The Sowing

The smile fades from my lips. He knows me too well.

Digory looks up and motions to me, then to himself, before his finger settles on the horizon.

I wipe my eyes. “We have a long journey ahead of us.”

TWENTY-EIGHT

The sun burns high overhead as we finish a refreshing swim in the stream—wrestling around, splashing, taking turns dunking each other as if we were children, until we reluctantly get dressed.

Digory scampers up countless trees, using his bare feet and hands with such agility and grace, he’s almost a blur as he propels himself up and through the dense foliage. Even with all the Imp training I’ve undergone over the past year, I can barely keep up with him as I run alongside on the ground, pointing out which berries he should pluck that might be edible based on a few birds pecking at them.

Eventually he drops to the ground in front of me, scooping me over his shoulder while I make a feeble attempt at protest. We finally settle under the shade of an enormous magnolia tree, where he insists on feeding me himself as I rest my head on his lap.

“Mmm.” My mouth waters when my teeth sink into the succulent fruit. Sugary nectar drips from the corners of my mouth. “Thith ith delithus.”

Digory lifts my head and kisses me.

I kiss him back. “I wish we could stay here forever,” I murmur. “Just the two of us. But right now we have to figure out how to get out of here and back to the Parish.” I force myself to push away.

But I have no clue what direction to go in, or how to get back to Cole. The transceiver I’d hoped to use to communicate with Cage and the others was damaged in the glider crash and I don’t have the tools to repair it. I can only hope they made it out okay.

I stand and offer Digory my hand, savoring the way the muscles in his arm swell as he stretches and reaches for it. Then I’m relishing the feel of his hand in mine as I pull him to his feet.

Our fingers remain entwined like the roots of one of these ancient trees, infusing me with strength. My eyes scan the lush foliage. “What do you suppose this forest is doing, right in the middle of a ruined city?”

Through a gap in the leafy awning shading us, I glimpse several of those enormous buildings, or at least what’s left of them, far off in the distance, specters lurking in the mist.

And a plume of dark smoke billowing into the air between them.

“Look!” I point.

Digory’s eyes, narrowed to slits, are already glued to the site.

“Could be other survivors from Infiernos,” I say. Then another thought hits me. “Or maybe there’s something living here.”

Clutching each other’s hands tighter, we trudge off in the direction of the curling blackness.

———

Once we leave the clearing, our pathway toward the smoke weaves through ever-thickening underbrush, which grows so dense at times that we can barely see a few feet beyond it. Soon both our arms and legs are covered with thin scratches from the whipping branches and waist-high grass.

More than once we stumble over protrusions jutting from the ground. At one point, my foot hits something and I trip, almost nose-diving. But Digory grabs my arm and holds me steady.

“Thanks.” I stare down at the metal disc embedded in a patch of dirt. “Looks like a manhole cover.”

Digory kicks the earth and shrubs away from it, exposing a series of words surrounding a leaf design.

CITY OF NEW YORK PARKS AND RECREATION.

My forehead crinkles. “City of New… York. I guess the Lady’s city finally has a name.”

We move on.

So this wasn’t a natural forest after all. It was a park. There were once pathways cutting through the greenery, long ago. But in the years since the Ash Wars these paths have been reclaimed by nature, overrun with moss and earth.

And the pathways aren’t the only sign of the city’s previous inhabitants. Every once in a while we come across the remnants of intricate cobbled bridges, now ensnared by twisting vines. And that looks like the remnants of a lamppost.

Digory’s leg sinks into a pothole and he grunts.

“I gotcha.” I hunch down and help free his foot. Something catches my eye.

More writing. “There’s something here!”

Digory stoops beside me, our hands overlapping as we clear the earth and leaves to reveal what’s left of a black and gray pattern, made up of tiny stone tiles, with one word at the center: IMAGINE.

“Imagine what?” I run my hand over the missing pieces. Digory leans his forehead into mine. He closes his eyes and his lips mutter something undecipherable.

When he opens his eyes again, he almost has a smile on his face. His eyes question me.

“What did I imagine?” I ask. “If I tell you, it won’t come true.” But I can’t help but smile myself. “This way,” I say, pulling him through another clump of trees.