Capítulo 4: Chapter 1 - Part 4
The first thousand petals bound themselves into a tight pink ball the size of a fist. It hovered several feet off the ground, spinning all the while.
Ermos had never seen anything like it in all his life. He wondered whether he should not lunge forward and cut the ball in two, but he was unable to summon the aggression to do so.
The more petals that bound to it, the larger the ball became. Soon it was even larger than Ermos, and still it continued to grow.
Pash gazed up at the sky, hypnotized. He had not the sense to fear something so beautiful.
To Ermos' horror, Pash raised his hand to try and touch the petals as they flew, but they did not bite at him for his transgression, or form a sword to slice him in two, instead, the whole stream moved away from him as though afraid. There was no evil to them.
The petals attempted to make the pink sphere more complicated.
They added two protrusions to the bottom of it, a sensible distance between them. More petals came and the protrusions lengthened and thickened, shaping themselves into a thigh, and then a knee, and then a foot.
It was undoubtedly the legs of a human, if one looked past their pink colour and their abnormally large size.
The ball was moulded until there was a slender torso of petals to accompany the legs. A woman's chest gave rise to arms and shoulders. And then the flowers adorned her in a light dress that fell all the way down to her ankles.
They began on the face. It took them a while longer than the rest of the body. They took the greatest of care.
A small nose, a pair of kind eyes, and then two strange pointed ears. When given lips, she turned to smile at them a warm smile, just as the girls had done before.
The petals finished her with a river of wild hair even longer than she was.
The last of the petals fell to the floor, no longer being needed. The trees were left bare and naked, not a single one of their blossoms remained.
"Your aggression seeps from you, chevalar," The Queen of Flowers said, her voice like the whisper of a gale.
"I've never fought anything quite like you," Ermos said calmly.
"And yet you are not afraid," she observed, a twinge of surprise twitching her eyebrows.
"…Do you want something?" Ermos said. "We waited through your magic flowers, but we're both pretty tired. We'd rather not fight if we don't have to."
The Queen of Flowers wore a strange look on her face, mirroring the confusion that Ermos felt. "…I'm a Thorne. I have guarded these forests since the day that the Gods planted them. A thousand years ago-"
Ermos sensed that a rather long monologue was bound to follow, so he held up his hand to stop her. "Like we were saying, that's no business of ours. If you're not trying to stop us, we would like to go and collect our treasure."
The Queen froze, positively stunned by Ermos' bluntness. The smiles of the five lute-bearing girls soon faded as well, replaced by something akin to hatred.
When the Queen of Flowers sighed, even the grass wilted. "…In my five hundred years of slumber, it would seem manners have been lost, amongst other things. You may leave if you wish, but I am your only hope if you want to get inside."
That was enough to make Ermos pause. "…What do you want with us?"
"The Teachers cast a spell when they erected that foul tower, protecting it from my magic. For the forest to recover, I must destroy it," The Queen said, having learned to keep things simple.
"You need me to cut something down? Then you'll ship us over to the Stone Tree with your flowers?" Ermos asked.
"Your role in this is more simple than that," the Queen said. She pointed with a long pink finger at the mispositioned bridge. "There is our enemy. The spell rests inside its stomach, supported by the souls of the thousands of humans that it has swallowed. Lure it close enough to me and I will shatter it."
Ermos brandished his sword with an excited smile. From the moment he had laid eyes on that cruel bridge, he had wanted to destroy it. "Now that I can do," he said. He strode towards the edge of the moat with a confidence.
And then he realized he had no idea what she was asking of him at all. "…How do I do any of that?"
"Go to the edge of the moat with the intent of crossing," The Queen told him patiently, "the bridge will smell your longing."
Ermos was glad that Pash looked as confused as he felt. All the talk of magic made him feel like a fool. Nevertheless, he moved even closer to the edge of that moat, enough so that he could peer into the waters below.
He even raised a foot up to step over the side, as if he really thought there was a bridge there. None of it worked. He wasn't overly surprised that he had misunderstood.
And then the ground shook.
The bridge – a solid mass of grey stone – trembled like a leaf in the wind. Angry spouts of water were coughed up into the air. Mud and sediment went with them.
One by one the pillars beneath the bridge wiggled themselves free from sticky mud. They moved like the legs of a centipede. Lifeless grey stone worked itself with the same fluidity as muscle.
When each of its pillars were free, it shook itself like a dog. Ermos had never seen anything so strange.
As Ermos had wished it would earlier, it began to totter around in a circle, swaying like a drunkard, until it aligned itself with the Stone Tree and the land. And then it went still again.
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