The next hour passed quickly, I was informed that Nadine and Gear had painted the bus to look like an assisted living facility bus. I’m not sure how this would pass if all of us in our early twenties got off the bus together, but they seemed to only be concerned with driving around and attracting attention as the big yellow school bus with no kids on it. The windows had all been tinted to nearly black as well. If the druids were looking for a big yellow bus, they wouldn’t find it.
“What about the plates?” I asked Nadine while my feet remained in their potted plants.
She shrugged. “Gear took care of it.”
Was Gear secretly in the CIA? Geeze.
Gear just looked at me with his large green mohawk and winked.
Now Dominic was driving the bus through some fancy neighborhood, while Isaac pointed the way to this majestic tree. I reached up and Logan helped me unpot my feet. I was reluctant to admit my head started throbbing once they were out. I hoped I hadn’t done permanent damage to anything. I was rather fond of my brain, and the way it was throbbing suggested I’d done a little damage.
“You okay?” Logan asked, and I nodded. I didn’t want to worry him over something I couldn’t fix and didn’t understand.
He didn’t seem to buy it, but thought better of challenging me, helping me stand as I peered out the dark-tinted windows. I’d never been to Louisiana, and it was beautiful. The road we were driving down had large plantation-style homes with red-brick fronts. The sun was just setting, casting an orange glow across the trees.
“Stop up here!” Isaac called out and I moved towards the front of the bus to see where he was pointing.
“Holy mother!” I exclaimed.
Isaac beamed; tears lined his eyes. “Isn’t she beautiful?”
One of the largest trees I’d ever seen was plopped right in the front yard of a red-brick home with white shutters. The base wasn’t one trunk, it was … seven. They spilled out sideways onto the lawn like creeping vines, covering a width of about seventy feet.
“It’s glorious.” I wanted to touch it, to lie in her branches while drawing all day. It looked so healthy and inviting.
“Eva, we’re going to need a cover if the homeowners come out,” Isaac instructed.
The sorceress nodded and rubbed her hands together. “Let’s do it.”
I stepped forward, and so did Logan, but Isaac put his hand out gently. “Logan … son … I need you to trust that I can protect her. The fewer people the better, for what needs to be done.”
His eyes lingered on me for a moment and then he nodded.
I reached out and squeezed his hand. ‘I’ll be right back.’
He didn’t say a word, staring at me with impossibly green eyes.
I followed Eva and Isaac off the bus. Barefoot of course. We crossed the street quietly, my eyes on that massive tree in all her glory. I was a bit embarrassed to admit that I had a tree obsession now. Ever since Isaac had saved Dom, I’d become enthralled. The way he’d just … sucked the life from that tree and transferred that energy to Dominic, it was a miracle. A miracle I wanted to learn how to do.
The moment my feet sank into the fresh green Southern lawn, I sighed in contentment. Mother Earth’s energy was strong here. I instinctively knew that the tree’s roots carried this far out under the ground. I could feel them sending me vibrations of healing. My headache lessened almost instantly.
“You feel that?” Isaac asked, and I nodded with a smile.
Eva looked at us both, perplexed, our bare feet in the lawn, and shook her head, smiling. She had her hands out, a yellowish hexagon shape floating over us, no doubt concealing us from any human eyes.
Isaac took in a deep breath before bending to place one hand on the ground. “He’s here.”
My blood froze for a moment, thinking he meant Steven, but I relaxed when I smelled fresh wood and oil.
“Griddish!” I whispered.
We all walked quickly to the tree, taking large strides. It had been almost two days since Griddish was attacked. If he was here, waiting for us the entire time, then he wasn’t in good shape.
Isaac stopped just before the tree’s branches. “He’s concealed.”
Eva thrust her hands forward and the glamour fell away like paper tearing. There at the base of the tree, clutching a beautiful purple-stone staff, was our little elf friend.
His skin looked waxy and gray; his breathing was labored, and the network of veins covering him was … red.
I fell to my knees and gently shook him. “Griddish … we’re here. We made it.”
He slowly peeled open one eye, and I tried to contain my shock at the blood red staining the white.
“Fire girl…” He smiled lazily.
I couldn’t see the wound in his neck anymore, but it was clear he was mortally injured.
“Help him!” I shrieked to Isaac.
The elf held up a limp hand. “No, I’m ready to be with Yalash and my queen.”
He gingerly lifted the staff and handed it to me. It was stupid, but I cared for him. Something about him had made me feel like we had something in common, like we weren’t that different. I took the staff in my hands, and the remainder of my headache was chased away immediately. Other than a slight popping noise and a rush of power under my skin, there wasn’t a big light and magic show, for which I was grateful.
Griddish was looking at me then with his head cocked to the side. “I knew your mother. That hair, the pointy chin … fire druid. I don’t know why I didn’t recognize you before.”
My whole body froze. “You knew her?” I breathed.
He nodded and then winced as if the act pained him. “She was the queen’s battle druid.”
Isaac gasped behind me, but I didn’t dare turn to him. I was frozen staring at Griddish, longing to absorb any information I could.
“What? What’s that?”
Griddish gasped a little, his eyes losing focus, and a bright smile lit up his face. “Yalash,” he said, as tears spilled over onto his cheeks. Suddenly, he was gone. Where he once lay was now only a pile of his blood-soaked clothes. He’d completely disappeared. Dead.
A sob caught in my throat as I leaned forward to clutch the clothes.
“He’s gone,” I said stupidly.
Isaac’s hand came to rest on my shoulder. “He’s at peace.”
I stood, turning around then, and faced Isaac. “What was he talking about? My mother … a battle druid? The queen’s battle druid.”
I felt like this entire journey from the Grand Canyon until now I’d been collecting puzzle pieces. Now I needed them to come together and all make sense.
Isaac looked to Eva, who threw up her arms. “Don’t look at me. I wasn’t some highborn royal in Faery. I lived in a small village with Logan and his family. I never met the queen, or her battle druid.”