by Natalie Erin
The wolves waited until they were sure he was far enough away before they began to follow. They moved silently, doing everything they could to slow their frantic hearts. The Ortusan moved rather quickly. The wolves struggled to keep up while still staying low.
“This is ridiculous,” Jade muttered. “He’s going to find us soon enough.”
“Yes. But until he does, we follow,” Shadowin replied.
Eventually, the jungle’s thick foliage grew thin and the Ortusan drew near to a small camp, where twelve other monsters lurked around a fire, gnawing on bones and fighting over scraps of meat. Some were in wolf form, and others were not.
“Steady now,” Shadowin said. “Wait until he enters.”
The Ortusan walked into the camp. Just then, Shadowin and Jade sprung out from the cover of the jungle, sinking their teeth into their own separate Ortusans. The entire camp screamed as the two wolves flung their first kills aside and went for others, the only goal being sinking their fangs into anything that moved.
Along with being ill prepared, these Ortusans weren’t very well trained, and they fell easily against Jade and Shadowin’s attack. When they’d eliminated all but one, Shadowin bared his teeth and leapt, but as he did so a leg kicked out at him from nowhere, and he went flying in the opposite direction.
The wolves backed up as twenty more Ortusans emerged from the woods, bloody teeth bared, faces filled with rage. They were all heavily muscled, sleek and fast. Getting a bite on them would be near impossible.
Jade knew when to fight, and she knew when to run. “Retreat!” she called, turning away and lunging into the forest.
“No way!” Shadowin growled, and he lunged at the leader of the hunting party. “We can still take them!”
He charged towards the group. Jade shouted out a protest, but as he took various swipes at the Ortusans they all simply batted him away, trying to latch onto him but never managing to get a good hold.
“Come get me, you cowards!” Shadowin shouted boldly. He continued further and further into the darkened jungle, and the Ortusan coven followed.
“Shadowin!” Jade cried. “Shadowin, come back!”
He didn’t hear her. Fleeing in the opposite direction, Jade didn’t pause for breath until she was sure there were no Ortusans behind them.
Jade sat down and waited for Shadowin anxiously. Several hours passed. Jade scanned the woods for any sign of her brother, but she didn’t have a clue where he’d gone. She’d killed a few Ortusans on her search, but it was obvious that the majority of them had followed her brother somewhere deep into the jungle.
“Shadowin,” Jade moaned. “Where are you?”
Adelaide awoke as the first rays of the sun kissed her face. She looked about groggily as she rose to her feet. Tatl and Rabika slept a few feet away, but Xiuh and Midnightstar were nowhere to be found. “Mids!” Adelaide called softly. “Where are you, Mids?”
“What’s all the yelling about?” Rabika grumped, stretching lazily.
“Midnightstar and Xiuh are gone,” Adelaide whined.
“They’ll turn up,” Tatl said, stirring slowly and rising to his feet. “They couldn’t have gone far.”
“But what if they left us alone?” Adelaide whimpered. “What if they just went away and they don’t come back ever?”
“Xiuh wouldn’t let that happen,” Rabika said simply. “That dragon wouldn’t let Midnightstar go anywhere.”
At that moment, Xiuh appeared, sailing over the mountain. He landed quickly upon the ground, the expression on his face one of hurt and frustration. “She’s gone.”
“What do you mean?” Tatl asked blankly.
“Midnightstar’s gone,” Xiuh replied. “She was gone when I woke up, so I went looking for her, but she’s nowhere nearby. She left us.”
“But...why did she leave?” Adelaide questioned quietly. “What did we do wrong?”
“We did nothing. She’s just being selfish.” Rabika snorted loudly. “Besides, we’re better off without her. There isn’t anything to do anyway. The Assembly’s dead, so there’s nobody left to stop the unicorn war.”
“Wrong, Rabika. We need her,” Tatl snapped. “Midnightstar is the protector of the Lands. We need to find her.”
“I’ve been searching for hours,” Xiuh moaned. “She’s long gone.”
“What do we do now?” Adelaide asked. “We can’t go home without her.”
