Phony Potions

Chapter 5

CHAPTER Five

Mallow's screams ripped me from a deep sleep. Everything around me was dark. The sunlight fighting through the canvas ceiling was only enough to hint at the edges of my environment. The blanket's weight, which the previous night was comforting, was now confining. I muscled my way free of the prison of pelts. My hands hit the curtain, billowing fabric giving way. Light flooded into the carriage. I was blinded. I jutted my head out.

The set-up she had made last night had been dismantled. The blanket was rolled up and tied. The tent cloth folded likewise and set on the ground next to it. The three poles hadn't moved from their hiding spots in the mud.

I heard Mallow shriek again. I spotted her hopping around on one foot nearby, swearing.

"Frigid misery!" She clenched her heel and scowled at the ground in irritation.

"What's wrong, Mallow?"

"I need shoes!" she yelled back at me, swinging. She scanned the ground suspiciously.

"What?" It was too early for nonsense. "Mallow, why are you screaming?"

"Because." She lowered the foot she had been clutching to the ground cautiously. "I need shoes."

I rubbed my eyes, flicking away the sleepy debris.

"I stepped on a bug," she hissed.

"I'm sure the bug came out worse from the conflict," I said, consoling her. "How badly could it have hurt you?"

She hobbled over to the carriage and lifted her leg. The heavy foot landed next to me. There was a puncture on the bottom of the padding. Blood dribbled out, the silvery substance mingling with the dirt caked there and forming a foamy brown.

"Yeah, if it'd been a spider or a worm or something..." She huffed. "It was a Kobeetle, though."

"Where is it now?" I glanced to the left and the right, my neck hurting with the quickness I had snapped it from side to side.

"I killed it. It couldn't handle my weight..." Mallow pointed, and I followed her finger. Amid a clump of grass, shimmering in the sunlight, was the ruined carcass of a Kobeetle. Its notched legs splayed out in a halo around it. "Still, if I would have had shoes..."

Kobeetles were nasty little bugs. Mallow's thick soles could handle pretty much anything. She'd been walking barefoot everywhere for years since she could no longer fit in the carriage. The magical Kobeetles were just smart enough to pick up debris on their shells, like broken tips of spears, shattered glass, or even toxic spores. If you stepped on one, not only would you be guaranteed to suffer, but the little critters released a sound that sounded like laughter to alert the others to swarm.

Even though I hadn't heard laughter, I clambered out of the carriage and began to get Flatchert and Gourd together. They were grazing in a meadow within my sight line, so I had to shout for them before they trotted over. Mallow, usually useful, leaned against a tree. She kept her hurt foot cocked up at the heel, so the wound didn't touch the ground. Waves of dissatisfaction emanated from her, but with the risk of the Kobeetles swarming, I didn't have time to humor her.

"Mallow, come help me," I demanded. Mallow scooped up her remaining poles and attached them to the side of the carriage. Limping, she shook out her improvised canopy. She beat the blanket she'd ruined in the mud against one of the trees.

"Why couldn't the stupid thing run under my foot last night?" she mumbled. "It would have been healed by now."

I wanted to stop and wrap Mallow's foot, but the sound of dozens of tiny, high pitched wheezing voices convinced me we had to get going. I urged the drowsy horses onwards, and we left our sad, little campsite behind.