“No,” she said, “I am not, for now I am cursed and alone. But it is my punishment to be this way, for I was the starstone’s guardian, and I allowed the creature to take it. Now, I guard this pool with my life, for it is the only purpose I have left.”
“Cyren,” I said, “what is the creature called?”
She swallowed, the fear evident in her eyes. “Some call it bloodthorn.”
An uneasy silence settled in the forest.
“Cyren, we are here because we are trying to stop this creature—the bloodthorn—from killing more people. Anything you can tell us about him will help us to find and stop him. Isn’t that what you want?”
She only stared at me with those haunting red eyes. “Just as I was, so it was. I was elf. It was unicorn.”
Unicorn?
“But why?” I asked. “Why would it have stolen its own starstone?”
She nodded toward the pool. “Before I became the pool’s guardian, he was its protector. I do not know how long he guarded it—hundreds of years, perhaps. During that time, images appeared in the water. At first, the visions were beautiful, but they grew increasingly more alarming, until he was convinced that he must create a portal in the pool to escape our lands. One day, we came to visit him, only to find him gone. We searched but never found him, until years later, he returned to our forest. But he was different. He was tainted and dark. Evil. He no longer walked as a unicorn, but as a man. After his return, he stole our stone and took it to the unknown land.”
“How do you know this?” I asked.
“Because I was his apprentice.”
“You?” Heidel asked.
She nodded. “After he stole our stone and disappeared into the unknown land, I kept watch for him. I waited many years, and when he returned to our world to steal the fairies’ stone, I knew it was my time to confront him. I left my wood in order to challenge the bloodthorn, and I found him as he escaped the fairies’ forest with the starstone. He tried to return to the unknown land, but I stopped him. I tried to kill the bloodthorn, but he created a portal and escaped to the human realm.”
“Can you tell us where to find the land where he took your stone?”
“The entrance is atop Dragon Spine Mountain. But it would do no good to go there now, for I sealed it shut with a ward, using his own blood against him. Now, he will never have enough power to activate the portal.”
I mulled over her words as the clues began to piece together. “If you sealed it with his blood,” I said, “then the creature will be trying to create another entrance to the unknown land. If he’s now stuck on Earth, that may explain the murders. The bloodthorn is using dark energy to fuel the stone so he can open a portal into the unknown land. He’s trying to escape with the fairies’ stone just as he did with the unicorns’ stone.”
“But why?” Kull asked. “What reason does he have for taking the stones?”
“And why does he seem to target you?” Heidel asked. “Both victims in Earth Kingdom were related to your clients. It almost seems as if he were trying to send you a message.”
“Perhaps,” Cyren said, “he needs her.”
“For what purpose?” I asked.
“Your powers, perhaps? Your magic is very powerful, for I have felt it in this wood since you entered. I am surprised you are able to control such a potent energy.”
“I’m not sure that I can,” I muttered.
“Then we must return to Earth Kingdom,” Kull said. “We must find him before he kills another victim, and we must stop him before he creates the portal.”
“But we still have no idea who we’re looking for.” I turned to Cyren. “I know the creature is difficult for you to speak of, but can’t you tell us anything else about him?”
“I can tell you that he no longer understands the difference between good and evil. What he once called light, he now sees only as darkness. He seeks to destroy the unicorns and fairies. He will not hesitate to kill them.”
I turned to Kull. “The fairy prince and princess—they may be in more danger than we realized.”
“I agree,” Kull said, “but we still do not know who to look for.”
I turned back to Cyren. “Do you know if the creature is a shape-shifter?”
She pressed her eyes closed, seeming much older. “The bloodthorn only has one true form, though he can manipulate his essence to take over another’s body.”
The moon rose over the dale, lighting it with a bright bluish glow that illumined the elven girl’s milky skin. Something moved in the trees above us. I looked but saw nothing.
“The bloodthorn is a beast conjured from nightmares,” Cyren said. “He and his companion from the unknown land have appearances meant to strike fear into those who see their true forms.”
“Companion?” Kull asked. “You never mentioned a companion.”
“Didn’t I?”
The rustling leaves grew louder. Scanning the trees overhead, I found a dark shape blocking out the moonlight. Chills prickled my skin as its bulky body and long, spiny legs came into view.
It had a spider’s body and a human head, like some kind of hack job spliced together in a freakish laboratory. Human arms in various stages of decomposition hung from its thorax. Its head had one bulging eye, and the other was sewn shut. Its gaping maw revealed rows of toothless gums interspersed with sharklike teeth that were too big for its mouth. Cancerous, busted lips dripped blood where teeth had cut into its own flesh. The spider’s legs ended in sharp, pointed tips that dripped greenish liquid.
Gliding to the forest floor on a silky thread of greenish-gray webbing, the spider landed with a gentle thump behind the elven girl.
“I am sorry it has to come to this,” the girl said. “But you should have never entered
