Thor swallowed hard. He felt as if they were entering an impenetrable animal kingdom. Everything felt different here; the air smelled different, foreign. Nothing here remotely reminded him of the Ring. The other Legion members all turned and looked at each other, and Thor could see the hesitation in their eyes. They all wondered what creatures lay in wait for them inside that jungle.
It was not as if they had a choice. The current brought them one way, and clearly this was where they needed to disembark to enter the Empire’s lands.
"Over here!" O'Connor yelled.
They rushed to O’Connor’s side of the railing, as he leaned over and pointed down at the water. There, swimming alongside the ship, was a huge insect, a luminescent purple, ten feet long, with hundreds of legs. It glowed beneath the waves, then scurried along the water’s surface; as it did, its thousands of small wings started buzzing, and it lifted just above the water. Then it went back to gliding along the surface, then it plunged below. Then it repeated the process all over again.
As they watched, it suddenly rose up, higher in the air, to eye level with the boys, hovering, staring at them with its four large green eyes. It hissed, and they all jumped back involuntarily, reaching for their swords.
Elden stepped forward and swung at it. But by the time his sword reached the air, it was already back in the water.
Thor and the others went flying, crashing on the deck, as their boat came to a sudden stop, lodging itself on shore with a jolt.
Thor's heart beat faster as he looked over the edge: beneath them was a narrow beach made up of thousands of small jagged rocks, bright purple in color.
Land. They had made it.
Elden lead the way to the anchor, and they all hoisted it and dropped it over the edge. They each climbed down the chain, jumping off it and landing on shore, Thor handing Krohn to Elden as he went.
Thor sighed as his feet touched the ground. It felt so good to have land—dry, steady land—beneath his feet. He would be fine if he never set sail on a ship again.
They all grabbed the ropes and dragged the boat as far onto shore as they could.
"Do you think the tides will take it away?" Reece asked, looking up at the boat.
Thor looked at it; it seemed secure in the sand.
“Not with that anchor,” Elden said.
"The tide won’t take it," O’Connor said. "The question is whether someone else will.”
Thor took one long last look at the ship, and realized his friend was right. Even if they found the sword, they might very well return to an empty shore.
"And then how will we get back?" Conval asked.
Thor could not help but feel as if, every step of the way, they were burning their bridges.
"We shall find a way," Thor said. “After all, there must be other ships in the Empire, right?"
Thor tried to sound authoritative, to reassure his friends. But deep down, he was not so sure himself. This entire journey was feeling increasingly ominous to him.
As one, they turned and faced the jungle, staring at it. It was a wall of foliage, blackness behind it. The animal noises rose up in a cacophony all around them, so loud that Thor could hardly hear himself think. It felt as if every beast of the Empire was screaming out to greet them.
Or to warn them.
*
Thor and the others hiked side-by-side, warily, each of them on guard, through the thick, tropical jungle. It was hard for Thor to hear himself think, so persistent were the screams and cries of the orchestra of insects and animals around him. Yet when he looked into the blackness of the foliage, he could not spot them.
Krohn walked at his heels, snarling, the hair standing on his back. Thor had never seen him so alert. He looked over at his brothers-in-arms, and saw each, like he, with a hand resting on the hilt of his sword, all of them on-edge, too.
They had been hiking for hours now, deeper and deeper into the jungle, the air becoming hotter and thicker, more humid, heavier to breathe. They had followed the traces of what appeared to once be a trail, a few broken branches hinting at the path the group of men who had arrived here may have taken. Thor only hoped that it was the trail of the group who had stolen the sword.
Thor looked up, in awe of the nature: everything was overgrown to epic proportion, every leaf as big as Thor. He felt like an insect in a land of giants. He saw something rustling behind some of the leaves, but couldn’t actually see anything. He had the ominous feeling that they were being watched.
The trail before them suddenly ended in a solid wall of foliage. They all stopped and looked at each other, puzzled.
"But the trail can't just disappear!" O'Connor said, hopeless.
"It didn't," Reece said, examining the leaves. "The jungle just grew back on itself.”
"So which way now?" Conval asked.
Thor turned and looked all around, wondering the same thing. In every direction was just more of the dense foliage, and there seemed to be no way out. Thor was beginning to have a sinking feeling, and felt increasingly lost.
Then he had an idea.
“Krohn," he said, kneeling down and whispering in Krohn's ear. "Climb that tree. Look for us. Tell us which way to go.”
Krohn looked up at him with his soulful eyes, and Thor felt he understood.
Krohn sprinted for an enormous tree, the trunk as wide as ten men, and without hesitating pounced on it and clawed his way up. Krohn sprinted straight up then leapt out onto one of the highest branches. He walked out to its tip and looked out, his ears standing straight. Thor had always sensed that Krohn understood him, and now he knew for certain that he did.
Krohn leaned back and made a strange purring noise in the back of his throat, then scurried back down the trunk and took off in one direction. The boys exchanged a curious look, then all turned and followed Krohn, heading off into that part of the jungle, pushing back the thick leaves so they could walk.
After a few minutes of following him, Thor was relieved to see the trail pick up again, the telltale signs of broken branches and foliage showing which way the group had went. Thor leaned down and patted Krohn, kissing him on the head.
"I don’t know what we would have done without him," Reece said.
“Nor do I," Thor responded.
Krohn purred, satisfied, proud.
As they continued deeper into the jungle, twisting and turning, they came to a stretch of new foliage, with flowers all around them, enormous, the size of Thor, bursting with every color. Other trees had fruits the size of boulders hanging from the branches.