The Fiery Arrow

by Bo Burnette

  At this, the other snakes began sliding madly in circles, lines, and up and down trees. They did not strike yet, but acted as soldiers preparing for battle. Arliss felt she might be sick.

  Philip, his voice strained and shaking, motioned to the others. “Quick. Run for the light, as fast as you can.”

  “But, Philip,” Erik whispered, “That’s the wrong way!”

  “Can’t you see the way to the river is blocked?” Philip said with the authority of an older brother. “Now go! All three of you, get to the light!”

  “What about you?” The question slipped from Arliss’s mouth before she thought about it.

  “I shall be right behind you.”

  He did not make a very good liar. Still, she obeyed him, grabbing Ilayda’s hand and dragging her away from the clearing. The snakes were still slithering around like strands of demoniac vines, strangling the forest.

  Erik had his sword out as he covered them, and Arliss had an arrow on the string. Ilayda held no weapon. Arliss walked as fast as she could without making noise; even so, the space between them and the whiteness did not seem to be growing much smaller.

  She glanced over her shoulder at Philip. He had stepped just outside the clearing and now stood with his sword toward the gathering serpents. His gaze met hers, and they locked eyes for a long moment. She did not turn away. She stood transfixed by the fierce care that permeated his gaze. He wasn’t just acting the brother to Erik.

  He was doing it for her as well.

  She turned and marched on, not once looking back from then on. They neared the whiteness, an area comprised of several smaller parts. They came nearer still, and it looked like patches of snow. From within twenty paces of the white stuff, it resembled silvery paper.

  Erik stopped her for a moment. “I’m going back to Philip. Stay here.”

  “I make no promises,” she responded.

  He huffed. With a stern stare, he turned and dashed back to his cousin.

  The serpents must have been following them in the murkiness of the trees all the way, for one sprang from the darkening shadows of the surrounding forest and blocked their way. Ilayda shouted for Arliss. The snake preparing to spring on her was dead with Arliss’s arrow through its open mouth even before Ilayda finished calling.

  “Run!” Arliss grabbed her forearm and dashed for the white, open space.

  The serpents raced along just behind them, hissing through curved fangs. Arliss released Ilayda’s hand just before they reached the whiteness. Drawing an arrow—her last arrow—she stepped into the mysterious white stuff and turned to face the serpents. She would cover Ilayda to the end.

  With a serpent hissing at her heels, Ilayda tripped over a root and tumbled into the milky expanse of the clearing. Arliss stretched her bow all the way.

  She did not release the arrow. There was no need to. The snakes had stopped their pursuit and lay wriggling at the borders of the pale clearing. The creatures refused to come any farther. As unnatural as the serpents’ aggression had been, this new development seemed even more unusual.

  “Arliss, look,” Ilayda whispered with an awestruck voice. “The flowers.”

  Arliss let the tension out of her bow and took in her surroundings. Gentle white flowers swirled the forest floor around her, covering a space about the size of her own bedroom at the castle. The petals shone pure white, with the furthest edges of them graced with a pale purple. They had appeared in the book about Reinhold, the book which she carried in her satchel. That book seemed to carry many secrets. It had even given her the name of the flower: Lasairbláth.

  So they weren’t just legend. They were real.

  On the fringe of the grove lay a snake, writhing and convulsing. Its skin had turned from striped green to an ashy grey, and it rolled to and fro. Finally, it ceased all movement and lay limp at the border of the flowering clearing.

  “Do you know what this means, Ilayda? The flowers kill the snakes. We can beat them!”

  She gathered up an armload of loose petals and stuffed them into her satchel. She knelt and turned her head back toward the now-distant clearing of snakes. Somehow, she would retrieve her other two arrows.

  She would need them.

  Philip lunged with his sword, trying to fend off the serpent that was seeping down from the branches above him. It hissed, enraged, and slithered through his legs, trying to attack him from behind. He slashed the thing in half before it even rose to strike.

  He wasn’t fond of snakes. No sir, especially not ones this enormous. Repulsive creatures with neither arms nor legs.

