Page 5 of The Frog Prince

Bubbles escaped his mouth from an aborted gasp he couldn’t take under the water, his natural human response superseded by amphibian instinct. He didn’t need to breathe underwater. His skin breathed for him now.

But his heart still hammered. It was the only part of him untouched by the evil queen’s magic—the organ that harbored all his fear and resentment and anger.

Phantom echoes of pain reverberated through his elongated limbs as the familiar nightmare faded. He dragged his hand from where it was buried in the reeds and let it float in front of his face.

Four fingers instead of five. Green and mottled skin instead of pink flesh. The pads of his fingers wide and sticky.

Bulbous. Disfigured. Slippery.

A monster’s hand.

Something he didn’t recognize, even after eight long winters.

A small, pointed face appeared between the webbing, patches of rusty orange splattering its feet. Bulbous red eyes regarded him with trust and hands, an exact replica of his in all but color, wrapped around the end of his finger, pads creating small pressure points.

Farwin.

It hurt now to even think of the name he had given his small spadefoot friend a few winters ago. The echo of his dream pierced his heart like a blade, bringing fresh grief to the surface. It was a sharp reminder of what he was still striving toward, however.

With the last of the air in its throat sac, Farwin let out a high croak that rippled through the water.

Someone is here.

Alwin gathered the frog into the cup of his fingers and pushed through the water.

The paths along the bottom of the glen were all too familiar now, fed from the river they had long since carved deep into the area. His presence and the arrival of frogs and toads and all manner of slimy creatures had only deepened those grooves and pools, creating a network between them that couldn’t be seen from the surface. It was guarded by moss and lily pads and floating debris, walled in by the wreckage of an ancient castle that had been forgotten in time.

He used it to his advantage now, peering through the murky depths to see who had stepped into his lair.

A stumbling, frantic figure cupping their hand over their ear came into sight near where an outer wall used to be, the whites of their eyes bright in the darkness. They tripped into a shallow puddle, mud splattering up their arms to join the blood that seemed to be pouring from the area where an ear used to be nestled. Alwin searched the area behind them for the culprit as they scrambled back to their feet, continuing deeper.

Nothing could be seen giving chase.

Though that did not mean there was nothing there.

Or explain why they may have been following.

Alwin tracked the man toward where a canopy of willow leaves blocked the splintered shell of a room from the castle, acting as a wall.

The stranger pushed through them and climbed inside, shivering and terrified, and Alwin let go of his frog friend to raise himself from the water on the other side of the willow curtain.

“Only fools enter someone else’s house uninvited,” he said.

A scream of fright answered him. The man plastered himself to the wall as he turned, searching the darkness until he caught sight of Alwin’s silhouette.

“P-please…have mercy…have mercy,” he rambled.

Alwin cast his gaze over the stranger, able to see him better this close. He was dressed in threadbare clothes, dirty and bloodstained, and there was a stain at the front of his breeches like he had wet himself.

Alwin didn’t think it was because of him.

Which begged the question…

“Who are you running from?”

“Not who,” he whispered, searching the very shadows as if they could overhear him. “What.”

Alwin clenched his jaw.