The Edge of Strange Hollow

by Gabrielle K. Byrne

I’m sorry about our fight, Mack. Poppy thought the words but couldn’t bring herself to say them. Instead she turned her back on him as he pulled a tentacular from the pan, blowing on it and tossing it from hand to hand before popping it into his mouth. He hadn’t said a word.

  Nula stared at Poppy, then back at Mack, her expression speculative.

  “We should rest for a few hours,” Mack said. “We’re going to need it.”

  Nula’s face darkened, but she let it be. They ate the tentaculars without talking, and each of them found a patch of dirt and got comfortable.

  They slept in shifts. Poppy woke once to see Mack sitting cross-legged at the edge of the circle. Dog sat next to him. Across the narrow band of salt and iron, a tall black dog with long fur and red eyes sat watching them. More red eyes gleamed from the darkness. None of them moved.

  “Mack?” Poppy breathed the words. “Are you okay?”

  He nodded. “They won’t cross the circle. You can go back to sleep.”

  A few hours before dawn, when it was her turn to watch, Nula woke her, yawning. Poppy crept over and sat next to her to watch the last embers of their fire.

  Nula pointed vaguely toward the east. “There’s a couple of trolls over there. They already came by once, but they couldn’t cross the circle.”

  “Nula?”

  “Hm?”

  “How come the salt and iron don’t bother you and Mack?”

  “Hm? Oh … ill intent.”

  “Huh—”

  “We don’t have ill intent. That’s what the salt and the iron keep out. We aren’t looking to cause harm to anyone inside the circle, so it doesn’t react to us. Can’t hurt that you invited us in, as well.” She laughed.

  “Is that why you can go into the Hollows too, because you don’t want to hurt anyone?”

  Nula considered. “Maybe. I don’t know what keeps other things out of the Hollows, but nothing’s ever stopped me—definitely not those useless carved statues.”

  Poppy grinned. “Mack’s always wanted to go see it for himself.”

  Nula studied her. “What’s up with you two, anyway?”

  “I don’t know. He’s angry.” Poppy rested her chin on her knees.

  “Yeah, I got that.”

  Poppy pressed her lips tight, as though holding the words back would keep them from being true. “I promised him I wouldn’t bargain with the faeries.”

  Nula blanched. “Ah. But then you did it anyway. Yeah, that sucks.”

  Poppy pulled her hair back into a ponytail. “I had to. How else was I—”

  “Yeah, I get it. You had to. But you didn’t even … you broke your promise to him, and it took you about one second. You didn’t talk to him about it first or anything.”

  Poppy moved her forehead to her knees.

  “I can see why he’s angry at you. You … you weren’t being a good friend. And you made him small.”

  Poppy lifted her face. “Huh?”

  “You made him small. You know … small in your life, like he doesn’t matter.”

  Poppy turned her head away. “Nula?”

  “Hm?”

  “What do you think that book is about?”

  “Change the subject much?” Nula shook her head. “Yeah, okay. The book. I don’t know, but it’s powerful.” She paused. “Honestly, I sort of want to put it back.”

  Poppy turned back to give her a sympathetic smile.

  “Welp,” Nula said, brushing the dirt off her hands. “I’m going to get a little sleep before the sun comes up … but if you want my advice.” She nudged Poppy with her elbow. “And I know you do. You should tell Mack you’re sorry. You messed up, so you should own that.”

  Poppy’s cheeks heated, but she didn’t have the heart to snap at Nula. A moment later, she didn’t want to anyway. She wanted to cry.

  The pooka lay down under the tree and was asleep the moment she closed her eyes.

  Poppy didn’t cry. She sat watching the wood, spinning the pooka’s words in her head. She could hear the trolls crashing through the underbrush—farther away, then nearer, then off in the distance again.

  She wondered what they were doing. She wondered what they looked like. She briefly considered leaving the circle to go find out, but if anything happened, time might not be the worst thing she’d lose. She considered waking Mack up to tell him she was making the right choice and not being reckless, but instead, she turned her thoughts to Nula’s strange stolen book, and its even stranger rhyme.

