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“Please!” A young Katherine begs, drawing out the ‘e’ sound. “I won’t go far!”
Her mother sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose. She turns to look at her daughter with an annoyed expression, but that doesn’t discourage Katherine. “Just– stay within the kingdom borders. Take Fern with you and come back before sundown, okay?”
“Yes! Thank you!” Katherine gives her mother a quick hug and rushes out of the study room, pink dress flowing behind her. In her room, she finds her dog lounging on her bed, gnawing on a bone. Fern looks up at her as she enters and her tail wags as Katherine comes closer. “C’mere Fern! We’re going on an adventure!”
The dog immediately hops down from her place on the bed. She trots up to Katherine, clearly excited for wherever they’ll be going.
Katherine loves adventuring out into the taiga forest surrounding her kingdom. There’s always something new and exciting to find, whether that be a cave or a funky mushroom or a cool bug. She has a lot of dogs, but Fern is always the one who goes with her. Fern’s the oldest and smartest, following commands with no hesitation and defending her from any mobs that try anything. Don’t tell the others, but Fern is Katherine’s favorite. She’s an above-average sized dog with fluffy grey fur that makes most people mistake her as a wolf at first.
The thin dragonfly wings on her back flutter as she steps outside, happy to be in the warm sun. Nice days like this are rare in Misty Meadow – usually, there’s a fog coating the forest, hence the Misty part of the kingdom’s name.
Today, she decides to go a different way than she usually does. Katherine doesn’t want to waste perfect exploration weather! It’s not like her mother has to know.
The forest is active, birds sing and bugs all fly around her. She doesn’t hate the bugs, quite the opposite really. They’re just like her! Okay, well, she can’t fly yet, but she’s learning, and soon she’ll be able to take to the skies just like them. Most of the people in the empire are bug hybrids so she’s got some great teachers. Katherine knows a lot of others in different kingdoms don’t like the little insects that buzz around, which only gives her more reason to love them, really!
She inspects beetles living on the trunks of trees and the fungi that clings to the bark. Fern is a lot more interested in sniffing around to find any buried animal bones, and Katherine can’t blame her for it. Bones are her favorite treat, and do tend to be scattered about the forest due to the greater-than-average skeleton population.
Katherine even gets to see a small group of deer prancing about the woods. Deer aren’t exactly rare, but they’re not a common sight either, so she makes sure to treasure it. There’s two adult deer and one fawn that Katherine has to resist the urge to run up to and pet. She stays firmly planted in her spot behind a bush, watching as they make their way past. Fern thankfully seems to understand what’s happening and also stays quiet until the deer are out of sight.
She slowly crawls out from her hiding place, ignoring the way her dress gets dirty even though her mother will surely be upset about it later. Katherine’s never really cared about that stuff.
Tea parties and tiaras are fun but she’d be lying if she said she liked them more than the wilderness. There’s just something so nice about the forest. Even on gloomy and rainy days she’d choose it over the stuffiness of royal business meetings.
The sun shining down on her keeps her warm despite the cool breeze that pricks at her skin. She continues trudging through the forest, making sure to take note of funny looking trees and pretty flowers so she can find her way back home. She’s never actually gotten lost, but it never hurts to be safe. Katherine knows her way around like the back of her hand, even the parts she’s never been to.
A loud, high-pitched sound breaks Katherine from her thoughts.
First, she looks to make sure Fern isn’t hurt. The dog stands still with her ears perked up, looking just as surprised as Katherine despite the bone lodged between her teeth. Knowing that Fern’s okay, Katherine takes a cautious step in the direction she thinks the sound came from. She flinches when the sound rings out again, though now that she’s paying attention, it sounds more like it’s coming from a person. If she really tries, she can hear quiet sniffles like someone is crying.
Running towards someone crying in the middle of a forest is probably not the smartest thing to do, but Katherine isn’t just going to sit by while someone’s upset! This is her empire even if she’s not in charge yet, and she doesn’t want anyone sad while they’re here!
Fern follows behind her as she moves closer to the source of the crying. Katherine’s wings flutter nervously as it gets louder, because she didn’t really think this whole thing through. She pushes past a particularly thick bush and stumbles into a large, open clearing she hadn’t expected. The taiga is usually rather packed together, so spaces like this aren’t very common. A little ways away is a small river that carries on farther than she can see. The sun reflects off the wet rocks and water in a way that almost makes it look sparkly, and Katherine probably would have stared at it for hours if she wasn’t on a mission.
She looks across the river and spots a small frame against one of the tree trunks. Katherine squints her eyes and realizes that it’s a person, a girl curled up into a ball, arms wrapped around her legs and her head buried in her knees. She shakes as she hiccups, treebark digging into her back.
Immediately Katherine rushes to the river bank, ignoring the way her feet sink into the mud as she calls out to the girl. “Hey! Are you okay?”
Her head shoots up from her knees, revealing the prettiest face Katherine has ever seen. And that’s saying a lot, because Katherine has seen a ton of pretty faces. She has black hair and shiny yellow eyes that look gold in the sun, glistening with tears. She stares at Katherine, mouth parting but no words coming out. Her nose scrunches up as she sniffles again. She’s wearing a plain red t-shirt and shorts that tell Katherine she’s definitely not from around Misty Meadow. Thin, clear wings rest on her back, similar to Katherine’s but not iridescent.
