Wow at last. You guys have no idea how sorry I am this took. SENIOR YEAR SUCKS! But than thanksgiving break saved my life and now I finally have time to work on I digress. On with the story.
Disclaimer: I don't own epic and never will
I have never seen such a creature, Nod thought. But whatever it is, it's got me rooted to the spot. Nothing could be truer. His muscles would not respond and he couldn't tear his eyes away from the penetrating gaze that seem to bore into his soul. He didn't know if it was out of fear, fascination, or a mixture of both.
The creature's pink, raspy tongue flicked out and swiped its cheeks. Its pointed canines flashed in the light, making Nod's knees tremble a little. Those were some large, dangerous teeth.
"Nobody move," M.K. called out softly. He could tell that she was trying to stay calm but the slight tremor in her voice was audible."This is a house cat...they tend to want to eat little things."
The cat not having budged from its spot, only the tip of its long tail flicking, studied them the same way Cricket had when he spied a living bug.
"Then why hasn't it eaten us yet?" Thryn asked, just as soft and not moving her head toward M.K.
"It probably hasn't decided to."
That seemed to be the explanation. The cat continued to stare; it wondered if they were edible or even worth the meal. Nod wouldn't wait around for it to make its choice.
"On three, everybody jump," Nod whispered. The cat's ears flicked at the sound of his voice. "One…"
A deep growl emitted from the feline's throat, its hair rising on its neck. It was like it knew what they were going to do. The ivory claws slid from their sheaths, digging into the tree bark.
"Three!"
Without waiting to see if they would follow him, Nod grabbed M.K.'s hand and pulled them both over the edge. The cat snarled and swiped it's claws at where they once stood. Air whipped past him and he turned himself and M.K. until their feet faced the ground
"Bend your knees!" he shouted.
"I know what to do!"
Initially, the impact sent pain through their legs since it was hard ground and not the cushioning undergrowth of the forest. But as they bent their knees, the shock was absorbed and it passed quickly out of their bodies. The others landed behind them and Nod did a head count. Wait a minute, he thought. Where's...
"Jason!" M.K. cried.
Nod and the others looked up to see that the young man was still in the tree, having not followed them when he should have. Instead, he ran down the branch until its end, the cat taking methodical steps towards him. The branch quivered with the weight, making Jason nearly lose his balance several times.
"You have to jump!" Nod yelled as loud as he could, more than a little irritated that Jason was still in the tree with the hungry cat.
"And break my ankles?!" he shouted back, wind-milling his arms to keep upright. The cat was having no trouble, placing its paws slowly but firmly on the flimsy branch.
"We made it down just fine, you snail brain!" Thryn added, not bothering to hide her irateness. "Get your butt down here or the cat's going to eat it!"
"Snail brain..." Jason muttered through gritted teeth. However there was no time for a comeback, for the cat was almost upon him. All it had to do was stretch out its claws and snag him for lunch. He tried to give himself a pep talk. "C'mon Jason, you like trying new things...sort of."
A black paw swiped the air in front of him, nearly hitting his face. He swayed back and did not regain his balance in time before his foot slipped. All he felt then was nothing but air. He fell, time slowing down even though he knew that the ground was coming up fast. The wind made his eyes tear up and he could see blurry figures on the ground shouting at him, but could not hear a single thing but the roaring wind.
Just before his face could meet the dirt, something caught him. Or more like he landed on something strong and cushioning. Gusts of air writhed beneath him, billowing his clothes and making him hover a few centimeters above the ground. Then it dissipated and he floated gently to the ground.
The others ran to him and Mason helped him to his feet. He dusted himself off. "What was that?"
"I think it was the wind bird," M.K. replied. "It kind of caught you."
"Good thing to or you would have busted up your face, the way you were falling and all," Mason quipped.
A hair-raising yowl broke their banter as the cat began to climb down the tree trunk, its green eyes locked on them. The teenagers broke into a run, dashing from the foot of the tree through the short, springy grass of the backyard. They needed to get out this place before the feline caught up to them.
Halfway across the lawn, Nod saw a flowerbed growing next to the fence. That could offer some cover until they could find a way out. He picked up speed when he heard the thud of paws hitting the ground and coming toward them. He didn't dare look back.
He reached the edge first, stopping there to make sure the others made it. M.K. and Mason rushed pass him, not stopping until they were safe within the forest of plants. Jason was close behind. Ross and Lex were almost there and Nod was sure that they were all in the clear...until he saw the cat bounding toward them, making a beeline for his two friends that were still in the open.
For a big animal, it moved fast. And as quick as Ross and Lex were, Nod knew that they wouldn't make it before the cat got them first. Dashing out from the flowers, Nod pulled his short sword from the sheath on his back. In two seconds, he planted his feet, drew back his arm, and hurled the weapon. It flew, the blade flashing as it spun. The cat was almost upon them.
