Almost done fixing up this one!
We kept out of challenge range while we planned. We spoke low, but didn’t whisper: whispers can carry. Even an ear corrupted by bittersap might hear it.
“Why does it not keep watch?” asked the dryad. “Did it keep no animals with it?”
I gave that question some consideration. “No,” I decided. “When you fled this place, your limb was still infected, despite your friend’s best effort. So it gathered all the animals too slow or foolish to flee, and sent them out after you.”
“Why, Jack? I would have died, if I had not reached you in time. There would be no need for it to fight me.”
I shook my head. “They were not there to fight you. They were there to bring your reanimated corpse back to the grove.”
“So now it wonders what happened to its army?” The dryad glared in the direction of her former grove. “I like the thought of that, though I wish it was not forewarned.”
“It wonders nothing,” I pointed out. “Bittersap can’t think. It just has hungers. One of those hungers is for more animals, to use them to help expand the reach of this abomination. We are lucky that it cannot anticipate that you might return, with help.”