The Werewolf of Fever Swamp

4

"I don't believe this!" Emily shrieked.

Her loud shout made the two blackbirds flutter off their tree limb. They soared away, cawing angrily.

"What am I doing here?" she cried. Emily is not good in emergencies. When she got a flat tire during one of her first driving lessons back home in Burlington, she jumped out of the car and ran away!

So I didn't exactly expect her to be calm and cool now. Since we were totally lost in the middle of a dark, hot swamp, I expected her to panic. And she did.

I'm the calm one in the family. I take after Dad. Cool and scientific. "Let's just figure out the direction of the sun," I said, ignoring the fluttering in my chest.

"What sun?" Emily cried, throwing her hands up.

It was really dark. The palm trees with their wide leaves formed a pretty solid roof above us.

"Well, we could check out some moss," I suggested. The fluttering in my chest was growing stronger. "Isn't moss supposed to grow on the north side of trees?"

"East side, I think," Emily muttered. "Or is it the west?"

"I'm pretty sure it's the north," I insisted, gazing around.

"Pretty sure? What good is pretty sure?" Emily cried shrilly.

"Forget the moss," I said, rolling my eyes. "I'm not even sure what moss looks like."

We stared at each other for a long time.

"Didn't you used to carry a compass with you wherever you went?" Emily asked, sounding a little shaky.

"Yeah. When I was four," I replied.

"I can't believe we were so stupid," Emily wailed. "We should have worn one of the radio transmitters. You know. For the deer. Then Dad could track us down."

"I should have worn jeans," I muttered, noticing some tiny red bumps along my calf. Poison ivy? Some kind of rash?

"What should we do?" Emily asked impatiently, wiping sweat off her forehead with her hand.

"Go back up the hill, I guess," I told her. "There were no trees there. It was sunny. Once we see where the sun is, we can figure out the direction to get back."

"But which way is the hill?" Emily demanded.

I spun around. Was it behind us? To our right? A cold chill ran down my back as I realized I wasn't sure.

I shrugged. "We're really lost," I murmured with a sigh.

"Let's go this way," Emily said, starting to walk away. "I just have a feeling this is the way. If we come to that bog, we'll know we're going right."

"And if we don't?" I demanded.

"We'll come to something else, maybe," she replied.

Brilliant.

But I didn't see any good in arguing with her. So I followed.

We walked in silence, the shrill ringing of the insects on all sides, the calls of birds startling us from above. After a short while, we pushed our way through a clump of tall, stiff reeds.

"Have we been here before?" Emily asked.

I couldn't remember. I pushed a reed away to step through and realized it had left something sticky on my hand. "Yuck!"

"Hey, look!" Emily's excited cry made me glance up from the sticky green gunk that clung to my hand.

The bog! It was right in front of us. The same bog we had stopped at before.

"Yay!" Emily cried. "I knew I was right. I just had a feeling."

The sight of the gurgling green pond cheered us both up. Once past it, we began to run. We knew we were on the right path, nearly home.

"Way to go!" I cried happily, running past my sister. "Way to go!"

I was feeling really good again.

Then something reached up, grabbed my ankle, and pulled me down to the swampy ground.