare and his eyes drawn as two X s, was Four.

The cross was carved into him with a red pencil, pressed so hard that it had gone through the paper, leaving a hole.

Next to the depiction of Four, splayed out with her head resting in a puddle of blood and two X s for eyes, was a body labeled “Mum.”

Tia.

Effie stiffened as she read the words that were scribbled underneath.

He’s taken her. Mum is with God now.

Now she will be properly punished.

Effie swallowed and looked out at the bush.

“What happened, Anya?” Her voice caught. “What happened to you here?”

She bit into the flesh of her cheeks. Blinking the sting from her eyes, Effie turned the paper over and silently mouthed the words on the back.

Leave. Or you will end up like Mum .

“What did he do to you?”

Effie folded the picture and slipped it into her pocket. She didn’t run at the trees. She didn’t scream Anya’s name. The bush had her now. He had her. And, in the maze of trees, they were as good as gone.

Vanished.

Even with dogs and drones and a team of officers, the bush might never give them up. But she would try. Effie lifted her bag onto her back. She would get Lewis and do it right. Then she would strip the bush bare.

“I’ll help her, Tia. I promise.”