A day’s worth of continual rain left pools of water connected by morning light, forming a giant pond outside my cottage in the low areas. Grass stems stuck out of the pristine water, harassed by more falling rain.
Goat and Other Goat splashed through the water, muddied from hoof to belly, while I moved their pen to higher ground on the other side of the cottage. Water soaked my hair, my clothes. The rain fell relentlessly, thrumming like knuckles on the roof. A grumble issued from the sky every now and then, but the worst of the thunder had faded overnight.
We protect yours.
You are safe.
When I touched a nearby trunk, my mind zipped farther away, to the edge of the Central Network. The storm raged there, too, where witches from the East hunkered below trees. Shelters of old branches, thick with leaves or needles, littered most areas. Campfires, children scampering, saturated blankets thrown over boughs for extra reassurance. Despite the weather, the picture appeared cozy enough, with small fires to keep warm.
“Any sign of demigods?”
The ill-fated are not here.
We watch, we wait.
“Thank you.”
The trees shook.
I turned back to my task. When Baxter moved the manulele birds to my house, he’d put protective god magic over the area to keep the birds safe from predators, but not from rain.
Ava and I attempted to save the tiny birds’ homes. She used a pickax and shovel to create drains away from their bushes to a downhill area, while I scooped bucketfuls of water away from the hedges.
So far, it appeared to be working.
Manulele birds fluttered near my shoulders, their feathers a gentle caress on my cheek. A light murmur from my throat and one of them released a warble. I grinned, unable to help myself. So small, yet so indignant.
When a frustrated growl came from behind, I cast a wary glance to Ava. She stood near the far hedge, brow furrowed, glaring at a hole. One hand lifted to a spot in the green pillar, where a manulele bird peeked out. The bright feathers, soft underbelly, disappeared.
Ava frowned.
“You all right, Ava?”
At the sound of my question, she startled, then relaxed. I extended a small burlap bag filled with seeds to her. She managed a grateful smile as she accepted, then turned back to her birds.
Sticks rested in a shallow trench of honey nearby, where a waterskin filled with seeds lay on top. She picked open the sewn edges of the bag, grabbed a clean end of the closest stick, then shoved it inside. After she withdrew a seed-coated stick, she rested it on the hedge, just outside the bird’s hole.
Instead of eating, the bird hopped to her shoulder and burrowed into her neck. I pressed back a giggle. She looked like an aviary. Birds touched every available spot on her body. Those that couldn’t land, fluttered.
“Ava?”
“Hmm?”
“You all right?”
“I’m just tired.”
“Baby Tomas keeping you awake?”
She shook her head. “No.”
“Can you hear him crying?”
“No.”
I paused, giving her a moment to extrapolate. She didn’t, so I pressed on.
“Not sleeping well?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
She shrugged. Another stick plunked into the birdseed, emerging speckled with various seeds. Some were black and tiny, others oblong and fat. Manulele birds flocked to her, but ignored the nourishment.
“What is wrong?” she murmured in a loving tone. One bird landed on her chest, gripping a button. It rested against her heart, burrowing close.
Ava looked at me in astonishment.
I shrugged.
“Something is wrong with the manulele, Bianca. They have never done this. They act . . . afraid.”
“I can see that.”
“Can birds have fear?”
“Maybe?”
Ava glanced overhead. “Any owls? Have big animals bothered them?”
“No. Baxter’s magic is still working. Even the gnomes have left them alone.”
She placed a stick of seeds on a trench of water, then set her fingers in the bag. When her hand emerged, fifteen birds landed across her fingers and her wrist. Their attention brought a gentle smile to her face, though concern lay under it.
“All the creatures are being strange,” I murmured. “The gnomes keep coming to my house and asking for bread. I leave out water dishes for them. It’s not normal.”
Ava gave no response, clearly lost in other thoughts.
I nudged her with an elbow.
“Want to talk about whatever is bothering you?”
Her troubled gaze fluttered to mine, then away. “No, but the ghosts inside . . .”
She curled a hand protectively around a baby manulele no larger than the space between the knuckles of my thumb. It chirped, happy inside her palm.
“I’ll tell you, but please don’t tell Priscilla?”
“What is it?”
“I . . . I have dreams at night.”
“Oh?”
“Bad dreams. Dreams of . . .”
“Alaysia?”
She shuddered, then nodded. Her lips pressed together, tight and firm. The other hand clutched the birdseed bag so hard the knuckles turned white.
“Is it about what happened in the Heart of Alaysia?”
She nodded.
“It was pretty frightening, wasn’t it?”
Ava said nothing.
One of her only Alaysian friends, Daemon, had been killed right in front of her by Tontes. Had she not returned to my side moments before, she would have drowned with him. Then demigods captured her, held her prisoner, and four gods warred over all of our lives.
