Page 37 of The Blight of Hollowmire

“Monsters! Animals, Renard. You wandered into their territories. Certainly, you were protecting yourself in killing them, but just because they do not look like the beasts on your side of the forest does not mean they are mindless evils here. Everything is connected. They serve a purpose in this world, just as you and I do. Do not be so foolish as to believe that you have the right to be arbiter of life and death without respecting how greatly your sword may alter it,” I say, tying off the clean bandage with more force than strictly necessary.

I can tell he wants to argue—the emotions are wild in his eyes, the words crowding out on the tip of his tongue. But for the second time this evening, he keeps his reply—and I suspect, his temper—to himself. After a moment, his brow furrows in a way that suggests he might be taking my words to heart.

Or perhaps we’re both too tired for these kinds of conversations.

“Anyway,” I say briskly, pulling back. “Your bandages are clean, your wounds are healing. I daresay you will live, Farmer Knight.”

“Thanks to your ministrations, Lady Fae.”

“Hmph. Don’t make me regret it.”

He studies me for a moment longer than is comfortable.

“Thank you, Vireth,” he says, the teasing in his tone now absent.

I decide I don’t like the way he says my name like that, because I rather like it too much. The softness that rolls over his tongue, like my name is something small and precious—so unlike the vitriolic hissing I’ve grown accustomed to at court.

“The food should be ready,” I say, rising too quickly and turning back to the fire to avoid blue eyes and uncomfortable feelings. “After we eat, I will take first watch. You should rest.”

“And you?” he asks.

“I will sleep when I choose,” I reply, already moving to the far side of the clearing. “Preferably far from you and your ego.”

A quiet huff of laughter follows me, low and warm enough to unsettle something beneath my ribs. I ignore it.

We eat in silence, except for my uncivilized moans of delight at the succulent, savory meat and unctuous roasted mushroom. Twice I catch Renard’s jaw muscles working even when he’s not chewing, but he doesn’t look at me any more than necessary. Nibblebones comes to eat her share and curls up against my neck, rumbling softly with contentment.

I find a comfortable tree to rest against at the edge of the clearing, still close enough to feel the heat from the fire and keep my distance. I’m almost certain it’s safer that way… for both of us.

I must have slept, but I don’t remember deciding to. One moment, I am staring into the fire, watching the embers pulse and shift like a beating heart. The next, darkness.

But it is not the darkness that normally blankets the world and soothes things to sleep. My instincts are screaming at me that something is wrong.

That’s the first coherent thought that comes to me, but I don’t know if I’m dreaming or not. It is dark—that much is clear. It’s too dark without starlight or the cold moon glinting on the freshly fallen snow. The air doesn’t carry the familiar chill of a snowy eve, rather, it feels too warm and thick and close, like I’ve been buried. I desperately try to move, but my body doesn’t seem to want to listen.

Then comes the scent—rot. But it isn’t my rot. It isn’t the comforting fragrance of damp earth and the soft, mineral aroma of mushrooms or even the sour punch of mold. It is the smell of rotting bodies and the peculiar pungent things that only grow on human and fae flesh, and it is wrong.

Again, I try to move, but my limbs are so heavy and sluggish that it’s almost like I’m sinking into something soft and yielding beneath me. The ground—gods, is this the ground? Why does it feel like flesh?—gives way under my weight.

I try to call out to Nibblebones, and then to Renard, but nothing happens. My tongue feels too thick and weighty, slicking the backs of my teeth that have become more numerous and much sharper than I remember. The unease starts to give way to panic and I hear it then… a whisper curling through the dark.

Vireth. Blight Mother.

My name, spoken in a voice that is not a voice at all. It’s a chorus of them—a thousand mouths whispering in unison. I open my mouth to answer, but a bitter taste coats my tongue and something spills out—black spores, drifting upward like ash.

“No,” I rasp.

The darkness parts, giving way to a soft gray mist and I see them. Roots. Endless roots, twisting and writhing, threading through bones. Through disembodied rib cages. Through the cracked teeth and hollow eye sockets of skulls that turn toward me as one.

This is the deathly chorus that has been calling my name. These dead ones are hungry, and they are waiting for something that feels both incredibly important and terrifyingly inevitable.

Something presses against my brow—a heavy, jagged, and painful thing that I realize belatedly is a twisted crown made from these dead ones’ bones. I reach up to try and rip it off—no no no, please, I don’t want this—but I feel it sink into my skin, burrowing, taking root beneath my hair, ripping through my scalp.

Pain explodes behind my eyes and I wake with a scream clawing its way up my throat.

The bitterly cold air rushes in, sharp and biting, yanking me from the nightmares that have been getting too terrible and so real, I would swear they weren’t dreams at all. The fire has burned low, little more than embers now, and the clearing lies in uneasy half-light.

My head—gods. It feels like it is splitting apart. I clutch at it instinctively, fingers tangling in my hair… and freeze. Something alien, something foreign, meets my fingertips. Bringing a hand forward into what little light there is, what I find pulls bile up from my gut. Pale shapes tremble between my fingers—small, rubbery, and soft. Mushrooms. Growing from me. Not from my powers, but from me. On me. As if I am rotting from the outside in.