There were too many strzygi these days, and she couldn’t run the risk of adding three more to a forest already boiling over.
Ryś looked doubtful.
“Very well,” said Czarn at last, getting to his feet. “I will help you.”
“Thank you,” said Ren, moving aside as he passed her.
Ryś made an annoyed sound but grudgingly joined them.
They dug in silence. Czarn helped Ren tip the bodies into graves. The dense branches trapped the late-afternoon sun, and the work was punishingly hot. Now that the strzygi were dead and her panic had faded, Ren was acutely aware of the heavy warmth in the air.
There were more monsters every day, every night. And not just strzygi. Other, terrible things. Zmara, who hung around throats in the night and throttled their victims into a permanent slumber. Rusalki, who dragged humans under the water and wore their skins above it. Nocnica, who drank up any foolish souls sleeping too near their webs. Psotniki, who collected eyeballs in their high-up nests.
And of course, the humans.
They came rarely, probably because what had happened to Czarn—and to the hunter—had lit the fires of fear in their hearts. If the occasional hunters ventured in, someone else usually got to them before Ren did. They died at the claws of strzygi, rusalki, nocnica, psotniki . . . they died at the whims of the forest itself. Tangled in roots, hemmed in by walls of trunks. Captured on trails that circled for miles, yielded no secrets, and eventually, without warning, closed in forever.
Despite everything, this was Ren’s forest, and she loved it. But even if she had wanted to leave it, she wasn’t sure whether it would let her.
Czarn finished kicking the dirt over the bodies. His black fur was drying into sticky points, and when Ren ran a paw over her own face, she found it was crusted and sticky with blood. The strzygi had left their mark on the surrounding forest, too: bloody scratches in weeping tree trunks, bits of rotting flesh strewn around the perimeter. The trees themselves bent a little lower, the grass a little slimier, the horseflies a little hungrier. The smell of blood was overwhelming in the clearing. It smelled like fury. Anguish. Evil.
It smelled like monsters.
Sweat broke over her shoulders. Suddenly, she didn’t want to be in the clearing. Didn’t want to be covered in blood. Her power rippled away, and she was human once more.
“Hoping to get eaten, I see,” observed Czarn in his lazy voice.
“I’m going for a swim,” she said. Blood coated every inch of her body like a second skin. “I need to get this off.”
Ryś was already using a dampened paw to wash behind his ears. He gave her a look of supreme disdain.
“Or”—he sniffed—“you could just be normal and lick it off.”
“Be careful,” called Czarn as Ren disappeared into the trees. “There are rusalki in the river!”
“I’ll be fine,” she called back, already deep in the trees. “Wodnik will be there!”
As Ren got farther from the clearing, the forest changed. Trees unbent, dark trunks lightening to golden brown. Overhead, boughs untangled and welcomed in the sun. Rot yielded to grass and the hushed voices of the last animals brave enough to stay in the forest.
She breathed in the clean, woody air, and with it came a sense of relief. She hadn’t realized how tightly wound she was—hadn’t noticed the sense of dread hanging over her. It was so constant that she often forgot how heavily it weighed on her. How much longer? she asked herself, never daring to speak the words out loud. How much longer could she keep her animals holed up in the castle, keep these last parts of the forest sunny and bright?
She didn’t know. The forest had already driven out most of the humans. Now it was coming for them.
The river roared into view. The trees were smooth and straight, covered with thick green moss. Cool light filtered through the treetops, and everything smelled fresh and clean and alive. No claw marks on trees. No blood spattering the ground.
No monsters.
Ren glanced over her shoulder, frowning. Nothing had followed her, and the trees were silent. Somewhere, crickets were chirping. But all the same . . .
She hadn’t noticed that this part of the forest lay so close to the strzygi’s clearing . . . hadn’t realized that the river—her river—had almost been in the strzygi’s path—hadn’t realized things were getting so bad so quickly—
Ren forced down the dread. She was catastrophizing. Everything would feel better once she’d gotten the blood off.
Ignoring the wild water, Ren sat on the riverbank and slipped easily into the coolness. The water instantly calmed.
“Thank you, Wodnik,” she said across the expanse.
The water spirit didn’t reply. The river was still.
Ren smiled and pushed off, swimming for the center of the swell. It was ice-cold and perfect. Even though she was mostly lynx these days, there was still some human left in her. And that human loved the water more than any cat ever would.
As the crusted blood melted off her skin, she began to feel better. Cleaner. Like there wasn’t a pile of strzygi corpses and buried villagers a half mile away.
A wave broke over her shoulders.
A new, horrible thought occurred to Ren. The poisoned parts of the forest were expanding—might even have reached this river. A second wave rippled inquisitively across the clear surface. Literally, it seemed, testing the water.
And then a third. This one was high enough to brush her chin as it passed.
Ren’s heart skipped a beat. Was there a monster in the water? Something other than Wodnik? One that could hear that skipped beat below the surface. That could see her bare legs, kicking. That . . .
Ren kicked harder. Whatever it was, it touched her ankle. She screamed, floundered—
The voice was as soft as water.
Our queen, it whispered. We have returned.
The water began to roil.
Our queen.
Fear released her. She knew these creatures: nimfy.
Silver fingertips broke the surface. They tangled her long dark hair. The strands slid down their silvery forearms as the creatures rose from the water. Hollow eyes trained on her, cold fingers played over her lips, her chin, rubbed away the blood. And then Ren was surrounded: one dark-haired girl surrounded by dozens that—it seemed—had been cast in silver.
Our queen. Their voices carried through the water, sank into Ren’s skin. Our queen. Each one repeated the words. Our queen. Our queen. Our queen.
One nimfa pulled away from the others. She clutched Ren’s shoulders in icy hands, silver-white webbing glittering between her fingers. She bent and kissed Ren’s cheek.
Our queen.
The water churned, and three dozen silent silver bodies slid up from the depths and kissed their queen.
“Welcome home.” Ren grinned, hugged their shoulders as they came. The kisses were ice-cold on her cheeks. “You’ve grown.”
Back in the winter, half of these creatures had been just tiny tadpoles. They’d flitted in and out of the bulrushes, too shy for Ren to hold them, always darting back to the safety of Wodnik’s arms. Then, as they’d done every spring, the tadpoles disappeared upriver to grow strong and beautiful. For the first time in her life, Ren had feared they might not make it back. They had seemed so fragile, and the evil had not spared the waters.
Ren heard a sudden splash as bubbles appeared near the opposite bank. The brownish rushes trembled. It was so subtle that anyone else might have ignored it completely.