Three moons in various states of waning told me I almost certainly had a concussion. Wonderful. Which of James’s two brain cells had decided to throw medieval weapons at people? I lifted one off my chest—a seven-foot pole with a thin metal doughnut on the end. It was engraved with symbolic runes. The outside of the doughnut was sharpened to a fine edge, so it was a miracle James hadn’t split my head open with it.

I touched my face, just to make sure I wasn’t bleeding. No blood, luckily, but I was still going to kick James’s butt. 

I snorted. No, I wouldn’t. I would probably struggle to tell him not to do it again before pretending to move on. But I would definitely daydream about kicking his butt.

Setting the weapon aside, I propped myself up on my elbows. Something was wrong. Something other than my triple vision. It took me a painfully long time to realize what it was. The insanity of a ritual that ended with weapons thrown at my face had distracted me. But when I realized where I was—or rather, where I wasn’t—my heart jumped into my throat. 

The ruins were gone, replaced by grass so tall that I couldn’t see anything but the sky. Why the hell had James dragged me away from the ruins? I might actually have to hit him for this. 

Leaning on the pole weapon, I stood in the chest-height grass. All around me grew more grass. Beyond that, rolling hills with even more grass. The nearest trees were at least half a mile away, and there couldn’t have been more than five.  I couldn’t think of any area around Silvervale that had this much open ground. James was beyond insane. 

I turned around, searching for any hint of street lights or lit windows. In the dark, any man-made light should’ve been visible from miles away. Where was James’s car? He couldn’t have actually left me here. He must’ve parked nearby to watch. 

“James?” I shouted. “Grace?” I didn’t think she was a part of this stupid prank, but she might’ve been dropped off somewhere around here. “I swear, if you don’t come out right now-” I didn’t have a clue how to finish that threat. 

A low grunting sound made me shiver. 

“James? That’s not funny or scary or whatever. Just come out already.”

Movement out of the corner of my eye drew my attention to a dark figure rising from the grass about fifty feet away. It was an animal the size of a small elephant or an enormous horse—maybe eight feet tall at the shoulder. I stood very, very still as it raised its head. The largest animal around Silvervale was a grizzly bear, but even standing on its hind legs, it would barely reach eight feet tall—and this animal was on all fours. It had to be a costume James and his friends were wearing. They wanted me to run and scream. I wasn’t going to give them the satisfaction. 

“This is stupid, James.” I wished my voice hadn’t risen an octave, but at least it wasn’t shaking too badly. “I know it’s you.” 

The ‘animal’ grunted again and started toward me at an alarming pace. I shouldn’t run; it was just a costume. But it didn’t move like a costume. It moved like a bear. Moonlight illuminated hairless wrinkly skin, which was an odd choice if James was trying to convince me it was a real bear. 

“I’ve got the pole weapon, and I’ll cut you, idiot!” I braced the butt of the pole against the ground, angling the sharp doughnut at the ‘bear.’ “I swear, I’ll do it!”

The ‘bear’ was running too quickly for two or more people in a massive costume. It was too fluid, too real. But it couldn’t be. Even polar bears weren’t this big. What if it was something else, an elephant? A very angry elephant that escaped from a zoo or a circus or-

Whatever it was, it wanted to kill me. 

I took off running perpendicular to the animal’s path. Hopefully, it couldn’t turn quickly. I didn’t know the turning radius of an elephant, but I knew they could run over twenty miles per hour, and I could run about five miles per hour on a good day. I was so dead if I couldn’t find a building to hide in. There had to be something around here. Please, let there be something. 

There—in the side of a hill, a door. There was no time to wonder why it was there or whether it was locked. It had better be unlocked, or I was screwed. My calves screamed as I ran faster than I’d ever done before. The grunting beast was right behind me. I had moments before it caught me. Seconds before I reached the door. 

It didn’t have a knob, just a latch that took too long to unhook. I threw open the door and sprinted into the darkness. 

My stomach flew into my mouth as my foot hit empty air. I flailed my arms to catch something, anything, but my momentum took me past solid ground. There was no time to scream before the ground slammed into me. I puked. My head spun. Moving even a little threatened to make me black out, so I froze.  

After an age, there were voices, light. The noise made the split in my head widen until I would’ve been happy to see anyone, even James, if they would just make the pain stop. 

Someone groaned. “Not again.” The man spoke in the same way a farmer might if he’d just found teenagers tipping his cows. “We’ve got to put a sign on that thing.”

“It’s not our responsibility to keep idiots from charging into a dark pit.” This voice belonged to a woman, and it was oddly high-pitched. 

There was a buzz and clopping hooves, both of which stopped nearby. 

