This one is almost finished being revised, too. Two more days. Maybe one.
“But they can run, can they not?” the dryad said, after a moment. “The bittersap bezoar might somehow grasp that its minions had not returned, it would not know why unless one of the beasts it had perverted returned to it. Even a mouse might give news of our coming, and…” She fell silent.
I finished her thought for her. “…and give the grove itself a chance to prepare for our presence.”
That earned me a scowl, even if it was not aimed at me. Mostly. “I do not like the thought of my grove being my enemy, Jack.”
“It is not your grove any more,” I told her, sadly. “It is dead, and its roots and branches now serve the woodlands’ great enemy. Do not hope for even a cutting from it.”
Her scowl deepened. “I am no fool, Jack! I know all the old songs, all the warnings! I left more than my hand behind in that grove! Aye, and the things that the Keeper and I collected together, and the work we had done! All of it, now twisted and corrupted, and unsafe to carry away.
“But, alive or dead, it is still my grove. The bittersap may not take that from me. I will not let it.”
Now it was my turn to scowl — at myself. “My apologies,” I eventually said. “We are to be priests, not scolds. And you are not a child, for me to shake my finger at.”
“Why, how nice of you to finally notice,” replied the dryad, her face already losing the deeper green of anger. Thus it is with Those Who Speak; their rages flash like lightning, bright one moment, and gone the next. “But if you wish to shake things at me… I suppose a finger might do.” Her smile was impish. “For a start.”