“Forgive me, but we must make haste,” he said over my shriek while bounding away. “The magical infection has spread to the trees, and we are all in danger of being bushwhacked.”
I stopped beating him with my shoe long enough to look back at where I’d stood. The knots in the trees trunks made a pattern in the bark, like faces. Angry ones. And the branches, having lost their broomstick-flying prey from the sky, silently bent low and reached out for what was on the ground. Clawlike twigs and branches flexed hungrily, making the Bumpkins seem like cheery woodland sprites.
“Move!” I yelled.
Kato was already roaring and chasing after me, though at my holler, he looked behind him. Then he ran faster.
Rexi stayed put with her arms folded. “I’m done rescuing dimwits in distress.”
Why do I even bother? I thought to myself.
Out loud, I yelled, “You’re about to get a splinter the size of a broadsword, SO DUCK!”
For once, she obeyed without arguing and barely missed being skewered. “AHHH! Why didn’t you warn me sooner?” She scrambled away from a slashing branch.
The four of us sprinted through the forest—well, technically three, since I was a reduced to bouncing cargo. My ride was fast, much faster than my companions, who trailed farther and farther behind. With nothing else to do, I could only watch helplessly as the trees pulled up their roots and closed in around them.
Kato tried to hit an oncoming branch attack with his tail, but these trees were not the withered ones from Midas. The ironwood sprouted metal thorns that ripped through Kato’s dragon-hide tail. He howled at the same time Rexi screamed after barely avoiding an impossibly fast acorn bullet.
I buried my face in the gorilla’s fur. It was bad enough to watch them get hurt knowing I could do nothing—it was soul rending to watch and know the cause of the “magical infection.”
I wish—no. I’d never wish again. Instead, I offered a broken prayer in the hopes that the Storymakers or the powers of magic itself would hear my plea. Someone…please help them.
Something sliced up the top of my calf. I inhaled sharply from pain. The fur I’d buried my nose in smelled like animal musk, sandalwood, and roses. The wind picked up harshly and brought the scent of burning wood with it.
Crackling and popping sounds came from overhead. I looked up, half-afraid of what I might find. A smoking twig claw retreated backward, the tree it belonged to stood tall again instead of stooping low to attack. Normally, I’d freak with anything associated with fire, but it was working in our favor this time.
The rest of the trees stopped advancing as well and formed a semicircle border behind us. Once they had re-rooted themselves to the ground, they froze in place.
“What are they doing?” I muttered to myself.
The gorilla answered, “It would seem you are not very tasty. And they are most likely petrified, since a Maker’s workshop chose to appear in their forest.”
“Huh?” Confused, I twisted my back to look where we were going instead of where we’d been. At the same time, the gorilla stopped running and let go of me. I fell to the ground and landed nose to nose with some sort of worm. It had a green body the size of my fist, a salt-and-pepper mustache, and wore large, round spectacles. He blinked at me and, seemingly unimpressed with what he saw, inched back to a tower of books stacked by half of a stone building. If this was the workshop that supposedly “appeared,” the other half didn’t make the trip.
“Why are we stopping? I thought stopping equaled dying,” Rexi huffed. She and Kato staggered into the magical clearing, out of breath. “Hey, was this thing here a minute ago?”
“‘Chose to appear.’ That’s what…” I realized I didn’t know the ape’s name. There hadn’t been time for introductions. Would I have bothered to ask even if there had been time? How long has Rexi worked as the kitchen girl and I just learned her name yesterday?
“What’s your name?” I whispered, so Rexi wouldn’t hear and say something to embarrass me further.
“Nikko,” he answered just as quietly before righting the fez atop his head again and peering up at me gratefully.
“‘Chose to appear’ is what Nikko said.”
“Every wizard has a workshop,” he clarified. “The more powerful the wizard, the more magical the workshop. And a Maker bends magic and fate at will, so it’s not surprising that their workshops can too. Although this one does seem to be in a state of disrepair.”
“Understatement,” Rexi grumbled under her breath.
Bookshelves lined the two and a half walls, and the layer of dust was every bit as thick as the books it covered. Still, the workshop was proof a Maker had heard my prayer.