by Kate Elliott
“Hurry!” Rowan galloped across the meadow, Will right behind and Cerise following. She heard Elowen’s voice, calling after them, but she didn’t stop.
A path opened where two yew trees bent so their branches intertwined to make an opening in the dense growth. Rowan pressed her horse forward into the gloom. The track was so heavily overhung by trees that little light reached the ground. Forgotten buildings loomed within the tangle of forest on either side. Feet, hands, arms, and crowns from dismembered statues littered the path, forcing her to a cautious walk. The path wound through the undergrowth as far as she could see, fading into dimness.
An animal rustled through the vegetation to her left. When she glanced that way, she saw the pale glow of a unicorn’s horn. Had Cerise taken a different path? But she’d seen no other path, no fork in the trail. Was the heart realm trying to separate them?
“Cerise!” she called.
“Hush, don’t call attention to us,” scolded Will.
“Did you see another path where she might have—” She broke off.
A moment ago the path had cut straight through the forest with no branches or forks. Now, straight ahead, the trail split into two. They halted.
“Which way did the stag go?”
Will raised a trembling arm to point down the rightward fork. A massive dragon’s skull as tall as a house sat on the path, facing them with its bony jaws gaping wide open. The trail led into the skull. Light shone at the end of the long tunnel it made, a glimpse to an open space not covered by trees.
“That skull was in the visions,” he said, starting forward. “I think we’re meant to go through there.”
Fibrous vines twisted around the upper part of the jaw, holding it taut rather like a portcullis held open by a winch at Castle Ardenvale. Rowan couldn’t help but wonder what would happen if the vines snapped just as they rode underneath the dragon’s teeth, but she wasn’t about to say so aloud, not even to Will. She didn’t want him to think she was afraid, even though she was terrified. Elowen might lecture on and on about the glorious mysteries of the Wilds but Rowan just wanted to find the stag, find their father, and get out before they got horribly killed like Titus. She shouldn’t have raced ahead onto the jade bridge. She should have stayed loyally back with her friend, shoulder to shoulder. But the lich knight’s ghastly stench and chilling magic had terrified her into letting Titus take rearguard alone.
Will reached the dragon’s maw. He looked back at her with head tilted to one side, questioningly. “Rowan?”
Furious with herself, she urged her mount forward. The mare’s ears flicked back and forth at the sight of the huge skull, but she moved forward obedient to her rider’s command.
Inside the skull the air had a peculiar sweet smell. Its curved interior gleamed softly. Sparks floated high up in the its cranium like a dance of fireflies. It was oddly peaceful.
Will whispered, “Do you hear voices ahead?”
The back of the skull opened onto a stone-paved plaza choked with flowering shrubs and tall grass. The headless body of the dragon was curled into an oval. Because it had been turned to stone, it formed a wall three stories high around an unseen open space inside. The tip of its tail had pinched up where it met the severed neck, the curve forming a gateway. Climbing roses with flowers as red as blood grew from cracks in shield-sized scales that had the texture of granite. One wing had been unfurled at the moment the dragon had been turned to stone, left sticking straight up into the sky to such a height that Rowan had to lean backward to see the top. A flame burned at the shining tip of the wing.
They had found the amphitheater mentioned by Elowen, carved out of the body of a petrified dragon.
Argumentative voices came from inside.
Rowan dismounted and handed her reins to Will. As he led the horses behind a concealing height of brush, she padded over to the wall. Her gloves and armor protected her from the thorns, and the cracks between the petrified scales of the dragon made it easy for her to climb to the top. Inside, the central area was filled with tiers of stone seats built in an oval. A crested eagle perched on the far wall, overlooking a meeting taking place below.
A crude campfire burned on the central oval. Eight elves sat on broken stones around the fire, arguing.
