‘It… it is what I wish,’ he said painfully, and every word hurt as he forced it from his lips.
There came the sensation of a vast satisfaction. It radiated from the walls, wrapped Phineas like a suffocating cocoon. ‘Good little baker’s boy,’ said the Thorn.
Defeated, Phineas awaited his fate.
The moment Phineas’s fingers touched the fallen mushroom, he was gone.
That was it. No flurry of darkness to sweep him away, no sudden attack, not even a whisper of sound; he was simply gone.
‘Phineas!’ she called, her heart pounding wildly.
No answer came.
‘Right,’ she muttered, and retraced her steps along the path until she came to another of her soundlessly stolen flowers: a frosty, velvet-blue hellebore. She took a steadying breath, braced herself, and bent to collect it.
And then she, to
