Witch, Wolf, Woods

CHAPTER 34: INSIDE THE FOREST

As they journeyed deeper into the forest, Wolf did his best to recall the names of things they passed, from flowers to fungi to different birds calling out overhead, watching curiously from the safety of the tallest trees.

"This had to be the most incredible place to grow up!" exclaimed Katja as she made her way over a stream, stepping from one wide, smooth stone to another. Wolf simply splashed through the water, shaking the wetness from his fur when he reached the other side.

"It was," he agreed. "It feels different now, but I suppose that's to be expected after being gone so long."

"I think it's only natural it would feel different," agreed Katja. She ran her fingers over her mother's ring before looking at the trees around her. "I wish it was possible to know if my mother ever came this way."

She tried to imagine the painting of her mother coming to life and moving through the woods, ducking under low-hanging boughs and stepping over rotting logs, cooling her feet in a stream or sitting in a clearing with her face tilted towards the sun, enjoying the peacefulness of the secluded world, as different from the contained bustle of the Hexen castle as could be imagined.

Katja continued to study the flora and fauna as they walked, wishing she had any skill in drawing so she could preserve the strange things she saw. At least on paper, they would be protected from the inevitable effects of passing time rubbing against established memories, sanding them down until they were too far gone to be recalled.

Stopping before a sprawling cluster of red and blue mushrooms, Katja bent down and pressed a finger against one, noting what appeared to be faint black lines peeking through the otherwise vibrant colors.

Concentrating on the mushroom, Katja was surprised at the weakness of its song—it took a long time for the fungus to respond to her presence, and when it did, it acted as if it was waking from a very deep sleep, each note unfolding slowly and uncertainly, as if it was vaguely aware of how it ought to be responding but found doing so incredibly difficult.

Katja listened to the start-stop melody, then, as she'd done with the vine before, she attempted to infuse the organism with health. The mushroom responded sluggishly, making her frown, and it took a great deal of effort on her part to establish enough of a connection to send her magic into the tiny growth.

Most likely it was merely an isolated incident, but it continued to bother Katja long after they'd left the mushroom behind.

A while later, she stopped beneath the shade of a beech tree, catching her breath before taking a long drink from her canteen. Reaching out to touch the tree, she was surprised to see the same black veins she'd noticed on the mushroom streaking across the bark.

Moving to where she could inspect the leaves, Katja saw that the ones with the greatest amount of black on them were a noticeably lighter shade of green, far less vivid, as if the black lines were somehow leeching the color right out of the foliage.

Katja quickly wrapped a hand around a branch, introducing herself and listening to the tree's response. The beech was difficult to understand, as it kept making a sound that might have been a rasping cough, and that's when it struck Katja.

"I think this tree is sick," she said, prompting Wolf to trot over and sniff around the base, stepping over twisting roots and upturned rocks. "Of course, I could be wrong, since I only just learned I can communicate with the forest, but it sounds different from the trees closer to the edge of the woods."

She touched the tree's trunk again, and the tip of Wolf's nose twitched.

"Something's definitely wrong," he agreed. "It smells familiar, but I can't quite place it. It's like a different version of something I've smelled before, but I can't remember what."