The predawn quiet of Cantee Forest was shattered by the clanging of bells. Birds burst from their roosts, shrieking with alarm. Startled deer froze, heads held high as they tested the air and then dashed for the safety of the underbrush. The pookas and dryads and niskies, just settling down after a night of revelry, pulled leaves and moss over their heads and covered their ears, groaning at the noise. The trees paused in their whispered conversations to listen briefly, while elsewhere in the forest the unicorn and the wyvern noted the noise and wondered what poor creature had stumbled into Ashega's web.
In barely a moment the rattling bells subsided to their regular melodic murmur and the forest community welcomed the return of the morning's peace. Ashega, more than any other, disliked her bells to ring out of tune.
Lilliput closed his eyes, burrowed deeper into his bed of leaves, and tried to rediscover that restful lethargy that comes just before sleep. Something large must have hit Ashega's web for the bells to ring so loudly, he thought sadly. A shame to meet her as dinner; she really is a sweet spider, otherwise.
The comfortable slow rumbling of Borl's voice as he debated philosophy--something to do with the question of what is what?--with another of the great ironroot trees soothed Lilliput and he yawned, willingly slipping into the beginnings of a dream.
But again the clatter of Ashega's bells jarred the quiet. Lilliput sat up, yanked once more from the arms of his dream-pooka, waiting for the noise to stop. It did, for the span of a breath. Then the bells rang again, louder and longer this time, and then again. He thought he heard Ashega's shrill voice crying out along with the bells.
"What the--?" he fumed, climbing from his bed and emerging from the hollow under the great tree's trunk. "Borl? Do you know what she's caught?" he asked, emerging from the hollow under the great tree's trunk.
The tree rattled its branches and sighed. Lilliput waited, knowing it asked the question of a tree closer to Ashega's web.
"She is saying it is stone," Borl replied in his deep, slow voice. "A creature made of stone."
"What?"
Lilliput didn't wait for the tree's answer. He raced off toward the angry sound of bells. As he ran, he noticed that others--pookas, dryads, even a niskie or two--were also running toward the sound. "What is it?" he asked Draea, secretly thrilled that he had a real reason to speak with the pretty silvery-green dryad.
"Who can know?" she asked. "Ashega is furious, though." She grinned. "Just listen to her curse!"
"Lilliput! Draea!" a female voice called from behind them. Lilliput cringed inside at the sound of Roxanne's familiar voice. He pretended he hadn't heard her.
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