by Brandon Mull
“A little quieter here,” Seth said, glancing periodically at the ominous tree until it was out of view.
After some time, Yimo came to a halt and indicated the way ahead. Beyond where he stopped, there was undergrowth, and the trees were not so evenly spaced. The difference was remarkable. It was clear that Yimo intended to go no farther.
“End of the line,” Patton said, dismounting. “We need to talk.”
The Bewilderness
Kendra climbed down from Glory, patting the mare in appreciation. There had been a tense feeling while they were moving through the Sentient Wood, but Glory had performed beautifully.
“Yimo,” Patton said, accompanying his words with hand motions, “we appreciate your help.”
The woodling gave a little bow and strode away on its long legs. Everyone huddled around Patton, including the mounts.
“Our next step is tricky,” Patton said. “The Bewilderness is not directly protected from dragons.”
“No barriers?” Seth asked.
“Right,” Patton said. “But dragons do not venture there.”
“Why not?” Kendra asked.
“The Bewilderness is incredibly disorienting to many animals and magical creatures,” Patton said. “Dragons especially hate it. They get terribly dizzy and find the whole place deeply disturbing.”
“Will we get dizzy?” Knox asked.
“We shouldn’t get dizzy,” Patton said. “But if we’re not careful we’ll definitely get killed.”
“What’s the danger?” Seth asked.
“Risenmay dwells at the heart of the Bewilderness,” Patton said. “I can get no more specific than that. I have found her before, but I do not believe I can do so as a stingbulb. Only one of us should try.”
“Me,” Seth said.
“Don’t be too hasty,” Patton said. “The person ought to be the one most likely to win Risenmay’s aid. Kendra’s fairykind status makes her the ideal candidate.”
“Okay,” Kendra said, though part of her would have been happy to let Seth volunteer. “Why just one of us?”
“The way to Risenmay will vary depending on the person,” Patton said. “Think of it as if there are a thousand right ways to her, and a million wrong ways. Groups tend to argue and get killed.”
“But don’t we all need to get there?” Kendra asked.
“If she agrees to help you, Risenmay will summon the rest of us, and we’ll get there easily,” Patton said.
“If she doesn’t agree to help?” Kendra asked.
“It gets scary in many ways,” Patton said. “At this point, without her help, I’m not sure if we can reach Stormguard Castle in time.”
“How do I find her?” Kendra asked.
“To those who don’t know the secret, the Bewilderness is a death trap,” Patton said. “The trick is simple, but not easy. Once you get inside the Bewilderness, you must always go the direction that feels most wrong.”
“The way that feels wrong?” Kendra checked.
“If you go the way that feels right, it will lead you into a fatal trap,” Patton said. “I know of poisonous thorns, covered pits, monsters with limited domains—and those are just the dangers I have witnessed or heard about.”
“What if I don’t feel anything?” Kendra asked.
“Going in a neutral direction will also take you the wrong way and eventually kill you. Inside the Bewilderness, always go against your instincts.”
“That sounds difficult,” Lomo said.
“It can be,” Patton said. “Take it slow. Beware of finding a way that feels wrong and deciding it must be right. Once it feels right, it will be wrong. Only keep going if it feels truly wrong.”
“I’m terrible for this,” Kendra said. “I overthink all the time.”
“Truth,” Seth said.
“That could be an advantage if you take it slow,” Patton said. “Don’t advance if it seems like the right way, or if you have reason to suspect you will get where you want to go. Don’t head off in a random direction. Make sure it truly feels wrong. As hopeless as possible. And you will eventually make it.”
“No horse?” Kendra asked.
“You don’t want an animal in there,” Patton said. “It’s harder for them to work against strong instincts.”
“The camel would rather be a bystander,” Babak said.
“We’re thinking horses,” Charlemagne pointed out. “We can play the same mind games as you humans.”
“You could succeed as an intelligent horse,” Patton said. “You might be able to betray your instincts. But if a thinking horse goes with Kendra, your routes will not match, and you will confuse each other.”
“I’ll do it,” Kendra said. “I should probably get going.”
“Start promptly,” Patton said. “But don’t hurry. Take your time and get it right.”
“Meaning get it wrong,” Seth said. “Get every step wrong.”
Kendra nodded. She had lived her life trying to get things right. Good grades mattered to her. So did pleasing her parents. She often earned perfect scores on tests. Couldn’t she reverse the tendency? Get this perfectly wrong? She looked at the horses, the camel, the rabbit, her friends, and her brother. “See you soon.”
She turned and marched away from the Sentient Wood. She told herself not to look back. There was no way returning to Patton and the others was the right direction.
She stopped.
If it felt like the guaranteed wrong way, didn’t she have to go back?
She turned around.
Seth, Lomo, Tanu, Knox, Patton, Glory, Noble, Charlemagne, Rodolfo, Captain, Thistleton, and Babak all stood watching her. Calvin was too small to see at this distance. She wanted to return to them. That felt safe.
What felt worse was going onward.
And so she did.
Every step away from her brother and her friends took her closer to a point where she might not have the ability to find her way back. And that felt terrible.
