Read Immortal Bones - A Supernatural Thriller - Detective Saussure Mysteries - Book 1 Page 13

I HAD NO CHOICE BUT TO SLEEP IN THE FOREST. If I had gotten lost in the middle of the day, I wouldn’t make it out of there alive during the night, not without the help of my friends, the Tree-Hugger Squad. I didn’t even want to imagine the wild animals that inhabited those woods: wolves, bears, basilisks, manticores…You name it, I bet it was in there.

  Wayra lent me one of his monstrous tunics so I was able to get out of my wet clothes and have dinner with them. I have to say it was one of the weirdest experiences I have ever had. It made me miss my cheese sandwich. Although, in that case, the parameters I regularly used to measure weird were, obviously, slightly altered.

  When it was time to sleep, we walked into the hut and I was shown to a bed of grass and leaves far more comfortable than it sounds. Wayra and Irupé each had one, too. One thing I noticed when we were getting ready to call it a day was the forest turning off the glow. No more fluorescent green to light up our night. “There is no way out of the forest in the night for foreigners.”

  The next morning, I was up as soon as the sun shone some light over us. My clothing was neatly hanging on a branch close by. And next to my polished shoes, a warm beverage was waiting for my mouth to make breakfast out of it. Best hotel I had ever stayed in. Irupé and Wayra were nowhere to be seen, so I quickly changed and left the little house while drinking my breakfast on the way. It wasn’t coffee. It wasn’t tea. Just swallow it and get the hell out of the spooky woods.

  “Good morning,” my elfish host greeted me. She was swinging from a vine branch, like everything else there. “Wayra is waiting for you, whenever you’re ready.”

  I thanked her for the hospitality and approached her. Something from our past conversation had lingered with me throughout my sleep.

  “So, to sum up our meeting, you think I should talk to Death?”

  “Mr. Saussure, have you asked yourself why all life is drained from everything around Hugh Hurlingthon, but not from Hugh himself?”

  No, I hadn’t, and it was a good question.

  “This means you believe him?”

  “If you’re still wondering that, it’s because you are putting your shoes on first.”

  A view from the inside. I had to give it to Annie. It had turned out to be a pretty good idea. And speaking of Annie...

  “I was wondering if, perhaps, you could help me with another case I’m working on. It happened a couple of days ago. Three boys were murdered in these woods, and since you told me no foreigner can leave the forest at night...”

  I caught her soft glance before she directed it far away to get lost among the trees. Irupé felt the burden of those incidents. Therefore, she knew they had happened.

  “I can’t undo that. If I could stop it, I would. But once they’re in...There’s no going back.” A smooth draft of fresh air circled us and moved some leaves, caressing the top of her head.

  “Are you saying the woods killed them?”

  “It’s not so simple.”

  Wayra came behind me and placed his massive hand over my shoulder. It was time for me to go. I thanked Irupé once more and followed the mute giant through the forest, leaving the ever flowing fluorescent nature behind us, to reach the waistband of the sleeping trees.

  I had stepped back into the regular (and now slightly boring) nature. I turned to thank Wayra for his bodyguard services, but he was gone. Someone needed put a rattle on that guy’s neck.

  As I drove back to civilization, I thought I would make it a round trip and pay Grumpy Al a visit. I needed some black coffee to wash down all that green stuff I had drank. And maybe, now that I was prepared for it, I’d ask Alistair about the origin of his knowledge of my elderly client.