The Holly Oak’s smooth shoulders appeared next, followed by her arms, which lifted into a graceful stretch. A rustling sound, and the bark below her collarbones shifted into a gown of russet and gold leaves.
The Holly Oak smiled, her hazel eyes sparkling with amusement. She lifted one arm to point directly at Poppy. “You are Pandora Sunshine Bright. I can see your mother and your father in you. Come here.” Her voice was deep and rough.
Poppy swallowed and stepped back up on the dais. “Just Poppy,” she whispered.
The tree gave her a gentle smile. “Poppy, then. Come closer. I won’t bite.” The Holly Oak lifted one hand to shield her mouth so the others couldn’t see. “I don’t have to,” she confided.
Poppy’s mouth twitched. She did as she was asked.
The Holly Oak reached up and took Poppy’s chin in her fingers. Her grip was gentle, but firm—strong. Poppy held very still. She could sense the care the Holly Oak used, as if in other circumstances, she could choose to snap bone with her bare fingers.
The Oak turned Poppy’s face first to one side, and then the other. She let go, and Poppy fell back a step. “You have your parents’ bravery, I think.” She smiled as her hazel eyes narrowed. “But I think … not yet their wisdom.” She leaned forward from the tree, as though peeling herself away from it. “So, why are you here, Poppy Sunshine? Did your parents send you?”
“Send me? My—my parents? No. They’re in the wood too though, hunting something called the Soul Jar. They think it’s a malediction that was maybe altered by—”
Poppy sputtered to a halt as the smile melted off the Holly Oak’s face. “I’m familiar with that rumor. But I think you must be mistaken.”
Dark clouds appeared to roll over the Holly Oak’s face. Poppy faltered. “You—you mean it’s not a malediction? They can’t be changed to have an altered purpose?”
“No, your parents are right about that. I don’t know who has learned to change a malediction’s purpose and bind it with their blood. It must be a creature with great power. Nonetheless, that is certainly what this Soul Jar is.” She paused. “What I meant was, your parents aren’t hunting the Soul Jar. They aren’t in the Grimwood at all.”
“What?” Poppy shook her head. “No, they have to be. Where else would they be? Jute said they were.”
The Holly Oak leaned farther out, until Poppy was forced to step back off the dais to make way for the folds of her gown. “I cannot see them, or sense them. That can mean only one of two things.”
Poppy’s stomach dropped through the floor.
“It means they are dead, or they have crossed the fog.”
A small cry escaped Poppy’s lips, but the Holly Oak only straightened. Her eyes never left Poppy’s face. “I am sorry to be the bearer of these tidings.”
“No. That’s wrong.”
“It is not.”
“They can’t be dead.”
“Then they are outside the fog.”
“Why would they leave?” Mack asked, stepping forward. “I don’t think they’d do that. You said … you said the Soul Jar was real. What does it do?”
The tree cocked her head at him. “Hello, elf.”
Mack flushed and dropped his head. “Mackintosh nee Gala, ma’am. I go by Mack.”
“Mack,” the Oak acknowledged. “What does the Soul Jar do? Though I have not beheld it, I expect that, as its name implies, it traps souls—or the energy of souls.”
“That’s what we thought too.” Mack agreed.
Nula stepped up on Poppy’s other side. “So, could they be in there, then? Could Poppy’s parents have gotten caught in the Soul Jar? Would that explain why you can’t see them?”
Poppy’s heart raced. If her parents were stuck in the Soul Jar … then there was a chance she could get them out. Wasn’t there? She held her breath.
“Greetings, pooka.” Nula blushed dark blue under the Oak’s scrutiny. “Trapped inside a malediction. That is an interesting theory…”
Dog, sensing Poppy’s anxiety, leaned into her leg. Poppy dropped one cold hand down against Eta’s warm neck.
“It seems unlikely,” the tree finished.
“But—” Nula and Poppy said in unison.
Nula whipped the air with her tail. “Maybe you just don’t know as much as you think you do,” she snapped.
The Holly Oak’s hazel eyes focused on Nula. “And maybe, little pooka … maybe I know more than you think I do.”
“Stop it,” Mack hissed at Nula. “You’re not helping.”
Nula’s ears flattened.
“Can you see my house?” Poppy asked.
“Your home is of the wood, and so within my sight and sense.”
“And they’re not there?”
The tree shook her head, sending her leafy gown rustling.
“What about the Hollows?” Mack asked. “Can you see there?”
The gold-brown skin of the Holly Oak’s face darkened. “I cannot.”
Poppy scowled. “My parents aren’t welcome in Strange Hollow—not in any of the Hollows, especially now that Governor Gale is in charge.”
Mack grimaced. “That leaves the fog.”
“The fog does not belong to me,” the Holly Oak said. “My magic called it, and maintains it, but it is a free being. I cannot see within, or beyond it.”
Poppy felt the blood drain from her face. Mack looked queasy. “The fog … is really alive?”
“Its very nature is to obscure. Its task is to hold the Grimwood and the Hollows together, bound by my magic, and bound to it as well.”
The tree held up one hand as Poppy opened her mouth to speak. “Peace. I can only tell you what I know to be true. My power extends to all the trees and soil of the forest—only as far as the edge of Strange Hollow. If they are in the wood, this Soul Jar is the only place I know of where I might not know of their presence. Perhaps they are not dead.”
The wave of relief that washed over Poppy was so strong she thought she might be sick. Her parents weren’t dead. They couldn’t be. She wouldn’t let it be. And they weren’t gone forever into the outside world either—or lost in the fog. They would never leave the Grimwood behind. They
