by Holly Hook
I hesitated for a split second. The pain grew to a scream.
And I bolted for the swampy water.
“No!” Shorty shouted. But I was too far gone. All that mattered was the pain. It had to stop even if I passed out and drowned. All thoughts of what could happen flew from my mind. Only one primal need remained. I barely noticed the dread hitting me as I crossed back into the dark spot.
And I splashed right into the disgusting water.
“Candice!” Shorty yelled.
Cool relief washed over me. I didn’t care about the horrible smell. The slime wrapping giant hands around my feet. The green scum floating on the water next to me. All I cared was that the pain was fading, fading away like a horrible dream. I reached down into the water and felt my thigh, making sure that my skin was still there. I pulled out a piece of fried jean fabric, but no skin.
No skin.
I was alive.
Shorty splashed into the water next to me. “Get out. Now!”
Then I remembered.
Alric.
But it was too late.
I looked up.
And in the shining murkiness stood a man in a black robe and a red-trimmed hood.
He was clear now. Clear as he'd be if he was standing right here. I could sense the hate washing off this man.
And then he turned to face Shorty. The air filled with a cold, deadly magic.
The water rippled. And Alric took a bold step forward.
Chapter Nine
We scrambled out of the water. Shorty had a lump under the shoulder of his shirt again. Shorty kept a hold of my arm and I struggled to pull my feet out of the muck and onto dry land.
Behind us, the water made a strange parting sound.
He was coming out. Alric.
Into the trees, Lawrence said.
“This way,” I breathed, pulling Shorty out of the dark spot and towards the thick cover of the woods. We wouldn’t make it far on the open road. Only concealment would save us here.
We crashed into the trees. The parting sound intensified, and I dared to look back. Twin walls of water grew farther apart where I stood seconds ago, leaving a greenish, slimy floor dotted with sticks and weeds. The air rippled and shimmered right above it and I caught the outline of a black-robed man forming there.
“Keep running,” Shorty said. “He’ll kill us. He’ll kill us both.”
I did, keeping the wand clutched in one hand. Lawrence remained a bump in Shorty’s shirt. The trees thickened around us and I lost sight of the road. I crashed through a patch of yellow flowers and through a ray of sun.
“Shorty!” Alric shouted behind us.
His voice was like a black void. A wave of cold energy washed over me as if the wizard had sent a dark ripple of it through the world. How could Shorty have come from someone so evil?
My sides felt ready to split. I kept going. Shorty released my arm and pumped his arms faster. Leaves slapped at my face. He was out. It was my fault.
And I couldn’t even use this wand.
“Shorty!” Alric shouted again, fainter this time. We were leaving him behind.
“Don’t stop,” Shorty said. He was hoarse. “He doesn’t know where we are. But he will look.”
We didn’t slow until I was so out of breath I couldn’t go anymore and my heart felt ready to explode. I stopped and leaned against a tree. Where were we? The forest all looked the same.
“I’m sorry,” I gasped.
“Don’t be,” Shorty said. He sucked in breath after breath. “I shouldn’t have asked you to take off your pants. Great move.”
“What choice did you have?”
The wind blew through the trees and Lawrence emerged from Shorty’s shirt and perched back on his shoulder. His throat moved in and out. Even he was gasping for breath. Lawrence would have been the first to die.
And we still weren’t safe.
Not with Alric within even a few miles of us.
“What’s he capable of?” I asked.
Shorty glanced at the tree next to me. He didn’t want to look right at me. Shame burned in his eyes. "You don’t want to know. Shrinking whole kingdoms and imprisoning them in boxes, for one. The kingdom my mother was living in is being held hostage right now."
“Along with your mother.” I remembered the boxes. The tiny villages and castles in them along with the glass containers of vapor.
“Shorty!” Alric shouted in the distance.
I jumped. Lawrence made to crawl inside Shorty’s shirt again, but he clamped it shut and prevented entry. “We need to go,” he said. “He knows I’ve turned on him.”
Satisfaction punctuated Shorty’s sentence. But then he hiked up his pants and waved me deeper into the forest. “Come on.”
I followed. “Where are we going?” I couldn't tell where the road was anymore. We had left it far behind.
“I don’t know.”
“You know Fable.”
“Not every forest. No one knows all the forests.”
“Isn’t getting lost a thing that happened a lot in fairy tales?” We walked in the opposite direction of the castle for all I knew.
“Shorty!”
Alric grew more faint. We were putting a distance between us and him. He might even stand at the swamp, hoping that he could intimidate Shorty into emerging from the trees. Maybe he wasn’t that powerful after all if he had to do that. At least it seemed like he couldn’t materialize out of thin air in front of us or he would have done it already.
A deafening crack went through the air, echoing off the surrounding tree trunks.
Shorty paled. Lawrence jumped and about fell.
"What's that?" I asked.
"I've never heard that sound before," Shorty said. "It can't be good."
And then a stiff wind blew through the trees.
"I don't think so either," I said. "We need to keep running."
I sucked in a breath, wheezing, and picked up my pace. Tree after tree passed, and they got thicker and closer together. There was no one out here. No one except for us and Alric.
