THE NEXT DAY, THE FOREST finally cleared. Through one last row of pines, a vast and empty sea of grass spread before them. There was nothing on the horizon and Nahtaia felt sick to her stomach. Were they even going the right way? All she knew was the Elven Territory was to the west. She had hoped to see, at the very least, the leaves of the Willow of D’Irdda. If a tree as massive as an Elven willow could not be seen, they were still a very, very long way away.
“You don’t suppose there is a non-faery-eating bird we can ride on, do you?” Nahtaia huffed.
“No,” Oren laughed. “I don’t.”
She sighed and made her way to a tree, skimming her eyes over the trunk from the bottom up.
“What are you looking for?” Kale asked, then took a bite out of a berry he’d picked.
“A way up,” she replied.
Kal