  Why was it so similar—but also so different, from the rhyme in Strange Hollow? Which one was the original? It was the center of the whole book—so it must be important.

  As she was pondering how to sneak the book away from Nula while she slept, the trolls crashed out of the undergrowth. Poppy scrambled to her feet.

  They were wrestling each other. The trees creaked and swayed around them as they gripped each other’s forearms, locked together by their enormous racks of antlers, drawing back, then coming together again with such force it shook the ground.

  The trolls took no notice of her. They were enormous, and pale white, and except for the fact that their arms and legs bulged with muscles, they looked nothing like Poppy had imagined.

  They were shaped like people, but way bigger—the tops of their antlers reaching well into the tree branches. Their faces were strange too—long and lumpy—with pointed white teeth that gleamed and snapped as they twisted their antlers first one way and then the other, shoving to try to gain an advantage.

  They broke apart.

  The one with the long blond braid grunted. “Gives it up, Myrtle.”

  The other one chuckled and shook dark curls. “Nah. Don’t thinks I will. How ’bout you gives it up, Gregor?”

  “Can’t. I likes winning too much.”

  They drove at each other again, their antlers crashing together with a sound like snapping limbs. “You knows it doesn’t matter,” Myrtle ground out. “The elders won’t declares a new general until they finds out who mades the fire near the nesting grounds.”

  Gregor chuckled. “S’pose you’re right. But still, I won’t chance losin’.”

  “Well, yer givin’ me a headaches … and I don’t likes to waste my times.”

  “Sun’s coming up soon. Truce, then?”

  “Yeah. For nows. Truce.”

  They drew back, untangling their antlers to stand still, both of them panting.

  “Anyways,” Myrtle said. “Since the sun’s risin’, as you says, we shoulds be goin’.”

  “Don’t wants to get turned to stones.”

  Poppy heard herself speak before she’d even realized she was considering it. “That’s true? You really turn to stone in the sun?”

  The two trolls looked over, their yellow eyes gleaming, and suddenly Poppy wished she hadn’t called attention to herself.

  “Well, well.”

  “It speaks.”

  “That’s a different ones.”

  “Is it, then? I can’t tells them apart.”

  “Can you nots, then? The one from earliers is blue. And there—see that’s another ones sitting there againsts the tree.”

  “That one’s an elf.”

  “Is he deads?”

  Poppy shook her head. “Of course not! He’s just sleeping.”

  “Oh. Good.” A mournful look crossed Myrtle’s face. “But we can’t gets him.”

  “Not with the salts.”

  “Not with the salts and the irons.”

  Goose bumps rose on Poppy’s arms. She cleared her throat. “So the sun really turns you to stone?”

  The troll with the braid nodded. “Let’s goes, Myrtle. She’s makin’ me hungrys.”

  “Me toos, Gregor. I wishes we could eat ’er. She’s biggish, so we’d haves to breaks her and…”

  “No, couldn’t breaks her. We got no pot. Can’t cooks ’er. No fires in the woods. We’d haves to brings her back and shares her.”

  “True. True.” The dark-haired one gave a hu
ff of laughter. “Now that’d puts us in a fix.”

  “Thorn trees likety splikity. Let’s goes, Myrtle. I’ve had enoughs.”

  “Wait!” Poppy called. “Did you say something about a fire … in your nesting ground?”

  They had started to turn away, but paused now, and moved nearer instead—a lumbering, shambling gait that made Poppy back farther away from the edge of the circle.

  “We did indeeds. What do you knows about it?”

  “Nothing really. I know there was a fire near some werewolves’ homes, and … and we got caught in one too. The thorn trees put it out. Are … are either of those near where you nest?”

  “Why are you askin’ ’bouts our nesting ground?”

  “Takes it easys, Gregor. She’s just sayin’. Other fires, you says? Fire grows the thorn trees every time. Who’s doin’ the makin’? Says if you knows.”

  Poppy shook her head. “I don’t knows … know. But there seem to be a lot of them springing up.”

  “And thorn trees,” the blond troll lamented. “The Oak’s gots to defend the wood.” He shook his enormous head. “Can’t just lets it go burnin’.”