She waded through undergrowth that sometimes snagged at her pant legs. The rising and falling terrain soon left her surrounded by trees large and small. Up ahead, two low hills came into view, with a natural path leading between them. It was the obvious way to proceed.
Kendra paused.
Less convenient would be climbing the hills, but she would get a good view at the top. It seemed like a smart idea, so she disregarded it. Heading back toward her brother still felt comforting. Going left or right showed no obvious advantage. As she considered both more carefully, she had a bad feeling about going left. It would lead into some thick trees that would take away her lines of sight. The more she thought about it, the worse it felt.
So she went left. As Kendra progressed, it continued to feel like a bad idea, until she was inside a dense grove of smallish trees. There was little undergrowth and no clear paths. Before long, she began to lose her sense of direction. Was she curving north? South? Back toward where she had entered? There was a sameness among these trees that left her disoriented.
She figured she would just keep going as straight as she could. That seemed the most reasonable choice under the circumstances.
And Kendra stopped.
What felt worst? Doubling back.
She reversed direction. As she walked, she felt unease about veering left, so she did. It kept feeling bad, and she kept going. Something in her gut warned her to go back the way she had come. She ignored it. Every step felt like a bad idea. So bad that it had to be the right way.
Kendra stopped. What really felt unsettling was going right. The realization that it felt bad did not make it feel good.
She turned right and tried to keep going straight. There were several other adjustments before she emerged from the trees, uncertain what direction she was facing. The sun remained too high for her to get oriented.
Onward she traveled, meticulously aware of whatever direction felt the worst. She shoved through denser underbrush instead of choosing easier ways. She traversed f
oreboding thickets and clambered up awkward slopes. She waded through gooey mud when drier paths were available. Part of Kendra worried she was taking the advice too far, making her path unnecessarily difficult, but if Patton was right, she always needed to pursue the way that seemed worst to her. And that was sometimes very inconvenient.
Time passed, the sun slowly sliding across the sky. She felt lost, and she was certain she was only getting more lost, killing time when she needed to hurry.
Kendra reached a place where all directions were more or less open. Any direction seemed as good as any other, including doubling back. What could she do when all ways felt equal? She tried setting off in one direction or another, but kept halting because it felt fine.
Then she noticed the hole.
It barely looked large enough for a person to squeeze inside. Maybe a burrow for a badger or some other medium-sized animal. Did badgers have burrows?
Climbing into the hole undeniably seemed like a really foolish way to proceed. It clearly would not go anywhere—just a few feet down to an unseen dead end.
All other ways seemed much better. This would be a complete waste of time.
Sighing, Kendra got down on her hands and knees and peered into the dark hole. It went down at an angle, curving out of sight. She could see no end.
It truly seemed like a horrible idea.
Looking around, she hoped some direction would feel worse. Nothing came close.
Lying down flat, Kendra squirmed into the hole. It was uncomfortably snug. She had to worm forward on her elbows, swiveling her shoulders, pushing with her feet. Every inch forward felt like a bad idea. Would she be able to back up if the tunnel came to an end? The thought made her claustrophobic. Spindly roots tickled her head and the back of her neck. She could taste the soil in the air.
What if the roof caved in? What if it got so narrow she became fully stuck, unable to proceed or retreat? The little tunnel went deeper, the angle of descent steepening. Inching forward became easier, but she wondered if backing up the incline would even be possible.
The tunnel finally ended at another hole. The only way in was headfirst. Even with her fairykind sight, she could not perceive the ground in the dimness, maybe because it was dark soil like in the tunnel. She reached into the hole but could not feel the ground. How far was the drop? Five feet? Ten? A hundred?
Dropping into the hole seemed like a horrible idea. Trying to squirm out backwards felt much more sensible, even though it would be difficult. Where was she supposed to draw the line with bad ideas? If the worst way to proceed was jumping off a cliff onto jagged rocks, would she do it? Wasn’t that going beyond choosing the worst direction to travel? Wasn’t that just being absurdly reckless?
Scooting into the hole in a tunnel with an uncertain drop seemed suicidal. It struck her as a likely way to break her neck.
But in order to find Risenmay, she was supposed to always disobey her instincts.
Perhaps if she disobeyed too well it would kill her. Was she taking the idea too far? Disobeying all common sense?
Kendra scooted into the hole, trying to brace herself against the sides to keep from falling fast. And suddenly there were no sides. And she was falling.
Kendra shrieked and slowly spun in the air, deliberately trying to land on her feet. During a period of rapid acceleration she was able to think about the fall and fear for her life. It was a long drop.
The impact of the water shocked her. She hit feetfirst, sinking deep but not touching the bottom. She stroked upward, reached the surface, and gulped air. The water was still, the room dim. She could not see walls in any direction.
Treading water, her clothes billowing as she moved, she thought about which direction felt worse. Seeing only more water in all directions, she had almost no sensory input to go by, but one way gave her an uncomfortable feeling. The feeling persisted and even grew as she stroked in that direction.
She tried to stay calm. Kendra had never been entirely comfortable with swimming, and being weighed down by her clothes was an odd sensation. She wondered if she should try to take off her shoes, but thought the effort might make her sink, and for now she was staying afloat.