The wind blew again. Was it picking up?
And with it came the odor of smoke.
"Something's burning," I said. "Shorty?"
"Yeah?" He kept going, not looking back.
"Did Alric set the woods on fire?"
Shorty stopped and so did I. Lawrence's yellow eyes got huge as he peeked into the green behind us.
Yes, Lawrence thought.
I followed his gaze. I saw nothing through the trees, but Lawrence must be able to see with those huge eyes of his. The reek of smoke returned, stronger than ever and riding on the wind.
"You win," I told Lawrence, heart racing.
Alric was trying to burn the whole forest down.
He wanted all three of us dead.
I gasped for air as I ran. Shorty led the way in front of me. He didn’t look back. He ran faster. And faster. I struggled to keep up. “Wait,” I said, hating that I wasn’t more athletic. “We can't get separated.”
But Shorty didn’t respond. He pumped his legs so hard that Lawrence struggled to hold on.
The smoke smell grew stronger and the air, hazy. I glanced back.
And regretted it.
An orange glow peeked out from between the trees far behind us—all the trees. It flickered and grew stronger by the second. Closer.
A wall of flame.
Trees popped hundreds of feet back and the wall towered over the tops, reaching for the sky. The wind blew harder, and the wall raced closer, brightening by the second.
“Shorty—look!”
He did.
And cursed.
“Run!” he shouted, grabbing my hand again.
I huffed and huffed, but a roaring sound grew louder and louder behind us. The wind grew hot. Unbearable. The wall was gaining on us and we were all about to die a horrible death.
I kept a death grip on the wand as we weaved through trees. Embers rained into the surrounding folia
ge. Rabbits bolted ahead of us, trying to escape. Birds shot into terrified flight. I wished we could join them.
The heat seared my eyeballs. The cold magic of the wand did nothing to cool me down. An orange glow fell on the trees and grass around us. I hoped this would be quick. That we wouldn't suffer for too long.
Then a thought hit me.
“Shorty,” I managed. “Hold the fire back!”
I held out the wand the best I could in front of him but he kept running.
“Shorty!” He had to do this. I was useless here.
Then he stopped. Grabbed the wand from me.
And turned towards the fire.
I screamed. The wall of flame closed in, ready for the kill. Behind it, trees burned and snapped and underbrush turned black. It was the apocalypse.
And it was only a few house lengths away.
Shorty raised the wand. He was shaking. He shouted something into the oncoming fire and I closed my eyes, waiting for the burning death to hit. The air grew to an oven and a deafening snap sounded.
And then it cooled.
I didn’t open my eyes for the longest time.
“Candice,” Shorty said. “It’s retreating.”
I opened my eyes. Cool air caressed them and I blinked, letting moisture return.
We were alive.
The wall of fire was still there, but it was surging away from us, retreating over the black ground and death. Only about twenty feet away, the grass had curled and blackened. Trees had turned to skeletons. The fire had come that close to us. If Shorty hadn’t done whatever he’d done, we’d be burnt alive.
The air cooled more, and the wind calmed. Shorty let his hand slap to his side. He still clutched the wand and breathed faster and faster as if the terror of the situation were catching up with him.
“You saved our lives,” I said.
Shorty faced me for a second, made a disgusted face, and threw the wand down on the ground.
“Leave that there,” he said. “We need to go. Now.”
I’d never heard him so angry. “We might have to use it again. I’m taking it.”
“Leave it!” Shorty yelled.
I backed up. “I know you don’t like to use magic. But we have to fight magic with magic.”
Shorty said nothing. Lawrence was still on his shoulder.
And then Shorty stalked off, deeper into the forest.
“Shorty!” I said. “We’re alive. Why are you so upset?”
I regretted it big time.
“Honestly,” Shorty said. He picked up a stray branch and cracked it across his knee, then threw the pieces down. "You’re wondering why I’m acting this way?"
“I know why you’re upset. Sorry,” I said, searching the grass for the wand. I found it lying there underneath a red tulip. The poor tulip was turning black from the magic and the surrounding grass darkened to a sinister green. A new dark spot was forming here. This wand carried evil with it everywhere it went.
I picked it up.
Shorty could do magic. This might even be the first time it had happened.
And he hated that he could. That he'd inherited something from the man who just tried to kill us.
"Sorry," I repeated, catching up with him. But Shorty said nothing. I kept the wand out of his view and tucked it back into my pocket. "I am. Alric—he's the worst person I've ever met."
"Tell no one."
"About what?"
"About what I did. I want no one to know." Then he glared at Lawrence. "That goes for you, too."
Lawrence said nothing. He turned away from Shorty's face the best he could.
And he was silent.
Chapter Ten
The forest only got thicker the farther we went in. The beams of sun got farther and farther apart, but at least we didn't run into any more dark spots. I knew the one I'd left behind us was growing and would one day get as big as the one we'd run through.
My jeans flapped over the hole the toxic mushrooms had left on them and my skin was a little red, but otherwise I was fine. I was glad I had a hole in my jeans. The less like royalty I looked, the better. Franco would love this. We'd match.
Shorty grew more sullen the more we walked. He needed to think and nothing I said right now would make him feel better.
