He ran all the way to the river.
He skidded in the mud by the river’s bank.
He stared out over the rushing water, panting.
He wished he could dive in, let it carry him away.
It was spring, and the waterline sat high on the banks, high enough to spill over and be a little scary. It had been raining a lot. Water fed the stream from both fields, and turned it into a rushing, tumbling torrent in this part of the forest grounds. He stopped long enough to watch the creatures that teamed in the blue water: water fae, knucker dragons, sprites, glowing fish that flashed different colors as they darted through the rough currents, turtles, frogs.
He took a breath, then picked his way to the higher part of the path.
He soon ran along the muddy trail, still choosing his footing carefully where it curved alongside the shore, leaping over or walking carefully around the muddiest parts where it ran too near the banks, or dipped low enough to capture part of the stream. He stared down at the ridge of mud he’d already collected around the soles of his shoes. He’d need to clean everything thoroughly before his father came home.
But that was for later.
He came to an abrupt stop as he reached the dead English oak.
He saw the dark hole of the nearest large burrow between the roots and grinned.
He dug into his pocket, pulled out a scratched gold pocket watch he’d found in one of the drawers of one of the many rooms in the Black Tower no one ever went inside. It had a bird onthe case, a hummingbird according to the colorful books in the Bones family library.
He dangled it from the gold chain, and whistled.
A bare pause, a rustle in the wet ground.
A dark, wet nose poked out of the muddy hole.
It sniffed.
Caelum’s grin widened.
“Come on,” he called out in his loud, proud, six-year-old’s impatient voice. “I brought it for you. Do you want it, or not?”
The nose ventured out further. Red, glowing eyes soon followed, peering up at him. The black nose sniffed again, followed by tufted ears that swiveled forward, listening.
“Don’t be a coward!” Caelum admonished. “You already took two of my buttons, last I was here. And my sandwich. And my shoe, which you promptly set on fire and chewed to ribbons. This one I actuallybroughtfor you. Or do you only like it when you steal?”
The soft, black-furred head emerged all the way.
It continued to sniff the air as it hunkered down, walking low over the mud and grass towards him. Its fiery tail emerged last. The blue and green, licking and coiling flames somehow never burned the black fur of the creature itself, even as it made leaves and grass-tips smolder and scorch as it passed. Most of the area around its burrow had already been burned free of everything but mud and ash.
Caelum stood still, waiting, dangling the gold watch on its chain.
He grinned when the little black fox walked right up to him.
She took the gold object carefully, almost daintily, out of Caelum’s fingers with her sharp teeth. Then, without a pause, she turned and darted back into the dark hole.
Caelum waited, arms folded.
Seconds later, the creature reemerged, and now it had an unmistakable smile on its canine jaws. It walked towards him again, wagging its tail, still low to the ground.
The fox didn’t flinch when it got close enough for Caelum to bend down and stroke its achingly soft head and nose. After Caelum rubbed her ears for a few seconds, she made little yelping, chattering, yipping noises. Then she rolled over on her back, plaintively wagging her fiery tail as she begged for belly scratches.
Caelum crouched down next to her, careful not to get too close to the burning tail as he rubbed the creature’s belly and chest and tugged her black paws and ears.
“Why do you like gold so much?” Caelum mused softly. “What do you do with it? Just fill your dirt hole so you can admire it all when no one’s around?”
The fox writhed closer until she was nearly in his lap and Caelum fell onto his knees, still stroking her soft fur. She extinguished her tail entirely then, and crawled right up into his arms so that Caelum could cradle her against his chest. The fur of the tail was still hot, but it hadn’t burned him yet, not once in any of the times he’d visited her here.