It was a rushed throw, therefore it was only a glancing blow. The sharp end of the blade bounced off the cat's nose, giving it the tiniest scratch. But it was enough. The creature screeched in surprise, pawing its own face like there was an annoying flea there. The distraction gave Ross and Lex enough time to make it to the flowerbed, Nod close behind them.
The cat was furious, hissing loudly and its fur puffed along it spine. The teenagers cowered back, fearful that the flowers would not be enough to hide them. Yet the cat did not approach any closer but continued to pace along the edge, frustrated growls omitting from its throat.
"It's not going to come after us?" Lex squeaked, more than a little shaken from the experience of almost being eaten.
"It can't," M.K. pointed at something near the edge of the flowerbed. Half of a round, orange fruit rested there, its bright orange flesh exposed and giving off a faint but pleasant smell. More of the same fruit were set at intervals all along the flowerbeds.
"Don't know why, but cats hate the smell of oranges or any other citrus fruit," the red-head explained. "The owners put them there to keep the cat out of the garden."
"Some luck at last," Ross commented.
As strange as this sounded to Nod, he decided not to question it. The longer they lingered, the bigger the chance of the cat finding a way in. They moved further in, wanting to leave behind the beast that was glaring at them from the yard, waiting for them to come out. Nod was not necessarily worried that they were trapped; there just had to be a hole they could slip through or some way they could scale the fence. The others tried whistling to their birds but none of their mounts heeded the calls.
As they moved, each area offered new flowers. Where they had escaped the cat, they were protected by purple and white pansies, though the flowers were so short, it didn't do much to hide them. As they moved on, they passed through patches of marigolds and daffodils. The last section had tall, thorny, and familiar plants.
"Roses," Nod murmured. He had to pause and stare at them. They were huge, their thorns about as long as the length of his body. Some were in full bloom, the petals spread out to look like miniature suns. Most were pink and magenta, a few were white. He looked at his own rose, still a green bud that refused to open, though it was a bit bigger and bulkier now. As soon as the thought crossed his mind, he felt the familiar dizziness that came when the rose had taken more than its fair share of his energy. He needed food and water and he needed it sooner than later.
M.K. noticed his slight swaying. "You feeling okay?"
"The rose...it's hogging all the life in me." He cracked a grin, trying not to let M.K. worry too much about him.
"We'll fix that when the birds come back," Lex reassured.
Ross suddenly face-palmed. "Dammit, we took all the supplies and saddles off in the tree. It's all still up there!"
"No worries," Mason said. "When we have the birds back, we'll fly up and fetch them, and hopefully the cat won't be around."
Quite suddenly, Nod felt something heavy in the air. Something omniscient was watching them, making his gut knot up. It was almost like the same feeling he felt when he had brunch with the Queen in her garden...Great, I'm feeling plant presences again.
Like it had awakened, one of the giant roses suddenly moved. But there was no wind; no, the rose moved on its own accord, like it was actually thinking. Everybody fell dead silent, shocked as this towering plant turned its flowery face from the sun to the teenagers huddled below its leaves; and (surprise, surprise) the center of its attention was Nod.
All around them, other roses shook their leaves and stems, turned towards him like the first one. They were surrounded by the active plants, all of them acting like inquisitive birds, moving their petals to the side as if trying to get a good look at them. Nod felt his own rose uncurl from its rest and raise itself slowly and hesitantly, like it was shy of its bigger brethren.
For a moment, the big roses and Nod's rose stilled to frozen statues and all that could be heard was the breathing of apprehensive teenagers as they waited and feared the outcome.
Then, the big roses backed off, recoiling their leaves, moving away from the strange little rose on Nod's arm like it was toxic. Nod thought they would cower back like all the other plants that had reacted to his rose.
The opposite happened. Instead, one seemed to gather its courage and rose up, challengingly, the leaves flared out and the thorns somehow looking sharper. The group tensed, ready to move. Thryn had not separated herself from her katanas and they slid effortlessly from their sheaths. Mason, Ross, and Lex had left their weapons strapped to the saddles but they had each kept a long knife at their sides. Nod, M.K., and Jason were the only ones unarmed.
The one rose's challenge affected the others and they were all rearing up and were hissing like snakes, just like Nod's rose did at a threat. However, now his flower was the one cowed by fear, intimidated by all the bigger bullies. It shrank against his arm, trying to disappear.
"This day just keeps getting weirder," Jason muttered.
The angry roses attacked.
The sky was a clear blue, not even a spot of clouds floating in its abyss. The only thing that marred the azure atmosphere was a group of dark specks in the distance. The specks cawed obnoxiously to one another and their flight patterns could make any observer think that the birds were drunk. Their riders did not correct their haphazard wing beats as they were more intent on scanning the land below them.
