Page 77 of Edge of Wonder

“I have no idea. But it’s probably not great.”

I flipped the card over and found a map leading to the start of the challenge. The Bloodless Forest was massive. It was a bleak labyrinth of thorns where decay and death ran rampant. Finding a blooming rose would be a grueling task. Even without the mysterious Gursuss.

“See? We can’t wait any longer. It’s time. No more excuses. We leave at daybreak.” Tristan plucked the card from my fingers, earning him a squinted glare. How had I thought for even a second that he was handsome? Sure, he had rugged good looks, but they were soured by his disposition. First impressions weren’t all they were cracked up to be.

Sebastian had been a walking ego from the moment I met him, but he’d put himself on the line over and over, showing his true self. Tristan was full of flattery and promising smiles, but they hid a darker side. One that was only starting to emerge, and one I dreaded to see where it would lead.

“Fine. I’ll let the guards know we’ll be traveling without them.” Pushing out of my chair, I left the room, heading for the front door. Shire was on my heels, squeaking in my ear.

“Alice, what are you doing? We should wait a little longer. Don’t give up on Sebastian. Peter isn’t back yet. We still don’t know what happened.”

“I’m not giving up, but I can’t keep putting Tristan off. If our suspicions are right, he’s dangerous. Someone could get hurt. Duchess, or the other members of our group. I’m not willing to risk that. He’s right. It’s time to end this.”

“Well, I don’t like it.”

“Shire, I’m going to be okay. Trust me.”

“I do, Alice. I just don’t want anything to happen to you. You're kind of the only friend I can talk to without having to use lighting gestures. And you know how I feel about the other ghosts in the realm. Boring.”

I stifled a smile. “You’re my best friend, too, Shire. Even if you are a little nosy.”

“I nose because I care.” Shire giggled. Then slapped her hands together. “Oh, I nearly forgot. I think I discovered a clue to help you in the last challenge. I was looking everywhere on my body, but then one of the ghosts in the graveyard spotted something written on my back. Who knew I’d gotten a tattoo!”

“What’s the tattoo of?”

“Well, it’s sort of vague. But it’s three slashes above a leafy plant with small gold berries, and then beneath that it just says: eat me.”

I crinkled my nose. “That’s it? What happens if you eat the berries?”

“I’m not sure,” Shire mused. “I guess I should have been more specific when I was getting inked. But that’s what we have to work with. So if you see some gold berries, I say, give it a go. What’s the worst that could happen?”

“They could be poisonous.”

Shire clucked her tongue. “Hmm… yeah. That’s certainly a possibility. What if the tattoo is faded, and it used to say: don’t eat me? That’s a pickle.”

“Shire!”

“No. No. Let’s go with the first one. Definitely eat the unknown, suspicious berries inside the deadly forest.”

I rolled my eyes. Shire’s clue was going to get me killed. But it was all I had, and I wasn’t sharing it with my new partner.

***

Tristan and I left at dawn. By the time we reached the start of the challenge, it was already midday. The map led us to a stone wall secured with an iron gate. On the other side, the Bloodless Forest raged, twisting its spiked branches into the sky. The sun had disappeared behind thick dark clouds swirling overhead, and an icy wind wailed through the branches like a banshee crying out in pain.

“This is it,” I said, tucking the map into my bag. “We enter here and then the challenge starts.”

Tristan pushed against the iron bars, making the hinges screech. He ushered me through, closing the gate behind him. Instantly, the world turned gray. Everything was drenched in dreary darkness. The shadows were deeper, the winding trail so narrow you had to walk single file. Thorns scraped against my cloak, snagging the fabric like skeletal hands, trying to drag me into their clutches.

The air was thick with the scent of decay and swamp water, and I took shallow breaths, huddling deeper inside my cloak to ward off the chilly, foul air.

“What do you know about the Bloodless Forest?” I asked, ducking beneath a thorny branch.

“Just that it’s a curse brought about by the queen as punishment to the people. It’s a living creature, growing day by day.”

“And we just walked into its mouth,” I joked, wriggling my brow. But Tristan frowned, turning up his nose at my attempt at humor. Another thing I missed about Sebastian. He always made me laugh while we were leaping into danger. I exhaled a shaky breath. This felt wrong. Every step was hard, and I had to force myself to keep moving or I might turn around and run.

“So what’s the plan? How are we going to find the rose? We could split up and try to cover more ground.” I hoped he’d take the bait as we approached a set of two separate trails. They seemed to run parallel, at least for a short distance.

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