She kept her eyes ahead, to frightened to look anywhere else.

Grimalkin never hesitated, leading them on without a backward glance, passing gates and doors and strange, random things stuck in the tangled web of thorns. A mirror, a doll and an empty golf bag dangled from the branches as they walked by, as well as the countless bones and sometimes full skeletons that littered the trail. Strange creatures watched them from the shadows, mostly unseen, just their eyes glowing in the dark. Black birds with human faces perched in the branches, observing them silently as they passed, like waiting vultures. At one point, Grimalkin pulled them all into a side tunnel, hissing at them to be quiet and not move.

She stayed silent, barely breathing as she tensed up.

Moments later, a massive spider, easily the size of a car, crawled over the brambles directly overhead. Huge and shiny, with a splash of red across its bloated abdomen, it paused a moment, as if sensing warm blood and fluids were very close, waiting for the slightest tremor to betray its quarry.

She stayed frozen in place, staring at it from the shadows.

For several heart-pounding seconds, they crouched in the tunnel. Above them, the spider sat perfectly still as well, patiently waiting for its prey to grow bored, to assume it was safe and make the first move that would be its last. Eventually, something rustled in the branches ahead, and it darted away, frighteningly quick for something that huge. The scream of some unfortunate creature pierced the air, and then silence.

She stayed still, not moving a muscle out of pure fear.

For a few moments after the spider left, nobody dared to move, either. Eventually, Grimalkin crept forward, poking his head out warily, scanning the thorns. "Wait here," he told them. "I will see if it is safe." Slipping into the shadows like a ghost, he disappeared.

She waited patiently for Grim, sitting in the dark with Ironhorse and Puck.

Puck put a hand on her shoulder. "You okay, Princess?"