13
Flare
My eyes peeled open. Water licked my chin as I lay on my back, with my head twisted to the side and fire scalding my throat. Groggy, I lugged myself halfway up. The hem of my chemise was torn, both straps frayed and blazing red cuts marring the knob of one knee.
Hellfire. My hip throbbed like a son of a bitch.
The breeze stirred, bringing with it the echo of shivering leaves. The scent of brine mingled with a strange floral whiff I didn’t recognize. I slumped atop a bed of sand—brilliant, white sand that abutted a blue-green ocean tide, the color reminding me of an aquamarine.
While the lazy sea dragged back and forth across the shore, a globe of light blazed over the horizon and splashed gold onto the breakers. I wobbled to my feet and stumbled in the orb’s direction. Submerged to my calves, I gawked at the sun, which glowed like a medallion, baking the world in heat and light.
I had washed up … where?
Despite being a Summer coastline, the ocean’s rumble sounded deeper, longer, and fiercer. The sights were richer in hue and exaggerated in shape, lush and overlapping. The crescent beach stretched far, a cove with no inkling of life, no footprints or docked ships. Fern trees crouched low and extended their slender necks over the jeweled water, while other foreign trees rose to a single wooded peak behind me, the thick canopy painted in too many shades of green to count, and fog coiled like a python between the treetops.
A rainforest. It was a rainforest.
I remembered. The Summer lyrics had formed a map, and that map had displayed a path within the sky’s rays. I’d been escaping, then fighting the villain prince, then combating a storm. I’d seen the beams of sun and followed them while Summer’s castle shrank, disappearing behind a filmy curtain. Afterward, the clouds had parted to unveil another landmass.
Seek not, find not, this Phantom Wild.
Divine Seasons! Laughter sprang from my lips. I covered my mouth and keeled over, my shoulders quaking with mirth. My giddy heels stomped the water, the disturbance scattering trumpet-nosed fish.
Quickly, my humor dissolved into relieved sobs, and I sank to my knees. Overcome, I crawled out of the ocean, slogged across the sand, and stamped my head there. I dug my nails into the ground and clung to the grainy surface, then pressed my palms against the earth like I’d imagined doing endless times. My lips brushed a kiss against the shore and muttered a prayer of gratitude.
“I’m here,” I whispered. “I heard you calling, and I came, and we’re together.”
And I was free.
Yet my happiness died a swift death. What about the prince? Had he landed elsewhere, or had the sea taken him? I’d tried to save us both, hadn’t I? Hadn’t I tried? I’d grabbed his loathsome hand and thrown us into the waves, but maybe I’d flung him into the crags by accident. When the tidefarer smashed into—
The tidefarer!
I shot to my feet and whirled, my desperate gaze vaulting across the tide. Boulders jutted from the sea, and chunks of marigold-painted wood littered the shore to my right, while the rest of the slain vessel had either sunk or floated away.
With a cry, I dashed into the waves. I leaped over a stingray, its translucent body resembling a sheer scarf. After dunking my head beneath the surface, I forced my eyes open despite the sting of salt. Under and over I went, plunging and rising.
For the next hour, I salvaged what I could. Over multiple trips, I towed ashore my parents’ spear, though its tip was shattered, plus rigging lines, a water net, a sand net, Poet’s dagger and sheath from the ocean floor, a canteen, a front sail, part of the mainsail, and shiplap planks from the upper cabin.
My haul grew larger, which I dumped beneath a fern tree. All that had been lost flashed through my head, including the stuff I’d forgotten we owned like pails and sand hooks and stone weights for the water nets, boning and hacking knives, chests loaded with compasses, cutlery, blankets, and clothes. I hadn’t recovered the boat’s third sail or my parents’ machete—things I needed and things that had belonged to my family.
I mourned. Sand drifters knew how to find essentials, but I couldn’t locate them if the rainforest didn’t want me to, if this realm had a different fate in mind.
Thirst parched my throat. Licking my cracked lips, I peered at the misty wall of trees. In the rainforest, there would be blessed springs and creeks. Not least of all, I might encounter ethereal creatures, dark treasures, and otherworldly dangers the Summer song hadn’t warned me about.
But inside, I would also find the key to my fate. My purpose, my calling, my mission for born souls.
After ripping long strips of the sail cloth, I wrapped the bands around my feet. Although my toes and heels remained exposed, the cloth protected the rest of my soles.
