Wildwood (Wildwood Chronicles 1)

Glancing up at the looming branches, Curtis nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Maybe that would be best.”

A small group of soldiers helped Curtis into the lower limbs of an obliging cedar, and from there he scaled up to the thicker branches that sprouted at the ancient tree’s gnarled midsection. Selecting a particularly hearty branch, he scooted himself out along the woody surface until he found a spot where the branch split and he was able to couch himself in the intersection, looking out over the ravine. From this vantage, he could see the entire legion of coyotes stretching away down the ridge. He still could not, however, see anything on the other side of the ravine. He heard a command below and watched as the fusiliers lifted their muskets to their shoulders in taut unison. The orderly rows of soldiers behind the rifles ceased their restless movement and stood vigilantly at the ready. The barking of orders came to a stop and there was silence in the ravine, save the slight whisper of the wind and the rustle of the high tree branches. Curtis found himself holding his breath as he searched the opposing hillside for sign of movement.

Suddenly, the trees came alive.

Prue leapt out of her bath, hearing the mirage of a knock at the door. Hoping it would be one of the Governor’s attendants, come to give her good news, she threw on the bathrobe and ran to the door, peeking out into the hallway beyond. Her heart sank to see no one was there.

“Hello?” she called.

Her eyes fell on the figure of a large dog, a mastiff, clad in dress blues, standing against the wall at the very end of the hallway. He glanced at her briefly before looking back down at his paws. He lifted a cigarette to his teeth. The glow of a lit match suddenly illuminated the smooth fur of his face as he brought it to the end of his cigarette. He took a ponderous drag and looked back at Prue. He nodded.

“Oh, hi,” said Prue.

The mastiff said nothing. Prue squinted, making out a patch on the shoulder of his jacket. There, the word SWORD was spelled out in all capital letters.

“Excuse me,” called Prue. “Do you work here?”

The dog gave no answer.

“I don’t suppose you know anything about my brother, do you? Did the Governor send you here?”

Still, silence. The dog shrugged his shoulders and looked away down the hall.

Well, that’s pretty rude, thought Prue. She was about to ask what the dog was doing there when a tall man in a suit rounded the corner and greeted the dog. They shook hands and began speaking to each other in low voices.

He was just waiting for someone, thought Prue despondently. That’s all.

She closed the door and returned to the bathroom, where she began toweling her wet hair. Some song from the radio snuck into her head and she began humming it, singing an approximated version of the chorus when it came around. Absently running the towel over her neck and nape, she wandered the room in the early evening’s dimming light.

The better part of an hour had passed before a sudden sound from below brought her to the window. She arrived in time to see the multitude of finches she had seen earlier swing down from their nooks in the building and hover before the double doors of the Mansion’s entrance. After a few moments, the doors were heaved open and out walked the resplendent Owl Rex, attended by Roger, the Governor’s aide. Prue watched transfixed as the massive owl turned and nodded to his companion. Roger repeated his shallow bow and walked back into the Mansion, the doors closing behind him. Alone in the courtyard, the owl hesitated before taking flight; he scanned the horizon and seemed to savor the air for a moment before, astonishingly, he craned his horned head around to gaze directly up into Prue’s window.

Prue jumped back from the glass with surprise. His bright yellow eyes continued to hold in place as she stared back. Finally, after what seemed an eternity, he swiveled his head back around, crouched low, and unfurled his immense dappled wings. With a tremendous lunge, the owl launched himself into the sky. He wheeled twice above the driveway, almost prehistoric in his carriage, before flying off into the forest, the mass of finches gliding in his wake like static against the graying sky.

Prue shook her head, unnerved by the experience. Had he been looking at her? He couldn’t have been, she decided; why would an owl prince have any interest in a human girl? It must’ve been pure coincidence, an illusion that he looked up into her window, nothing more.

Something caught her eye on the windowsill, just outside the glass. It was a small white envelope. The words Miss Prue McKeel were written on the front in a delicate, elaborate hand. She quickly threw open the sash and grabbed the letter from the sill. She looked out at the vista beyond the window; the birds were gone. Tearing open the seal of the envelope, Prue removed a piece of ivory paper, which, unfolded, revealed a short note written on the Mansion’s own embossed letterhead. It read:

Dear Miss McKeel,

It is of vital importance that I meet with you tonight. Please come to my rooms at the White Stone House, 86 Rue Thurmond. Make certain that no one follows you.

You may be in grave danger.

Yours, Owl Rex

Prue reread the note in stunned silence. She wandered the room, turning the piece of paper over and over in her hands, a pang of fear blossoming in her chest. She read the note again, this time in a hushed whisper, intoning the last sentence several times over before she folded the note into a small square.

She walked to the door and slowly cracked it open, peering out into the hall. The mastiff in the blue suit was still there at the end of the corridor. His attention was focused on his forepaws; he was picking at his claws with a little file. Prue saw him begin to turn his great, jowly head toward her, and she quietly pushed the door closed, retreating back into the room.

In a trance, she walked over to the bed, where her jeans lay. She stuffed the note into the front pocket. The light was slowly fading in the room, and she turned on the small bedside lamp. She sat on the bed and felt her heart pounding through her rib cage as if it were exploding.

Curtis had, at one point, been an avowed Animal Planet buff. Couldn’t get enough of it. Starting when he was two, he was told, his parents would set him down in front of the television after dinner and he would sit, transfixed, absorbing anything the cable channel would broadcast, regardless of the featured species, habitat, or climate. The obsession wore off eventually (to be replaced by a series of things: Robin Hood, ancient Egypt, Flash Gordon—the list went on) but he always remembered the images that first carried his fascination. One of them was the scene, ubiquitous in any program involving creatures that numbered camouflage among their evolutionary advantages, where the camera would be trained on a tranquil, empty meadow or veldt and you, the viewer, would be baffled as to why these professional wildlife documentarians would waste precious film on animal-less grassland—when all of a sudden, a lion or a snake or a panther would move out of the grass or scrub and you would be shocked at your own inability to detect it.

This is what popped into Curtis’s mind as he watched the forest on the far side of the gully breathe into life.

It started imperceptibly; the gentle movements of the swaying fern fronds and low-hanging branches slowly seemed to take on a more threatening, deliberate aspect, and Curtis thought he saw a flash of metal from behind a small pile of deadfall. Then, it was as if

the undergrowth sprouted limbs and began to move, unmoored from the forest floor. The bodies of humans soon began to distinguish themselves from the background, and Curtis gasped to see a few figures emerge from the greenery, their dark faces savagely streaked with brown and green paint. As Curtis watched, more and more bodies joined these few until the entire far ridge was crowded with people, a people swathed in tattered clothing and holding a strange and wild variety of weapons: rifles, knives, clubs, and bows. The crowd continued to grow, and Curtis estimated their number to be well over two hundred—at least as many people as he’d remembered seeing in his school’s gymnasium during a rally. Their movements made no sound, save the clicking of rifles engaging and the yawning creak of arrows being drawn.