“Are you out of your fucking mind?” I hissed at him. “You can’t just say stuff like that. He might hear you!”
Gary rolled his eyes. “Oh please. Tiggy is keeping him distracted for me.”
“You planned this?”
“You always have to have a plan when you are going into battle.”
“I’m not going to talk to you anymore.”
“Sam. Sam. Sam. Sam. SamSamSamSam—”
A WEEK later, I was awakened in the middle of the night by a cold nose pressing against my face. I groaned and cracked an eye open.
Big unicorn nostrils right in my face. I could hear Ryan’s and Tiggy’s snores from the other side of the fire. Gary had been on watch.
“What?” I croaked.
“What are you doing?” His breath smelled of cinnamon and apples. Apparently it was a unicorn thing to have delightful odors.
“Sleeping.”
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“So.”
“So?”
“I thought of another one.”
“Another what?”
“Did you hear about what happened to the murderers in Falquist?”
“What? What are you talking about? What murderers?”
He leaned closer and whispered in my ear, “They were stoned to death.”
He never blinked.
“Oh my gods,” I muttered, pushing his face as hard as I could. “Did you wake me up just so you could tell me that?”
“Yes. Obviously. Tell me.”
“Fuck off.” I rolled on my side and pulled the scratchy blanket over my head.
Right before I fell back asleep, I heard him whisper, “I’m never going to forget this. You will succumb to the power of the unicorn.”
I WOKE up the next morning to a pile of stones next to my head.
Tiggy laughed.
Ryan’s eyes narrowed.
Gary said, “Wow. How did that happen?”
GARY WASN’T getting what he wanted from me, so four days later he went a different direction.