He felt something on his right leg, just above where the jungle boot met the fabric of his pants. Looking back and down, he saw half a dozen of the black tendrils touching his upper calf. Several were unmistakably pointed in his direction. Their tips, he could see clearly now, were hollow. Tubes designed and equipped for spraying lethal sticky maroon powder at any potential predator.
Slowly, very slowly, he withdrew his fingers from the vicinity of the damaged basidiocarp. As he did so, the black rhizomorphs straightened, the threatening tips pointing skyward instead of toward him. They did not, however, withdraw back into the rotting log from which they had emerged. Instead, they continued to feel his leg just below the knee.
“Come along, Hasa,” urged Masurathoo. “You are delaying our departure.”
Jemunu-jah was eyeing the human more intently. “What is going on, Hasa? What you looking at?”
“I’ve found something. Or it’s found me. I’m not sure yet.”
“Found something?” The Sakuntala took a long nimble step toward where the human was starting to sit back down. “Found what?”
“I don’t know.” He glanced quickly in the Sakuntala’s direction before returning his attention to the busy rhizomorphs. “Maybe some of your forest spirits.” Keeping his movements slow and predictable, he sat down on the large log that had served as the center of their encampment. Rising hypnotically from the wood, more and more of the rhizomorphs emerged to inspect his body. Some of them were unusually thick, even by the standards of Fluvan fungal growths. A few were giants of their kind, as big around as his little finger.