by Jenn Reese
“Oh, no,” Sam said. She grew panicked picturing Birch with her tiny sword, trying to fend off a fox. “Is she okay?”
Is she okay? Mom, is she okay?
“We don’t know,” Cedar said.
“We will hope that she is,” Maple replied firmly. “Birch is strong.”
The forest blurred, and for a moment Sam couldn’t tell if she was stumbling between tree trunks in the middle of a storm or navigating an endless hospital hallway that flickered in and out in time with its fluorescent lights. Caitlin will wake up, Sam. She will. She’s strong.
“He wouldn’t hurt her, would he?” Sam asked in a small voice.
Maple ran silently. “Not on purpose, but … maybe by accident.”
It was an accident.
“Why would she do that for me?” The rain was everywhere, even in her eyes. Sam wiped them with her soaking sleeve. “I never asked her to do that!”
“Do you mean Birch or Caitlin?” Maple asked.
“I meant…”
But suddenly Sam didn’t know how to answer. When she pictured Birch, the squirrel had a cast on her foreleg. When she pictured Caitlin, her sister was wearing a knight’s helmet and brandishing a sword made of sticks.
Maple slid to a stop. Cedar nearly collided into her.
“Quiet. Ashander is in the forest,” Maple said.
Sam peered into the dark behind them and tried to silence her rasping breaths. “How close?”
“It’s hard to tell,” Maple said. “The wind is being coy with his scent.”
“The trees are letting him pass,” Cedar said, hugging his arms to his chest. He wasn’t wearing his galoshes anymore—just his normal yellow tunic and pants, already soaked from the rain.
“We still don’t know where to find the Golden Acorn,” Sam said. She shined the flashlight on the compass. They were still headed northeast, but who knew if that was even right. Ashander was going to catch her before she found it.
Sam switched the flashlight off to save the battery. As her eyes adjusted to the dark, a strange thing happened: the directions and hands of the compass lit up as if Sam had plugged them into a light switch. A glow-in-the-dark compass! Why hadn’t Lucas mentioned that when he gave it to her?
Maybe because Sam was too busy throwing it at him.
She studied the compass and noticed something odd. The regular compass hand and ordinal directions weren’t visible in the darkness, but a new, glowing symbol had appeared, along with a glowing arrow. They must have been hidden under the glare of the flashlight.
Wait, Sam thought. Somewhere up above the trees and the clouds, there was a full moon. It was the moon that had turned Lucas’s compass to magic. Sam peered closer, hoping to see what her heart most desired.
The symbol was an acorn.
Her compass could direct her to the Golden Acorn!
“Look, look!” Sam knelt and held out the compass so Maple and Cedar could see. “That symbol represents the Golden Acorn. All we have to do is turn until the arrow points to it, and then we know we’re going in the right direction!”
“How marvelous,” Maple said, clapping her paws. “You are such a clever girl, Samantha.”
Sam’s chest swelled with something other than panic for a change.
Cedar turned and sniffed the air. “I can smell him.” He looked at Sam, his eyes wide and afraid. “Ashander is hunting.”
“We should move quickly,” Maple said. She touched Cedar’s shoulder, and he shivered. Maple took off her raincoat and wrapped it around the younger squirrel. The blue fabric turned yellow the moment she buttoned it.
“If things get ugly, I will do what I can to protect you,” Maple said. She looked up at Sam. “And you, too, Samantha. I will do everything in my power.”
Sam stared into Maple’s determined eyes and couldn’t coax a single word from her own throat. She nodded gratefully.
“Now lead us to the Golden Acorn, Sam,” Maple said. “We haven’t much time!”
Sam turned until the glowing compass arrow lined up with the acorn symbol. “This way.”
The forest had never been silent, but now it was a raging cacophony. Branches snapped, leaves rustled, rain drummed against every surface. Animals darted through the underbrush and leaped from tree to tree overhead. Sam’s clothes were twice as heavy now that they were soaked with water, and despite the summer month, it grew colder every minute. Soon her breath came in ragged puffs.
