Next Big Book Thing: The Druid Legacy by Mark Miller

Chapter 4 Larissa

I felt warm inside. I was lying with my head on her lap staring up at her, when she stopped singing and looked down at me. Her almond shaped eyes were pink, and now that I looked at her closely I realized that her hair had tints of green in it. It reminded me of a beautiful spring day. Lying there, I realized I was holding my breath. It was like my body suddenly forgot how to work right. My mouth opened and my jaw went up and down, but no sound came out. I am sure I looked to her like a fish dying slowly on the shore, gasping for water to breathe. She just sat there, smiling at me. I tried again with the word things.

“What are you?” I asked in wonderment.

I said this, as I knew with absolute certainty that she was too pretty to be human. She giggled and petted my cheek. I noticed pointy ears sticking through her hair. My mind reeled as I sat up; I had almost forgotten where I was, until I noticed I was still in chains, pegged to the ground. I looked around at the grelkin camp. It was almost completely packed up. I guessed we would be leaving soon.

“My name is Larissa, and I am a wood nymph. I am so happy you can see me, Druid. What order are you in? Do you follow Melikin? Did he send you to investigate the grelkin?” She asked all these questions in one rushing breath, her eyes wide, as she waited for my answer.

“Umm, I am 12,” I said.

“Oh, I am 73. Isn’t 12 young to be a Druid?” she asked.

At this point I noticed she wasn’t wearing chains, like I was, and none of the grelkin were paying her any attention.

“What is a Druid? Why do you keep calling me that?”

“Oh right, sorry. The grelkin might hear you. Of course they can’t hear me, but if they saw you talking to a bush about which order you were in and who sent you, that would be bad.” She crossed her arms as if perplexed about how to talk to me.

I slapped my forehead. I wanted to test that I was actually awake and suddenly I was sure I wasn’t, as there was no gash on my head from last night. So now I was sure I was dreaming. Since I was dreaming, I knew I could do anything and say anything. I decided since I was dreaming and right now my life was pretty much horrible, being a captive of the grelkin and all, I would allow myself to have an awesome dream. I might as well enjoy it before I woke up. I slid myself towards her and she leaned in like I was going to tell her a secret.

I closed my eyes and mashed my lips against hers. My toes were tingling and I forgot to breathe again. She gave out a stunned little squeak and then the dream got really weird. I heard Durrani’s voice directly behind me.

“Why are you kissing that bush?”

My eyes popped open and sure enough, I was kissing a bush. I think it was a dewberry. I stood and pivoted around to see Durrani smirking at me with his hands on his hips.

“Erm, just working on my morning breath, you know rub some leaves on your teeth and it helps. Here, want one?”

I reached down and plucked a leaf off. The bush made a little “hrumph” sound.

Durrani was walking off. As I turned back to him, I think I heard him muttering about having a delusional house slave. I was pretty sure he was right.

Across the camp, I saw the grelkin forming up a long caravan line of wagons. There was a long chain attached to the back of the rear wagon. As I watched, grelkin were leading humans, men and women from various spots around the camp, and hooking their hands to the long chain. Once they had their hands chained, they removed the shackles from their feet. I thought I had been the only human here last night, but apparently, the grelkin had been busy.

I had the sudden suspicion that I wasn’t dreaming, because when I control my own dreams I can fly and beat up monsters and I certainly could break through chains on my feet. As I was staring down at my chains, trying to use my dream powers to make them explode, my stomach growled. I also realized my mouth was dry; I hadn’t drunk anything since yesterday. I am never hungry in my dreams and that left me more confused than ever, as I studied Larissa the bush.

My deep thoughts were broken as I heard someone saying my name.

“Wess…is that you lad?”

I knew right away who it was and my insides froze at what it meant. I looked up to see Mr. Millen being chained to the back of the wagon. He was staring right at me, but I couldn’t answer. If he was here, that meant Myka had faced these creatures. I looked around desperately, but I didn’t see her anywhere.

Mr. Millen called out to me again. “She was out in the fields when they came, Wess. I haven’t seen her, so I am hoping she got away.”

At this point, I was grabbed once again under my arm and yanked hard towards the wagon. I vowed silently to never wash there as long as I was a captive. It was a small rebellion, but it was all I had really.

I was chained three people behind Mr. Millen, directly behind a short woman who had definitely eaten well, wherever she came from. I looked up and down the chain, and I guessed that there were about 20 of us there, with more coming still. I glanced back at the Larissa bush and blushed as I thought about my first kiss being with a 73 year old wood nymph/bush. I had always thought my first kiss would be with Myka if she would let me one day.

I broke free from my embarrassing thoughts as there were shouts all up the line of wagons. I lurched forward as our wagon began to move and I had no choice but to keep up.