Excuse me, Lawrence thought. Shouldn't we find our way back to the road?
I hadn't heard him in forever and it was the most polite question he'd asked us so far. Shorty's mood had a lot to do with it.
But Shorty stopped. He perked up, maybe glad for something else to think about. "I like that idea," he said, "Except that Alric might wait for us to appear there. He might even realize we're headed to the castle. We should keep leading him off the trail."
"I like Shorty's plan," I said. "Except that we're, you know, lost."
I agree, Lawrence thought. However, this is my kingdom. I once hunted foxes in these woods.
I knew where this was going.
Don't you want to know the way to the castle from here? How to evade Alric?
Neither Shorty nor I said anything. I still held the wand. Lawrence knew Shorty could use it now. I had made things worse.
This is a big forest, Lawrence said. And you still have the wand. If you can release my curse, I can show you the way out.
Shorty and I stared at each other. If we released him now, things would be all over. I'd be his, and he'd take me to his kingdom right now. How dangerous was Lawrence in human form? He could attack us both. He'd turn on Shorty.
"I don't trust you," I said. "I think we should find our way out ourselves."
But Alric nearly made our story fall, Lawrence thought. He trained those big, yellow eyes on me. They were hateful. Condescending. Do you not realize what almost happened to both of our kingdoms? You are shirking on your responsibility, Candice. Abandoning your people.
"But we survived," I said. "I don't want these kingdoms to fall. I don't want you in my life. Ever. We'll find another way to make sure you get the ending you want." I could hold this off for a while.
But it is your story, he thought. You must love a prince. The frog prince.
"And this whole responsibility is mine?" I asked. "I'd rather have any other prince. Any other frog prince. There's got to be more than one of you in this world. I'll find one!" I was losing it. The story was closing in tighter and tighter and I was fearing that there was no escape.
Shorty jumped back and glared at Lawrence. "We'll keep you a frog for a while," he said. "I know what you're up to. Candice and I will find our way out of these woods ourselves. It's not like we're back in that swamp."
And then Shorty smiled at me.
He was on my side with this. I had an ally here. One that could use magic even if he didn't want to.
One that would help both me and these two kingdoms avoid the worst.
"Let's go," I said.
"You still have that wand?" Shorty asked. This time, he wasn't upset.
"I do. You want me to guard it?"
"Yes. If we need it again, hand it over."
Lawrence said nothing and looked right ahead while we changed direction and continued to walk. "You know," Shorty said. "If these are the woods Lawrence here used to hunt in, we must be close to his old castle. And Mary."
Lawrence turned away. If he could slap himself, I imagined he would.
"Are you sure we should go to her?" I asked. I hated that we were talking about all of this in front of Lawrence.
The frog still said nothing. I wondered what he was thinking. What he was plotting. He still had Franco imprisoned with the nix. I wasn't sure what I would do about that. He wouldn't bargain with her until he was free of his curse.
We had to wait for the right time.
"Is the Queen your mother?" I asked Lawrence.
Yes.
I wondered how that would go. Whether she'd be on our side. I doubted it. She'd demand to have her precious son back. Unless she knew he was a jerk. I didn't ask about that. Shorty and I w
ould have to deal with it when we got there.
The forest thinned only an hour later.
"Are we close?" I asked Lawrence.
He wouldn't answer me. The frog prince just kept staring ahead. He must know we wouldn't believe him if he said no. The guy sure liked control.
"I think we are," Shorty said, smiling at me. "We'll be able to find Mary in no time."
But will they let us into the castle? Lawrence asked. The two of you dress like strange peasants.
"Which is what we want," I told Lawrence. The less power he had over us, the better.
Guards surround the castle. There are knights posted at the entrances. Even when I was young and Alric was not as much of a threat, they remained vigilant.
He was finding ways. Lawrence wanted Shorty to take off his curse. Then the guy would go back on everything he promised.
Shorty gulped. "I can just use magic to make them fall asleep or something. I've seen my grandmother do that lots of times. There was this one time she broke into a market to steal supplies she needed for a spell and she made the woman at the stall fall asleep while she took whatever she wanted. It was nice of her. At least she didn't kill her." His face reddened, and he looked at the ground as he spoke. The shame burned in him. This was hurting him to even talk about this. To plan using more magic.
And he was doing it because of me.
"Hey," I told him, hating what I was about to say. "Maybe I should just stick on a tiara and a fancy dress and they'll let me in. You can magic one up for me."
"Maybe," Shorty said. "I know you hate this whole royalty thing, though.
"And I know you hate this whole magic thing. So I can suffer with you."
"Let's make the knights fall asleep," he said. "You shouldn't have to do that."
It would be proper, Lawrence thought. I want a princess who knows who she is.
"I want a prince whose head isn't so inflated," I said.
The woods cleared even more, and the trees grew so far apart I could hang a clothesline between them. The grass grew tamer and more trimmed. I spotted a hunters' shack in the distance, new and fresh. A small cottage stood much farther behind it. It was a good thing the fire wall had stopped some distance behind us. We were about to break into civilization and I couldn't imagine such an apocalypse surging towards the people here.
