She tore off Sy’s gloves and stuffed them into her pocket. Digging her fingers into the slick bark, she hauled herself onto the side of the tree, gripping a low branch as swiftly and stealthily as her size would allow. Her boots scraped against the bark, shredding it as she pulled herself higher.
“I don’t know the spell,” Sy said through clenched teeth. “I told you. I only have guesses. I need to research, to test it.”
The knife dug deeper, and he suppressed a cry. She nearly lost her grip. The tacky, dewy slime on her palms helped keep her steady, but it wasn’t enough; she was too heavy. As she tried to right herself, a branch shook, showering needles and dropping a pinecone. She ducked behind the trunk, making herself as small as she could. Her fingernails dug into the bark. Small needles of wood sliced beneath her nail beds.
Sy saw her.
She paused, then placed a single finger over her lips.
Then she kept climbing.
He turned back to Aquila. “The forest’s magic is influencing us. All of us. Surely you’ve noticed.”
Aquila turned the scalded half of his face toward Sy. “I’ve noticed.”
“That isn’t – what I mean to say is, the magic here is volatile. Unpredictable. If we don’t test the spell, it may backfire in ways we can’t countenance. Profoundly unnerving ways.”
“We’ll test it on you first, then,” said Claude, slinging his pistol around carelessly, as if wielding a folding fan and not a loaded weapon. Anya gritted her teeth as she climbed.
She reached a sturdy branch, high enough she wouldn’t be immediately seen, low enough she still had dead aim.
But she only had four arrows; only three she could use. She couldn’t waste an arrow and she couldn’t risk shooting Aquila while he stood so close to Sy; not with her vision obscured by the pine’s curtaining needles.
She needed him to move. She needed to stop him before he hurt Sy again, or decided hurting him, and thus keeping him alive, was more trouble than it was worth.
Below her, shimmering indigo globules swayed in the breeze.
Liar’s pigeon was toxic, but not deadly. It caused a state akin to inebriation, clouding judgment and coordination. It also had the uncanny effect of making lying impossible. More than one jealous lover had risked the Lichtenwald to sprinkle a bit of the spore in their beloved’s tea. Once, someone at the lodge had brought a bottle of captured spore. They’d divvied it up in half the lodgers’ beer, not revealing whose beer was spiked and whose wasn’t, and played a fraught game of liar’s dice. The night had ended in more than one fist fight.
Now, the breeze tickled her face. Letting it guide her, she pinpointed a fruiting liar’s pigeon just upwind of the camp. The way the wind blew, the spores would hit all of them, including her and Sy. A price she must pay. Edging forward, she perched precariously on the branch. One strong gust, and she’d be meat on the forest floor. Moving slowly, she reached over her shoulder and felt the ends of her arrows, withdrawing one, nocking it. But something nagged her, tugged at her gut.
The wind, she realized. The wind was blowing from the east.
Just my luck, she thought with a satisfied smile.
She loosed her arrow.
The fungus exploded into thousands of indigo spores.
“What was that?” Aquila said, turning toward her target. The wind picked up, and the gust lifted the sparkling spores. They swept over the camp in a swathe, straight into all their faces, up their noses, into their lungs.
Clutching the branch for dear life, Anya braced for the spore’s effect.
It didn’t come.
“And why would it?” she muttered, pulling her hat lower and aiming her next arrow. “You’re not fucking human, are you?”
Aquila turned on Claude, who was rubbing his nose as if to suppress a sneeze. “What have you done now?”
“I’ve done nothing,” Claude protested petulantly.
Anya couldn’t stop her triumphant grin. It was working. She glanced at Sy – he was frowning, as if trying to work out a difficult math problem.
“Everysinglething that has gone wrong on this expedition has been due to your ineptitude,” Aquila said, waving his knife at Claude. “I’m astounded Sangfeder let you leave its doors with your bones still intact.”
“I may have cheated the final exam a bit,” Claude relented. “But I am good. The king calls me to fix up his girls how he likes them. There’s proof.”
“You,” she heard Sy say, his voice bleak as winter. “Claude.”
