"Rory what is that?" Ethan asks, warning sharp in his voice.
ory is sliding into shotgun wearing a crown of twigs and moss. Ethan already knows it's the Dryad King's crown but the tiniest part of him hopes Rory has managed to arts and crafts himself a replica.
"Dude this was a peace mission. You did not just steal the royal jewels." Benny says, his hand dropping from the keys in the ignition to inspect the forest surrounding the dirt and gravel road.
"King Quercus left it on a stump; he clearly didn't want it anymore." Rory reasons adding, "Besides it looks better me."
"He's a dryad that lives in the forest. A stump is like his nightstand." Benny explains. Just down the road Jane, Erica, and two spell casters from the recently formed White Chapel Coven, were dawdling getting into the truck. Benny's looking for any sign that the dryads have noticed Rory's theft. Is the wind picking up or are the trees agitated?
"Luke to Leia. Leia please come in. Over" Ethan calls out over the walkie-talkie they brought along (the cell reception was spotty).
"Ethan you don't have to use that stupid radio talk, or code names. No one else is listening to us." Jane replies from no more than 15 feet away.
"We may have an issue, Jar Jar stole the golden idle. Be on the lookout for storm troopers. Over." Ethan replies still serious. Sarah chuckles a little. "What?" Ethan asks indignantly.
"Nothing." Sarah says kissing his cheek, "You're just really cute when you're dorky." Ethan beams, giving Sarah a light kiss on the lips.
"Be gross-cute later, guys. We have incoming." Benny points out the front window at a group of armed dryads gathering near the edge of the tree line. On first look Ethan doesn't see anything, but notices movement when a new arrival edges around a bush. Its bark textured skin and leaf clothing blend in perfectly with the forest. "I count 20 so far." Benny adds. Ethan made a mental note to ask Benny later if he was actually able to see the stationary dryads —it could be natural ability of Earth-dedicated spell casters.
"Am I supposed to understand your geek-speak mumbo-jumbo?" Jane sounds exasperated even over the scratchy walkie-talkie line.
"Hostiles, Jane! Don't pretend like you don't understand. Translation: Rory pissed the dryads off and now they're grouping around at the edge of the road." Ethan explains urgently. "Over." He adds hastily. Good radio etiquette serves a purpose.
Benny started the car, which got the attention of the other group. Jane was gesturing rapidly, clearly explaining the situation to the older mages, Robert and Kevin.
"Benny what are you doing? They're going to think we're trying to run. We have to give the crown back," Ethan demands.
"Uh... Okay. But in the meantime, I'm working on a 30 point turn so we can get out of here. You know, in case a tribe of magic tree people with trust issues forgets about the 300lbs of fertilizer we brought in favor of killing us for stealing the ancient magic forest crown." Benny says dryly.
"Wait, am I Jar Jar Binks?" Rory asks outraged.
"Not now Rory," Ethan hushes him. Outside the car the dryads continue emerging from the trees along both sides of the road. Jane, Robert, and Kevin are buckling into the truck, but Erica vamp-speeds into Benny's car shoving Sarah into the middle seat in the back.
"Remind me again why I came along on this little travesty." Erica asks, the door clicking closed again.
Sarah replies with exasperation, "Because I went with you on six hour non-stop shopping trip so you could find the perfect outfit for your birthday party."
"Okay well this snoozefest just turned into a good way to ruin my manicure so I'm out." Erica declares tugging on the door handle.
Sarah snagged Erica's arm before she was able to speed off. "Erica, no. You promised to help get everyone out if things went bad." Sarah begged.
Erica relents with a shrug. "Fine. What's the plan to keep all the losers safe?"
"Yeah Ethan, what is the plan?" Benny asks with a slight tremble in his voice. In a quick synchronized action, the dryads stagger onto road into a circular formation surrounding both the car and the truck.
"Rory go out there and give back the crown." Ethan directs Rory, pointing over his shoulder to what he assumed was the king. He was the tallest person-shaped tree segment.
Benny stopped the car to give Rory a chance to get out. Rory cautiously approached the lone tree-like figure still wearing the venerated wooden circlet and waving at him sheepishly. "Hi there, Mr. Tree King sir. I didn't mean to take your crown..." Rory trails off.
