Chapter 1 #3
There’s a catch in my throat, notable enough that Javen takes the plastic container back, sliding it onto the hood of my Jeep before pulling me into a tight hug. “I’m gonna miss you so fucking much, Dox.”
“Gonna miss you too.”
Tears soak both our cheeks when we pull away.
One of my foster moms who was obsessed with magnified images once told me, under a microscope, dried tears look different depending on the reason for them.
Something in the chemical makeup of emotions changes their properties.
I’m sure Javen’s would look like starbursts of hope and reminiscence right now.
Mine probably look like rotten tree roots infecting the rest of the forest.
“I don’t want to say goodbye,” I tell him, grateful I can camouflage some of my despair at my crumbling life with missing him.
He pinches my left cheek, the one with the dimple. “It’s not goodbye. It’s see you later.”
“See you later, then.”
Pressing a kiss to the crown of my head, he squeezes my hand and leaves me to bite my trembling lip. With the truck all closed and a final wave out the window, Javen takes off down the road.
I sit in my Jeep—my new home—with all my earthly belongings piled in a sad heap in the front seat, a dais for the sugar bomb Javen left me.
My gaze fixes on the corner of my dad’s journal, just sticking out of my backpack.
Its pages are filled with notes and musings and little stories.
Stories I’d like to think he would have told me when I was old enough to appreciate the gravity of them.
He thought he had time.
Panic rises, filling my chest cavity. Like I’m a vase teeming with nothing but dirt and a thousand wriggling worms. Slithering down my ribs, burrowing into my stomach. Puncturing my heart over and over until it resembles a blood-soaked sponge.
Out my car window, the dark trees taunt me. I can almost hear them cackling at my misfortune.
My gaze is drawn to a dirt trail leading into the tree line, where a young man with dark brown hair and tan skin walks, hands shoved in his pockets.
There’s nothing particularly unique about him—save for the pair of demon-like horns adorning his bowed head.
My gaze narrows. Dryads don’t usually come this far into town.
He glances over a shoulder, but before I can get a good look at his face, it’s bathed in shadows. Then he disappears into the forest.
Could always make a deal with a dryad…
Again, I look to my father’s journal, pulling it out and opening it to a page I’ve returned to many times—one of the first entries he made.
Myrtle Queen makes deals.
Take Myrtle Tree Trail.
Find the largest tree.
Leave no room for loopholes.
Every wish comes with a price.
The ever-present gloom of my life lightens for the first time. I’m at the metaphorical end of my rope, so what else is there to lose? Who else is there to go to? Also, if I can’t get what I want—what I need to survive—maybe I can take a few dryads down with me.
Without registering what I’m doing, I shift my Jeep into drive and pull slowly onto the tree-lined highway in the direction of Myrtle Tree Trail.
Every atom in my being should be screaming at me to turn around, reminding me what happened there when I was a kid.
But I’m older now. No wiser, maybe, but at least I’m armed.
My mind scrolls through my father’s journal, read so often his words are like memories—of antlered dryads and green-skinned arborfae with translucent wings, of tree sirens and wood sprites.
Of the city-dwelling ironfae. Tales of treetop kingdoms and caverns filled with bones and a queen who grants wishes to desperate mortals.
The Myrtle Queen.
After combing through my dad’s notebook while my foster families slept, I would dream of meeting the dryad queen, about asking her to take me away from my capricious foster-kid life.
But I’d remember the notes in the margins—the warnings—and change my mind.
Nothing seemed grave enough for me to risk a run-in with a dryad my dad had deemed “formidable.”
Never trust a dryad was a phrase that came up more than once in the pages of his journal, tucked between anecdotes of tree fairies who ripped men’s bones from their bodies to decorate their walls.
According to one of the songs my mother taught me on piano, only fools rush in. But I have never pretended to be anything other than foolish. It’s either rush in or sit and wait for the inevitable. Like watching a giant wave approach without moving an inch.
If I don’t do something, I’m going to be a homeless diabetic. And it takes far less than a fool to know that homelessness and insulin dependence don’t mix.
I’m not sure how long I’ve been driving now. Pulling off the highway onto a narrow road, the memories fade into reality. My car groans as I put it in park, awareness trickling in as my eyes slide to the little brown sign that reads Myrtle Tree Trail.
The last place I saw my parents alive. The home of the Myrtle Queen.
Hope she likes cake.