The Wonder (Queen of Hearts Saga #2)(10)

Dinah ran her hands over the trunk. It was so beautiful it took her breath away—why would anyone ever chop it down? There was so much more beauty in a living tree than a pendant wrapped around some noblewoman’s neck. The tree pulsed with warmth that Dinah suspected didn’t come from the sun, but rather from inside the tree. Her fingers trembled with the knowledge that its texture was changing underneath her skin. Whereas before it had felt like cool marble, it now was soft, like the jams she spread on toast. When she pulled away, her hands were covered with a dark, drippy syrup the color of molasses. Without thinking, she licked it. After weeks of stale bread and dried bird meat, the syrup was heavenly—rich and sweet, the best thing she had ever tasted. She licked her hands dry, covering her face in syrup, and went back for more until she felt sluggish with the sugar, drunk on this rush of goodness. She stumbled away from the tree past Morte, who had also been licking the trunk.

Dinah was wiping her hands on the damp grass when she looked up in surprise, her eyes catching a strange form in the trees. There was a house in front of her. Dinah leapt back in shock, her hand on her sword hilt. How had I not noticed it? The house sat snugly between two trees, their roots twisting up through the roof. This made Dinah shudder. Morte continued to drink with abandon. It reminded her of the Black Towers, of that root twisting itself into her mouth, up her nostril…. Dinah heaved up the syrup onto the ground, the thick sludge puddling at her feet, over and over again. Afterward, to her relief, she felt much better without its weight sitting in her stomach. Dinah gaped at the house as she crouched behind the liquid tree. There was no visible light coming from the house, no candles flickering in open windows, no guards against the approaching night. Morte flattened his ears back against his head and gave a loud huff. Dinah felt that familiar dread that had plagued her all day. Was this dangerous? Should she flee from the house? While longing to plunge back into the safety of the woods, Dinah found herself drawn to the man-made structure. It had been so long since she had seen anything related to humans and she longed to run her hands over the walls, to feel timber and bolts, blankets and cups. Also, she reasoned, there might be food in the house, something she could not ignore.

Scrambling on her knees, Dinah found a small rock and threw it at the door. It bounced off with a loud thud, and landed beside an empty bucket. Dinah waited a few minutes, but nothing happened, other than the wind tossing the branches of the trees overhead in a lulling whoosh. She drew her sword and approached cautiously, on silent cat feet. Dinah crouched low beneath the window and raised her head to peer through the beveled glass. She could see nothing through the thick glass, but she could sense that everything was silent and still. With a deep breath, she turned the door handle. The door swung open and rocked on its hinge. Dinah stepped inside, praying to find a fully stocked kitchen. The house was one large circular room with a beautiful high-vaulted ceiling and a dirt floor. On the right, an unmade bed had been overturned and books were scattered about, their pages flapping in the wind. At the front of the room sat a cold fireplace, cozied up to a sitting area that featured a well-worn rocking chair resting against the wall. The blanket that had once been draped on the chair had been ripped to shreds and was tossed about the room.

To the left was indeed a kitchen that had been recently ransacked. Milk dripped from an overturned jug onto the floor, where a basket of food had been tossed aside. Hunger making her impulsive, Dinah raced toward it. She pushed past the overturned table, stepping over the blue-and-white spotted tea kettle smashed on the floor. She didn’t care—all she saw were two loaves of bread, some onions, carrots, and what looked to be a burnt husk of thick meat—deer, perhaps. Ravenous, Dinah threw these things into her bag as the sun dipped behind the cottage, filling the room with a shadowy light. She gnashed at the bread. Who had been here? Yurkei? Had an animal gotten in—a wolf? Something worse? Dinah looked around. No. The chaos seemed a little neat for an animal, a little too intentional. What animal would leave food but rip pictures off the wall and flip a bed over?

Morte gave a nervous whinny from outside and pounded the ground with his heavy, spiked hooves. The dishes inside rattled. Dinah took one last glimpse around the kitchen before ducking out of the round house. She said a silent thanks to whoever baked this bread and grew these onions as she made her way behind the house, back into the woods. Morte shortly followed behind her before they both stopped short. There was a long field that stretched hundreds of feet behind the garden, and the body was there, lying face down in the dirt. He had been quite large but obviously strong—huge muscles, still as stone, that looked as though they had been carved out of his back. He wore a floppy hat and a lavender linen tunic, his feet bare and dirty. A farmer, Dinah thought, pressing her fingers across her trembling lips. Broken jars of the amber tree syrup littered the ground around him. Dinah felt all the air rush out of her lungs as she comprehended what she was seeing. Out of the man’s back arched a long arrow. It nestled between his great shoulder blades, a small blotch of blood surrounding the entry point. He had bled out from the front, the ground stained a deep red all around him. The blood was still wet, but it was cooling quickly and becoming one with the sticky syrup, a sickening swirling mixture of red and amber.

The fact that this hadn’t happened long ago alarmed Dinah, but not as much as the blown red glass heart that topped the end of the arrow. She had seen these arrows before, adorning the backs of many Heart Cards that guarded the outer gates of the palace. She stood, the world spinning around her. It wasn’t the Yurkei that had been here. The Cards had found her. Dinah swung the bag around her back and ran straight toward Morte. “Up!” she barked. Her panic was evident and for this he didn’t hesitate, lifting his leg as she neared him. Dinah stepped without fear onto his spikes and vaulted herself onto his back, her legs curling around his massive neck.