Into the Wild by Sarah Beth Durst

Author:Sarah Beth Durst
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Publisher: Penguin Group US
Published: 2010-02-28T22:00:00+00:00

Chapter Sixteen

Swan Soldiers

She felt a yank on her hair, and her face was jerked above the waves. Julie gasped for air. It burned. Oh, it burned! Something clamped onto her elbows and then onto her legs. Horizontal, she was raised out of the ocean.

Suspended an inch over the water, she started moving forward with a whoosh sound. Her stomach skimmed the surface of the sea. Waves slapped her face. She rose higher. Whoosh, whoosh, she heard. What was happening?

Out of the corner of her eye, she caught a glimpse of white. Held by the hair, she couldn’t move her head. “Boots! Boots, where are you?” she called.

She heard the cat’s voice: “Don’t eat me! Please, don’t eat me! I swear I’ll never chase another sparrow. Not even a chickadee!”

She heard a louder whoosh. Feathers filled her view—she was in a flock of giant swans. Each bird was at least six feet long from beak to tail feathers. The closest swan turned its boa neck toward her. “Don’t worry, miss. Everything’s under control. We said we’d look out for you, and here we are,” the swan said. “Lieutenant, loosen up on that hair there.”

Lieutenant . . . She knew them! She’d seen them turned into swans: they were the National Guardsmen she’d met back on Main Street.

The lieutenant holding her hair loosened his grip, and she turned her head to see a man-sized swan holding her elbow in his beak. “Where are you taking us?” she called.

The lead swan flapped ahead without answering. “Keep up that V formation, boys! Let me see those wings flap! What are you, a bunch of sissies? Up, down. Up, down!”

Ocean passed underneath her as the swans flew on.

“Gently, gently. On three: one, two . . .” The swans lowered her toward a patch of moss. Two inches from the ground, the swans released her and she belly-flopped onto the ground.

She lifted her face. “Ow,” she said.

In a flutter of wings, the swans landed around her. She pushed herself to her knees. Beside her, Boots lay shuddering on the ground. She crawled to him. “Are you okay?” she asked.

“Birds,” he said. “Giant birds.”

“But are you okay?”

He raised his head and looked at her. Fur wet, his face looked like a mop. “I’m wet,” he said. “I’m cold. I’m hungry.”

She hugged him. “Yeah, me too,” she said. He didn’t squirm out of her arms. Instead, he curled against her as she looked around them. They were on a shore, a narrow beach of rocks lined by the encroaching forest. The swans were waddling in between the trees toward a picturesque cottage. “Excuse me, uh, sir?” she called. “Where are we?”

“Safe,” said the closest swan, the captain. “You’ll stay here for the night.” On the word night, the sky suddenly tinted orange. Julie and Boots looked up. Across the water, the afternoon sun had dipped instantly into sunset.

Okay, that was disturbing. Her urge to leave the Wild suddenly doubled. “Sir? We were heading for an ogre’s castle. It’s supposed to be on the other side of the ocean.

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