“We can, and we will,” Rabika snapped. “She left us, so we can leave her.”
“A claw for a claw leaves everyone defenseless, Rabika,” Xiuh said. “We can’t abandon her, whether she left us or not.”
“Xiuh’s right,” Tatl said. “We can’t leave her out here. Come on, guys.”
Tatl led the way, picking up on Midnightstar’s scent as they wandered. Adelaide eagerly walked beside him, following closely, and too often bumping into him with her large, floundering paws.
“Adelaide, if you want to help, go walk by Rabika,” Tatl ordered.
“But Rabika is being sour,” Adelaide replied. “Just look at her!”
Rabika walked a few paces behind them, her face filled with anger. “She deserves to be alone in the woods,” Rabika grumbled. “I don’t know why we’re looking for her.”
Xiuh had gone onwards to scout ahead. They found him lying by the side of the river, his serpentine body drooping. “I lost the trail here,” he muttered. “She must’ve jumped in the water.”
“She didn’t want us to follow,” Tatl said, shocked. “But why?”
“Because, Tatl, she doesn’t care about us.” Rabika snapped. “All she cares about is herself. Why do you think she went on this crazy mission? She wanted to get away from the pack and get some attention, not stop the Second Despondent.”
“She wouldn’t do that!” Adelaide said, jumping to the defense of her friend. “Mids cares about everyone!”
“She cares about no one,” Rabika growled. “She was bored with being a wolf, so she tried to be something different. But she can’t even be a skygazer, so she ran away.”
“Just because you didn’t get what you wanted doesn’t mean Midnightstar has the same reasons for leaving, Rabika!” Tatl shouted. “This isn’t about you!”
Rabika hung back, muttering under her breath. “It’s never about me, and it’s always about Midnightstar. But she’s still the one who left. At least I stayed.”
Snapfoot watched over the few remaining members of the pack as they tried to regroup. Most of them were wounded, and Snapfoot was sure the unicorns were trailing them in an attempt to finish the pack off. Hurt or not, he needed to get these wolves moving if they were going to survive.
Kaliska stood by his side. Her ankle still wasn’t healed, but she was able to walk on it now so long as she didn’t bear down all of her weight. “What are we to do?” she asked softly, looking at Snapfoot.
“I don’t know anymore,” Snapfoot replied, hanging his head. “We’ve been torn apart. There is nothing left for us to do.”
“The pack is small, but it still stands,” Kaliska told him in an encouraging voice. “The Snapfoot I knew wouldn’t have given up. What happened to him?”
“That wasn’t him. That was a pup, trying to live in the image of his father,” Snapfoot said bluntly. “Lilja left a coward in his place.”
“You’re not a coward,” Kaliska said. “You’re strong.”
“No. I’m useless,” Snapfoot retorted. “I should’ve stayed with my pack, but instead, I wasted my time on you, and my father paid for my mistake.”
“Is that all I am?” Kaliska snapped. “A waste of time?”
“That’s all you’ll ever be, Kaliska,” Snapfoot said harshly. “Now that you’re here, I feel the need to protect you. But keeping you safe is costing the pack, and your pups will be that much more of a nuisance.”
“I thought you were better than that,” Kaliska said. “I thought you cared.”
“Maybe I did once, but there is nothing left to care for. Soon, the High Plains Pack w
ill be gone, and it will always be known that Snapfoot, son of Lilja, caused it to happen.”
Snapfoot turned and walked away, leaving Kaliska behind him.
“What has this war done to you?” Kaliska muttered to herself, hanging her head low. She knew Snapfoot didn’t mean what he said, but that didn’t stop his words from wounding her gravely all the same.
Snapfoot climbed a large hill, to watch over his pack from above. On closer observance, he saw that Kaliska was nowhere to be found. She must’ve run off, but the notion didn’t bother him. He’d been harsh to her, but she’d survive. She’d grown too close to him as of late, and as Snapfoot now realized, the creatures he loved often met rotten fates. It was better if Kaliska hated him.