"This is pointless!" a Boggan growled. His complaint caught the attention of the Boggan flying next to him.
"Shut it, Snitch! No one wants to hear it."
Snitch was not chastised in the slightest and argued further. "We aren't going to find anybody out here, Krok! We are way out of our lands and there's hardly anything except miles of blasted trees!"
The leader of the group pulled harshly on his grackle's feathers, bringing the bird to a halt and hover in the air. The ones following did not expect it and some had to careen out-of-the-way, lest they crashed. The Boggan leader turned a murderous glare on the two bickering spineless fools in the back. He had heard them, he always did. Boggans were not known for their whispers and skills in subtlety.
"So, Snitch since you bring up an actual valid point, I'll let you be the first one to turn around and fly back to Lord Batlash to tell him how illogical his plan is of sending out patrols to find a stupid flower, with orders to not return until we have it in our custody." He rounded on the second one. "And furthermore, Krok can go with you and tell Lord Batlash how empty-headed you are. You can waste his time and see what happens, or you can waste my time and suffer through days or even weeks of searching for a plant within a forest of plants!"
Silence is what met his ultimatum, Krok and Snitch not daring to lift up their bowed, shamed heads. Savidicus was a Boggan known for his words, a rare trait to find among their kind of culture. Needless to say, he was good at persuasion and threatening if he needed to. It's why he rose in the ranks rather quickly.
"Savidicus!" The shout drew the leader's attention to a Boggan that had flown lower in an attempt to sweep the area. He guided his grackle to fly up to his leader and he saluted. "There's a strange disturbance below, in what looks like a Stomper settlement."
Savidicus's interest piqued up. Though he would always follow Batlash's orders to the letter and without hesitation, he also felt the same irritation that the rest of his Boggans felt. It's like their Lord had expected them to have superpowers to try and find a bloody rose attached to the arm of (surprisingly) a teenager! At this point, Savidicus would investigate a pile of badger crap if it meant that their target could be found in it.
"Show me!" he barked. The Boggan descended on his mount, followed by the rest of the patrol. The box-like, wooden structures that Stompers lived in grew bigger as they approached. The Boggan led him to a tree that grew in the back lot of one of these buildings.
The Boggans perched their grackles in the tree's branches, shielded from sight by the leaves. Savidicus looked through the canopy and saw a strange creature he had never seen before, yowling, snarling, and pacing in front of a row of flowers. It was obviously irate about something though he had no idea what.
"You brought me down here because you thought some beast with a temper was important to our mission?" he addressed the Boggan, clearly not amused.
"Er...no sir, it wasn't that," the Boggan amended. "I thought I saw some flowers moving."
Savidicus gritted his teeth. "You thought you saw flowers moving?" By the power of Rot, deliver me from these idiots.
"Yes, they were moving in such an unnatural way, I thought it might be the missing Queen." He realized that his leader was still not convinced and quickly pointed out into the garden. "It was those flowers, sir. I think they are roses."
Savidicus looked and indeed, spotted a patch of roses in the garden, further away from their position. He glanced suspiciously at them and saw that some of them were moving in a strange, abnormal way. It reminded him of a pit of angry vipers. He could even here slight hissing sounds that were drowned out by the caterwauling of the animal.
"What are your orders?" the Boggan asked hesitantly, still not sure if his superior believed him.
"We wait," Savidicus said. "I'm not charging into a situation I know nothing about. If what we came for is in there, I get the feeling that we will know soon enough."
Nod was being pushed to his limit: physically and mentally. Today was just not his day. He had gone from waking up in a safe place to fleeing for his life from Boggans and a hungry house cat. Now he was evading every which way so he wouldn't be mauled by roses.
Really, was his luck this bad?!
The roses were acting like rabid raccoons and were snaking their thorny stems as far as they could go just to reach him. If it was just one, he could handle it unarmed, but he and his friends were surrounded by at least a dozen, maybe more. He didn't even have his sword anymore. The constant drain of his energy (thanks to his burden) rendered his physique, strength, and stamina worthless. He was already breathing shallowly and sweating.
When they tried to run, some of the roses moved fast enough to surround the young warriors, enclosing them in a prickly cage. The group was then occupied trying to keep from being killed by the remaining flowers, particularly Nod.
As he moved, his friends that had weapons fought to keep them at bay and as far away from him as possible. Thryn sliced through their thorns and stems with her katanas. Mason, Ross, and Lex were doing there best to help but their knives didn't give them much reach. If they got to close to the writhing things they risked getting horribly scratched, or worse, impaled.
"What is the deal with these things?!" Lex cried as she flipped to evade a thorny stem.
"I think the rose has an effect on plants like the Queen does," Nod panted, pivoting to avoid a rose that tried to dive-bomb him. He managed to kick it away so he could recover and escape. "Only the flora is not as welcoming!"