  “The Oak?” Poppy asked, nearly stepping out of the circle in her excitement. “Did you say the Oak has to defend the wood … with the thorn trees?”

  “Oh sures. Thems hers too. It’s all hers.” They stood staring at her for a moment, their eyes gleaming. One started to drool, and Poppy stepped back. Her back hit the trunk of the tree. She let out a yelp as a hand wrapped around her ankle. She looked down to see Mack staring back.

  Staring at the trolls, he rose slowly to his feet next to her.

  As one, the trolls turned and shambled away, still muttering. “I thinks it’s the faeries doin’ the burnings. They always likes to be on tops.”

  “Nah. I thinks it’s that bog biddy—she’s a nasty one.”

  “Nah. Not hers, Myrtle. She’s stucks in the bog. What does such as hers wants with fire?”

  “Wells, who else?”

  “Wells, the thorn trees don’t burn when they puts it out. Maybe it’s thems.”

  “You needs your head examined for worms, I thinks, Gregor. They’s nasty, but they’s just doin’ their jobs. Besides, why woulds they puts them out if they starts them?”

  Their voices faded as they moved away into the wood. Poppy stared after them, her heartbeat fast. She had hoped to find adventure in the Grimwood, but more than that, she’d hoped to find answers. No … she had expected to find answers. Here was one she had waited for. It wasn’t just the regular trees the Holly Oak controlled. The thorn trees were hers too. Did that make the maledictions hers as well?

  She fisted her hands. More questions! She knew what a thorn tree looked like—and a troll—and she was beginning to understand why it was a bad idea to deal with faeries. But when it came to understanding the Grimwood—freeing her parents and being a part of something bigger together, all she’d found were more secrets and more questions. The forest wasn’t like she thought it would be.

  She turned to Mack and opened her mouth to tell him about what she’d learned, but he just gave her a sad look and settled back down against the tree, closing his eyes.

  She blinked rapidly. And then there was Mack. She might have lost his friendship for good.

  Dog came over to stand next to her. The night was beginning to slip toward dawn. Brutus bumped her leg with his cinder-block head, and she let one hand uncurl and rest on their side. “We have to figure this out and free Mom and Dad, guys … and I’ve got to find a way to make it up to Mack.”

  Nula came and stood next to her on the other side, rubbing her eyes.

  “How much time do you think is left, Nula?” Poppy’s voice caught.

  Nula considered. “The forest folk don’t really think much about time, you know. They don’t really need to, unless—”

  “Unless they happen to have made a bargain with the Fae.”

  Nula flushed. “Right … but, the sun sets late, and rises early, so I’d say … I’d say it’s been about six hours.”

  “Six hours.” Poppy blanched. “Then we only have eighteen hours left.”

  “Plenty of time.” Nula gave a stiff chuckle that wasn’t at all reassuring before she lay back down and closed her eyes.

  Poppy stretched out next to Nula and Dog, but instead of closing her eyes, she watched the sky begin to turn green as it slipped toward morning. Dawn couldn’t come fast enough.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  An hour or so later, when the sun had finally stretched golden tendrils over the tops of the trees, Poppy woke Nula. Mack’s eyes popped open as if he’d been awake all along. Maybe he had. The light was still dim through the trees, but they didn’t have a moment to spare. The queen had told them to start at bluff meadow.

  “Do you think the queen was lying when she told us where to begin?” Poppy asked aloud.

  “Faeries don’t lie!” Nula called back from where she walked ahead.

  Mack considered, his copper hair knotted where his head had rested against the tree. “No, but they don’t tell the full truth either. Certainly not to help us out. She gave us that information for a reason.”

  “But why? Doesn’t she want to win?”

  He sketched a frown, but just looked tired. “That’s the thing about the faeries,” he said. “They always win.”

  Poppy grimaced.

  “Listen, Poppy. If you don’t get the Valkyrie song before this evening, she wins, and gets to take whatever she wants from you—including you, by the way. You remember she wanted you to join her court, right?”

  Poppy swallowed.

