We Followed the Moonwing Butterfly into the Emerald Dragonwood
We followed the Moonwing Butterfly beneath the Dragonwood’s dripping canopy, where leaves rose higher than our heads and every step sank into black moss. It settled on a broad green blade, its wings veined like amber glass. Then the leaf trembled. Something enormous shifted above us, and the butterfly shot into the dark.
We followed the Moonwing butterfly into the Emerald Dragonwood just before dusk. It settled on a broad, blue-green leaf, wings folded like a burnt map. I expected it to fly. Instead, it tapped the leaf twice with one thin leg and went still. Beneath it, the veins bore fresh cuts, sap bright as glass. Someone had tried to erase a trail. Mara crouched beside me. No web, no bite marks, no dragon scales: the beast had not passed here. The butterfly’s left wing carried red dust. We found the same dust on a thorn ten paces north, then on a stone beside a gap in the roots. The tracks stopped there. I heard a click below us, then a breath that smelled of wet iron. The Moonwing opened its wings. From the dark under the roots, something clicked back.