"No kidding," Thyrn grunted. Out of all of them, she was having the better time with it but for every rose she cut down, two more replaced it.
"Keep distracting them! I have an idea!" M.K. shouted. "Jason, come with me, I'll need your help."
"Whatever you're going to do, do it quick!" Thryn replied.
M.K. and Jason ran from the chaotic battle, squeezing through a gap in the rose barrier that was barely big enough for their bodies. The roses didn't pay any attention to them as they were more focused on the elusive Nod who could not avoid them for much longer.
"What are you planning?" Jason asked between breaths. Of all the weird things happening to him today, this won the blue ribbon.
"I'm going to give those things something else to fight," M.K. muttered through gritted teeth. Jason wish he could share in her determination; she was obviously more accustomed to dealing with weird incidents like this.
They reached the edge where the bed touched the yard. The cat was still there, crouched on its paws, tail sweeping back and forth. At the sight of them, its ears flattened and a growl rose from its chest.
"Help me with this," M.K. said, breaking Jason's wary gaze from the cat to the half orange slice sitting in the sun. She shooed away the fruit flies contentedly sucking on the citrus juices and pushed with all her strength. Understanding dawned and Jason rushed to help her, throwing his effort in. Slowly, they pushed the orange up and it fell over, the round half now facing up.
M.K. pointed to another orange a little down the way. "Now that one." And again, they pushed with all their might to tip it over on its other side. Jason had a fleeting thought of how he used to effortlessly juggle oranges and other fruits to entertain his brothers when they were younger. Now he was struggling to lift up half of an orange.
When they finally succeeded, the cat was already creeping closed, still sniffing the citrus in the air but it wasn't as strong as before. They backed up further into the flower bed but the cat advanced on them faster, encouraged to begin the chase again.
"Let's hope this works!" Jason yelled as he and M.K. turned to run for their lives, back to the others.
"It better," she replied. "I'm fresh out of ideas."
They heard the cat crashing through the foliage behind them and ran faster. Soon they heard the sounds of the others ahead, one voice in particular louder than the others.
"Hey Ross!" Mason shouted, sounding a little more gleeful than he should given the circumstances. "Doesn't this remind you of a poem?"
Ross didn't miss a beat. "Shut up, Mason!"
"Oh, come on and say it with me!" Mason leaped on a rose head that was getting to close to Nod while his back was turned and stabbed its petals with his knife. It didn't stop him from reciting the poem he came up with in his head: "Roses are red, violent and rude. They want to kill Nod and Ross's inner poet too!"
And all of them in unison: "SHUT UP, MASON!"
"We need to go! Backup's on its way!" M.K. shouted as she and Jason arrived.
"What do you-" Lex began asking when the cat crashed through and ran headlong into the thrashing, rabid flowers. "Never mind!"
The feline screeched something unholy as the roses' thorns scratched its face. It clawed back with a fury, shredding their petals and leaves. The flowers all converged on this new attacker and it gave Thryn the time to slice through the stems to make an opening.
The group ran like they had an entire army of Boggans on their heels, leaving the cat and roses to fight it out. Nod was near to collapsing on his feet but he summoned the last of his strength to make it out of the forest of flowers. When they bursted out back in the open, he put his fingers to his lips and emitted the sharpest, loudest whistle he could manage. The others followed suit and they waited in tense silence, hoping against hope that their birds would finally heed the call.
After about ten seconds, their feathered mounts fly out of the trees and land next to them. The teenagers scrambled on and wasted no time escaping. M.K. took the initiative and helped Nod onto Flitterbite, taking the front seat and kicking the jay's sides hard. The bird, usually prone to responding to harsh signals with aggression, felt her fear and could hear the yowls of an angry predator. He took off without delay.
In the air at last, the flock flew away from the Stomper's backyard, wind rushing through M.K.'s hair as she tried to calm her hammering heart. Nod was slumped against her back, taking deep breaths and his muscles shaking from exertion. They needed to stop again soon or he'll faint from exhaustion.
Wait! A sudden thought occurred to her, something that Ross had said and the fact that she finally registered that she was riding bareback. We can't refuel without the supplies. Their packs, saddles, and weapons were still in the tree.
She was about to call out to the others when she heard it. The throaty shrieks of grackles. Whipping her head around, she spotted the dark birds and their armed riders closing the distance between them. A patrol must have finally caught up with them and had waited for them to recklessly charge from their hiding place. The other teenagers saw them too and shouted at their birds to speed up. M.K. ducked low as she willed Flitterbite faster, feeling Nod's weight bear on her as he slipped into unconsciousness. They were running again and this time, they had nothing.
Even a short review does wonders for encouragement. Please leave one but if you're still pissed at me for taking so long, I understand. I cannot guarantee the next update will come any faster.