Her smile was a mile-wide. “Did you expect anything different?”
Snorting, he shook his head. “I think I’m beginning to understand you, creature.”
“Good or bad?” Teasing laughter glinted in the depths of her inky eyes.
“Not sure yet.”
His stomach choose that moment to growl. He’d not had a chance to eat this morning, and now with his pack gone, the odds of eating soon grew more slim.
She trotted ahead of him a ways, before stopping roughly twenty yards up. “Here is a licorice bush. If you’re hungry.”
It was obvious she knew he was, but he shook his head. “I’m not a fan of licorice.”
“Well then you’re in luck, because it’s not really licorice at all. It’s a doppleganger bush.”
Yet again something he had no idea what it was. “And that is?” he asked once he neared her.
“Anything you want it to be. The bush assumes a form that will keep it safe from predators. Licorice is most reviled in Wonderland, the only one I ever see actively farming it is Alice, and even she wears gloves and a mask when she does it.”
He peered at the long sticks of black rubbery tubes. It looked and smelled just like licorice to him. He curled his nose. “And how can you tell it’s not actually licorice?”
“Because I’m very suited to seeing black. My eyes you see.” She blinked. “Black isn’t just black to me, there are so many different variations of it. Smoky, light, inky, shadowy, brilliant… I can see all variants of it. But when I stare at this,” she turned her furry head and playfully flicked it with her paw, “it is the red berry of the doppleganger. It is rather exceptional camouflage when you think about it, there are few beings such as myself.”
Then a rumbling purr tore from her throat and she rubbed her face against the stick with a look of lustful delight.
“Does it not smell to you?” he asked.
“Once you see through its deception it becomes whatever you want it to be.”
“Let me guess, cat nip?”
She chortled. “I told you, man, I’m no cat. No, this is grilled steak.” She then proceeded to take a big bite of the stick, swallowing it in less than three semi-chews.
Lissa peered at him. “Won’t you eat too?”
“No.” He backed away from the bush because the noxious, sickly sweet odor of licorice was being replaced by the yeasty whiff of buttery sweet bread. “No eating in Wonderland. I’ll wait.”
She sighed. “Afraid you’ll be poisoned, Hunter?”
“Something like that. Come on, let’s go. I’d rather be off this bridge before nightfall.”
“Whatever you say, killer.”
He definitely detected a note of sarcasm in her words, but didn’t get a chance to ask why, before she was off and trotting again. Keeping well ahead of him so as to make natural conversation impossible.
The silence between them was absolute for the next hour. The sun’s rays cast shadows upon the forest floor that grew longer and wider as the day pressed on.
Aeric slapped at his neck as a swarm of sweat gnats engulfed his face and neck. The buzzing shiver made his skin wet with sweat. But he couldn’t help his grin when the rolling ball of black bugs bounced against the fiery bridge, incinerating it on contact.
It was odd, the fire harmed neither them nor the forest itself, but anything else was fair game. Twice he’d spied regular forest rabbits pause and sniff with their noses up in the air before immediately hopping rapidly away.
A dangling spider had also just managed to avoid the ravenous blue flame when it spun free of its web to ensnare a passing flutterby.
He paused, aware of a noise growing off in the distance. It was low at first. Just a vibrating hum of random noise. But the more he walked, the louder the buzzing grew.
Until finally it poured from the sky like the roll of thunder. Clamping his hands to his ears, he looked at Lissa.
She nodded and mouthed, “We’re here.”
Siria sat on her rose pink duvet by the roaring crackling flame of a midnight fire. She hated the night. With everything in her. At one time, she’d loved it. Him.
Adored all that the night implied.
Secret trysts, forbidden lust, danger…
At one time it’d made her heart speed. But not now, not since the night of Jericho’s betrayal. Oh, she could be a typical woman and blame the hardening of his heart solely on Calanthe, but she refused to live her life as a fool. She and Jericho had been having problems for a while, she’d known it, she’d seen it. However, unlike him, she’d always held out hope that they could fix things.
Calanthe had never been anything but a thorn in Siria’s flesh, Jericho had held the key to Siria’s heart. His perfidy had changed her in ways even she’d not known herself capable of.