"Rory take it off." Ethan yells out the window over Sarah and Erica. Benny puts the car in reverse, careful not to hit Rory, resuming his increasingly irrelevant quest of turning the car around.
Rory takes the crown off and offers it out to the Dryad King. In retrospect Ethan should've sent Benny out with the crown. Benny had a spell that allowed him to speak the dryad language. And more importantly, understand it. Rory was just shrugging and smiling apologetically. Ethan was pretty sure Grandma Weir had said something about showing one's teeth being considered a sign of aggression to the dryads.
The Dryad King ripped the crown out of Rory's hand in a grand sweeping gesture that aimed slightly higher could have just as easily taken a human's head off. A good reason to not have sent Benny actually.
Ethan angled his body between the front two seats so he could see the action better. Sarah steadied him with a strong hand on his hip. Possibly it was more to keep Ethan from squishing her.
The Dryad King was yelling something that Ethan didn't understand, but he did understand what it meant when all of the surrounding dryads suddenly rushed forward brandishing branches and rocks.
"Benny get us out of here now!" Ethan yells.
The car was now entirely perpendicular to the direction of the road, facing down the very steep tree covered hillside. "Okay," Benny mumbles to himself, "car's useless." Hastily Benny throws out a Latin incantation interspersed with uncertain um's. Ethan has a moment to be worried before a blinding flash of light gradually gives way to complete black.
"What just happened?" Erica demands into the darkness. Whatever Benny had cast, Ethan could no longer hear dryad war cries outside, so that had to be good.
"Okay let's evaluate our situation. Benny can you do a torch spell?" Ethan knew he had to be the calm rational voice.
No response. "Benny?" Ethan asks again.
"I can do a fairy light spell." Jane's voice issues from the front of the car surprising Ethan. Without waiting for an answer Jane speaks the incantation and small glowing balls rise out of her palms to skitter along the ceiling of the car. The resulting light is rose-toned and patchy, but adequate.
"When did you get here, mini-Morgan?" Erica asks, inspecting her intact nails. Ethan is reminded of a cat feigning disinterest. Jane sticks her tongue out as a response.
Benny was still in the car but he was slumped over the steering wheel. Outside the windows of the car appears to be solid stone fitted smoothly against the glass.
"Uh okay this is different," Ethan remarks absently. He had learned that focusing on a question before touching the subject could more reliably trigger visions. So Ethan concentrated on 'What did Benny do? How did it go wrong?' until his curiosity was an itchy pressure behind his eyes, and snaked his hand up between the driver's seat and the car door to touch Benny's back. He could just hear Sarah asking Jane to turn the car off as the vision hit him.
He saw the dryads closing in around their car. Switch views. Benny was casting the spell, but in the vision Ethan knew it was a transportation spell. A flash of Jane's face, Benny was scared for her safety in the attack, so he had pulled her into their car. A flash of the Weir's driveway. He was trying to get them home.
Helpfully the vision showed a map with a little car icon leaving a dotted trail from the site of the dryad meet-up and stopping short in a mountain. A flash of fuel gauge bottoming out. Ethan understood this to mean Benny had run out of power while the car was passing through a mountain. Finally a digital clock popped up showing 47 hours, 36 minutes, and 10 seconds counting down. Ethan unfortunately realized this was the time it would take Benny to recharge before casting the transportation spell again. At least it also meant that Benny was going to be okay.
Sarah was watching his face when he came out of the vision. "Benny ran out of juice halfway through a transportation spell. We're inside a mountain." Ethan explains briefly.
"Oh no, I am not stuck in a car with you nerds." Erica declares shoving her shoulder into the door. Ethan covers his ears against the horrible metal screech of car door grinding against boulder. Erica left a sizable dent in the mangled door suggesting she had made an impact on the stone outside, but the only result was crushed gravel and broken glass littering the floor at Erica's feet. "So much for that." She mumbles irritably.
"Did you see why I'm here?" Jane asks.
"Benny wanted to get you out of the fight." Ethan answers a little hesitantly. This was a repeating argument with Jane.
