Once outside, Georgia had stopped to breathe in the cool evening air, while she tried to steady her nerves. The family home was on the outskirts of the tiny Lake District village of Fellmere, situated at just the point where the hillside settlements petered out and the untamed countryside took over. Autumn had already visited their front garden, and the plants were mostly bare, bent branches. A mole had kicked up a few mounds of dirt in the grass as he tunnelled his way through, and everything was covered in leaves. Her father’s rake stood rusting against the wall.
Eventually, Georgia took a long, deep breath and set off. She regularly turned towards the hills at this time of day, on a late-afternoon run, but this evening, for once, she set her back to them and headed for the woodland path. The rough track was well worn by tourists and Fellmere locals, although at this time of year the increasing rain and first fall of leaves could make the journey slippery. Along the way, a few benches were situated at the finest viewpoints over the valley, where you could look south across Lake Windermere and west towards the Langdales.
‘These are the places that have made poets fall to their knees in wonder,’ Georgia’s English teacher had said last year, when they made a trek up Haystacks, a popular mountain in the Buttermere Valley, in search of inspiration for an essay project. It had been a sweeping reference to the many fells and mountains and valleys that belonged to the Lake District, and Georgia could already feel that reverence growing within her. Even the best oil paintings and watercolours seemed stifled by their two dimensions when she could stand on a summit and turn a complete circle of glorious panoramas, bear witness to nature’s careful brushstrokes in infinite degrees. Not only that, but the scenery was preternatural, apt for more change in moments than millennia, thanks to the continuous interventions of the weather. White clouds could drop deep shadows into the greenest valley, while their darker storm cousins could turn the entire scene grey and violent in seconds. Yet with one quick kiss from a benevolent sun, every colour and surface in the landscape would be repainted with rich golden hues, sending idle photographers scrambling for tripods and timers.
Georgia’s love of her surroundings had deepened in the past few years, thanks to fell-running. It was a sport unlike any other – competitive racing through this ever-changing mountainous terrain that might see her scrabbling up grassy banks, balancing along jagged rocky summits, negotiating waterfalls and sliding down scree slopes. It was racing that might take hours – even days, at the most competitive levels – and required her to pack water, sustenance, wet-weather gear, a map, a compass and a whistle. It was an activity that challenged her body and cleared her mind while nature pushed her to her limits and called her as witness to its treasures – from the tiny songbirds and shy red squirrels that hid in the forests, to the vast rocky peaks that shone like steel above verdant valleys shimmering in sunshine.
Georgia trained as often as she could – the school fell-running championships would take place in two days’ time, and she was on the verge of breaking records. As a result, she knew the woods intimately, and yet they seemed to change along with her mood. When she was running, it was the lush colours and patterns she noticed most – the emerald moss that crawled and settled over everything from the rocks to the trees; the crowds of ferns with their intricate tips curled into themselves as tightly as the fists of newborn babes. Clusters of bright flowers peeked shyly from arbitrary points along the way, sometimes springing up recklessly on the path so she had to jump over them as she ran. And at the right time of year the bluebells took over their own section of the forest, laying a pretty carpet between the trees that mirrored the spring skies. But on nights like tonight, the woods were an annoyance – one long stepping stone between Georgia and the social life of town. On these occasions there always seemed a root ready to trip her, or a stick poking out from an errant branch, eager to snag her clothes and slow her down.