Five
If Arwen had been an ordinary human, this forest would definitely be giving her Disney villain vibes.
She half expected the next turn in the road to reveal a cursed beast's castle or at the very least, creepy grasping trees with eyes, like in that really old Disney cartoon, though she couldn't for the life of her remember which one.
One with a charming prince and lots of singing, anyway.
Well, there might not be spooky trees or singing, and she wasn't a princess in this realm, though she might be in the fae world, but her scooter battery was definitely dying, with no sign of a charging station in sight.
And the pull on her heart told her she'd need to leave the road and venture into the woods proper, if she wanted to reach the fairy ring.
With one final pitiful whine, the scooter sputtered into silence. It was time.
Arwen slugged back the last dose of antidote, hoping it would be enough to rid her system of those hateful heart pills, and stepped between the trees.
At first, she was glad of her gumboots, for the muddy game trail would have swallowed her sneakers within the first dozen metres.
But as she staggered onwards, deeper into the forest, her legs began to feel as leaden as her arms, and when one of her boots got stuck almost knee deep in a particularly stubborn mire, she no longer had the energy to pull it out. Only her sock-clad foot came free.
She stared at her empty boot. In a moment, it would sink beneath the surface, and she wasn't sure she cared. The persistent tug in her chest, telling her where she needed to go, urged her onward. Away from the gumboot that had already given up on her quest.
But Arwen would not give up. This was her father's dying wish – what he wanted her to do. She didn't dare disappoint him now.
So on she staggered, until the remaining boot got caught in a tree root and tripped her, tearing that boot off her foot, too.
She glared at the second boot, but it was stuck fast. Fuck it, too, then. In her father's stories, the fae folk never wore shoes, not even in Scotland, and his first pair of shoes had been a gift made for him by his second wife, a woman who'd lived and died centuries before Arwen had been born.
Well, she still had her socks.
Now, if only she'd brought a bottle of water...
Three steps later, a tiny tarn soaked through her socks. Arwen dropped to her knees and drank her fill. Scotland might be cold and damp, but you'd never be short of water, for you couldn't walk more than a mile before tripping over a stream.
Three streams later, when she rose from another deep drink, dizziness drove her back to her knees.
She hoped it was just exhaustion, but she didn't know how long it had been since she'd eaten, and dizziness was one of the symptoms of digitalin poisoning.
Perhaps she hadn't taken the antidote early enough, and the drug had already damaged her heart...
If only she could have stayed in hospital, where they might have been able to help. Then again, if they had, surely they would have done something to cure her father's heart condition, too.
Yet another reason for her to flee to the fae realm. They'd have magical healers there, capable of things that the human world could only imagine. She had to keep going.
Another attempt to rise sent her to her hands and knees.
No, more walking was beyond her now. But she could still crawl.
Just another beast in the woods. It was a pity she wasn't a shifter, something swift and sure-footed.
But then she wouldn't be able to get to the fae realm, for only someone with fae blood could open the gate.
Every human who'd stepped though a fairy ring had only done so because someone with fae blood had chosen to let them through.
This was the right forest. It all felt so familiar, somehow, though it had been years since she'd visited.
There was fae magic in the trees, magic that greeted and strengthened her every time she touched another trunk.
She would not have made it so far without the trees.
Trees that wanted to cheer her on. She would not disappoint them. Or disappoint her father.
The game trail seemed to go on forever, but Arwen knew she was going the right way. Until her path was blocked by a tarn too wide to step across.
Once again, she drank her fill, before sitting up to survey her options. Her destination lay across the water, so she had to get across somehow. Ah, there was her bridge – a row of stepping stones so covered in dark moss they'd been invisible at first.
By the time Arwen reached the far bank, she was soaked as if she'd swum across the stream instead of crossing by the stones. Pale sunlight filtered through the trees, but it wasn't enough to stop her from shivering. But she was close now – she could feel it. Just a little further...
Arwen's hand thumped onto damp oak. A beam, not a tree trunk. The first of three steps leading to a cottage that looked like it could have been here when her father first crossed over to the human world.
This was no fairy ring, yet her heart had led her here. To three steps that felt impossible to climb, in her exhausted state.
She needed rest. Not for long. Just a night, and she would continue on in the morning.
Her heart knew what she needed, and this place must be it.
How many other fae had spent the night beneath this very roof, resting at the beginning or end of a long journey?
Surely that was the purpose of this place.
This was her fae heritage as much as theirs.
Arwen hauled her deadweight body up the steps, reaching up for the door handle. A handle, not a knob, so all she had to do was close her fingers around it, and let the full weight of her arm drag it down to open the door. No need for locks this far in the forest.
Ice-white tiles froze her fingers as she crawled over the threshold and came face to face with a washing machine. Arwen almost laughed. The cottage might be ancient, but the inside had been upgraded with the times. Her father wasn't the only fae who fancied modern gadgets.
Arwen struggled out of her wet clothes, piling them into the barrel of the washing machine to deal with later. She wiped herself dry with a towel and tossed that in, too.
The next room had wood floors, worn smooth over the centuries, but it was the bed around the corner that caught her attention. She could explore the place later, when she woke. Right now, what she needed most was rest.
Someone had already made the bed, as though they were expecting her. The ancient laws of hospitality still held true here, as they did in the fae realm. She'd need to remember that, when she crossed over.
But now...to sleep, perchance to dream, so that tomorrow she might take arms against a sea of troubles once more and venture into what Hamlet had called the undiscovered country, for he was just a human prince, not a fae one, though he'd lost his father, too.
Arwen tumbled into the bed, fumbling at the blankets until they covered her from the grasp of winter's icy claws.
To sleep. Oh yes, to dream ...