As Dally moved through the thornbush tunnel, one of the wooden blades snagged her right shoulder. Perhaps she was not paying careful enough attention, as her every breath was filled with the dark unknown that awaited her. But she suspected the bushes possessed the ability to snare those who encroached upon their territory. It was hardly a glancing flick, yet still the thorn sliced through her singlet and her skin. She felt little more than a pinprick, but the blood was soon streaming down her arm. It stained her sleeve black and dripped off her fingers onto the earth.
As she passed from the tunnel into the forest, Dally debated turning around. Going back to sunlight and safety. The wolfhound to her right sniffed at the blood pooling on the earth and whined. Then again, Dally reflected, perhaps the wound would heighten her ability to play the lure.
If only she was not so afraid.
Then Myron hissed softly from behind her. The sound was enough to spur her forward.
Dally had only brought Nabu and Dama with her. These were the pair she could most trust to do exactly what she ordered. She had discarded the idea of coming in unaccompanied. The fiends had been aware of the dogs before, so they needed to sense them now.
She closed her eyes and extended herself into Nabu, long enough to be certain the shadow-beasts clustered together just beyond her field of vision. She opened her eyes and searched the distant trees, trying to detect movement, but saw nothing.
Then she had an idea.
Dally closed her eyes once more, this time reaching farther than ever before. Out to where the enemy watched. She approached them, fearful, tremulous, but doing it just the same . . .
And struck a wall as dark and forbidding as the grave.
She retreated and opened her eyes, regretting that she had failed and relieved at the same time. But her attempt had brought two new realizations.
The fiends were closer than she’d thought. They could not be seen, however, for they possessed the ability to warp the forest shadows into a cloak.
She realized something else as well. The beasts assumed they held complete dominance over this situation. She represented no real threat. The forest was now their realm. They had conquered it. She was the interloper. They sought a measure of her force, just as Meda had suspected. But not because they feared her. They wanted to know what strength was held by the soldiers beyond the thorns. They would study her assault. And then they would destroy her. And afterward defeat the soldiers. Then devour the entire valley.
The prospect of more families enduring the pain and loss that had dominated her life for these long years filled Dally with a rage so potent, all her fears simply vanished. The terror she had known was consumed like a morning mist facing the noonday sun.
Dally directed the two dogs to gather behind her. Then she drew Edlyn’s wand. She did not call out the spell. She screamed the words with all her might.
The resulting blast plucked smaller saplings out by their roots. Even the tallest trees were shaken to their very foundations. The shadows hiding the beasts were obliterated. The enemy tumbled about.
The fiends were momentarily stunned by the force of her spell.
Then they tasted Dally’s blood.
It had sprayed out with her spell, blown into a fine mist that now engulfed the animals’ senses. Their natural fury turned to a blind and ravenous hunger.
Dally wheeled about. “Run!”