The only elves Rowan had ever seen were Queen Ayara and some of the courtiers of Locthwain, with their elegant attire and sophisticated haughtiness. The elves of the Wilds had little in common with their kinfolk who had stayed in the Realm. They wore crowns of flowers and leaves in their hair, clothing woven of flax and thistle, and they bore keen, quick expressions. But the most shocking sight at the meeting was Queen Ayara, standing to one side like a humble on-looker. She wore black riding clothes instead of her usual sweeping black gown, with golden broaches in the shape of goblets pinned to the lapels of her jacket. Her hair was braided into a tight crown, leaving her face unveiled. She didn’t look old—elves never did—but there was an indefinable air of great age and ancient exasperation as she glared, hands on hips, at the young elf who was speaking to the council.
“The time to attack is now while the Realm is weakened, while they squabble in disorder and disagreement,” said this individual, a gloriously handsome young person. He held a beautifully carved bow in his brown hands. “We can start tonight. For generations we’ve been confined within the Wilds. What’s to stop us from riding through the Realm this midwinter? To hunt where we choose, as we used to do? To take our pick of prey, as we ought to be able to do!”
“You young fool,” snapped Ayara. “What do think that will accomplish, except to terrorize the inhabitants of the Realm?”
“They terrorize us with their quests and their rules. You have become complacent. A collaborator!”
A swirl of dust spun a whirlwind of magic around the council, forming a tall column in a funnel of air meant to sweep Locthwain’s queen off her feet. Ayara brushed it aside with a casual flick of a hand as she continued speaking.
“You parrot the words of an individual who has been traveling through the Wilds since autumn, goading you to attack. According to the reports sent to me by my envoy, this person is a stranger to us. Why do you trust him, Ilidon?”
“Because he is correct.” He raised his bow toward the sky. “The hunt rides tonight. And this year we ride where we wish.”
Another elf spoke up. Although she looked no older than Ilidon, there was something about her voice that held a time-worn weight of caution. “Ayara is correct.”
“You’d say so, Aelfra!” Ilidon retorted. “You and she are cousins.”
“Do you not respect our ancient clans and ties of kinship? Ayara does. That is why she hunts with us every midwinter although the hunt is forbidden in the Realm. The meal we share at the end of the hunt binds our clans together. It binds the earth and the sky together. So it has always been. So it will always be.”
“Since before you were born, stripling,” remarked Ayara with a curl of her lips.
Aelfra waved her to silence and turned back to the younger elf. “You should be asking yourself where the stranger came from and which clan he belongs to. No one knows him. Worse, he brings a corruption with him that harms the Wilds. Have you not seen the dead beasts, eaten away by a magical curse none of us recognize? He’s no friend of ours, Ilidon.”
“He doesn’t need to be our friend. He needs only to be our ally. With the High King missing and every court suspicious of the others, we can push back effectively at long last! Reclaim what has always been rightfully ours.”
Aelfra held a spear decorated with copper and bronze leaves. She stamped its haft on the ground. “Be careful of what you think you know! You’re too young to recall the days when we retreated into the Wilds and what happened then. Beyond that, the stranger claims to have bespelled the High King but cannot produce him. I’m not against taking back what we’ve lost. But we need concrete assurances that following a stranger’s counsel would not lead us into a worse disaster.”
“I
advise rapprochement with Castle Ardenvale,” said Ayara. “There has never been a better time to seek to reach a more advantageous understanding with Queen Linden. If we can find Algenus Kenrith and restore him to the throne, it might allow our people to—”
Ilidon leaped to his feet, shaking the bow at her. “Appeasement? Surrender? Never!”
The others broke out in angry remonstrances, some crying out against any negotiations with the Realm, others supporting Ayara and Aelfra. A few refused to engage in the dispute as they instead sharpened their spear points for the hunt that would set off at dusk.
A flurry of wings pulled Rowan’s attention away from the council. The crested eagle had flown over to perch a short distance away, watching her with a disturbingly acute gaze. What if it were like that Garenbrig knight’s hawk, an animal bound to a master for whom it could spy? She edged backward and climbed down. No one in the council oval raised an alert, so maybe it had just been a curious eagle.