  Erik, on the other hand, cut through snakes left and right with little apprehension. Philip dashed over to join him. Their swords scythed the vile serpents like sheaves of wheat, yet more still came. Their numbers seemed to be increasing rather than the opposite.

  With sweat streaming down his face, Philip put everything into the strength of his sword. He pivoted left to slice a wayward snake.

  “Philip!” Erik yelled. A snake had attached itself to his forearm.

  Philip grasped the tail of the snake and wrenched it from Erik’s arm. Erik gasped in pain.

  The scaly tail of the serpent felt disgusting. It sent chills up and down Philip’s arm. But it all happened within a splinter of a second.

  “Erik, grab your sword!”

  Erik nabbed it from the ground, and they raised their blades. Philip swung the snake up and released it. The two swords met against each other and split the snake in two. The halves flopped onto the ground in a slimy mess.

  Philip and Erik backed towards one another. The remaining creatures were once again encircling the clearing. How could there be so many? And would even more be coming?

  Philip kept a wary eye on the snakes and stepped backward until he collided with Erik. “We have to get to Arliss.”

  “Looks like we need her to get to us,” Erik remarked. “I’m sure you’d agree.”

  Heat rose into Philip’s cheeks. He kicked his cousin’s heel from behind. “I’m not sure what you are thinking, but I’d probably stop thinking it anyway.” Philip quieted. He thought he had heard a scream: a distant, almost inhuman call. Was it…

  “Arliss!” Philip raised his voice for the first time. The snakes twitched at the noise. “Arliss!” His voice strained with tension. No, she had to be safe. Yet still she did not answer. An orangish snake slithered nearer to him. “Arliss!”

  An arrow stuck the creature as it sprang to attack. Arliss burst into the clearing, one last arrow on her string. Ilayda hurried behind her, carrying a torch.

  “Philip!” Arliss called. “I’m here!” Her golden hair flying, she spun toward the gathering of snakes. She didn’t shoot her arrow, though. Instead, she cast whitish petals all around. Her open satchel was full of them.

  “What is this?” Philip asked, bewildered, as he joined her.

  “Lasairbláth—a powerful and ancient flower. It’s poison to the snakes.”

  A flash of light exploded behind them, and the snakes fled into the darkness.

  “When the petals are burned, it seems that they snap and flare in an unusual way,” Ilayda explained. “Quite convenient, don’t you think?”

  “Come on.” Erik beckoned to the others as he strode toward the edge of the clearing. “Let’s get out of here.”

  “This way,” Arliss nodded as she yanked two arrows from coiled corpses.

  Philip’s chest sank heavily as he followed her—farther into the forest, farther from the river, farther from the castle, and closer to the heart of Reinhold.

  Ilayda filled her lungs with the air that smelled deep and dark—like the purple edges of the flaming sunset. She could barely glimpse it now above the tangle of silhouetted trees.

  She crossed her arms tight across her chest and let her breath shudder out. Adrenaline still prickled her skin and refused to let her pulse normalize. It had been that close. She had stared death in the eyes—its shiny, serpentine eyes.

  She squeezed her eye
s shut. If it wasn’t for Arliss, that snake would have devoured her.

  She opened her eyes and stared at Arliss’s shadowy form up in the lead. If it wasn’t for Arliss, they wouldn’t be on this adventure in the first place.

  It wasn’t safe. But they had made it across the river, and the snakes seemed to be fully behind them. Who knew? Maybe the heart of Reinhold lay just beyond.

  Erik slowed and let her catch up to him. He eyed her a moment, then reached into his bag.

  She glanced briefly toward his rummaging hands. She didn’t want to seem too interested in such a standoffish peasant.

  He drew a sheathed hunting knife from the bag, flung it into midair, and caught it with his other hand. He tilted the handle toward her. “Here.”

  She reached cautiously for the hilt. “A…knife.”

  “Astute observation.”

  She narrowed her eyes at him. “But why?”