The pack milled about aimlessly, broken and falling apart. No one trusted him anymore, and he didn’t blame them. He had left the entire pack to save one wolf. Because of him, over thirty wolves perished, including both of his parents.
But he had saved Kaliska’s life. That was something that seemed priceless to him.
Off in the distance, something caught his eye. A bright and shining city gleamed in the distance, appearing as shimmering as gold. It was grandly constructed, but only halfway done. The skeletons of buildings sat next to towering castles, and small dots moved among them, growing the new metropolis. “Who could be building anything in this rotting place?” Snapfoot mumbled, squinting to get a better view.
The city looked grand, even from this distance. He supposed it must be a capital of some kind, but who would build such a thing, here, in the Lands? All the fairies were in hiding, and animals certainly didn’t need buildings to live in.
He stared for a moment, wondering about the great city before it finally hit him. “Ortusans!”
Midnightstar ran as fast and as far as her legs could carry her. The forest around her was dense, thick with foliage, and she had no idea which direction was which. The sun streamed through the canopy in thin beams, and everything the light touched seemed to glow with an ethereal magic. She stopped beneath one band of golden sun and allowed it to spill across her back, warming her fur.
You are free now, Midnightstar, the voices breathed. You don’t have to worry about keeping the others safe anymore.
“I feel like I should go back,” Midnightstar mumbled, turning her head to glance behind. “They were my friends.”
They weren’t your true friends, Midnightstar, the voices replied. You have no real friends in this world that means nothing. Why grow attached to them when none of this is real?
“What do you mean, this isn’t real?” Midnightstar questioned.
This world is fake. It’s just an illusion, created to give false hope, the voices hummed. But you are better than the falsities, Midnightstar. You do not fall for such lies.
“This whole life is a lie.” Midnightstar looked up at the sky, but it was blotted out by green leaves. “Everything I’ve ever been, ever wanted to be, is just a lie.”
Yes, Midnightstar. Just like the moon and the stars, the voices cooed at her. Nothing but smoke turned into pretty shapes.
“Then I can’t go back to my friends,” she murmured. “If I go back, I’m falling for the illusion. If I go back, I give in to the lies.”
Midnightstar looked down, and screamed as she saw she was surrounded by bugs of all kinds and all sizes, crawling along the ground. There were hundreds of them, and they followed her until they had her cornered against a collection of trees. She yelped for someone to come help her, but no one came.
“Get away from me!” she shouted. “Leave me alone!”
The bugs moved closer, creeping towards her on their strange, long legs. Midnightstar lashed out, stomping on the bugs one by one, but the more she killed the more came.
Don’t try to fight it, Midnightstar. Give in to the fear, the voices taunted. Just let them take you away. Let them win.
“No! I’m not ready to go yet!” Midnightstar cried. “I can’t go until I make this right!”
What is there to make right, Midnightstar? You already left all of those that cared about you. You have nothing left, the voices hissed.
“I have to fix this!” Midnightstar yelled as the creatures around her slithered up her legs, nestling in her fur. “Get off of me!”
The bugs overwhelmed her, crawling into her mouth so she couldn’t breathe. She choked and coughed, struggling to get air into her lungs. As everything went black, Midnightstar found herself on the ground, without any bugs in sight or in memory.
Midnightstar coughed and spat onto the ground. A large beetle sat on the dirt, wiggling uselessly and covered in saliva.
“How did you get into my throat?” Midnightstar questioned. On the wind was the sound of the voices, laughing.
As she watched the beetle squirm, Midnightstar felt her stomach twist in fear. “By the Creator,” she whispered. “What’s happening to me?”
The next thing she did, she felt she had no control over. Midnightstar began rolling in the muck, squashing the beetle underneath her and covering her fur in thick, filthy mud.
“I’m not worth beauty,” she mumbled. “I need to be nasty, like the bugs and all the other crawly creatures.” She rose to her feet, waddling down the forest path to look at her reflection in a nearby puddle. Leaves stuck to the mud on her back, and her eyes had lost their strange, swirling knowledge.
“I am like a spider now,” she growled at herself. “I am so nasty and grand!”