Sam stopped to check the compass. Had she been gone five minutes, or ten minutes, or three hours? Aunt Vicky’s house felt as far away as Oz or Narnia or middle-earth.
“I’m done,” Cedar said, huffing at Sam’s side. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
“Shush now,” Maple said, patting him on the back. She seemed only mildly winded by their run and had somehow acquired another blue raincoat. “You don’t mean that.”
“I do mean it,” Cedar said angrily. “We had everything figured out before she got here. We knew his moods. We knew what to say and what not to say. We knew when to lower our eyes or to laugh or to fetch him his dinner. He liked my juggling—it made him smile once! He only got angry sometimes, and only when we deserved it. Everything would have kept on being okay if she hadn’t come to the forest.” He glared at Sam. “You ruined everything!”
“Shh, shh,” Maple said.
Sam couldn’t help feeling hurt. Didn’t Cedar see how manipulative Ashander was? How the fox slid between happy and angry and tricky and sweet so fast that there was no way to keep up? How Ashander said one thing but did another?
“It’s not my fault that he’s like that,” Sam said. “It’s not my fault that you have to worry so much about what he’s thinking.”
“The forest was better before you got here,” Cedar said.
“That’s enough,” Maple said sternly. “We have no time for this bickering.”
“If you don’t want to stay, then don’t,” Sam told Cedar. “I’m not making you do something you don’t want to do.”
Cedar crossed his arms. “If I have a choice, then I’m definitely leaving. And I think you should turn around, too. It doesn’t help anyone to go against Ashander’s wishes. You should give yourself up and beg for forgiveness. He’ll punish all of us if you don’t!”
“If you’re going to leave, then go,” Maple said crossly.
“Fine, I will. And if you’re smart, you’ll go too, Maple.” Cedar gave Sam one last defiant glare, then darted into the night.
The compass shook in Sam’s hand. She tried to focus on its face instead of on the disappearing tail of a squirrel she’d thought was her friend.
“You may as well go, too,” Sam said to the compass, because she couldn’t bring herself to look at Maple.
“Of course I’m staying,” Maple said. “I promised to protect you, and I will.”
“Thank you, Maple.” Sam wiped her nose with her very wet sleeve. “I wish Ashander stayed charming.”
Maple’s determined face grew sad. She touched Sam’s leg with her paw. “Nobody is only one thing.”
“Then I wish he weren’t charming at all. If he hadn’t been so nice at the beginning, if I didn’t like him, then it wouldn’t matter so much that, that…”
“That he’s hunting us,” Maple said.
“Yeah.”
“Let’s run, child,” the squirrel said, and they did.
The farther they went into the forest, the darker it got. Sam tripped over a tree root and landed face-first in the mud. Her body ached. Maple cleaned the muck from Sam’s eyes and got her back on her feet. They kept running, but this time with the flashlight. It was impossible to know how far they had to go. The compass told them the direction, but not the distance. The Golden Acorn might still be miles away.
Strange voices echoed through the forest. Sam couldn’t tell what they were saying, not through the noise of the rain. It was like a thousand drummers were banging on the leaves and the tree trunks and the ground, determined to be as lou
d as possible.
A twig snapped, and Sam swung the flashlight.
Nothing.
She swept it in the other direction, and a dark shape darted away from the beam.
“He’s close,” Maple said. “Faster!”
Sam sped up, but her boots slid in the mud. She fell to her hands and knees. The flashlight dropped from her grip and rolled away, the beam bouncing wildly.
Maple tugged at Sam’s hand. “Get up! Get the flashlight! We have to go!”
Sam tried to stand, but her shoes kept slipping and her hands were so numb that they refused to do what she asked. Plus, she was sure that her left shin was bleeding from the fall.
A howl cut through the darkness, silencing both the rain and the voices.
Sam scrambled forward, but all she managed to do was twist and land on her rear in what felt like a stream. The water was freezing! At least she got her almost useless fingers to wrap around the flashlight.
