The sparkles shifted, resolved into shimmering forms.
Poppy stared.
Unicorns! A whole herd of them. Their fur was thick and smooth—like mirrored silver, reflecting the sunlight and refracting rainbows as they ran. Their wide sides cast blurred reflections of the trees as they passed. Poppy gasped as one galloped so near that for a sharp moment she could see her own face reflected in its fur. It lifted its head and the light gleamed off its glass-like horn. Even their eyes seemed to catch the light and throw it back again.
A moment, maybe two, and the herd was gone. The drumbeat of their hooves faded away to nothing, and the forest stilled in their wake, as if shocked into silence. It took a few minutes for Poppy to stop shaking, but she knew she’d been given a gift, and she promised herself she would never forget it. The Grimwood was magical. She had always known it, but she had never imagined anything so beautiful.
“I wonder what they were running from,” Mack said in a low, awestruck voice.
Nula, the bird, fluttered down from the tree to land between Poppy and Mack. A soft pop and she was a pooka again. “Wow,” she breathed. “Glad I didn’t miss that.”
“Me too.” Poppy swallowed as she turned to the pooka. “Thank you, Nula. Really.”
Surprise flashed across Nula’s face. Her cheeks flushed as she gave Poppy a small nod. “It was … It was no trouble.”
On a whim, Poppy threw her arms around Mack’s neck and squeezed. Her reward was his fleeting look of shock and a red stain that spread up his neck.
Poppy laughed and rolled her shoulders a few times until her neck cracked. Everything was perfect. She patted her leg to bring Dog to her side, relaxing as Eta leaned in to lick the back of her hand. “By the way, Nula. I’ve been meaning to ask you … When you change forms like that … what … happens to your clothes? I mean … they come right back again, but … where do you put them?”
Nula stopped walking and turned a blank face to Poppy. “I never thought about that.” She laughed. “I don’t put them anywhere. When I shift, I guess the magic just knows what things are mine—the same way it knows the rest of me belongs to me.” She shrugged. “I don’t need to know how, as long as everything comes back again.”
A mystery for another day, Poppy thought, turning to look over her shoulder at Mack. Sure enough, his blush had deepened. She put him out of his misery and changed the subject.
“Let’s go to the Holly Oak. If anyone can tell us where to start looking for an altered malediction, it’s her.”
Mack was still recovering from their conversation and Poppy’s burst of exuberance. His voice was softer than normal. “I know the unicorns were amazing, but the Grimwood’s not everything you think it is, Poppy.”
“It’s more than I even hoped it would be. We’ll be fine—this is the right thing. Can’t you feel it?”
“Well…”
“Come on, Mack! This might be my only chance to explore. And anyway, what’s the worst that could happen?”
He frowned. “Seriously?” He met Nula’s eyes, looking for backup, but the pooka’s gaze slid away.
Poppy grinned at him. “We’ll be careful,” she amended. “I promise.”
He huffed a breath. “Well, we’ll have to be.”
They moved into the forest at a good pace. As they moved through the wood, the trees grew denser. Here and there, they saw thorn trees and avoided the darker circles of soil that marked their reach.
Poppy was surprised how many there were … just on their own. Her parents’ journals spoke of the thorn groves in the Grimwood deep on the far side of the Holly Oak, but she hadn’t expected there to be so many thorn trees on the way. Dog kept their distance too. For the first time, Poppy could smell the iron-tinged scent of blood coming off the soil like a warning.
The wood was quieter than she expected too. A breeze rustled through the canopy from time to time. But besides that, the occasional Mogwen song in the distance, and the thumping of a woodpecker, the only sounds were their footsteps, and Dog, panting. Maybe she had just grown so used to the constant buzzing of the blood ward that once it was gone everything seemed quiet.
Dog was alert, except for Two, who kept falling asleep, his head lolling. Brutus trotted along next to Poppy, while Eta kept her ears cocked forward, listening.
Ahead of them Nula slowed as she passed a tall moss-covered stone. She dropped down into the form of a small lynx and prowled around it—sniffing.
“Mack?”
“Yeah. I see her.”
“What’s she doing? That looks almost like … a gravestone.”
Brutus’s knees locked straight at the sight of the cat, but Poppy put her hand on his head. “Leave it, Brutus.” He gave her a baleful look, checked to see whether Eta was interested (she wasn’t), and huffed a breath.
Poppy slipped forward to examine the stone too. It sat under a hawthorn tree—yet another plant covered in two-inch-long thorns—but at least the hawthorn trees didn’t try to eat you like thorn trees did. It had to be a really old grave. The stone crumbled at the corners, and the writing was so worn and covered in moss it was impossible to read.
Mack stiffened. His voice was wary. “Poppy, does it seem … darker to you?”
She looked up. A pall had fallen over the woods. “No … it’s just fog.”
As if naming it gave permission, the fog began to sift up out of the ground. Nula appeared out of nowhere behind them and even Dog jumped. Brutus gave an offended woof.
“We should go now,” Nula whined, herself again. She lay her ears flat into her thick brown hair. “I don’t like it here.”
Poppy nodded, just as a piercing