“Hold on, I’m coming over!” Katherine shouts. She pulls her dress up to her knees, but it doesn’t help much as she wades across the river, the water coming up to her torso. Fern swims across much faster than Katherine, shaking all the water out of her fur the moment she’s back on dry land.
While she wishes she could do the same as Fern, she doesn’t bother trying to dry off when she makes it across, knowing the sun will help her out with that. Katherine walks over to the girl, who still hasn’t moved, and is watching Katherine with what might be awe on her face.
She crouches down, knees digging into the hard tree roots that peek out from the dirt. “I’m Katherine!”
“Uh,” The girl stutters and wipes her nose with her wrist, “I’m Shelby.”
“That’s a pretty name!” Katherine replies, smiling. Fern then trots up next to her with a new stick in her mouth to replace the bone she had before. She sits right to the side of Katherine, examining Shelby. “And this is Fern! She’s my puppy. You can pet her if you want, just hold your hand out so she can sniff you first.”
Shelby’s eyes go wide as she looks from Katherine to Fern. Slowly, she reaches out a hand, uncurling from the ball she’d been. Her hand shakes in the air as Fern cautiously sniffs it and her face breaks out into a wide grin when Fern licks her fingers. She giggles, which makes Katherine giggle, which makes Fern’s tail start to thump against the dirt as it wags. Shelby’s other hand reaches up to scratch behind Fern’s ears and the dog happily leans into it because that’s her favorite place to get pets.
“Why were you crying in the forest?” Katherine asks after a minute or two of petting Fern.
Immediately Shelby’s face falls and Katherine wishes she could take the question back. “Oh, I’m lost. I don’t know how to get home.”
“I can help! Fern’s really good at finding stuff!” Fern, as if to prove Katherine’s point, drops her stick right at Shelby’s feet. It probably would have been more impressive if it had been a bone, or like, Katherine’s missing bracelet, but it works well enough.
Katherine stands up and reaches out a hand, which Shelby quickly takes to help her stand up. She doesn’t let go even though she’s pretty sure that would be the proper thing to do. Keeping her new friend close is much more important, she decides. She doesn’t want to lose Shelby right after meeting her! “So, where do you live?”
“I live in the birch forest. I was just exploring and got turned around, so I don’t even know what direction it’s in.” Shelby’s voice wobbles like she might start crying again, so Katherine squeezes her hand tightly to reassure her. “Don’t worry, we’ll find it!”
As they start walking, Fern leads the way. Katherine’s not sure if Fern knows what she’s doing or if she’s just hunting down a new bone, but she follows regardless, because she trusts Fern. Not once does she let go of Shelby’s hand, even when she almost falls off a short ledge. Katherine hasn’t ever actually seen the birch forest despite it neighboring the taiga, but she knows it exists because of all the maps in her mother’s study.
She learns a lot of things about her new friend during the journey. Shelby’s a bee hybrid and lives in a town deep in the birch trees named Feverwood. Everyone there is also bee hybrids, including her parents, but not her siblings because she doesn’t have any. A lot of the plants have been dying there and they don’t know why. Katherine also tells Shelby a lot about herself, like how she has a lot of dogs and that she’s a princess. Shelby seems more interested in the dogs than she is the royalty part, and that makes Katherine smile even wider.
But, unfortunately, their time together comes to an end as birch trees come into view. Fern leads them to a slightly overgrown pathway, and Shelby gasps. “I know this path!”
“Can you get home from here?” Katherine asks, reluctantly letting go of Shelby’s hand.
Shelby leans down to give Fern a few pats on the head for helping so much before she turns back to Katherine. “I can. Thanks for helping me.”
The two stand awkwardly, neither wanting to leave first. Katherine shuffles back and forth on her feet and fidgets with her dress, which is now dry thanks to the sun. “Can I… do you think I’ll ever see you again?”
“...I don’t know. I hope so.” Shelby frowns, and Katherine copies the expression without meaning to. Fern looks back and forth between them as Shelby stops petting her.
“I could probably get my mom to bring me to your town! And even if I can’t, I’ll sneak over there, ‘cause she can’t stop me,” Crossing her arms defiantly, Katherine grins at the small laugh she gets out of Shelby. She looks up to see the sun beginning to go down, and knows it’s time to go. She does not want to be out here with the skeletons, even if she has Fern to protect her.
Unexpectedly, Shelby steps forward. “Just in case you can’t, here’s a gift for bringing me home.”
Warm lips peck Katherine’s cheek, gone as quick as they came. Shelby giggles and turns around, waving as she begins walking down the path. “Okay bye! I hope I see you again!”
Katherine blinks and waves back. Once Shelby is out of sight, she looks down at Fern, who is giving her a very unimpressed look as if she’s bored. “Don’t look at me like that. Let’s go home.” She says, and starts moving in a random direction that she hopes is the way back to her home.
She’ll definitely be finding a way to visit Shelby in the future.