Queen of Their Colony (Kindred Tales)

“What does it want? How do we get in? Tem, put me down and let me see!” she exclaimed.

The Soul of the colony put her on her feet reluctantly and Terra ran to the fence between them and the door. Remembering that she’d had to touch the other two doors before the instructions appeared, she began running her hands over the glowing fence, which felt cool and glassy-smooth under her fingertips.

Almost at once, she found the doorway that led through the gate. It was a high, arching thing and she saw that the fence wasn’t just a fence—it actually extended over the entire area of the door between worlds, rather like a protective dome.

“Look!” Rive exclaimed, pointing to the arched gateway. “That’s what we need to get through!”

High on the door in the fence were four handprints—three large and one small. While the rest of the fence glowed a pale gold, the handprints were cold and dark. Clearly the four of them were meant to press their hands to the prints in order to make the fence open.

“Let’s go!” Terra exclaimed, already reaching to place her hand on the smallest handprint which must be meant for her. “We need to—”

But at that moment, something grabbed onto the long train of her flower dress and began dragging her backwards.

“What? What’s happening?” Terra looked around, but couldn’t see anything. Or rather, she could see that something had the back of her dress and was yanking on it and dragging her, but she couldn’t quite see what it was that was doing it.

Is it camouflaged like V’rone, or is it just invisible? she wondered, beginning to feel panicked. Whichever was the case, she just wanted to get away from the damn thing.

But the predator was strong. No matter how she pulled and tugged, she couldn’t get free. And it was dragging her straight towards the river.

“No! No!” Terra shrieked as she felt her feet slip into the water. This was all happening so fast that Rive and Tem hadn’t even had a chance to get to her yet. They had been at opposite ends of the fence, examining it while she had been in the middle. They were rushing towards her, but even now Terra could tell they were going to be too late…

Then she heard a loud, angry cry.

“No, you fucker! Get off her!”

There was a huge splash and she realized that V’rone must have jumped into the blood-red river to fight the predator.

There was an angry snarling sound and then a ripping as her dress at last came free. Terra tumbled backwards onto the forest floor. She sat up at once, scanning the river eagerly, trying to see what was going on.

But she could see almost nothing—though she could hear a good deal.

“Take that, you fucker!” she heard V’rone growling. Then more angry snarling and a lot of splashing, in which she got drenched because she was still right on the edge of the river.

By this time Rive and Tem had reached her and they were trying to drag her away from the river but Terra fought them.

“No—no!” she cried. “V’rone, fight it! V’rone, where are you?”

At last she heard a sickening crack like bones breaking. Her heart rose into her throat. Oh God, had that been V’rone’s spine snapping? His bones being broken? What the hell was going on in the blood-red river?

And then, to her immense relief, she heard V’rone’s voice.

“I’m here.” He sounded hoarse and out of breath and she wished she could see him.

“What happened?” Rive demanded.

“You saved our Lady,” Tem added.

“Broke the fucker’s neck. Looked kinda like a crocodile mixed with a felinis tigris,” V’rone informed them. “But I think it got me.”

“What? Where?” Terra demanded. She put out her hands to feel him, since he was barely visible, and felt a lot of damp skin, which made sense, since he’d just been in the river. But then she felt something damp that wasn’t water—it was warm and wet and sticky and there seemed to be a hell of a lot of it.

Blood? she wondered. Is that blood? Is he bleeding?

“Yes, it’s blood,” V’rone said and she realized that she’d been speaking her thoughts aloud. “Come on—let’s get to the door before any more of them smell me and come running,” he added impatiently.

“Well, we need all four of us for that to work,” Rive explained. “Come on—everyone put their hand on the fence gate,” he added, pointing to the cold, dark handprints.

They all crowded up to the gate and pressed their hands to the prints. To Terra’s relief, the glowing gate opened at once, letting them into the area where the door was. They all shuffled through and the fence gate closed behind them at once.

Suddenly, the red jungle was gone and everything had changed.

FORTY-ONE

“What in the world…?” Terra spun around, taking in the three-sixty view of their new surroundings. The room they now found themselves in was all white. But not the sterile, frightening white of DY-12—this area was lit with a golden glow and there were several extra-large bean-bag type chairs scattered around, also upholstered in shaggy white fur.