Any child would be traumatized.
“Tontes is in my dreams, my mind. I wake up sweaty and afraid.” She gazed away, cheeks burning. “I get scared at night. When the dreams come, it feels like nowhere is safe. Not home, not Alkarra, not Letum Wood. I’m worried about my birds and Baxter is so busy.”
“Have you talked to him about the dreams?”
“He’s too busy.”
“He’s not too busy for you.”
She grunted, but didn’t argue the point. “They’re just dreams,” she muttered. Her furrowed brow indicated she didn’t have herself convinced yet, as if deeper issues lay in the recesses.
“What would make you feel safe?” I asked.
Ava’s brow created deep grooves. “A weapon. Not a sword. Not arrows.” She swiped an impatient hand through the air. “Derek taught me both of them and no. They weren’t my weapons. Not those. Something else. Something smaller. Faster, but still . . .”
“Dangerous to someone who wants to harm you?”
She nodded.
“I have other ideas. We’ll find weapons for you to try. Papa would love to give you a tour through all his others. You’ve only seen the beginning.”
A spark of hope appeared in her eyes.
“Let’s finish with the birds,” I promised. “We’ll go inside and find something.”
Fear lightened to relief in her gaze.
“Thank you.”
“Is there something else?” I leaned closer, driven by the feeling that she hadn’t said everything yet. “Anything else you want to tell me?”
Ava hesitated, met my gaze. With a blink, she turned away. Back rigid, knuckles white. Her tone was flat when she said, “No. Nothing else.”
Ava turned back to her birds, scattering seeds along the ground with long whips of her wrist. A singsong tune came out of her, like a warbling bird song. Some of the manulele thrilled to it. They stayed close, fought to be near her. The unlucky few that couldn’t cling to her clothes spun in dizzying circles, attempting to peck others away. Those she scolded with a grunt, a tap of her fingers to break them apart.
Trust, Grandfather had said.
The thought sank deep.
* * *
A house lay in splinters.
I tilted my head to the side, staring in wide-eyed shock. Rain cascaded down my hair, past my shoulder blades, over my spine. Streams of it grazed my temples, falling like waterfalls to my soaked shoulders.
An oak tree lay on its side. Branches straggled out, crushed, twisted, bent. Roots, like hairy limbs, sprouted from the ground. Mud coated all of it, driving past the fallen majesty in tunnels of free-flowing earth. Standing water stood as high as my knees after three full days of torrential rain.
“What happened?” I called over a peal of thunder.
The panicked saplings exploded in my mind.
We fall.
We fear.
The rains do not stop.
With practiced control, I quieted them. A few reassuring phrases sent the worst of their anxiety into calm again. The voices were high, tinny.
The tree had toppled, obliterating a forester house. Bright green shutters poked out from beneath it, cracked in half. The tree had fallen to the edge of the house, revealing hints of what had been a home.
“Were witches inside?”
We fall.
We fear.
With a growl, I attempted to push my thoughts past the saplings. They were not helpful. Behind them, older trees would speak, if I were lucky enough to hear them.
I wrapped a hand around one of the trailing branches of the fallen tree and searched for signs of magic still inside. Rain poured down the twigs, dripping to the lake below. A faint pulse of life still lived. Roots existed in the ground, which meant magic remained active, but not for long.
No witches, it said. No witches.
Relief gave me a moment of pause, but it was short-lived. The fall had embedded the tree deep in the mud, which meant we’d never recover the house or any possessions inside. I shoved a rain-soaked lock of hair out of my eyes. Breath misted in front of me. The steady moisture cooled everything.
“Jikes,” I muttered, at a loss. “You’re supposed to bring me to the demigods!”
The ill-fated are not here.
We protect you.
You protect us.
“There are no demigods anywhere?”
The ill-fated are not here.
“They didn’t push this tree over?”
The ill-fated are not here.
The wind.
I growled.
The dark side of a magical forest often surprised me. Gigantic creatures. Hungry predators. Vines that crawled around your neck at night and choked you slowly. Spots where magic didn’t work, and others where nothing but magic lived. All of it was frightening and unpredictable.
These drenching rains were something else entirely.
Swollen streams. Flooding lowlands. Mudslides and falling trees and dying, water-logged bushes. Entire meadows had been flooded in landslides last night, whisking saplings, bushes, and any familiar landmarks away.
Though I expected the worst, I’d still underestimated what so much water could do in Letum Wood. Mistook Tontes and Ventis’ brute-force personalities and tactics for impatience. The long-term game of wearing the land down in order to conquer it hadn’t occurred to me.
Until now.
“How do we fight this?” I murmured, palm pressed to a tree. A hope for sloping, blue letters filled my chest with a fluttering sensation. It died away when no answer from Deasylva came.
