Chapter 68
CHAPTER SIXTY-EIGHT
Briar
“Oh! Visitors! I so rarely get visitors!” a childlike voice exclaimed in my head.
I froze in the middle of harvesting the willowcap mushrooms from the large clearing in the woods. Some sun filtered through the clouds; flecks of it danced across the ground, but it was still more like dusk in Wildwood than the middle of the day.
I searched for the source of the voice, but the woods remained empty. I set the mushrooms I’d plucked in the basket I’d brought for this task.
I wasn’t supposed to be outside the wall, but Zephyr and Gizzi were keeping watch, and it wasn’t the first time we’d slipped out to gather the mushrooms. When I’d casually mentioned to Zephyr that willowcap mushrooms would make my potion stronger, he’d told me he knew a place, but it was outside the walls.
He said he hadn’t been there in over a year, but the mushrooms should still exist. We’d slipped out yesterday to check the area, plucked a few mushrooms, and scampered back before anyone noticed we’d gone.
Zephyr offered to harvest the mushrooms on his own, but there was safety in numbers, and I’d never forgive myself if he got killed while trying to help me. I wouldn’t forgive myself if something happened to him now, but at least I was here to help protect him.
Today, I brought a basket with me, and when Dromon went to help some sprites with the birth of a calf, we snuck away. This wasn’t my brightest decision, but some of the roses were still struggling, and these willowcaps could really help them.
If caught, I’d lose the freedom I’d gained, but it was worth it to help save the roses not responding as well to the earth moss potion. If we lost them, I was certain that, even if the curse could be broken, those shifters wouldn’t survive to see it.
“Look at how cute that thing is! What is it?”
The excited voice rang in my head again. I glanced over at where Gizzi sat on a branch, his nose twitching and his black eyes focused on the forest.
“I wish I could play with it!”
“Do you hear that?” I asked.
I searched for another animal in the trees or perched in the branches. I’d searched for something when we first arrived to see if I could communicate with it, but the woods were eerily still, and they remained that way.
“Hear what?” Zephyr asked from where he sat on a branch across the clearing from Gizzi. He still didn’t know I could communicate with Gizzi, but he didn’t question Gizzi’s ability to keep watch.
“That voice,” I muttered.
Zephyr frowned at me as Gizzi turned on his branch. “Do you hear another animal?” he asked me.
“I’m not sure, but I don’t see or sense anything.”
“What did it say?” Zephyr asked.
“It wants to play with Gizzi.”
“She heard me! She heard me! No one’s ever heard me!” the voice cried.
When cool air brushed my right arm, I turned toward it, but though I sensed something there, I didn’t see anything.
“She felt me too! She felt me!”
Before I could begin to process what was happening, a thunderous crash jerked my head toward the castle. My heart leapt into my throat as trees snapped with an echoing crack that reverberated throughout the day.
In the distance, three-hundred-foot-tall trees toppled like they were no more than twigs, and their impact caused the ground to quake. Whatever was causing them to fall like that was coming our way as the trees were plummeting toward us.
“What is that?” Zephyr shouted.
“We have to go!” Gizzi yelled in my head as he leapt off his branch, sprinted across the clearing, and scampered up to my shoulder.
He didn’t have to tell me twice, but as I was clasping the basket against my chest and preparing to run, a tree crashed into the clearing twenty feet away from me.
Its branches shattered on impact; it hit the earth so hard it bounced me a foot off the ground while smashing the precious patch of mushrooms beneath it.
My heart ached for the mushrooms, but my survival instincts screamed at me to run, and while I’d been stupid enough to sneak out here, I wasn’t dumb enough to stand here and wait for my death. The only problem was silence had descended with the crash of the last tree.
The absolute hush was far more unnerving than the crashing trees. At least then, I’d known some monster was coming at us from the direction of the castle, but now, I had no idea where it was.
All the hair on my arms and nape stood on end as the creature hunted us, and I didn’t doubt it was out there, stalking. It was big enough to topple trees, so I couldn’t imagine how it went so quiet, but I sensed it closing in.
I had to move, but I wasn’t sure which way to go. I couldn’t run further away from the castle; that would be suicide. That thing had come from the castle.
“Which way do we go?” I breathed.
“I’m not sure,” Zephyr whispered. “But we shouldn’t go further away from the castle.”
“I agree,” Gizzi said.
I clutched the basket against my chest as I debated my options. It would probably be smarter to leave it behind, but if I were going to die for these mushrooms, then I’d die with them.
“If it becomes necessary, I’ll bite them,” Gizzi said.
“I’m going to hold you to that,” I told him.
“It’s coming!” the childlike voice whispered in my head.
I had no idea who or what was speaking, and I’d stopped caring. “Where?”
“She can talk to me too! No one can talk to me!”
The excited cries echoed in my head, and while I was happy for this new intruder in my mind, I didn’t have time for its celebration. “Where?” I asked again.
“Straight ahead, fifty feet. Forty. Thirty. Oh boy, it’s fast and ugly!”
It closed in with a lethal speed that made the basilisk look slow.
“Twenty feet!”
My heart raced as, with the basket against my chest, I turned and sprinted to the right, toward the castle and away from whatever was about to eat us. I’d always been fast too, but even as my legs pumped and my lungs burned, I knew I didn’t stand a chance.
I’d only made it ten feet when a roar punctured the hush. Screw the mushrooms and my resolve to keep them!
Spinning, I went to throw the basket at whatever was closing in on us, but a hand snatched my wrist out of the air, and the basket toppled away. Pain flared through my arm as the monster jerked me around.