Flynne

I wasn’t expecting to run into anyone today—especially not a girl from Moonflower Valley. I was making my usual rounds and decided to pop by the Valley borders, see the sights and all that, when a perfectly oblivious-looking girl came skipping through the forest, stopping to smell the flowers and feel the sun on her face. And even then, I promised myself I wouldn’t approach her—for my own safety. But of course she had to stop for a poisonous snack while I was watching.

    And if I didn’t offer to help when I knew I had the antidote with me, what kind of a person would I be?

    Stupid, stupid, stupid, I scold myself, looking back towards the Valley even though I’m way too far away to see anything. I should have run out of the bushes like a rabid animal instead, to scare her off. That would’ve done the trick; most people from that kingdom are deathly terrified of foxes anyway.

    I wince and slow to a stop, sitting firmly down on the mossy ground and letting out a groan. Of course they would be—we killed their princess. And their king. Well, I guess ‘we’ is the wrong term. It was a few people from East Ridge, really. “What do I do?” I ask the trees, and of course their breezy response is very helpful. I need to talk to someone who can actually talk back to me, and who won’t completely freak out about me being so close to an unfriendly kingdom. Someone who knows more about the Eastern Invasion than anyone, and who may or may not be a sweet-talking thief on weekends. A few someones, really.

    In other words, I need to talk to the Larkspurs.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ───

January 15, 1919

Flynne (four years ago)

    I’m cold. Freezing. And bored. Very, very, very bored.

    It’s late winter, and I’m tending Mom’s stall while she’s out buying soaps, herbs, essential oils, and other ‘Mom Stuff’. She left me in charge, and at first I was excited! She trusts that me, Flynne, her nine-year-old daughter can take care of important things! But she’s been gone for ages and I’ve only had, like, six customers.

    Only

    Six

    Customers.

    I rest my chin on my fists, sighing and looking around. My mom told me not to look bored because I’d scare away potential customers, but how can I help it? I am bored.

    Other stalls have customers, like that juice bar to my right and the doughnut stall to my left. Hey! I should get a doughnut.

    I bend down to grab the closed sign from beneath the table and see a perfectly golden-brown bread bun roll my way and bump my fingers.

    I poke my head above the table to see where it came from. The stall across from mine is selling a modest assortment of breads and has a single customer; a banged, black-haired teenage boy who’s talking to the girl in charge. I roll my eyes. Teenagers. I’m about to duck under the table again when I notice that the boy is stealing bread from her, and slipping them into his satchel!

    Absolutely unacceptable.

    Forgetting the donuts, I march right up to the table and open my mouth to tell the girl what he’s doing, but then they notice me and she speaks up first.

    “Hi sweetie! How can I help you?” she wonders, doing that thing that I absolutely hate and talking to me like I’m a baby. Seriously, woman? I’m nine. I’m practically an adult. She starts listing off the different breads that she has, like a true salesperson. “I have rye, sourdough, sweet buns—oh.” She cocks her head at the table. “I don’t have any left. That’s weird, I haven’t sold that many today….” She bends under the table to look for reserves, I guess, and I take that opportunity to talk to the thief.

    “You’d better put those back,” I whisper to him. “Or else I’ll tell that girl.”

    He sighs and shakes his head, then bends down to my height even though he doesn’t have to because he’s only like, thirteen inches taller than me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, kid.”

    “You’re a liar.”

    “It’s called a hustle, sweetheart. And I’m not the liar—he is.” The boy points in the opposite direction and I turn to look. There’s no one there. I’m about to tell him as much, but he’s gone, nothing but a swishing tail left in his wake. If he thinks he can get away, he’s got something else coming to him. I drop to All-Fours and prepare to run.

    “I knew I had some!” The hapless vendor girl comes up with a satisfied smile on her face. She places a basket of bread on the table. “So, this is the—oh. Where’d they go?”

    I’ll tell you where we went—into the Black Forest unsupervised as I chase the thief.

    I love to run. Running gives me more joy than anything else. When I run, I feel free, like I’m on my own, yet a part of the wind, if that makes any sense.

    And when I run with a purpose, I feel like I can run forever.

    The thief must feel like this too, because it feels like we do run forever, and in many loops and turns until it seems like he’s trying to shake me.

    I slow down, out of breath, and realize…

    He’s gone.

    A cramp forms in my stomach, but I try to ignore it. I have to find him. There is NO WAY I’m letting him get away with stealing.

    “A little help here?” I ask the trees, panting. A warm breeze tickles me from behind, rustling the leaves to my left. I tilt my head at it. “Are you absolutely sure?”

    Tiny lights—whispersprites—pop up, illuminating the forest floor in the same direction that the wind was pointing. “I’ll take your word for it,” I say, before galloping through the forest, following the mischievous golden sprites.

    I move swiftly through the trees and under hedges until I give myself a rest and discover that I have absolutely no idea where I am. And to make matters worse, it’s almost dark, I’m starving, and I have running cramps. Oh, and those whispersprites that were leading me through the forest for an hour? Gone. All of them. That’s the last time I ever trust anything shiny.

    I stand Up and clutch my side, trying to get a better perspective. “Uh, hello?” I say uneasily, my voice quavering like a much smaller child than nine years. “Is anybody there?”

    No response.

    I shiver; a bitter wind blows and settles into my skin. I’ll freeze to death if I stay out in the winter evening any longer, so I pick a direction and hope it’s south.

    It’s not. I realize this a few minutes later when the sun’s last weak rays shine behind me. I’ve been going east.