  “And if you do happen to succeed, she gets the Valkyrie song without risking anything herself. She wins no matter what.” Mack dropped his hand to her shoulder, then snatched it back again. “We do have one small advantage.”

  “What?” Poppy heard the tremor in her voice.

  He brushed dirt off the backs of his legs. “I thought about it last night, and I think I know where the bluff meadow is.”

  They moved quickly, passing lone thorn trees—the first Poppy had seen since the ones that had sprung up to put out the fire.

  For the whole first hour they walked, Poppy talked. If she kept the words flowing, she didn’t have to think about her parents, or about her argument with Mack. If she kept talking, she didn’t even have to think about what might happen if the Faery Queen won.

  She told Mack and Nula about the thorn trees being part of the Holly Oak. When Mack walked ahead, she talked to Nula about the weather and the trolls until at last, Nula fell silent, and then Poppy talked at her.

  Nula caught up with Mack and, after a long look over her shoulder at Poppy, gave him a glare that held at least two lectures about something. Mack shook his head, and continued to keep his distance.

  Though she’d never been a nervous talker, Poppy grew chattier than she’d ever been in her life. She made observations about the forest as they walked. She wondered out loud about different species of tentaculars. She wondered out loud about the migration patterns of Mogwen. She wondered out loud whether it would rain, and how the thorn trees knew about the fire, and how they had put it out.

  She wondered out loud about anything and everything that might distract her from the fact that her parents’ souls were stuck somewhere and maybe injured, and maybe worse. She didn’t want to think about how Mack was angry with her, and how that was her fault for always pushing her way through. She tried to push away the passage of time, and the possibility of failure. She wanted to hide it all under a thick pile of questions the way a squirrel buries a nut for the winter.

  The wall between her and Mack wouldn’t budge, and she didn’t know how to fix it. He was only here because of his promise to Jute. They were running out of time … and they hadn’t even reached the bluff meadow. Her stomach churned, and her problems wouldn’t stay down. Instead they grew, like the heat of the day, becoming more real with every mile. Sweat dripped down Poppy’s b
ack.

  When two hours had passed, and they were still surrounded by trees, she began to panic. There was no chance she could win against the Faery Queen. She walked faster and faster until Nula got exasperated with trying to keep up and turned herself into a deer, sprinting ahead into the wood. Mack walked behind her and said nothing.

  After the third hour, Poppy had to slow down again, her breath ragged. The panic that had been fueling her began fading into despair. She had a stitch in her side, and her throat was raw from breathing fast. Mack was right. Dealing with faeries was a really bad idea. Foolish.

  Like her.

  If she lost, they would have to run—hide somehow, or at least she would. She wouldn’t drag her friends into her mess. And then what about her parents? And she still didn’t have any of the answers she needed.

  They had been walking for almost four hours when they came to a full-fledged grove of thorn trees, stretching into the distance. Even Dog seemed to tiptoe as they skirted the edges. In the stillness, Poppy’s renewed effort at distracting herself with chatter clattered to a halt.

  The smell was rank—thick and rotten. The black trees sparkled beautifully in the glimmers of late morning sunlight as it sifted down through the canopy, but the whole place felt somber and sad, and almost smothering. It was as though someone had dropped a heavy blanket over the whole grove.

  Bones littered the ground, some old and crumbling. Poppy could make out … other things, wrapped in the whips—things that were long past help.

  There were several holes in the loose rich soil under the trees, as though something had pushed up through the ground to escape.

  Maledictions, Poppy thought, her pulse hammering.

  Fifteen minutes later, Mack broke into a run. Poppy exchanged looks with Nula, who had become herself again sometime in the previous hour, and ran after him, her heart lifting as the forest opened up onto a huge meadow. Tall grasses stretched out to the edge of a cliff. A huge bird circled in the distance.

  Eta and Brutus barked happily, their tail wagging. Two woke up, tongue lolling as his head jostled between his two siblings like they were playing monkey in the middle. They all disappeared into the tall grass.

  Poppy couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up. She took a deep breath. The air was sweet and smelled of dust and sunlight. She hadn’t realized how closed in the Grimwood had become—how stifling.