And predictably she explodes, "Why doesn't anybody think I can do anything? I would've been fine with Bobby and Kevin there! Plus, I'm fourteen. You and Benny were fighting vampires by then, without help from the Coven, I might add."
"Jane, don't be like that. You know you're basically a sister to Benny." Ethan reasoned. "Let's focus on how to get out of here. Jane do you have any spells that could get us home?" Ethan redirects.
"No," Jane responds as if it should have been painfully obvious to Ethan, "I don't have anything like a transportation spell."
Something that was becoming increasingly frustrating for Ethan as the group's main strategist was keeping track of which spells Benny and his sister each had. Jane was a light dedicate and Benny an Earth one, which apparently had stark logical differences to Jane. Benny, on the other hand, was often as mystified by his own abilities as Ethan was.
Jane gives in, "I'll see if I can find anything in my grimoire, but I can guarantee you I won't have any transportation spells." Jane pulls out the thick pink book, as well as a Latin dictionary, from her Moleo backpack—something that she thankfully never took off during missions. Ethan had to give her credit for taking missions seriously. Absently, she calls one of the fairy lights to hover over her right shoulder, illuminating her books.
"You owe me so much more than a shopping trip for this." Erica snaps at Sarah. Ethan grimaces, even on the other side of Sarah, Erica was scary.
"Erica come off it. You're affected by supernatural baddies as much as anyone else in White Chapel, and you're more equipped to help. You should be doing this without having to be bribed!" Sarah rebuts.
"Don't act so high and mighty with me, Sarah. You only do this because you're dating Ethan. That and you have some perverse need to be punished for being a vampire. I don't. There's nothing in this for me." Erica says, getting louder.
Brilliantly, Ethan climbs over the back seat into the trunk to put some space between himself and the vampire girls. "Uh... taking inventory," Ethan quickly makes up when Sarah shoots him an accusing look. It was actually a good idea.
In the background the girls were still arguing. "That is so unfair. And sexist! I fight to keep all of White Chapel safe." Sarah fires back.
While the original plan assumed peace talks would take two days at most, Benny had packed enough food to last a week (well maybe not that long considering how much Benny could put away). So food wasn't an issue. Except their menu was mostly cold canned beans and Doritos.
"Whatever," Erica sounded decidedly uninterested. "Why should I care that my best friend only spends time with me when she wants something."
Two full gallons of water would be fine for three humans for two days. Ethan was fairly certain the vampires could survive without it.
"Erica," Sarah says sadly, "It's not like that."
Ethan turns his attention to personal gear. He knew what was in his backpack. Clothes, some toiletries, a novel he was reading, a flashlight. Nothing that would get them out of the car or help them communicate with the outside world. Oh shit! Maybe he had cell reception.
"It isn't?" Erica asks. "Because that's what it feels like."
Ethan digs his cell phone out of his pocket and checks the screen. No bars. Ethan briefly entertains the idea of asking if anyone else had cell reception, but the chances were low and he didn't particularly want to interrupt Sarah and Erica's heated argument.
Except it seems the fight might be resolving as Sarah sighs. "I'm sorry Erica. You are my best friend and I should spend more time with you." She licks her lips her eyes failing to her lap meekly. "I guess, you know it's hard for me to find time. Between school, working part time at the diner, and this," She waves around herself, "I just don't have a lot of time."
While Ethan didn't generally feel comfortable going through people's stuff without permission, he decides he has no such qualms going through Benny's bag.
Erica scoffs, "Why do you work at the diner anyways? Vampires can take anything they want."
"Because I'm not like that!" Sarah exclaims. "I'm trying to meet you halfway here Erica. Can you drop it on the 'acting like a proper vampire' thing?"
Ethan pulls Benny's duffel bag into his lap. It's strangely heavy for what should've been mostly clothes.
"Fine." Erica folds her arms against her chest. "If you can agree to spend more time with me, I'll stop asking you to act like what you are, which is awesome."
Sarah sighs heavily but takes this as a victory, "Deal." Erica and Sarah hug.
Sarah giggles, "Okay since we're stuck here for a while, why don't you tell me about your latest guy. Date not meal."