She cackled lowly and walked on, going nowhere in particular, weaving from side to side as she went. The sky was a swirl of orange and green above her, the grass a pale shade of pink. She could hear her heart beating uncontrollably in her chest, and the sound grew louder with every step she took.
“Stop that racket!” she yelled, tossing her head to the side in an odd manner. “You’re giving me a headache!”
Her heart kept beating, louder and louder, and Midnightstar screamed at the noise. “I’m tired of this!” she yelped. “If you don’t knock it off right now…”
She stopped and stared straight ahead, the sound of her heartbeat forgotten. It was one of the Blue Sky Peaks, caked in delicious white snow. A memory of running from a giant snowball during her puphood struck her, and she became determined to copy the event, barreling towards the mountain in a maniac frenzy.
“I’m coming, snowball!” she cried, a look of bewilderment sprawled across her face as she ran towards the mountain. If her friends had found her now, they wouldn't have recognized Midnightstar. She’d been replaced by a wolf who had lost her mind.
Chapter Eleven
Advice from a Mindless Creature
“This is so stupid,” Rabika complained as she followed her siblings through the Blue Sky Peaks. “We’ve passed this same tree ten times over!”
“She’s not in her right mind, Rabika. She could be going in circles, which means we have to keep backtracking as well.” Tatl said this calmly, but one could tell by the look on his face he thought that the search for Midnightstar was useless, too.
“Why don’t you ask the dragon?” Rabika said, and she gritted her teeth at Xiuh, who was currently sniffing the air for Midnightstar’s scent. “After all, I don’t know why he’s so caught up in this.”
“I love her,” Xiuh said and he turned on Rabika, tail lashing.
Rabika let out a haughty laugh. “How can you love her? You barely know her. She’s been pushing you away ever since you joined us.”
“She’s my skygazer. I have to care. I want to,” Xiuh said, and there was a high tone in his voice that betrayed his maturity. Even though he’d done and seen terrible things in the past, he was still a hatchling.
“Why did you join us, anyway?” Tatl asked, stepping forward.
Xiuh didn’t turn to look at him. “Where else was there for me to go? I wanted to be a part of something, something that would put an end to the Second Despondent. I saw Midnightstar, and I felt like wherever she was, I needed to be.”
Rab
ika coughed, and Tatl just stared.
“There doesn’t always have to be a reason for everything,” Adelaide said, and she came close to Xiuh. “Sometimes you do things because you think it feels right. I understand why you joined us and why you care so much, Xiuh. I miss Midnightstar, too.”
Xiuh nudged her playfully. “Thank you, Adelaide. You have such a gentle heart.”
“I’m not gentle. I’m just me!” The bow on her head seemed to hop as she said it.
Xiuh smiled. Rabika rolled her eyes and said, “Okay, do we have any idea where we want to look next?”
Xiuh looked back towards the mountains, his eyes narrowing. “Midnightstar can see through my eyes. Maybe I can see through hers.”
Xiuhcoatl concentrated and a thought broke into his mind, sudden and rude. The only thing he got from it was a giant snowball.
He shook his head. “She’s still at the Peaks. I believe it’s the highest one, because there’s still snow on it, even though it’s summer.”
“Figures she would pick the largest one to climb,” Rabika grumbled as they, once again, headed back the way they came.
Midnightstar collapsed with maniacal laughter on the mountainside, rolling around in madness as she tried scooping up the snow with her paws, putting it into a lopsided pile.
“And now,” she said, “I’m going to make a huge snowball, and I’m going to ride it all around the world! The whole planet will be mine, and they will bow to me and the ball of death that I name…Freezy!”
The snow mound was no bigger than a tiny drift, but in Midnightstar’s mind, it was huger than the mountain. “Now if I give it a big enough shove…”
She stood back, and then charged, plowing straight through the snow and tumbling through a hole in the mountain she didn’t see, a passageway that led down…down…down.
“Ow…” she whispered, closing her eyes as she curled up against a solid stone floor. “I think I just flew.”
“You should know better than to let the voices push you that far,” a mystical, musing voice whispered in her ear.