An Apple for the Creature

The library occupied a vast room. Shelves lined the walls. With magic coming and going like the tide, the e-readers were no longer reliable, but the library stocked them, too. If you needed to find something in a hurry, the e-readers were your best bet. You just had to wait until the magic ebbed and the technology took over again.

Sadly the magic showed no signs of ebbing.

I walked through the library, checking labels on the shelves. Philosophy, psychology . . .

“What are you looking for?” Brook snapped. “I’ll find it faster.”

“Greek and Roman mythology.”

“Two ninety-two.” Brook turned and ducked between the bookshelves. “Here.”

I scanned the titles. Encyclopedia of Greek and Roman Myths. Score!

Brook’s eyes lit up. “Shit! Of course. The apples. It’s so plain, I could slap myself for being so stupid.”

“You got it.” I yanked the book from the shelf and carried it to the nearest desk, flipping the pages to get to the letter E.

“What’s going on?” Barka asked.

“She found Ashlyn. She is in a tree,” Brook told him.

“Why?”

“Because she is an Epimeliad,” I murmured, looking for the right listing.

“She is a what?”

“An apple dryad, you dimwit,” Brook growled.

Barka raised his hand. “Easy! Greek and Roman was three semesters ago.”

“Epimeliads are the dryads of apple trees and guardians of sheep,” I explained.

Barka leaned again the desk. “That’s a bit random.”

“Their name comes from Greek melas, which means both apples and sheep,” Brook said.

“This explains why she’s scared of Yu Fong,” I said. “He’s all about heat and fire. Fire and trees don’t play well together.”

“And someone left a wolf print on her desk. Wolves are the natural enemies of sheep,” Barka said.

“Someone was trying to terrorize her.” Brook dropped into the chair, as if suddenly exhausted. “And none of us ever paid attention long enough to see it.”

“It was Lisa.” I scanned the entry for the dryad. Shy, reclusive, blah-blah-blah . . . No natural enemies. No mention of any mythological wolves.

“How do you know?”

“She has a wolf inside her. I saw it. That’s why her powers are stronger. I think she made a deal with something and I think that something wants Ashlyn.”

They looked at each other.

“Just what kind of magic do you have, exactly?” Barka asked.

“The right kind.” I pulled a chair out and sat down next to Brook. “If Lisa had made a deal with a three-headed demon or some sort of chimera, I could narrow it down, but a wolf, that could be . . .”

“Anything,” Brook finished. “Almost any mythology with a forest has a canid. It could be French or Celtic or English or Russian or anything.”

“Can any of you remember her saying anything about a wolf? Maybe there’s a record of books she checked out?”

“I’ll find out.” Brook got up and made a beeline to the library desk.

I flipped through the book some more. Dryads weren’t too well-known. They were just supposed to be these flighty creatures, easily spooked, pretty. Basically sex objects. I guess Ancient Greeks didn’t really have a lot of access to porn so it must’ve been fun to imagine that every tree hid a meek girl with big boobies.

Somehow I had to untangle Ashlyn, and not just from that apple tree, but from this entire situation. I didn’t know for sure if Lisa had made some sort of deal with the creature. I could be wrong—it could be forcing her. The only thing I knew for sure was that I alone didn’t have the strength to take it on in a fight. My magic wasn’t the combat kind and that thing . . . well, from the intensity of the wolf’s magic, it would give even the Pack’s fighters a pause.

Sometimes I wished I had been born a shapeshifter. If I was Curran, I’d just bite that wolf’s head off.

Curran. Hmm. Now there was a smart thought. I pulled a piece of scratch paper from the stack on the library desk, wrote a note, and read it. He would do it. After I pointed out all of his shortcomings, he would do it just to prove me wrong. I felt all happy with myself.

Brook came back with a disgusted expression on her face. “Apple trees. She checked out books on apple trees.”

“That’s okay. Barka, can you take this note to Yu Fong?”

He shrugged. “Sure. I like to live dangerously.” He took the note out of my fingers. “Later!” He winked at Brook and took off.

“You’re going to fight the wolf,” Brook said. “You are the stupidest person I’ve ever met. We need to take this to adults now.”

“I think Gendun already knows what’s going on. He wouldn’t have missed the tree coming to life. He didn’t seem frantic about Ashlyn’s disappearance and he said that the locating spell indicated she was on the grounds. I think that I’m meant to solve this one myself.”

“He would be putting your life in danger.” Brook shoved her glasses back up her nose. “And Ashlyn’s.”

“I can’t explain it. I just know that I’m trusted to do this on my own.” Maybe it was something only I could do. Maybe Ashlyn would trust another girl her age, but not an adult. Maybe Gendun was just clueless. I had no idea. I just had to get Ashlyn out of that tree.