Ethan shakes his head. He loves Sarah, but he wasn't sure he would ever understand her. Benny's bag was a complete mess. Dirty and clean clothes intermixed with candy, toys, and random items that looked vaguely magical. It was his grimoire that added a lot of the weight, but the brick certainly didn't help.
"Ethan," Jane calls out over the girl's chatter, now that it's safe. "We can turn the car heater on without running the engine, right? I know we can't run the engine because it'll build up carbon monoxide, but I'm cold."
Now that she mentioned it, Ethan was getting chilly—and cold would be yet another stuck in the mountain survival issue. "Yeah that would work for now," Ethan calls back, "but there can't be more than ten hours of battery power, so we have to figure out how to stay warm after that."
Ethan inspects a ball of green twine that he imagines is imbued with some interesting magical property.
"Wait," Erica leans over the back seat to glare at Ethan, "you think we're going to be here longer than ten hours?" Even in the weak dappled light of the fairy balls her fangs glinted menacingly.
"Did I forget to mention," Ethan's strained voice comes out higher than normal, "that uh... Benny apparently needs two days to recharge before he can cast the spell again..." Ethan lets the words trail off, tensely watching Erica's movements. "But we might find another way out before that." Ethan squeaks.
Sarah slammed her fist into the side of the car beyond Erica, effectively blocking Erica from Ethan. Right. Vampire girlfriend. Handy.
"Ugh I wouldn't do anything to Ethan." Erica rolls her eyes, "Permanent." She adds quietly. Ethan gulped.
"Okaay," Jane says, "But I'm still cold and I don't know how to turn the car on."
Sarah isn't moving. Erica scoffs but gives in, leaning forward to turn the car's electricity on.
"Thanks," Jane says flatly and begins fiddling with the dials to get the result she wants.
"Maybe," Erica begins in a falsely bright tone, "We should move all the humans into the back row so they can keep each other warm." On several occasions, Sarah had assured Ethan that Erica was only condescending and mean to mask the fact she cared. Ethan guessed it still counted as helping.
"I'm warm." Sarah whines.
"Right," Erica looks pained as if Sarah was forcing to call up patience from some previously unknown depths, "But you shouldn't be. We're dead Sarah. We don't have to breath, eat human food, or produce body heat. Considering we're stuck in a mountain without a lot of feeding options, maybe we should be conserving energy? Hmm?"
"Fine," Sarah relents, "but I don't know how to... 'turn myself off.'"
Ethan waits in the back as the girls play musical car seats. Jane crawls back to where Ethan had been sitting, leaving her spot open for Erica. Once Erica is in the front, she does her best to scoop Benny up (It's not that he's heavy, he's just an awkward shape), bracing her knee on the middle console as she feeds him head first to Sarah. Benny's body is completely limp and watching his limbs flop turns Ethan's stomach.
Sarah positions Benny gently into Erica's old spot, going so far to take off her jacket and fold it into a pillow. Still his head lolls straight back with his mouth gaping open. As an afterthought Sarah gathers up some of the glass from the floor and tosses it outside the door though the broken window. Thankfully the window is mostly intact and doesn't pose a serious danger.
Afterwards Sarah climbs into the driver's seat. While Jane is the smallest, she is leaving the middle seat open for Ethan. Begrudgingly, Ethan gathers up his findings and clambers into the middle seat.
Erica is walking Sarah through turning off her body's autonomic functions. Jane has reopened her grimoire and resumed skimming its contents. Ethan shows her the green twine, "Do you know what this is."
Jane huffs, "I'm actually doing something here." She gestures to the open book in her lap.
"Real quick," Ethan pleads, "Either you know what it is or not."
Jane takes the twine, whispering in Latin. It glows briefly. "This is ordinary twine, Ethan" She reports, "Besides don't you get visions off enchanted items?"
"Right." Ethan says deflated. He hadn't gotten visions off anything he pulled from Benny's bag. Why would Benny pack half a spool of twine, an empty tin box, marbles, and a dog toy. Even those gemstones hadn't given Ethan a vision.
Benny makes a pained grunt in his sleep. Ethan scoots up to Benny until their sides are fully touching, to keep him warm. Unable to help Jane and uninterested in discussing birthday party plans with Sarah and Erica, Ethan resigns himself to wait patiently as Benny's heater. At least he has a book.
