Page 8 of The Frog Prince

With a sigh, he reached down and plucked the frog from just below his knee. He did his best to examine it, but he knew nothing of amphibian physiology. Perhaps later. For now, he needed to move, and the frog would be safer with him.

“Are you up for a quest, little one?” he asked, putting the frog in the front pocket of his shirt and letting it settle in there. The frog croaked a tiny bit before quieting and stilling.

Otto took that as a yes and set off on his path again. If one could even call it a path anymore.

The water was getting deeper, nearly to his knees now, and it made it feel like the forest was fighting him with each new step he took. The tree branches got thinner still, and the light changed from overwhelming green to something worse. Yellowish. Rotten. Dying.

The air grew even more humid, sticking to his face and lungs and skin. Suffocating him.

He looked forward, seeing stretches of wet and broken branches sticking out of the water like spears. Like threats.

And then something in the distance.

Something that looked both like it didn’t belong and like it was part of the forest. Born from it. He stumbled toward it, toward the first thing that had felt different in days.

He fought against roots and mud until the ground beneath his feet felt firmer. Until it felt like he was actually walking instead of wrestling with something holding him down.

He looked down and frowned at what he saw beneath the shallow water. Stone instead of mud. A hard surface instead of mush.

A pathway.

He followed it for just a few moments before he came upon it—a flat surface with several piles of rocks evenly spread out. In front of them, a well stood beneath a flight of stairs leading to the remains of what must once have been something grand.

A castle.

Or, at least, what was left of one. It had been eaten by the forest seemingly centuries ago. Gnawed at and consumed and swallowed whole.

Otto could see walls, and holes where windows used to be. There was a gaping opening where a roof had caved in, allowing the trees to grow inside. The water sloshed around the edges of it, getting deeper the farther down the path Otto went.

He walked toward the steps, running a hand over the edge of the small well, feeling his heart in his throat. Something about this place felt…wrong.

There was an aura about it that made Otto feel like he wanted to run. Like heshouldrun before—

“Another one.”

The voice echoed from somewhere, sticking to Otto’s skin like it was made from the same humid air. It was slightly croaky. Scratchy. It didn’t sound human.

It was too late to run.

At the sound of the voice, the little frog in his front pocket kicked up a fuss, thin limbs flailing about as it tried to escape the confines of the cloth regardless of its injury.

He reached into his pocket hastily and took it out, crouching to set it down onto the damp ground. It limped away from him and disappeared from his sight between one blink and the next.

“You hurt one of mine,” the voice said in the next breath, making Otto’s heart stutter.

He shook his head as he straightened, his hand going to his breeches pocket and tightening around the small knife there as he looked around for the source.

“No,” he said, barely above a whisper. “I didn’t. I found it hurt and I helped it.”

“By taking it away from the home it knows on the ground?” the voice asked coldly.

“It couldn’t move! It was trapped under a rock.” Otto splashed through the water, finding a ruined tree trunk to press his back against, desperately trying to find a way to protect himself from whoever the voice belonged to. “It would have been eaten within hours.”

“You don’t have the gift of foresight.”

“But I do have the gift of common sense,” Otto said, some of his bite coming out through the blinding fear. A cornered animal snapping at a threat as if it stood a chance. Whatever it was, Otto knew it could end him in a second if it so chose.

“Do you?”