Then I strapped a rigging cord around my waist, made a knot to secure the empty canteen and dagger, and placed one foot in front of the other. The maybe-dead prince could wait. My heart wouldn’t break if the sea had taken that monster, especially not when I’d done my best to save him. I’d thrown the enemy into the waves, not at the rocks, not my fault. But if the universe had decided to play devil’s advocate and spare the enemy, I couldn’t best him without water.
I couldn’t do anything without water. Whatever lurked inside the rainforest could be perilous, but if the song was right, deadly might turn out to be beautiful.
The mesh of shrubs looked painfully adventurous to squeeze through. Thirsty and curious, I wedged myself into the thicket. Gnarled offshoots scraped my chin and poked my ankles. The hedges ate up the sunshine, cloaking the route in darkness and crushing me so that I couldn’t tell if I walked in a straight line.
I slapped my ear as something brambly skated behind my lobe. Whatever it was, it stung my flesh like a needle.
The air grew wetter, the plants tighter, the journey longer. A musty scent coated the air, making me dizzy. Creepers unfurled and reached out like fingers to snag my hair. Yelping, I jumped back and blinked through the haze.
Finally, the thicket parted. I spilled onto a path, the foul smell disappeared, and my head cleared. A dimly lit wild greeted me. Vapors slithered around the trunks while tendrils of vivid green plants glimmered among the shadows.
Then the rain fell. Washing down in droves, its arrival pulled a wondrous gasp from my lips. Smiling, I thrust my arms upward, tipping my chin and opening my mouth, the fresh, pure zest sliding across my dry tongue. My frame shook with relief, and if I started to cry, I let those tears bring me back to life.
The burning in my throat cooled. I drank and drank, then I filled my canteen.
Plucking a few leaves, I used them to scrub myself from top to bottom. I did this while laughing and weeping, the torrent leaching the sea salt from my body, soothed my cut knee, and clearing the sand from my fingernails until they gleamed white.
When the rain eased to a drizzle, I kept going. My eyes jumped from one marvel to the next. Vibrant colors glowed from every dark recess, some shades recognizable, others beyond my imagination. The flutter of goldenrod feathers. The quiver of fuzzy blossoms. Trees the likes of which I’d never seen—from sage to emerald—crocheted together and formed a dense canopy so high that my neck ached as I gaped overhead.
A melody of sounds rang from above. Cavernous warbles. The long slide of a whistle. Thuds pounded across boughs, the percussion heavy like the paws of a predator stalking its prey.
Blossoms covered a tree trunk, the bouquet spanning its height. As I padded closer, the petals flew from the bark and flapped into the air.
Butterflies! They flitted across the forest, some of their wings glowing and shifting color with each beat, from dainty pink to fiery red like stained glass. The creatures swirled around me, their sizes ranging from miniature to massive. Elated, I leaped into a dance, twirling alongside them, the jubilant butterflies fanning their wings and waltzing with me down the path.
Without warning, they broke apart and scattered. Grinning, I watched them soar.
From someplace nearby, a serpentine hiss vibrated through the air. Not long after, a low rumble skidded from another area, sounding very much like a feline’s roar. The echoes caused my flesh to shiver with a nervous thrill.
“Show me your secrets,” I whispered to the forest. “Let me learn. Help me find what I’m looking for.”
Did this land hear me the way I heard myself? I liked to believe so.
Closing my eyes, I waited for the slightest tremble of air and deciphered its direction. Opening my eyes, I watched how this world moved, how each breeze rustled the canopy, and I ran my fingers over the offshoots, looking for breaks that would lead to a spring.
Then I squatted and pressed my palms into the earth, feeling the tremors that rose from someplace below. Setting my ear to the ground, I listened for flows and streams. The floor rumbled, though not from water. Instead, the vibrations could be roots stretching or animals prowling from a distance. Nothing more.
Of course, this rainforest would not simply hand me everything I needed. It had chosen me, beckoned me, given me the power to recognize the map inside the song. But although this place had been awaiting my arrival, it wasn’t any common parcel of land like the ones I’d explored with Mama and Papa. This realm had no equal. It was the one and only rainforest in The Dark Seasons, and even with our bond, I couldn’t know all the rules. The wild would show me where to discover the key, provided that I earned it.
Sitting upright, I moved to stand—then halted. Another noise cut through the foliage, the disturbance made by human limbs and a pair of boots.
I doubted anyone else had been chosen by the wild to venture here. At least, not in recent eras. Therefore, the racket could only belong to one monster.
On all fours, I scampered into the shadows and set my fingers on the dagger. The prince wouldn’t stop until he got his hands on me. But I wouldn’t let him claim me again.
Not if I caught him first.