Free The Death Seer (Skeleton Key) by Skeleton Key, Tanis Kaige Page A

said one of the women.
    “Ye’ll get lost on the edges,” said another.
    “The serpent’ll eat ye, sure and certain,” said the third.
    I didn’t ask about the serpent. Didn’t want to know. Without Kord I was lost, so there was nothing to do but go after him.
    I threw my bag over my shoulder, thanked the women for their hospitality, and left. I followed the dirt trail into the forest until it split, and I actually paused. Hesitated as I remembered his words. Go back to Gus, seek shelter with the kings. This world was Kord’s home for ten years, surely he knew what he was talking about. Then again, he was a man, and men tended to overestimate their own strength. Maybe Kord had gotten himself into a situation he couldn’t handle alone.  
    I closed my eyes for a moment, breathed, and tried to make the right decision. I’d do just about anything for a kiss from you, he’d said, and I’d believed him. He’d wanted the promise of that kiss to give him hope, and if he wasn’t back here claiming it, that meant he’d lost all hope somehow.  
    I turned down the left path and into the unknown.  
    The trees grew thick and tall, blocking out nearly all the little light there had been. My eyes would have adjusted had there been enough light. My toe caught on more than one tree root before I finally stopped and knelt on the ground to dig through my bag. Kord had thrown in some supplies, a flashlight among them.
    “Momma?” came a soft voice. A child’s voice.
    My skin crawled. With the blackness around me I felt anything might be hovering right next to me. I switched the flashlight on and swung it in every direction.  
    “Are you my momma?” The voice came from a different direction. I aimed the light beam into the woods, but there was nothing there.
    “Is she here for us?” It was said in a whisper.
    “Let’s ask her.” Another whisper.
    I spun around, looking everywhere and finding nothing. “Who are you?” I asked, nearly choking on my own words.
    “Help us!” a child cried. And then a chorus of similar cries erupted. They were right upon me, they had to be, and yet I couldn’t see anything.  
    “Where are you?” I called. “Where are your families?”
    “Be with us, lady! Be with us!”
    “Please don’t leave us! Stay with us!”
    The sobs wrecked my nerves. Tears poured down my cheeks before I could even realize what was happening. All around me children cried and wept and begged, but I couldn’t see them. I even reached into the darkness blindly and felt for them, but there was nothing there.  
    “This is a trick!” I screamed.
    “It’s no trick.” This voice was more mature, though still young. This time when I swung my light around, the beam landed on a young woman in a white shift dress. She wore a mischievous smile and long, stringy hair. Behind her a tail swished from side to side.  
    “Who are you?” I gasped. A voice in my head berated me for not staying with the sisters and waiting for daylight. What on earth would I do if I got lost? What could these creatures do to me?
    “I’m no one,” the girl said. “Just no one and nothing. Not important. Undeserving.”
    “What the hell does that mean?” I asked, regaining some of my breath.
    The girl shrugged. “Doesn’t mean anything. Who are you?”
    “My name’s Brenna. I’m looking for my friend. He came this way earlier this morning.”
    “You aren’t dead,” the girl observed, squinting her eyes and taking a step towards me.  
    I stood my ground. “No. And neither is my friend. Have you seen him?”
    “We sleep through the day. Ain’t seen no one.”
    “We?”
    “Me and the children. The hidden ones.”
    “Hidden?”
    “Yep. Hidden forever. Not ever gonna be loved, them. Sad, really. But they’re used to it, I suppose.”
    I told myself they weren’t real. I had to, because for a moment, the weight of what she’d said bore down on me and I thought I might…despair. Children left in the woods destined to