From Will’s hiding place they could see no other way out of the plaza. In silence they rode back through the skull and took the fork that led left through the dense growth and empty ruins. When they’d gotten far enough away Will finally spoke in a low voice.
“What did you see?”
“A council of elves. Queen Ayara was there.”
“What? How did she get here?”
“King Yorvo must have sent her through the portal right before us.”
“And then he didn’t mention it to us. Is that normal?”
“I don’t know. He’s not obliged to tell us his other business, is he?”
“Do you think Queen Ayara has something to do with Father’s disappearance? That’s what they claim at Garenbrig.”
“She told the council she didn’t. There really is a midwinter hunt every year, like cranky old villagers always claim their grandmother’s grandmother talked about.”
“Really?”
“Yes. The elves are preparing for it right now. Apparently Ayara secretly takes part in the hunt every year.”
“Why would she do that?”
“They said it is an ancient clan tradition. They eat what they kill all together. Some kind of magical ceremony to bind the earth and sky. What if all those villagers are right and there really is a sacrifice?”
Trust good old Will not to look shocked. He merely nodded. “We go hunting and have feasts afterward too. Shared blood binds. That’s what the loremages say. That would explain why Ayara vanishes every midwinter solstice. But why does she keep it a secret? Is she ashamed of it?”
“It sounded to me as if no one in the Realm is meant to take part in the midwinter hunt, as if there is an old agreement about it.”
“A broken contract! That makes me more suspicious of her. What if she has just been waiting for a good chance to overthrow the Realm?”
“All these years? She’s been alive a really long time, Will.”
“If not her, then who is causing all this trouble?”
“They were talking about a stranger. Someone wandering the Wilds trying to convince the elves to attack the Realm now that Father is missing. Queen Ayara wants the council to open negotiations with Mother, but that will never happen. The Realm and the Wilds will always be opposed.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. What if it doesn’t have to be that way?”
“Now you sound like Loremage Elowen. But here’s another strange thing. I came under surveillance by a crested eagle, like Alona’s hawk. So we have to be even more cautious. And there’s worse! The midwinter hunt must be gathering nearby. We’ve got to find the stag and get out of here before the portal closes at dusk.”
“Shh,” he warned as the path lightened ahead.
They rode over a scattering of squat mushrooms and into a circular glade surrounded by stately oak, ash, and thorn trees. A slender tower rooted in the middle of the glade had toppled sideways long ago. Marble slabs scattered the ground. Its conical roof had broken into shards that spilled right up the path’s opening. A weather vane topped by a fanged cherub had been stuck upright into the earth.
Sunlight glinted on the pale stone remains of the fallen tower. Grass swayed in a mellow breeze. A man lounged at his ease in a vine-draped seat constructed out of pieces of marble into a mockery of a throne. He held a skull at arm’s length, studying it with a rueful but good-natured frown. As they reined their horses to a halt, he looked up and his eyes widened.
“Rowan and Will Kenrith!” he said with an exaggerated aspect of surprise. “How are you come here?”
A spike of agonizing pain lanced deep behind Rowan’s eyes. She pressed a hand over her face, thinking her eyes were about to bleed out, but the pain faded. When she opened her eyes, she blinked several times and stared. Beside her, Will’s mouth had dropped open as he gaped like a lackwit. Finally, he spoke.
“Lord Oko?” He said the name hesitantly.
“Oko!” Rowan echoed as the memory of that day flooded over her.
“What became of you at Beckborough?” said Will.
“Yes, that’s right. We lost track of you.” Rowan rubbed her eyes as a last tremor of headache cut through her brow. Yet it wasn’t really that strange she and Will had forgotten about the encounter, was it? Everything at Beckborough had happened so fast and with such appalling repercussions. “Are you questing for the High King too? Is that your companion we saw by the bridge? The hunter?”
