She scooped her brother onto her back and Fibber wrapped his furry arms round her neck, his small, clawed paws closing in a knot under her chin. Fox smiled at the brush of fur against her skin; it wasn’t exactly a hug, but it felt as warm and as safe as she imagined hugs might feel.
And, though Fox had made a number of mistakes out in Jungledrop, she knew she’d got one thing right as she stepped out into the mist. She’d teamed up with her brother. And she hoped that having a sibling on her side, or on her back as was the case now, could make the difference between winning and losing in a forest full of dark magic.
Fox walked deeper into the Bonelands, picking a path through the withered trees and rotten plants while Heckle flew on a few metres ahead. So thick was the mist that now and again Fox wondered whether the parrot had flown off completely, but she always reappeared in the end, a jolt of colour against the gloom. Eventually, the mist thickened so much that Fox couldn’t even see the ground beneath her feet. She felt the sloth tighten his paws round her neck.
‘Heckle,’ Fox whispered. ‘Where are you?’
The reply that came was not a squawk but a hiss. A long, rasping hiss that needled its way through the mist.
Fox leapt back. The hiss came again. It was close. So close it seemed to scratch the insides of her ear and, at the sound of it, Fox scuttled sideways which, it turned out, was exactly what the hissing creatures wanted.
The ground beneath Fox’s feet fell away and she shot downwards with a scream. The only reason she didn’t fall any further was because she managed to grab two fistfuls of weeds, but now she was dangling above a large, soily pit. She clung to the weeds on the rim and the sloth clung to her for all he was worth.
And then the hissing sounded again.
Fox forced herself to glance down, then immediately wished she hadn’t. Beneath her the pit was full of vipers. And there were so many of them they wove in and out of each other, all patterned scales and flickering tongues, like a heap of slithering chains. But what sent a rush of fear right through Fox was the realisation that the snakes were, one by one, raising their heads and their black fangs were getting closer and closer to her feet.
Fox tried to haul herself out of the pit, but the weeds she clung to were wet and rotten and, every time she gained a few centimetres, a handful would snap off and she’d have to reach for another clump to stop herself tumbling into the pit.
‘Heckle!’ she gasped. ‘I need your help! Where are you?!’
But the parrot was nowhere to be seen. Perhaps the bird had gone so far ahead she hadn’t even heard Fox scream.
Fox scrabbled for a firmer hold as the snake tongues got nearer still, but no matter how hard she tried to pull herself out she just couldn’t. The hissing grew louder and panic seized Fox’s body so that all she could do was cling on, her eyes bulging with fear. And, had it not been for the little sloth hugging her tight, she might well have given up then and let herself fall to her doom. But she clung on, even when the first of the vipers raked at the skin of her ankle with its fang.
Fox cried out. Not from pain but from the deadening sensation that was now spreading through her leg. The snake’s fangs were coated in poison, that much was clear, and it was a poison that seemed to be turning her foot to – Fox glanced down – stone!
It was then that Heckle came to the rescue. She had heard Fox scream when she fell and she had heard her scream again when the first of the vipers attacked. She had been gaining height, climbing up through the sky as high as she dared, to lend her ambush speed and force, so that when she did, finally, come hurtling down from the canopy, she was a fury of talons and feathers.
The parrot squawked and screeched as she batted at the snakes with her wings, tore at their scales with her talons and pecked as hard as she could with her beak. Thankfully, whatever curse the viper’s poison had laid on Fox’s leg hadn’t had time to set in for good because, as she looked down, she saw it was returning to normal, no longer stone but skin. And having Heckle come to her rescue spurred Fox on to try to haul herself out of the pit again.
She pulled with renewed strength, buoyed by the knowledge that the jungle’s most emotionally intrusive parrot was battling for her, as if she actually mattered and was worth fighting for.
Fox yanked herself free of the pit and ran blindly on. Heckle followed. The parrot was missing several feathers, but she was alive and free from the vipers. And, with the sloth still clinging to Fox’s back, the three of them tore through the forest, away from the pit, as fast as they could. Fox didn’t even stop when she felt a paw pinching her cheek.
‘Ouch,’ Fox panted as she leapt over a fallen tree and ran on. ‘What did you do that for, Fibber?’
It was Heckle who replied. ‘Fibber is trying to remind you to thank