  He snorted. “This forest isn’t safe. You shouldn’t be unarmed.”

  “I thought you were our guide, not our bodyguard.”

  He shrugged. “What about both?”

  They had almost come upon the circle of Lasairbláth again. Surely, surely, they would stop now and rest. It had been the longest day of her life.

  Ilayda accepted the knife from Erik, undid her thin belt, and strung the weapon around her waist. “Thank you.”

  “We are going to camp here for the night.” Erik halted and dropped his knapsack on the petal-strewn floor.

  Arliss was too tired to argue. She knelt down among the flowers and began to undo her satchel, drawing out the pork and oranges. The fruit had been somewhat squished during the incident with the snakes, but it would be edible. It had to be. Their stores might not last even another day. Somehow, they would have to recross the river and abandon their quest.

  Her quest. That’s what it had turned out to be, hadn’t it? Ilayda complained about her every idea. Erik criticized each move she made, much like the king did. Yet she did not want to think about her father—about facing him once again. If she found nothing on this mission, she would return to the castle as a lawbreaker and a reprobate, with no spoils to show for her heroism.

  She clenched her eyes shut. That would not happen.

  Philip had forced Erik to lie down and was tending to his snakebite. The wound had not torn deeply, only scarred the outer flesh. Philip tore a strip of fabric from a spare tunic in his bag and wrapped it around Erik’s forearm. Erik winced as Philip tied it in place.

  Arliss felt her senses blurring from tiredness. Her hands moved mechanically through tasks: passing out victuals to the other three, taking careful sips of water from her flask, spreading out a blanket. As her eyelids began to drift shut, she could glimpse Philip sitting up at the edge of the forest, keeping a vigilant watch.

  They would be safe that night.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: THE MASTER OF THE FOREST

  Someone shook Arliss’s shoulder, awakening her from uneasy dreams. Her eyelids fluttered open as she rolled fully onto her back, feeling the stiffness from the previous day’s escapades.

  “Good morning,” Philip said.

  She grunted and closed her eyes again.

  “Erik caught some breakfast.”

  She yawned. “I knew I brought him along for a reason.”

  Philip grinned. “He found something else, when he was hunting.”

  She was awake now. “What?”

  “A light. In the woods. He saw it from afar.”

  Her hair rippled off her shoulders as she sat up, staring at him. “A light in the woods? But that means—”

  “We’re not alone.”

  Erik tapped his small, iron pan with a stirring spoon. “Come on, you three sleepynuggins. Breakfast it is.”

  He took the tiny pan and scooped out meat into four even tinier bowls. The meat looked gristly but digestible—rabbit, if Arliss wasn’t mistaken. Well, couldn’t have venison every day.

  As Erik continued his spoon-tapping, Ilayda simply moaned and moved her left foot. He slid over to her and banged the spoon again, holding the pot right next to her ear.

  This time she rolled off her blanket, getting a mouthful of Lasairbláth petals.

  “Stupid princess!” she protested, rubbing her eyes.

  “I’m not a princess,” Erik said.

  Ilayda glowered at him. “Oh, you.”

  Arliss rolled her eyes at them as she stood and strode over to Erik’s simple meal. Some fish would have been quite an improvement over tough wild rabbit. Yet it didn’t really matter. Too much else pulled at her mind. The dark trees—had they been caused by the snakes? It seemed likely. But what about the snakes? What had caused them?

  “You saw something, Erik,” she said between chomping bites.

  “Yes, I did.” He nodded. “But I do not think you ought to see it.”

  “I know what you’re going to say. That I’ve led us astray, that I shouldn’t be allowed to go any farther on this quest. Maybe you’re right. But I know that we must continue while we still can.”

  Erik swallowed. “I phrased it differently in my head. If you see the light and its source, you’ll want to explore it, and you will not give up until you have.”

  Arliss smiled. “I suppose you can put it that way, too. And you’re right—I am going to finish this quest, no matter the cost.” She winced, her last words having come out harsher than she had anticipated. “What is the source of the light?”

  “A house.”

