Jade Fern Grove 976-EVIL

this was not the right direction.

so why

did he keep going?

madly, he thinks he’ll find her here; the madwoman who’d taken his nephew.

his dark tail lashes behind him as he ambles through the grove.

he swipes his tongue over his nose. his saliva, sticky.

beneath his fur his skin burns hot.

She planned to limit her time in Swiftcurrent Creek, if she stayed at all. She didn't want to risk bringing the sickness to her father's pack. Hell, even if she managed not to pass it on, she really didn't want them to witness her inevitable descent into madness.

Lilitu stayed close, but at length. Which was why she was here, nearly running into one of the young men involved in the skirmish on the mountain, looking a bit agitated as he traveled through the ferns.

Did you find them? she asked without preamble, heart hammering fast at the surprise of finding him here. Are the kids safe?

clueless to what tragedy burgeoned on the isle, dinah ranged ahead.
she would go back for judah, yes, she had made a promise; but simultaneously she yearned to leave, and something inside her bones told her something horrible would happen if she did not.
this was the closest she had come to rivenwood in months. she debates a visit, telling mama who she'd found, but she — hesitates.
and then there is the thud of footsteps that dashes away any possibility of such a thing.
she would know that sound and that scent anywhere.
mulherin?