Princess in the Rough

Echo

Of course, as soon as she said corrupted unicorns, one appeared. Just my luck. For once in my life, can I have it easy? First I get sucked into another world, than a talking tree gets mad at me, then there’s huge talking wolves and a girl who can run as fast as one!

“What do we do?” I whispered, backing away from the clearing. I felt like crying. Ever since I was a child, I had loved unicorns, then I found out there’s such a thing as corrupted ones. That just ruined my childhood.

“Uh, I-I don’t work well, under pressure.” Amber whined.

“Back away, very, slowly.” Night Cry whispered and started backing up. The rest of us followed her command.

“There goes our short cut.” Green Paw grumbled. “The only way now is to go through unknown territory. That means we don’t know what we’ll encounter. Foreign moon wolf territory? Difficult beasts? Ugh.”

“What if, Echo, since your book brought you too this forest, maybe if you do whatever you did you make it bring you here, it could take you back or take us to a different forest? Oh, but what if it goes wrong? What if we end up in a completely different and distant forest or a whole other land altogether?” Amber whimpered.

“What do we do?” Green Paw whined.

“Um, I don’t know. I’ll check.” I opened the book to the last page. Like last time, it had the Icelandic words at the top, but this time, it also had English words.

“That wasn’t there before.” I muttered, trying to read the words that were in small print.

“What wasn’t?” Green Paw asked, leaning over to try and get a look. Curse him and his wolf hearing.

“These English words.” I pointed at the small words on the page. Amber just looked confused. “It’s the language I speak.” I added, so she understood, at least, as much as someone who couldn’t read could understand.

“What does it say then?” She asked eagerly.

“It’s really small, but I’ll try. If you don’t know where you’re going, then it doesn’t matter where you go.” That line sounded familiar, but where was it from?

“It has a good point, but we already know where we want to go and how to get there. We just can’t get there.” Night Cry grumbled.

“If you really are from another land, how did your people get around?” Amber asked Echo.

“Cars.” I answered, not really thinking about it.

“Um, what are cars?” Amber asked unknowingly.

“Oh, there, um, know what, nevermind.” I couldn’t up with an answer, cars were something I didn’t know much about.

“I say we take the unknown path. At least we’ll get there.” Green Paw suggested.

“Agreed.” Night Cry agreed.

“Guess we’ll go that way then.” I headed to my left, but Amber tapped me on the shoulder to stop me.

“Green Paw says it’s that way.” She pointed in the other direction. I grinned sheepishly and turned around. It was a good thing I had them, otherwise, I’d be lost right now! We walked through the dense forest, every snap, russell, and gust of air freaking me out.

“Be quiet and walk carefully.” Night Cry whispered back to us and sniffed the ground. “Try to stay away from that side, but don’t go to close to that side ether.” She said and looked towards some rocky cliffs then looked at a river. “That’s the Cliff Hunter clan’s territory and that’s an unknown moon wolf clan territory so stay even further from there.”

“Just follow right behind you. We got it.” Amber chuckled.

We had been walking for so long! I was so tired, and so hungry! It felt like we’ve been walking for hours but Amber kept assuring me that we had only been walking for an hour at most. At long last, I could see the end of the forest! I started sprinting to it but Night Cry leaped in front of me. I skidded it a halt and somehow didn’t fall over her.

“What?” I hissed at her, annoyed she wouldn’t let me out of the forest.

“There’s a wolf up ahead!” She growled. “Green Paw’s handling it. You and Amber need to stay out of his sense range while I go up and help Green Paw. Stick with Amber and try not to die.” And with that she ran through some thistles and was gone.

“Can you see the other wolf from here?” I asked Amber.

“I may act, run, and fight like a wolf, but there are some things you can’t learn. Like wolf vision. Honestly, I’m glad I have human vision so I can see color.”

“Soooooooo… You can’t sense the wolf from here?”

“No. Remember? Green Paw had to pee so he ran up ahead and found the wolf. I have so many questions for you! One, why do you looks so uncomfortable around moon wolfs. I mean, sure they’re wild animals but their not near as big as some wolves; also, where do you get your clothes? I have to change my clothes every three days or so and the wolves have never seen clothes like yours.”

“Hold the phone, those are smaller than normal wolves?” I asked, panicked.

“Uh, yeah. Duh. Werewolves are slightly bigger but are nothing compared to the earth elementals. It takes the form of a wolf.” She said it like it was normal to have huge stone wolves walking around. “You really are from another world, huh? Normal people should know this stuff. Well, I guess you could be from around here. I have no idea what people know and not know.” She said casually but her face seemed sad. “It really sucks being isolated from your kind. I only now realise that since you came.”

“Oh, sorry. You asked me where I got my clothes. There’s this place at the mall called Nordstrom Rack. It’s usually where I get my shirts, then I get my jeans at Levi’s, and, I can see you have no idea what I’m talking about.” I sighed, this was going to be difficult. I was in a whole other world now.

“I still can’t believe you’re from another world. It’s messing with my mind.” She sighed jokingly. Suddenly there was a loud snap.

“What was that?” I whispered, terrified.

“I-I don’t know. Maybe it was Night Cry and Green Paw?” Amber whispered.

My knees started shaking again, the way they did when I first met the Moon Claw clan. I really hope it was Night Cry and Green Paw. It wasn’t.

A wolf walked through the thistles but it wasn’t our friends. This wolf was pure white with blue eyes and the tip of its tail was black.

“You and your friends have entered Night Walker territory without permission from the alpha. For this, you will be punished. Come with me and don’t think of running away, hurting me or any other funny business. I haven’t told anyone you’re here and I don’t have to tell them if your dead.” He laughed wickedly and walked away, turned around when he realized we weren’t walking and barked at us. The bark was hollow and spine chilling. Me and Amber quickly caught up to him. “There will be no second chance. Don’t mess up.”