  The ramshackle house was a poorly constructed affair—Arliss could tell that much even from far off. The wooden door looked too big for the doorframe, and the cloudy windows were unevenly spaced. The interweaving trees so enveloped the building that it seemed to almost blend into its wooded surroundings.

  “The lights have been lit since early this morning. I never saw any movement,” Erik whispered as he and Arliss stole along. Philip and Ilayda crunched on dead leaves behind them. Of all seasons to travel silently, autumn certainly wasn’t the best—though it was the most beautiful.

  Arliss fingered the three arrows which remained by her side. Only three.

  They were nearing the shack already. Erik stopped her and stared at the building from behind a thick tree trunk. “What do you think is in there?”

  She shook her head. “I don’t know.”

  “Arliss, you have to tell me. There’s something about your quest you have been hiding from me this whole time. I can see it in your eyes. Please, as a friend, tell me. Why did your father forbid crossing the river?”

  She sighed and closed her eyes. Erik was clever, too clever. He could read her too well—all three of them could, in truth. She had no choice but to tell them.

  “Five years ago, my father and many of the men from the village went hunting in the woods. For the first time, they crossed the river and hunted on this side of its banks. One of the men was lost that day. He went scouting on his own, and never returned to the company. His coat was found bloodied and torn, but they never recovered the body. After that, my father forbade anyone to come here.”

  “And you’ve dragged us right back?” Ilayda glanced around. “This place is downright creepy.”

  “It’s more than just creepy. According to her,” Erik said, “it’s dangerous.”

  Arliss’s arms tensed. “But that was five years ago! Why should one man’s death cause an entire country to cease exploring?”

  “But, how—” Philip began. A stark, terrible noise cut him off. A piercing, inhuman cry sliced through the murky silence of the misty woods.

  It had come from the house.

  Philip gripped his sword hilt.

  She put a hand on his arm and felt the muscles ripple through his sleeve. “Please, Philip, don’t go in there.”

  “I have to. Someone’s in there, and it sounds as if they are in trouble—dying, even.” He shook her hand off his arm.

  “We will come with you, then.” Arliss pursed her lips and set an arrow to her bow. Eri
k nocked an arrow on his longbow as well, and Ilayda gripped a hunting knife. The sight of Ilayda holding a weapon was rather amusing.

  Philip took the lead and strode to the door of the dilapidated cottage. The being within groaned like a wild beast. The door stood locked. Philip drew his sword and hacked at the wood without hesitation. The thin, warped door buckled, and they entered the house over a pile of huge wood splinters.

  Inside, the furnishings were sparse: a tiny table with two chairs, a brass kettle over a makeshift fireplace, and a shelf with various vials and gourds on it. In the far left corner, a creaking bed supported the weight of a moaning figure.

  Philip and Arliss eased toward him.

  “He will not offer much fight, it seems,” Philip whispered, his boots clamping softly on the floorboards.

  At the sound of his footsteps, the body on the bed moved, his unsteady breathing normalizing.

  “Master…” the man coughed. “Master, there is a disturbance—a great disturbance. I don’t rightly know what’s caused it. Beat me not, please, for I haven’t a thought as to what has disturbed ’em. Please…” his voice muffled off into nothingness.

  He turned his head toward them and opened his eyes. A ruffled mop of graying hair framed a haggard face with wild green eyes. He might have been a handsome young man once. Now, he seemed barely human.

  His eyes widened. “Who…the master…I didn’t do it…” A strange look of recognition took over his face. “Arliss? The princess?”

  Her heart jumped. How did he know her name?

  He shook his head. “You should never have come here. Never, never. He knows. He is coming. He will find you and kill you.”

  “Who is he?”

  “The master,” was all he offered. “My lady, please. Run from here as fast as you can, warn your father, do anything! Do you not know me?”

  She knelt beside the bed. “I am not sure, sir.”

  “My lady, I am a man of Reinhold—or I was. I am Áedán.”

  “Áedán?” she gasped. “It cannot be. You are alive?”