When a breeze blows in The Garden, that forest of flower trees within the greater forest of green trees in Gorrals, petals burst from and twirl about the woods in such abundance that it is as if the wind had just blown its first gust. And yet it was so windy in the heart of that expansive forest that it was the wind, not the flowers, that inspired the name of the town there.

  Zephyr, a town of white log cabins running up and around the northeastern edge of its namesake lake, was known far and wide for more than just its fragrant gusts. Peace and quiet were synonymous with Zephyr despite the plethora of perils in the woods beyond its borders. And Mrs. Apple, who had enjoyed such qualities those long years she'd lived there, preferred it that way.

  Which is exactly why, when that rotten Flowers kid had grown old enough to prove his nuisance beyond retort, she stood tall and proud with a small but raucous crowd outside Mayor Flowers's lawn and demanded he ship off his only adopted son. Not only did the foundling look foreign, with his unruly mop of blonde hair and frightfully bright blue eyes. But he acted foreign too, always clambering about in the trees like a squirrel, or one of those fabeled monkeys in the far east.

  He was older now, and worse rather than better for it. He scurried across rooftops between trees, no matter who lived beneath them or from whose yard they sprung. They were his, and he played in them like they were his personal jungle gym. He had already kicked over more than one of her potted plants on the upper patio garden – most recently, Oscar, her darling sapling oak – and she'd had the darn thing no more than a week.

  Those facts were why she became jumpy in her own home; and why when her floorboards quaked that fateful afternoon, and the house shuttered, and her windows rattled, her first thought was of the boy.

  She poked her head through the window beneath the patio garden. Didn't look like anyone was up there. But a dust cloud billowed to the east, over the tree line, and continued west a good ways. She thought she heard screaming too.

  She hurried to the door and flung it open for a better look. What she saw immediately drained the blood from her cheeks.

  Feathered drakuls. Three of them, one of them at least as high as the lower slant of her roof. They were looking about, like chickens on a hunt, and already standing over bloodstained grass.

  She slammed the door shut and nearly fell backward over a chair she toppled behind her in her fear.

  Shakily, she forced herself back to the door and locked it. She stepped back as it quaked violently, its handle jiggling. Dust she’d meant to get to came sprinkling down like a soft snow.

  She hurried for the broom and dustpan but froze. More screaming, hollering and a gut-wrenching squawk. It was so close, so thunderous that it tickled her feet through the floor.

  A horde of the giant birds stormed past chasing screaming townsfolk, a gust of dirt and spattering debris clattering into her walls and windows.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  And then stillness. Silence.

  She breathed heavily. In and out, her heart drumming - thump, thump, thump!

  She stood utterly still. She couldn't remember doing that, not in ages – she'd never had to. A rage against the foreign feeling welled inside her. She hurried to the sink and grabbed a heavy ladle.

  With it, she crept to the front door. There, she stopped. Why couldn't she will herself to grab the knob? This was her house, her yard – her lawn those birds had trampled all to hell.

  She just couldn't. She couldn't move. She stood there, frozen, and even quieted her breathing.

  There was a crashing, crashing sound like the thunder of nearby lightning. The logs supporting her ceiling crumbled at once in a splintering mess of shards and dangling beams. There, on her floor, was the Flowers boy. He'd finally done it. He'd finally gone and ruined her house.

  A panic she noticed in his eyes replaced her rage with fear. His gaze was aimed behind her. She turned and saw the source of his terror. A literal monster. A drakul, all of twelve feet tall, stood at the gaping hole her door once filled. The bird was only partially visible, from the grotesquely massive claws to just above its knobby knees. The skin of its legs were peeling and dirty, orange like freshly dug carrots. Its sticky gray body was shrouded by the wall that remained, but its stink pored through, and its head was clearly visible. It had forced it in through a gap in the broken ceiling, and presently struggled to break in further and eat her.

  It was monstrous, dead-eyed, and fixated on her like nothing had been since Bill during their last hoorah.

  She couldn't move, but she didn't have to. The boy – Windston Flowers – hurled himself into the bird. There was a thud of body-on-body impact. The bird's desperate yodeling cut short as it tumbled, Windston with it, down the freshly stained steps of her new front porch – all suddenly a ruinous mess of flying, splintering boards.

  With a sudden raging fire in her gut, the old woman hurled herself out into the sunlight and, with her ladle overhead, rushed the bird and the bastard boy.

  Another bird saw her. It caught her, snatched her up, slung her side-to-side like a puppy with a ragdoll. Her ribs crunched – she could oddly feel that; it was like a noiseless sound inside. Her wind escaped her from both sides. Her mouth went all salty, metallic, coppery. Her limbs tingled and her eyes felt as though they'd burst.

  The monster released her, or she ripped apart. She wasn't sure which. She only knew she was flying now, hopefully far away, to heaven maybe – to Bill, Ferny and Louise. She could see the trees and their flowers. And then she saw the Flowers boy. He was swinging that freaky flaming thing he called a sword, and she was sure he didn't see her coming. Screaming didn't work anymore; nothing came out but bubbling gurgles.

  As he turned, and he swung his sword into her body, she thought... I didn't think it'd feel like that. It didn't hurt. There was no impact. Just warmth rising to heat, and a tingling, tickling feeling. Oozing warmth followed, and just as something heavy was sliding out of her from within.

  Cold and fruitlessly gasping, she lay there bleeding out. And she was oddly fine with that.

  As she twitched and swallowed, she saw the boy again. Windston Flowers. His face was smudged with black blood, hair and feathers pasted to one side, to his cheek. His expression was neutral, neither disturbed, or even disgusted.

  She thought maybe she'd smile. She didn’t know why. There was a flooding feeling inside her; she felt full of bursting from within.

  Someone pushed past the boy, and she was sure it'd be her William.

  But it wasn't. It was Bo – Bo Beeman. She'd never liked him, and she was sure he never liked her. But he knelt down beside her all the same, despite the havoc, the commotion, the frenzy, and just to tell her one more lie.

  "Shh. Don't worry yourself, now. We're gonna get you some help. You're gonna be just fine."