Even my voice was strange. In that I had a voice.
She seemed relieved at my answer, at least, and her shoulders sagged a little. “Same.”
“Is your hand okay?”
Her eyes widened. “What?”
“Your hand. I bit it—but it was an accident. I didn’t mean to—I mean, I won’t do it again. Seriously. You tasted terrible.”
Her cheeks reddened, like those strawberries in her father’s garden. “Did you expect me to taste nice?”
“I expected you to run. I fell halfway down the Sundermount after you—I wasn’t going to let you die at the hands of her.” I jabbed a finger at the bear snug in the corner of the cottage, her nose stuffed under her paws, gently snoring away.
The girl glanced at the bear and then slowly drew her eyes back to me. Her skin lost its color. “. . . Fox?”
Fox.
She had always called me Fox before, so it felt almost comforting that she did now. I cleared my throat. “Now that you’re safe, I would greatly appreciate you turning me back. Please.” The sooner I got out of this body, the sooner I could go back to not—not thinking. I didn’t like all these words in my head, bouncing around, scratching at the inside of my skull.
Her shoulders straightened, and she looked at the old bear as if she could give her an answer, and then she said with so much fake bravado it would’ve been charming, if not for the words, “I don’t know that I can do that.”
I blinked. “Come again?”
“I can’t turn you back,” she mumbled to the floor and began to flush with embarrassment. “At least, I don’t think I can.”
Slowly, I sat forward. “Forgive me, I must be hearing things—I thought you just said you couldn’t turn me back. C’mon, stop pulling my leg and let’s get back to . . . to whatever we had before—”
“I’m not lying, Fox. I don’t know how. I don’t even know how I made you human in the first place.”
Oh. Well.
Fuck.
That was a new word I had never used before, but it certainly fit how I was feeling right now. I pushed my hands through my hair, my fingers tangling into its knots—why was my hair so long?—trying to make myself calm down and think. But the more I thought, the more I didn’t want to think. I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to be in this body. I didn’t want these thoughts, or the words in my mouth, or—or the look the girl was giving me.
I didn’t want any of it.
And especially not the lingering sweetness of her blood in my mouth.
“But, look, I’ve been thinking, and I believe we have to get to Voryn. They are a people of ancient forest magic; they’re the ones who made the crown. If there’s any chance at breaking the curse, it’s with them—and maybe we could find a way there to turn you back?” she said hopefully, pacing back and forth across the cottage. “Or maybe when we cure Anwen, she can put on the crown and use her magic?” And then, quietly, she added, “I don’t know. I’m sorry.”
I massaged the bridge of my nose, because there was a tiny bead of an ache beginning to bloom behind my eyes. “It’s not your fault. I did it to myself. I shouldn’t have bitten you.”
But I didn’t want to think that this—this development—was permanent, either. I already wanted to scrape my skin off; I couldn’t imagine living in this body until I died.
I didn’t have a tail. It was a tragedy.
Everything was too small, and too loud, and too dull all at once, like the world had suddenly lost a shade of magic.
“I found some clothes in a chest over there. You should see if there are any that fit you.” She pointed to a heap of clothes beside me, and I realized that she’d covered most of me with a blanket.
I picked up the shirt and wrinkled my nose. “I’m not putting this on.”
“Fox,” she whined.
“Daisy,” I whined back, “it smells like someone died in it.”
“I’m sure no one did—and you know that’s not my name, right?”
“Fox isn’t mine, either,” I pointed out, though I didn’t exactly know what my name was. I had never really thought about it before. “And how do you know no one died in them?”
“I don’t.”
“Have you even smelled them?” I asked, and she rolled her eyes and squatted down next to me to smell the collar.
She frowned. “It smells like—”
The sound of a tree branch snapping startled us from our argument. Outside the window, there was nothing but white, impenetrable fog. The bear stood from her pallet and turned toward the door, teeth bared.
Monsters, a voice chimed in my head.
A voice that wasn’t mine.
I stared at the bear in horror. I could still understand her?
“Do you hear—?” I began to ask Daisy, perplexed, when the bear interrupted again—
Monsters at the door. Corrupted. Bad. The bear’s lips pulled back from her yellow-white teeth, her ears flattening against her skull.
Daisy blinked. “Hear wha—?”
I quickly put a hand over her mouth. “Shh,” I hushed, and turned my gaze to the front door. “It’s back.”
Her eyes widened with fear.
Taking my hand from her mouth, I quickly pulled the shirt over my head and found my way into some trousers. I’d seen Daisy lace them up the front enough times that, even with my aggravatingly long fingers, I managed after a try. Why were my hands so big?
While I pulled on my clothes and managed to put on some scuffed old boots, the girl crawled over to her discarded green dress in the corner of the house, tied the sash with the crown to her waist, and started packing her dress with straw.
What are you doing? I mouthed as I shrugged on a coat, pulling my long hair out from beneath the collar, as something outside slammed its hand against the door, making the entire frame rattle.
“Briars, brambles, bones, and blossom, I smell a girl who can’t be forgotten,” said the monster at the door. The hoarse voice made the hair on my arms stand on end.
Daisy stilled. “It’s not the bone-eater,” she whispered. “It’s him.”
Him. The guy from the castle—the one after the crown. The one who smelled like rotten earth and ancient magic. I didn’t want to stick around if it was him at the door. What had Daisy called him—Seren?
We need to find safety. It was that voice again. The bear.
Daisy was still packing the dress, more fervently than ever. “What are you doing?” I hissed.
She gave me a meaningful look and then shoved the dress under the blanket and made it up to look like there was someone sleeping there.
“We can sense you in there, daughter of the Wilds,” the man said, rattling the door again.
Without another word, she grabbed me by the hand and hurried to the back window. Her hands were cold and still—and mine were shaking. I was scared? Is this what true fear feels like?
The bear followed us.
The door rattled again. The hinges wouldn’t hold much longer.
My heart was racing, and my skin felt electrified, and there was this metallic taste in my mouth—
Yes, I was scared.
Keep her safe. I will be there soon, said the voice that I knew now was the bear’s, as she turned around and headed for the door.