In time, the shore came dimly into view. Heading to the lakeshore felt inexplicably like a bad idea, so she went there. Kendra emerged dripping wet, shivering in the cool air of the cavern. She spent a moment wringing her clothes out as best she could.
Now she could see the wall of the cavern, including the opening to what might be a tunnel or a cave. She also had room to proceed along the lakeshore in either direction. Something about the tunnel gave her an uncomfortable feeling. It seemed like it must be the lair of some animal or monster.
The more she thought about going into the tunnel, the worse the idea sounded, so she went. It ran for a long distance, and every step seemed to bring her closer to doom. At length she reached a junction of five passages, and Kendra paused.
None of the ways stood out as bad. None felt terribly good, either. After some searching, she found a smaller tunnel slanting upward. It seemed too narrow, and she suspected it would lead to trouble.
So in she went. The passage constricted and widened again and again. She scooted through the snug places, hoping not to get stuck. Eventually daylight came into view, and she crawled out of a crack near the base of a large boulder.
Kendra resumed traveling aboveground. She felt bad about a wooded area, went there, and became completely turned around. Time and again, Kendra ignored the routes that looked promising in deference to her most uncertain and disquieted instincts. She pushed through dense vegetation, climbed unwelcoming slopes, avoided pleasant meadows, abandoned inviting streams, and generally made the way difficult for herself.
Eventually her clothes dried.
She kept an eye on the sun as it got lower. Once it vanished, Midsummer Eve would start. Kendra did not want to get caught out in the open when that happened. She picked up her pace, hurrying wherever she felt she should not go, stopping to reassess when she seemed to be heading in a good direction.
As she emerged from a thick stand of young trees, a pond came into view. A series of stepping-stones led to an island in the center of the pond. Soothing music came from the island, though Kendra couldn’t be sure whether instruments or voices generated the sound. There was also a glow from an unseen source on the island, bright enough to register despite the daylight.
Could this be it? Had she finally made it?
Kendra paused and looked around. On the far side of the pond rose a low bluff. She noticed a dark cleft in the rock.
Kendra tore her eyes away.
No!
She did not want to go back underground. That had been scary. She was lucky she hadn’t died. The cleft in the rock seemed like a terrible idea, especially now that she had found the probable location of the fairy.
Kendra closed her eyes and thought hard, searching her feelings. The cleft seemed like a huge mistake.
She opened her eyes, walked around the pond to the cleft, and went inside. She did not have to duck, but the way forward was twisty. After several turns, she saw light up ahead. She realized it probably meant danger. A tribe of goblins could inhabit this cave. Or worse.
Kendra took a few more turns and emerged into a bright, sparkling cavern. Glossy white walls of calcite bristled with glittering quartz crystals. A tall, beautiful brunette wearing a shimmering white gown framed by a pair of elaborate wings stood awaiting her.
“Congratulations, mortal!” the fairy said with a smile that conveyed pure, welcoming joy. “You have found me.”
“Risenmay?” Kendra asked.
The fairy’s smile became less an expression of joy and more a shape her mouth was making. “You know my name,” she said. “Someone helped you find me?”
“A stingbulb of Patton Burgess,” Kendra said. “I knew to work against my instincts.”
The smile warmed a bit. “Patton was a charming man. Still no small feat that you arrived.”
“He warned me to follow the way that felt worst to me,” Kendra said.
“Had you entered the Bewilderness unawares, following your best instincts would have led you to a clue. It would have suggested the same advice Patton offered, though a touch more poetically, I suppose. There are many such warnings around the perimeter of this realm, each with an attractor spell. After the warning, you would then have to follow the least welcoming route to survive. You skipped my personal warning due to the tip Patton gave you.” Her smile faltered. “Amazing how many people fail to reach me. More than nine out of ten die instead.”
“So many!” Kendra exclaimed.
“I can’t offer something for nothing,” Risenmay said. “It is interesting to watch how many individuals cannot obey simple instructions.”
“Is it worth killing them?” Kendra asked.
“I don’t kill them,” Risenmay said. “Their choices do that.”
“But you let them walk through a dangerous place, knowing they might die,” Kendra said.
“Dying is what mortals do best,” Risenmay said. “It’s your inheritance. You are visitors in this world. From the moment you are born, the end looms. The question is not if, rather when and how.”
“We get to live before we die,” Kendra said. “That matters to us. We want it to last.”
“I don’t mind any life lasting a little longer,” Risenmay said. “I’m not against you living. I don’t cheer for death. I’m just aware that none of you endure for very long, no matter how desperately you cling to life.”
“It matters to my friends and family how long I live,” Kendra said. “And to me.”
“Did you come all this way to lecture me, dear one?” Risenmay asked. “To teach me lessons from your finite experience that I have not learned in thousands of years?”
“I might know things about being a mortal that you don’t,” Kendra said.
“Does that somehow obligate me to think like a mortal?” Risenmay asked. “Are you required to learn to think like a dog? Or a mosquito? Can you not appreciate a dog but think like a human?”