“So many questions! And I have so many answers.”
“Whose skull is that?” Rowan stared at the gaping eye holes with a miasma of dread gnawing at her heart.
“A question I have been asking myself all morning as I contemplate the meaning of death and the vagaries of life. Who are we, really, in our hearts? What does it mean that this lost soul met their end in a beautiful glade amid sweet smelling flowers and beneath the all-embracing sky? Do such fates not make you wonder about why the worlds are the way they are? Do you not wonder at how the mighty flourish through cruelty? At how their lies masquerade as honesty? At how those in power tell you they are hurting you for your own good while they bind you with chains of their own making?”
“That’s why we strive to be virtuous,” said Rowan stoutly.
He sat up, taut and eager. “Yet what if virtue is not enough? What if virtue is a lie?”
“Virtue can’t be a lie!”
“Who tells you it cannot be a lie? The very ones who thrust you into a cage and torture you. People do not like to have their own behavior held to account or even criticized. I know that from my own humbling experience. I am fortunate to be alive and free at all, young Rowan. I cherish my good fortune every day as I breathe the strengthening air of freedom. It’s my hope I can help others—the hapless, the ignorant, the weak, the youthful strivers like you—to embrace freedom alongside me.”
His words rang in her ears like the toll of every unanswered question she had ever asked. His somber gaze pierced to the deepest part of her, the one that chafed at the restrictions placed on her, all the demands and refusals, the low-voiced disagreements between her parents broken off whenever one of their children came into the room.
“Were you really tortured?” she asked.
Will reached out to touch her arm. “Ro, you don’t ask people that kind of question.”
“Never apologize for asking honest questions. I honor those who seek answers.” Oko set down the skull. “Yet I would not sully your innocent ears with the coarse and grievous tale of my early years and how I survived them. Let me say only that I was put in a cage by the very people I trusted most. All the while they persecuted and maltreated me they claimed to do so out of love for me. They called me debased and dangerous when I would not bow to their whims and commands.”
Will shook his head as if to dislodge cobwebs. “I’m sorry for your troubles, Lord Oko, and I don’t mean to sound dismissive, but we are urgently on the track of a stag.”
“A stag!” He jumped to his feet. “When did you see a stag?”
&nbs
p; As the cobwebs of memory fully cleared from Rowan’s mind, she flashed on that glimpse of a unicorn’s horn seen through the trees. But she, Will, and Oko were the only people in sight in the glade.
“Where are the others?” she said to Will.
He turned to look back the way they’d come. “They were supposed to be right behind us. That was the only trail I saw.”
Rowan’s mouth went dry. After Titus’s death she ought never to have taken anything in the Wilds for granted, yet now she and Will had carelessly lost the others.
“Have you seen our companions?” she asked Oko.
“The Wilds holds tight to its secrets, does it not? Why would you suppose I had seen your companions or a stag when I have been sitting here enjoying the sun?” Relaxing, Oko strolled over toward them. Somehow he had in each hand an apple, which he fed to the grateful horses as he smiled, first at Will and then at Rowan, with a look of bright inquisitiveness. “When we met in Beckborough I thought you two not yet old enough to partake of a quest into the Wilds.”
“We turned eighteen on Wintertide’s Eve,” said Rowan.
“Ah. Times does fly, does it not? Tell me of your journey. How did you get here so quickly? I am given to understand it can take knights years to find this place, if they ever find it at all.”
Rowan was startled at how much she wanted to impress him with their deeds and valor. “First we rode to Vantress to speak to the mirror.”
“The mirror!” he exclaimed, clapping his hands together and clasping them at his chest as if delighted by her cleverness.
“Yes, Indrelon has been refusing to speak to the knights and questing folk. But Will and I were admitted into the watery pit.”
“Of course two fine young people like you were given that honor. Then what happened?”
“The vision we saw sent us to Garenbrig.”
“What vision was that?” Oko asked. “Can you describe it?”