The stronger trees held deep roots—they didn’t panic yet. The ancients would be safe against most major ills. The saplings held the greatest fear, and had reason to fear. Many of them fell, born down under the combined wind and rain.
Beneath the screeching panic of the saplings, new voices arose.
The saplings give way in the wind.
We must fight this enemy.
We are stalwart.
“How?” I shouted, arms spread. “How do you want to fight endless rain for days on end? I’m open to ideas!”
Silence replied.
It falls.
We fall.
To the enemy, we must fight.
“If the demigods aren’t here, no one will fight. Not even you. Stupid gods of wind and thunder!” I threw a stick into the fallen oak. “They know exactly what they’re doing! They’re weakening the forest, denying us a chance to steal their amulets by holding their demigods back, then they’ll attack. You’ll get your chance, all right?”
The buzzing energy fell into silence.
Frustration seethed through me as I sloshed away from the house. My rage began to ebb. This situation had nothing to do with Letum Wood, but I still felt annoyed by everything all the same.
“I’m sorry!” I called. “I’m . . . frustrated.”
The cry of a baby stopped my rampage away from the destroyed home. Shocked, I lifted my head and gaped.
“Oh!”
I shifted back, prevented from falling only by the presence of the Volare behind me, off which rain trickled in rivulets. A man, a woman, and a baby stood under a hastily-created lean-to near a tree. They studied me with great suspicion.
Right.
Who could blame them? I’d just screamed at the trees.
Water-logged hair and bright red noses indicated they’d been outside for some time. The woman bounced her child, patting it on the back. “I’m sorry about your home,” I cried over the falling rain.
The man stepped forward. I didn’t move, allowing him to study me. “You’re the forest lady?” he called. “The one that they say talks to the trees?”
Jikes, what a reputation.
Reluctantly, I nodded.
He waved to the fallen tree. “What’re we supposed to do now? Our home is gone to this confounded rain. The newscrolls say it’s the god of thunder and god of wind, but that’s idiotic.”
“It is the god of thunder and the god of wind causing this.”
The man blinked.
“There are resources at Chatham Castle,” I continued, too tired to have this discussion again. Several had already occurred over the last day. “You can go there. They’ll find shelter for you.”
A scowl crossed his expression. “Don’t want to go there.” His filthy face and missing teeth likely meant he’d rarely—if ever—left the forest.
I gestured around us. “You’re free to go somewhere else, but the whole forest has started to look like this. You won’t find shelter in Letum Wood. All the refugees from the East are transporting to the South now. Do you want to go there?”
His frustration deepened. The baby let out another squall from beneath a pile of blankets. With a thought, I sent the Volare to the three of them. It elongated and widened, then hovered overhead, repelling the water. The woman jerked away, then stopped. A small smile appeared on her face when she realized her shelter.
The trees stirred.
Now wasn’t the time for social norms. I tilted my head back and shouted over the thundering rain, “Can you help them or not?”
A pause, then, We know the way.
We shall guide.
We save you.
Relieved, I turned back to the forester. “The forest has a place for you to stay so you don’t have to leave. Don’t be afraid.”
A path formed at the man’s feet, shimmering at the top of the water. Watery lines twisted into the bushes, leading away from the fallen tree. He glanced down, saw the path. Shock glazed his features.
I nodded to it.
“Get out of the water, avoid the younger trees. You can get food from the castle, because there’s nothing left to forage here anymore. Good luck.”
Reluctantly, they obeyed. Minutes later, I stood alone again, regarding a forest that had nearly become an ocean. My lip curled over my teeth when a rumble of thunder broke the sky. A signature from Tontes.
“Get out of here,” I muttered.
Lightning crackled in response.
* * *
Twenty minutes later, I peered out of a window. Raindrops raced down the panes, chasing shadows. They merged, split, disappeared, and faded into the same murky gray from which they’d come. Letum Wood lay in a vague haze of green.
I stood against the far wall of Scarlett’s office, where no Underassistant would run into me, nor Guardian detect as they strolled past. With Leda in charge, magic ran rampant through Scarlett’s office, which kept me safe from notice. No one knew I was here. I planned to keep it that way.
Rain intensified the solemn shroud that lay over Chatham Castle. The fireplace, bright with simmering coals that kept a pot of tea warm, belied a sense of fear in the air. The grim expression in Hiddleston’s eyes matched everyone's turbulent emotions. Scarlett was nowhere to be seen.
Underassistants scuttled in the background. Leda issued flash flood reports, updated journalists with new warnings for the Chatterer, and passed information to Talmund through messages.
A lull of silence had fallen over the room for several minutes, giving me ample space to observe, catalog facts. I chewed on my cheek, lost in thought, while I waited for more updates to report from different parts of the Network.