“What is that?” the man asked. 

Someone muttered in a gravelly voice, too low to make out the words. 

“Really? I’ve never seen one around here.”

The woman scoffed. “You’ve never seen one at all.”

“I’ve seen pictures.”

“Doesn’t count.” She sighed. “Who’s going to move it out of the way?”

Her voice was getting on my nerves. I must’ve flinched, because someone gasped. 

“It’s alive,” the man said with a nicker. It couldn’t have been him; he must’ve had a horse. How’d he get a horse in the hole? “Think you can fix it?”

A pause, then a second man spoke softly. “It might be possible, but it would require the rest of the healing supplies I brought.”

The woman tsked. “Don’t waste them on a half-dead human.”

“Thyr?” He sounded hopeful.

Another pause, then a gravelly voice so low I could barely make it out. “Heal it.”

“Very well.” The soft-spoken man moved closer and knelt beside me. He was wearing a gray dress made of rough fabric—or maybe it was a robe. Whatever it was, I couldn’t lift my head to see more than its hem. 

He touched my forehead, and I jerked back with a yelp. Pain shot down my neck, dragging tears from my eyes. Everything was blurry and doubled. 

“The head… I can heal with a potion.” He touched my leg, and a scowl seeped into his voice. “The legs are another matter. Serious fractures like these don’t heal well without being set first, and I believe the bones are in too many pieces to do so through traditional means.”

“You want to do it?” the gravelly voice asked. 

“I do, but you should be aware that this will limit my abilities for a day.”

“Fine. Will you be able to change before she wakes up?”

“It won’t be necessary.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

“Ugh,” the woman groaned. “You shouldn’t waste bits on that thing. ‘Snot like you’ll get any ransom for it. Look at its clothes—not silk or fine linen. No jewelry, either.”

“Please keep your comments to yourself,” the soft-spoken man said. “I require silence to concentrate.”

The woman muttered something that made him sigh. 

“Thyr, if you could restrain her in a supine position?”

A grunt, followed by rough hands pushing me onto my back. I tried not to scream as they pinned my shoulders down, but a cry still escaped me. It was hard to follow what was going on, especially when blood and tears blurred my vision, but it sounded like they were trying to help me, so I didn’t fight them. Well, I tried not to fight. It was hard not to kick—or at least, to flail my leg—when the soft-spoken man touched it. 

There was a rustle, a hiss, and something hot dripped on my left leg. It felt like a slug moving up my leg. It bit me! I jerked, but Thyr and the soft-spoken man forced me to stay still. The pressure on my leg dragged whimpers from my throat. The slug was inside my leg, shifting and throbbing. Bone grated on bone. I started to throw up and choke on the vomit. 

“Prop up her head,” the soft-spoken man said with an exasperated tone. “Or I’ll have to empty her lungs as well.” 

Thyr propped me up. My neck and back spasmed. I puked. Coughing violently, I almost didn’t notice when the hot slug was placed on my other leg. What was this, the middle ages? I knew they could use leeches in modern medicine for some things, but I was pretty sure giving me a natural anticoagulant when my head was bleeding was a terrible idea. Maybe there was something wrong with my nerves and I was feeling things that weren’t there? That had to be it. 

Why couldn’t my nerves stop feeling pain instead? I flailed without meaning to. The soft-spoken man pinned my legs, which only made it hurt worse. I knew kicking meant he couldn’t set the bones, but I couldn’t stop. 

“Give her this. If she starts to vomit, wait before administering it again.”

One of Thyr’s hands moved from my shoulders. A clink, like nails against glass. A cup pressed against my lips, bringing fluids. Those were probably important. I should drink, even if I felt like I’d rather throw up again. Lukewarm liquid touched my tongue. It wasn’t water or gatorade or any drink I recognized, but it was good. Like milkshake-level good. Kinda savory, though. 

Strength flowed into my arms as I lifted a hand to take hold of the bottle. Thyr had to be wearing thick gloves, because his hand felt like a basketball filled with concrete. He wouldn’t let me take the bottle.

“You must drink, human.”  

I knew that, and I wasn’t trying to fight him. He was just giving me the liquid too slowly. I forced the bottle up and gulped. The drink was gone too soon. Feeling a lot better, I suspected it must’ve contained pain medicine. I shouldn’t move too much, though; the injuries were still untreated. 

At least my eyes were drying a little. I swiped my face and coughed as snot clogged my airways. 

My vision cleared, and I found myself face-to-face with abnormally large eyes that didn’t have visible whites. Above that, a crest of pale blue feathers stuck straight up from a sapphire blue head. Dog-like ears twitched in time with a semi-prehensile tail as Mark watched me with a concerned expression.