And there, in the spotlight of her beam, was Ashander.
His purple coat had ripped along its seams. Mud matted the fur of his arms and legs. But he leaned against a tree trunk and studied his claws, as if he’d been casually waiting for her the whole time.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
“MY, MY, MY, what have we here?” said the fox with a sly smile. His eyes grew big. “Why, it’s the sacrifice!”
Sam scuttled backward like a crab.
Ashander chuckled. “I do so love a good hunt, but I’m sure you know that the punishment is always so much worse when you try to outrun it.”
“Please, no,” Maple said, wringing her paws. “She’ll bring you the chicken. All the chickens. She’ll do whatever you ask. Promise him, Sam. Promise him!”
Sam could barely feel her fingers or her toes. Her teeth chattered. Every last bit of her was drenched. But she would promise no such thing. Ashander could not be trusted. Promising him the world might keep her safe tonight, but it would mean nothing tomorrow.
“Please, Samantha!” Maple begged. She stood between Sam and Ashander with her arms outstretched, as if she could stop them both with her tiny paws. “Do not anger him further!”
“You’re wasting your breath,” Ashander snarled. In a flash, his humor and wit vanished. Rather, Sam wished they had vanished. The aspects she loved were probably all still there, still every bit a part of him. Knowing this—that he could be this fox and the other fox at the same time—only made him more terrifying.
Ashander stalked toward Maple. “Unless you want to find out exactly how sharp my teeth are, you’d better fall in line yourself.”
Maple recoiled. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry!”
Sam doubted Maple even knew why she was apologizing. Those words had been spoken so often in Sam’s house, repeated over and over like a protection spell. Only, it rarely worked.
“Maple isn’t part of this,” Sam said, desperate. “It’s my fault, not hers!”
Ashander ignored Sam. “Oh, so you remember my teeth, do you,” he said to Maple. He smiled, and it was the most awful thing Sam had ever seen. “I’ll make this simple. It’s you or Samantha, Maple dear. Choose wisely, or you know what will happen. You know how bad it will be.”
Sam held her breath. All she could do was watch Maple’s small face and hope.
The moment Maple decided, her bright eyes dulled and her slender shoulders rounded. She always stood so tall and perfect, but now she shrank, as if all the life had leaked out of her.
Sam knew what was coming next. What always came next. I’m sorry, Grant. I won’t do it again.
“Samantha made me come with her,” Maple said, her voice flat. “She always intended to defy you.”
Sam’s eyes filled, but not with rain. Her lip trembled, but not from the cold.
“Aaaaaah,” Ashander said, stalking closer. “I thought as much! Such a selfish girl. Weak and helpless.”
Sam barely heard him. She could not stop staring at Maple, even though she could barely see the squirrel through all the useless water falling from her eyes.
I’ll do what I can to protect you.
Those were the words Maple had said.
I’ll do what I can to protect you.
But Maple had given Sam up to save herself. She’d handed Sam to the fox without a fight.
The fox would have hurt Maple. He had obviously hurt her before. But even so, Sam wanted …
She wished …
She hoped …
That maybe this time, Maple would have loved her enough to at least try.
Sam watched as Maple walked slowly to Ashander’s side and looked up at him with terrified eyes. He patted her on the head. “Good girl, Maple. You did the right thing.”
Maple did not relax, not even a little. Her shoulders remained stiff, her tail twitched. Every time the fox moved, Maple flinched.
“Run along home now, Maple,” Ashander said gently. “I’ve no quarrel with you. Not tonight.”
Maple dropped her head, defeated. She didn’t even look at Sam again as she fell to her four paws and bounded into the shadows.
“It’s just you and me now, Samantha. That’s the way it always should have been, don’t you think?” the fox said, suddenly charming again. “You are such a clever girl. So much smarter than the others.”
Sam wiped her eyes furiously. She hated how his words made her feel. She hated how much she wanted to believe them. But she could see the fangs in his mouth for what they were.
