Mira Felweave's Arc

Chapter 3 of 4

The fox curled tight on the shrine step and slept. Mira sat with her back against the cold stone and listened. Every branch that cracked sounded like a boot. Dawn was still hours off. She had bled a trail from the village, and hunters were not slow. If they swept this clearing before the fox woke, Mira would face them alone with claws she could not trust. She stood. The shrine glowed faintly under its vines and jewels, flowers heavy on every ledge. It felt like the wrong place to die. She looked for cover. Behind the shrine, a huge rose bush rose taller than her head, thick with red blooms and thorns the length of her finger. A hiding place, if she could stand the cuts. She stepped toward it. "Don't crawl in there bleeding," a voice said. "The thorns will make it worse." Mira spun, claws out. A very tall woman stood on the stone step where no one had been a breath before. Green hair. A dress of living leaves and flowers. She was barely taller than a child, but the air around her felt heavier, like a room with someone important in it. The fox did not wake. The shrine's stones brightened where the woman's hand rested. Mira knew, without being told, whose shrine this was. "You came," Mira said. Her voice cracked. "People pray here for years." "I know. I am late to most things." Mother Nature looked at Mira's arm, then her ears, then her claws. "I heard you an hour ago. I should have heard you at the village. I'm sorry." No one had ever said that to Mira. She did not know where to put it. "Hunters are coming," Mira said. "Yes. Three of them. Close." Mother Nature stepped down off the shrine. She touched the base of the giant rose bush. The canes shivered. New shoots pushed out of the dirt, fast, weaving into a low tunnel under the thorns. "In. Both of you. The bush will close." Mira scooped the sleeping fox against her chest. The fox weighed almost nothing. Mira crawled into the tunnel of canes. Thorns brushed her back but did not catch. Behind her, the shoots knit shut. Through the leaves she saw boots enter the clearing. Three men. They circled the shrine. One knelt where Mira had been sitting and touched the blood on the stone. He said something low. They spread out. Mother Nature stood in plain view beside the shrine. The hunters walked past her as if she were only a flower. One brushed her sleeve and did not turn his head. They searched the clearing twice. They did not search the rose bush. After a long time they moved west, toward the tower road. Mira breathed again. The fox stirred against her ribs and blinked up. "Morning?" the fox murmured. "Not yet," Mira said. "But we can walk now."