Froggy's Arc

Chapter 2 of 6

The cattails snapped. Froggy fell. The stems let go all at once, and the open pond rushed up at him. Below, the heron's wet eyes fixed on him. Wind pushed past his face. He had nothing to grip, no stem, no leaf, no branch. If he hit the water hard, he would land stunned, and the long beak would be waiting. Froggy spread his legs wide. His webbed feet opened like four small sails. The air caught them. His fall slowed, just a little, and he tilted sideways, away from the bird. He kicked against the air and twisted his body toward the shore. The heron stabbed upward. Its beak clicked shut where Froggy had been a breath before. Froggy's slowed drift had carried him past it. He aimed his whole body at the thickest green he could see: the dense ring of reeds at the water's edge. He crashed into the stalks. Slender reeds bent under him and sprang back. Soft seed heads slapped his face. He grabbed one reed, lost it, caught another. Each one slowed him. He slid down through the layered stalks, bouncing from stem to stem, until his feet touched mud. Froggy lay still in the screen of reeds. His heart banged. The seed heads swayed above him, hiding him from the open water. Through a gap he saw the heron turn its head, searching. It could not find him. The reeds held him like a cupped hand. He breathed. He was alive. Bruised, muddy, and safe behind the green wall. Then he lifted his chin and remembered what he had seen from the top. The clear lane. The three small pads. The floating leaf. The sunlit throne at the heart of the pond, broad and golden. The route was still fixed in his mind, grip by grip, leap by leap. But now a tall gray shape stood between him and that lane. The heron had moved. It planted its legs in the shallow water, right across the clear path Froggy needed. Its beak hung ready over the exact lane to his throne. Froggy crouched lower in the reeds. He had escaped the fall. He had kept his map. But the open road to the crown now had a guard, and the guard was hungry.