Ashander’s tail swished. “The test of sacrifice, Sam. You still need to pass it. After I’m done with you, I might just climb the gate to the chickens for fun. Who’ll be there to stop me?”
Sam refused to give up like this, not when so many people still needed her. Not when she was so close to the Golden Acorn. But how could she escape long enough to find it?
Maybe it was time for her to start changing the rules, too.
The fox stalked closer, drawing out his approach. Trying to make her more afraid. Good. Sam whispered words under her breath, searched for rhymes, tested syllables. Why didn’t orbit rhyme with anything? There was no time to invent something elaborate, but then again, in The Hobbit when Bilbo had needed a riddle, he’d simply asked, “What have I got in my pocket?” Sam could at least do better than that!
When Ashander was almost upon her, she held up her hand, as if she could stop his approach with just her five fingers and the ring Aunt Vicky had let her keep.
“Oh, little one, do you really think your small paw could stop me?” the fox asked. “How foolish!”
“I’ve promised you a sacrifice, but you must earn it,” Sam said, pleased when her voice didn’t waver. “You must answer my riddle.”
As Sam spoke those words, the forest around them lit up, as if someone was flicking the light switch to the sun. Thunder shook the trees.
Ashander laughed. “The lightning was a nice touch. A bit dramatic, but suitable for the occasion. However, there is absolutely no reason why I should have to do anything you ask, my tasty little sacrifice.”
Sam cried out as the ring on her finger burst into blue flames. But it didn’t hurt—in fact, a comforting warmth rushed through her arm and wrapped around her chest. It almost felt like being hugged.
Ashander stepped back with a hiss. “Well, this is unexpected.”
Aunt Vicky’s words came back to Sam: There are a lot of dangers in these woods. You might need the queen’s magic.
The ring wasn’t just Aunt Vicky’s ring; it had belonged to the Queen of Squirrels!
Ashander tried to recover his ground, but the ring flared brighter. He stayed where he was. “Fine. Tell me your riddle, then. I am excellent at solving puzzles and was going to ask for it anyway.”
Sam almost had the words in the right order. Almost. It was so hard to think when she was so cold, and so scared. She took a deep breath, counted to five, and spoke:
Above the mountains, seas, and cities
A lady drifts in shadowed air
&nb
sp; Smiling
Frowning
Hiding
Howling
But always, ever there.
Her ring blazed, casting Sam, Ashander, and a million drops of rain in eerie blue light. She hadn’t done anything, not on purpose. Had her words activated hidden magic in the ring, like some kind of spell?
Ashander tried to take a step forward but grunted and twisted in place, the first ungraceful move she’d seen him make.
He growled. “Oh, you’ve bound me to the answer, have you? I can’t move until I solve it? Clever, Samantha. Clever!” He tried to grin, tried to seem at ease despite his legs being literally stuck to the ground. “Very well, then, I will solve your little riddle. It’s probably something ridiculous, like an owl or a human hanging from a tree.”
Wrong, Sam thought, but she didn’t waste time saying it. She pulled out her compass—careful not to look at her watch, lest she give Ashander a clue—adjusted her bearing, and ran.
Ashander called after her. “Is it a witch on a broomstick? Is it a moth?”
The good news was that Ashander was not particularly good at riddles. The bad news was that he was guessing so much that he’d stumble upon the actual answer before too long.
Sam could not run very fast. Her legs ached. Her bones shivered. Her fingers were so numb that she could barely hold on to the compass and the flashlight while still making sure she didn’t poke her eyes out on a sharp branch. Every last bit of her was dripping. It would be so much easier if she just sat down in the mud and closed her eyes. Was it like this for all heroes, near the end?
The blue ring flared again, and Sam pushed those thoughts aside. The Queen of Squirrels was lending her strength. She would not squander it.
“Is it a chicken trying to fly?”
“Is it a jack-o’-lantern?”
Ashander’s guesses followed her through the woods, and even though he was still stuck in place, the ominous threat of his voice never grew distant. She could almost feel his warm breath on her cheek.
“Is it a face on a tree?”