Dreamwalker's Bride - Chapter 309

Chapter 309: I can’t
Mia kicked Harper again, terror spurring her on. She looked neither left nor right, but continued forward, looking not for the path now, but for safety.

Ahead, in the distance, the red seemed to fade. She had to get there. Had to reach beyond the place where these flowers fell like feathersoft razors.

The first few to hit her skin, she dismissed easily, but the streaks could only be ignored for so long. Blood. She was sure of it, or at least sure enough to let horror take hold and make her push Harper harder than she ever had before.

Even the previous day’s sprint could not match the effort of the moment. Standing slightly in the stirrups, Mia urged the horse into the fastest possible pace.

Harper was not the quickest animal amongst them. The others could keep up, she was sure… well, except for Denholm’s former horse, who she didn’t know very well. She glanced over at Ford, who was thankfully still beside her.

His form was better than she’d ever seen it, and he seemed exhilarated rather than terrified, despite the red dripping down his cheek. He ducked a branch, and Mia turned her attention forward.

Safety. Safety.

The pull continued in the same direction. The wind blew a fresh flurry of blooms down from their branches, and Mia ducked. She already had enough of it, and couldn’t spare a glance backward to see how her family was doing. Forward was the only way out.

The flowers fell in earnest, as if trying to hem the riders in, but Mia plunged through, head down, to the other side. To the glimpses of green and blue she could only barely see through the cascading crimson curtain.

Bursting through, Mia finally lifted her head and began to rein in the crying horse.

Her breathing was heavy, her skin marred with slashes of red. But no pain.

Were these wounds?

The other riders also emerged from the red jungle of flowers with bewildered or alarmed expressions. The people stared at one another, each touching the stripes on their skin gingerly.

“Blood,” Seth was the first to confirm it as he smudged it between his fingers.

“But it didn’t hurt. Scrapes always hurt,” Daniel protested as his mother fretted at the state of his face.

“I don’t know what that was,” Grandpa said, “but thank you, Mia, for getting us through.”

“I have no idea where we are,” She told him. “I fled for safety. I don’t know how far off course we are. I didn’t see any of this in my vision. I don’t know whether we can get back…”

Her voice broke off and bloody tears fell from her face. She pulled a handkerchief from her pocket and stared at its white surface a moment.

“Right now, we’re safe. That’s a step in the right direction,” Anaisa encouraged. “Next, let’s get our wounds treated.”

After looking around to make sure this new area of the forest didn’t hold any immediate and cloying dangers, the group dismounted. Mia pulled at one of the cuts on her arm. It didn’t hurt at all.

In fact, it was rather numb. Curious, she prodded it further. She could clearly see the rip in her skin, which went deeper than was comfortable to look at. And yet, poking around the cut yielded no sensation whatsoever.

“The flowers numbed where they cut,” She murmured. “So we couldn’t feel it.”

It was also strange that their clothing remained unscathed. Mia lifted a hand to her hair, which though uncovered, had no strands or sections missing nor cut short.

Ford was watching her examination with shrewd eyes.

“You noticed that, too?” His eyes glanced towards her hair.

“Isn’t it strange?”

“It’s magical,” His grin was temporary. “And did you notice how everything was perfectly still before we entered, and then it all fell like a curtain?”

He pointed back, to where the red flowers now lay either still upon the ground or hanging delicately upon their branches, as motionless as a painting.

“It was terrifying,” Mia swallowed. “I… I’ll look for a way around it. When we go home.”

“We should collect a few to take with us,” Ford announced, making Mia balk.

“But they’re so dangerous!”

“Exactly. But they apparently don’t cut fabric, or hair. Only flesh. So if we fill a bag with a few… They might come in handy at some point. Either as a weapon, or crushed up as a numbing agent of some kind. I don’t know. But I’m sure it has a use,” He insisted.

Seth hesitated, then nodded slowly. “I can think of a few potential uses for something like that. After all, we’re going up against dragons and magical creatures. It wouldn’t hurt to have a few surprises up our sleeves.”

“You shouldn’t put them in your sleeves,” Daniel chided. “They’ll cut you.”

“Thank you,” Seth made a funny face at his nephew. “It’s an expression, and you know it, cheeky boy.”

A canteen with the healing water was passed around to stem the seeping wounds everyone suffered. Some was given to the horses as well, who drank greedily as if aware that something was not right within them.

Perhaps the smell of blood was getting to their nerves. Mia patted Harper’s nose with an apology for what they’d been through together.

Closing her eyes, Mia reached out with her gift, searching for the fastest route, the best route, the safest route, and a dozen other ways she could think of.

The pull always remained the same. She swallowed. It seemed there was no other way. No other route.

Things were going to happen the way they were going to happen. Mia sank to her knees, feeling helpless. Hands to her eyes, she searched for the safest place to spend the night, and the pull was the same once again, prompting tears.

Was her magic failing her?

Surely the clearing they had left was still safer than what lay ahead, and yet the pull was forward, ever-forward.

“I can’t do this,” She whispered to herself. “I can’t.”