    “Mr. Thief!” I shout, cupping my hands around my mouth. “Hello? Are you out there? I need help. I can’t find my way home!” Unwillingly, my eyes water. “No, Flynne. No crying,” I tell myself sternly. “You got yourself into this mess. You can get yourself out.” I think for a moment, wiping at my eyes. “If I’m going east, then that’s west… and that way is north… then that means this way is… south!” I turn to my right and pump my fist in the air. “Yes! Never mind, Mr. Thief! Enjoy your bread! Goodbye!”

    I walk forward, delighted with myself for figuring out which way is home. I hear running and look over to my left. I can smell the bread coming closer—that means Thief is coming back!

    I suddenly don’t want to see him, so I run.

    Or at least, I try to. I take one step forward and something tightens around my ankle and pulls me up, and then I’m upside-down.

    “Ow!” The pain stuns me into a dizzy haze. My ankle feels like it’s been pulled out of place and it throbs with pain. For a moment, I simply hang there, my head seven inches above the floor, dazed.

    The boy I chased emerges from the bushes, his little brown satchel still stuffed with bread. He says an extremely naughty word when he sees me hanging upside down like a bat. He pulls out a knife as he steps towards me and my eyes widen.

    “Don’t be afraid, kid. I’m just going to cut the rope,” he tells me, and begins to saw through the coarse fibers.

    The pain in my ankle is all I can properly focus on, so I’m relieved that he doesn’t want to hurt me. I mean, normally I could take him, but not while I’m upside down, because, well, you know. He’d have an unfair advantage.

    He grabs my arm, pulls me towards him, finishes cutting the rope, and then he swings me over his shoulder.

    “Ach! Put me down!” I scramble, my legs searching for purchase before kicking quite hard in an area that should never be kicked (with my good foot, of course) and he doubles over, putting me down carefully on the ground. I make the mistake of standing on both feet, and the pain that shoots through my right ankle is crippling. I wince and lean back on the tree that someone tied the rope to and slide off my boot, turning my leg to observe my ankle. My skin is all puffy, and shades of violet, green, and blue mesh together to create a nauseating painting of pain. I focus on the boy in an attempt to block out the sensation.

    “It’s so purple,” I wince. “Why?”

    “You sprained it,” the boy says through gritted teeth, still recovering from my kick. He takes a step over to me and kneels down to inspect my ankle. “Does this hurt?” He gently taps my skin where it’s a blueish purple.

    “Not really, no.”

    “What about—”

    “Yes—don’t do that!” I plead, and he releases my foot. My tolerance for pain is nonexistent. (I should work on that.)

    “This is wonderful,” he groans, pinching the bridge of his nose. He stands and turns around, thinking. When he looks back at me, he says, “What’s your name?”

    “I’m Flynne, the one and only.”

    “Hey Flynne, I’m Shadowpaw. Shadowpaw Larkspur. Right now we’re about four miles away from the South Pack—”

    “Four miles?” I repeat, half impressed that I can run that far, and half furious that I did.

    “Yeah. Sorry about that. I can either help you back now, or we can go to my house, my sisters can wrap up that ankle of yours, and I’ll take you back then. What’ll it be, kid?”

    “Don’t call me that.” I consider it. “Well, will I be able to walk after they treat me?” I wonder.

    “Err… probably? And my house is on the way, actually.” He sees my furious expression and then hastily adds, “Definitely. I meant definitely.”

    “Then yes. As long as you don’t try anything funny, Larkspur.”

    “I wouldn’t dream of it, kid. You pack one heck of a kick.”

    “Ahh, don’t call me that.”

    He fashions me a crutch out of a fallen branch and some rope, and keeps me distracted by talking.

    He says he has younger sisters who he thinks will like me because I’m funny. He thinks I’m funny! Which is actually kind of weird because nothing I said was a joke…

    At last, Shadowpaw declares we’re ‘home’, even though there’s no house in sight.

    He leads me through a thick wall of ivy into a dark passage where he insists on carrying me because he doesn’t want me to slip and get hurt again. (I resist kicking him this time.) When we step through on the other side, I take note of the big, grassy ocean of hills and the burbling sound of a nearby river. A trail of flagstones leads up to a circular wooden door in the biggest hill. Shadowpaw sets me down and helps me to the door, which he opens with a great flourish.

    He shivers and rubs his arms as we walk inside. “You can sit there,” he points to two plush, worn couches in the middle of a large, cozy, living room.

    I swing expertly on my make-shift crutches and sit on the one nearest to me—and I only trip twice. (That’s progress!) I reach for an orange wool blanket and wrap myself in it, sighing a quiet sigh of relief as feeling returns to my fingertips.

    “Anybody home?” Shadowpaw shouts, kicking off his shoes and putting them against the wall.

    I look around the house curiously. The living room has two couches, each a burnt orange color. A soft, lush, emerald green moss carpet lays beneath my feet, and an empty fireplace sits across from me. A large pile of logged hickory wood lays beside the brick studded fireplace, and family pictures stand on the mantle. There’s a box labeled ‘fire starters’ beside it.

    “Why’s the fire out?” Shadowpaw mutters, piling logs into the ashy hearth.

    He struggles audibly while trying to get the fire to catch, and I study the pictures on the mantle. “Are those your parents?” I wonder, nodding to a wedding picture even though his back is to me.

    Shadowpaw is quiet for a short while, intent on starting the fire. “Yeah. Beautiful, aren’t they?”

    I nod. “And you look just like your dad.”

    The logs finally catch, at once giving the frigid winter night air warmth and a hint of hickory. Shadowpaw rises with a sharp intake of breath and looks around the room, not meeting my eyes.

    A loud thud makes me jump, and I turn towards the sound. The frosted glass window on the door is covered by a dark shadow, and another thud sounds out, followed closely by an animalistic groan.

    “What is that?” I hiss, my eyes wide. “It sounds like a wild animal!”

    “That’s because it is,” Shadowpaw says. “Or, in other, less accurate, words: my little brother.”