Willow Thornheart's Arc

Chapter 2 of 9

The rainbow fox slept on Willow's table, its leg healed but its scent still hanging sweet in the air. That scent worried her. A tracker could follow it straight to her door. Her cottage had ivy and flowers, but no way to hide a magical creature from hunting eyes. She needed a shelter that could not be found. So she rolled up her sleeves and walked out to the far corner of her land, where old oaks leaned close and blocked the sky. Willow knelt in the moss and pressed both palms to the ground. Magic ran down her arms, warm and steady. Wood rose from the dirt. Beams twisted into place. A little roof curled at its edges. Shingles layered themselves like scales. Runes glowed along the walls, then dimmed and vanished, drinking the shelter's shape into the woods around it. When she stood back, the cottage seemed to belong to the trees, as if it had grown there for a hundred years. But the charm would not hold. The runes flickered and sputtered. Willow felt the concealment slipping loose, like a knot too weak to stay tied. She pushed more power in. The glow flared, then died. She sank to her knees, breathing hard. Her own magic was strong, but it could not root a hiding spell into living land. She needed growing magic, and she had none. A voice came from above. "You've bound it wrong. Plants won't take orders. You have to ask them." Willow looked up. A fairy hovered among the branches, no taller than Willow's hand, in a dress of layered pink petals. Flowers dotted her pale hair. She dropped down and landed on the new roof without waiting for an answer. This was Flora Petalwind, though Willow had never met her before. She had only heard whispers of a fairy who could grow a garden in a heartbeat. "I felt your magic from across the woods," Flora said. "It's loud. Hunters can feel loud." She touched the wall. Vines burst from her fingertips and wove across the wood. Moss spread. Blossoms opened and closed like breathing. The runes drank in her green magic and steadied, glowing soft and sure. The shelter melted deeper into the trees until Willow could barely find its door. "There," Flora said. "Now nothing living will notice it. Not even a tracker with a good nose." Willow laughed, dizzy with relief. Then a sound stopped her. A high, cracked cry came from inside the new shelter. She pushed the door open. On the floor lay a dragon no bigger than a cat, scales gleaming gold, one wing bent under its body. It looked up at her and coughed a thin curl of flame. "It must have crawled in while we worked," Flora whispered. Willow's sanctuary now had walls that could hide. But her healing bottle was empty, and a hurt baby dragon needed it now.