Oko - Traps Will, Rowan, and Allies in Vines

A stalk sprouted from the ground and at an astonishing speed twisted into a green halter binding the stag’s head.

“If you’ll excuse me, my friends. And I know you will because I’m not giving you a choice.” Oko bowed with a flourish as he took hold of the stag’s vine-grown leash and walked into the trees.

The vegetation thrashed and churned as if a hundred redcaps were beating the brush, but the rustling at the edge of the trees wasn’t animals or creatures. It was a spurt of impossibly rapid growth. Magical growth. Vines slithered between the trunks of trees, weaving a barrier bristling with thorns and nettles that wound up along the trunks.

“Come on!” Rowan shouted, racing for the edge of the glade.

The vines were taller than them already, writhing through the canopy, reaching ever higher. With her touch Rowan pressed lightning into them, but green, living things do not easily burn and her magic fizzled. Will’s ice touched them with no more effect than a fall of snow on a winter forest. Hale leaped skyward with Cado, but the vines had already grown past the canopy, weaving a lattice-work dome over the glade. They were trapped in a cage of thorns.

***

Throne of Eldraine: The Wildered Quest, Part Two: Winter