Behind me, Twobble stumbled to a stop in the road, panting.
“I regret everything,” he wheezed.
Skonk jogged up beside him, still chewing.
“Did we catch it?” Skonk asked, looking around.
Twobble pointed up at me.
The broom slowed and hovered.
Right where the shadowy figure had stood earlier.
I slid off and landed lightly on the road.
The woods were quiet.
Too quiet.
The kind of quiet that listened back.
Behind me, Twobble bent over with his hands on his knees.
“I told you,” he gasped, “we should install brakes on that thing.”
My broom gave a smug little wiggle beside me as if it had delivered me exactly where I needed to be.
But what concerned me was I wasn’t sure which side it was on.
“Oh,” I muttered.
Twobble’s hands went to his hips. “Well, that’s reassuring. Oh? That’s all we get?”
The three of us stood at the edge of the road for a moment, looking into the trees where I’d thought I saw the figure.
The wind moved through the branches with a soft rustle overhead, but the woods themselves stayed silent.
Twobble finally straightened, puffing out a breath. He brushed powdered sugar off the front of his vest with great seriousness.
“Well,” he said, squinting into the trees. “That’s comforting.”
Skonk finished the last bite of his croissant and licked a crumb from his thumb.
“What exactly are we looking for again?”
“A mysterious person lurking in the woods,” Twobble snapped.
Skonk nodded thoughtfully. “Could’ve been a tall mushroom.”
Twobble slowly turned his head toward me.
“You see what I deal with?” he asked.
I stepped closer to the tree line. My broom floated along beside me, drifting like it was very pleased with itself.
“It wasn’t a mushroom,” I said.
Skonk scratched his chin. “How confident are we on that?”