I wanted to know what happened in Alkarra beyond what the Chatterer updated, but I didn’t want to talk to anyone.
“A bridge has dropped near Stanton,” Hiddleston called as he perused a small scroll. “The swollen river wiped the edges out and it collapsed. Most witches are trapped in Stanton now. It was the only way out, aside from transporting.”
“Is that where two adults were reported missing after attempting to cross the river?” Leda volleyed back, rubbing a hand over her forehead with a grimace.
Hiddleston’s dreadlocks swayed as he shook his head.
Leda scowled. “Blessed be. Update the board please, Shianne. There isn’t time to review each warning out loud anymore, so you’ll need to work as you receive them. Only report those with casualties, or impacting areas with populations greater than one hundred.”
“But I’m so far behind,” a young woman wailed. “There’s no time to track them for the Chatterer and update the board!”
Leda sucked in a sharp breath. Rage brightened her pretty features, driven there after hours of struggling to contain the flow of updates, no doubt. Hiddleston held up a hand to Leda, crossed the room, and spoke to the whiny woman in hushed whispers.
Leda’s bunched shoulders dropped in relief. “Daisy?” she called to a short, raven-haired witch surrounded by piles of envelopes. The woman looked up, saw Leda’s flushed neck, and immediately stood.
“Yes?”
“Please update the board while Shianne works with the Chatterer? It will be your responsibility now.”
“Of course.”
Daisy hurried to a wall-sized paper—no doubt conjured by magic. She plucked a message out of a basket near the end of Leda’s desk. Grids, ink, and pieces of parchment covered it. Organized chaos, of course.
Leda turned back to her work, muttering under her breath in a murderous rage. I slunk out of her crossfire by retreating to the hall. She’d go positively wild if she caught me listening in.
Once in the hallway, the melee worsened. Council Member Assistants rushed back and forth, darting across the hall, shouting questions. Guardians sprinted up and down the stairs, delivering reports with clanking swords and harried breaths. Other witches—most I didn’t recognize—cluttered any available space.
Still invisible, I pressed my back to the wall to avoid a passing Council Member, then froze. I stopped a gasp at the last moment.
Michelle, baby Isadora, and little Sanna appeared only a few paces away. Water dripped off their drenched clothes. Sanna’s teeth chattered, her lips frosted a darker tinge. They hurried to Scarlett’s office and stopped at the doorway.
“L-Leda?” Michelle called.
A breath issued from inside, then Leda rushed into the hall. She grabbed Sanna, clasping her close.
“What’s wrong?” she cried. “Sanna, you’re so cold.”
Michelle swallowed, her pale expression white. Baby Isadora wailed when Hiddleston appeared in the doorway. A blanket popped into his hands. He handed it to Michelle. She immediately pulled a sopping wet one off Isadora and wrapped the new one around her. Hiddleston took the wet one, then conjured another for Sanna.
“Flooding,” Michelle finally managed, on the verge of tears. “A mudslide headed toward our house. The dragons warned me just in time. We left. I . . . I wasn’t sure I could transport them, and then I did and . . . Nicholas is with the dragons now and . . .”
Leda’s lips parted in wordless astonishment.
“Mudslide?”
No, that didn’t make sense. Letum Wood had rolling hills, flat places, gradual slopes, but Michelle and Nicholas didn’t live near an incline. Their part of the forest was flat, steady, with a stream that had never failed. The back of my neck prickled.
“Did your house . . .” Leda trailed away. The question died when Michelle shook her head. A sob scraped out of her throat.
“Gone,” she wailed. “It’s gone!”
I stopped the invisibility spell. Leda glanced up in confusion as I rushed to Michelle’s side. Before I could ask, three other bodies appeared in the hallway, nearly transporting on top of Sanna and Leda.
Celia, Priscilla, and Ava. Tomas slept in Priscilla’s arms, bundled into a tight knot of blankets. Raindrops sprinkled Celia’s shoulders and gray hair. She gripped a basket stuffed with cloths, herb tinctures, and rolled-up clothes for the baby. A terrorized expression filled Ava’s face.
“The school,” Priscilla gasped. “It’s flooding. A stream is flowing right through it. Swept out the windows in the north wall and the dining hall, in minutes.”
Leda’s head snapped to mine. A dark feeling filled my gut. “Is the flooding so bad over there?” Leda asked.
I shook my head.
She hesitated, mouth half open. Her breathy voice whispered, “Is it . . .”
Letum Wood broke into my thoughts. I held up a hand, turned my head to the side slightly to hear over the commotion in the hallway.
The ill-fated have come.
We protect you.
The ill-fated have come.
“Demigods,” I hissed. “They’re in the forest.”
Leda paled. “Bianca . . .”
“Don’t do anything just yet. Let me figure out what’s going on.”