Now, she could see it—the Twisted Wood. It lay directly ahead of them, its outer ring of trees as tall as the castle towers. Their spindly branches clutched hungrily at the sky. The trees leaned and moaned together, their limbs shifting ever so slightly, even though there was no breeze. Dinah looked in wonder at the Wood, though Morte showed no signs of stopping. She held on. What else could she do as they sped closer and closer to the tree line? Though the trees were gigantic, the Wood had been farther away than it looked, and Dinah’s legs were cramped, her thighs bleeding by the time they made the edge of the trees. Her throat was parched—water seemed like an enticing dream.
The sun began to set in the East as they neared the border. It had been a day and half a night since Dinah had been shaken awake by the stranger. Morte was finally showing signs of exhaustion as violent spasms began to surge up and down his neck and a violet-tinted foam dripped from his lips. The trees, taller than anything Dinah had ever seen, taller than the Black Towers, lay directly ahead, their ghoulish arms blocking out most of the waning light. Something in the trees gave a shimmer, so Dinah didn’t see Morte’s hoof land in a small hole, plummeting him forward.
The air took them quickly, and both were thrown violently toward a muddy creek bank. Dinah’s body flew up and over Morte’s as his rolled like thunder beneath her. Dinah landed on her side, the bag cushioning her fall. She rolled with a thud against an overturned tree, her head slamming into the withered trunk. Something in her hand snapped like it was a thin tree branch, and a blinding pain shot up her arm.
She tried to raise her head but it was no use. She couldn’t think, she couldn’t move. Dirty water flowed into her open mouth as she struggled to stay awake. Her final thoughts were of Charles’s eyes as he poked his tousled head out from behind a staircase, brilliant blue and a soft green.
“My Dinah.”
He had touched her hand lightly.
She closed her eyes and surrendered to the black, a queen no longer.
Chapter Fourteen
Dinah dreamt of drowning. She was twisting and floating, only this time instead of the inky substance of glossy mirrors, she was actually inhaling water. The sea itself was flowing into her mouth and lungs. Wriggling fish nested on her tongue, minnows picked at her teeth. An eel, checkered white and black, slithered over her body, wrapping itself around her torso, her chest. Seaweed clung to her ankles as she struggled to move, and she felt a growing panic that she would never reach the surface.
Out from the black water swam something shadowy, something huge and terrifying. Dinah blinked her eyes, crusted over now with bits of coral and sand. A shimmering white fish glided toward her. Its scales rippled in the sunlight, blinding her with its beauty. It opened its mouth and Dinah saw row after row of razor-sharp teeth. The fish was wearing a hat. She opened her mouth to scream and all the water rushed in.
Dinah opened her eyes with a start. Was she drowning? Was she dying? There was water in her mouth, real water. She sputtered and choked. To her relief, the water was from a small stream, barely a trickle over a ground covered with mud and dying plants. Dinah turned her head and spat, gagging on a piece of grass that was stuck to her cheek. Hands shaking, she pushed herself up, only to have a stabbing pain race through her fingers. She looked down. Two of her fingers were swollen and distorted, both twisted in unnatural directions. She couldn’t bend them, and touching them lightly caused her to cry out in pain. Still sputtering, Dinah sat back down and stared down at her fingers. Take a breath. You have to think.
After staring for a few moments, she reached down and yanked two thick blades of grass up from the stream bed and wound her injured fingers together. Dinah let out a scream when she cinched the knot; it felt like needles being shoved under her nails. Breathless, she lay down facing the stream where she could see her filthy reflection. Frantically, she wiped the crusted blood off her face, which was scratched from temple to chin. The muddy waters of the creek still tasted foul on her tongue. She spat again and rolled over before letting out a shrill scream. Black hooves covered with thick bone spikes dug in inches from her face. Blood stains spotted the spikes—some fresh and dripping, some old. From this close, she could see that the bones were jagged, cut like a carving knife. This made them even more deadly than a smooth blade when pushed into the sides of a man’s head.