The old creature took a sip of his tea and then grinned up at him. “You’re still alive, are you, young Robin?” Arenthiel asked in a high-pitched, creaky voice.
Rook didn’t bother answering such a stupid question. “Fer, you shouldn’t be helping him,” he said.
She put away the last of the herbs and got to her feet. “He seems pretty harmless to me.” She looked from him to Arenthiel and back again. “Do what you came to help me with, Rook. Look at him with your puck-vision and tell me what you see.”
Before when he’d looked into Arenthiel Rook had seen through the shell of beauty he wore to hide his rotten core. It hadn’t been a glamorie that he’d worn that had made him beautiful; it’d been because he was kin to the High Ones, or so he claimed. Now, on the outside, Aren was a wrinkled husk; Rook expected to see rot on the inside, but it wasn’t there. Old Scrawny was withered all the way through, but with no taint of evil.
“Well?” Fer prompted.
“He looks all right.” Rook shook his head. “But he’s probably up to something. He’s a troublemaker.”
“Takes one to know one,” Arenthiel put in with a cackle.
Grrrr. Rook took a threatening step closer.
“Rook.” Fer shook her head, then turned to Arenthiel. “Your servant said you wanted to talk. The tea has valerian in it and it’ll make you sleepy, so you’d better make it fast.”
The ancient creature was already blinking. “Wait,” he muttered, and reached out with his withered stick of a hand. “Lady. Wait.”
Fer crouched beside him again; Rook edged closer to listen.
“Must tell you,” Arenthiel said in his cracked voice. “I am here in the nathe, at the center of all things, but I cannot leave these rooms. Cannot do anything. The High Ones’ power is waning; they keep to their rooms too. Those who broke their oaths. The Forsworn.” He paused to give a dry cough. “Their power grows. You must be careful. Be careful, Lady. They are here in the nathe.”
“They’re here?” Fer gasped.
“Be careful of them,” Arenthiel muttered, his eyes dropping closed. “Be careful of you.”
“Don’t worry,” Fer said, and took the mug from his hands, setting it on the floor. Getting to her feet, she gently eased Arenthiel back against the pillows. The old creature sighed, and slept.
Six
Arenthiel was right. She needed to be careful. As Fer led Rook through the winding passageways of the nathe, she remembered something the Mór had told her. The Mór, who had been forsworn herself. Our oaths bind us together, the crow-woman had said. When an oath is broken there is a price. And it is always more than the oath breaker can pay.
What price were the forsworn Lords and Ladies paying? Fer wondered. Their broken oaths might mean the usual connection a Lord or Lady had with their lands and their people had been cut. Evidently they had abandoned their own lands and were taking over the nathe.
The High Ones might not be able to stop them, Fer realized. They didn’t wear glamories; they had never seemed to rule by demanding obedience, or with might and muscle. Their power had come from somewhere else. From the weight of wisdom and quiet strength. But now they were hiding in their rooms as if their power was waning.
The Forsworn could be very dangerous indeed if they were drawing power from their broken oaths, here at the center of everything.
Maybe she should try to find them here at the nathe and talk to them. And then, if they wouldn’t fulfill their oaths to her, would she ask Rook to touch them with his shadow-stained hand? She shook her head. No. The Forsworn had to fulfill their oaths because they knew it was right, not because somebody forced them to do it.
Outside the nathewyr, Fer found Gnar and Lich waiting for her.
“Lady Strange,” Gnar said with a flickering grin. “You’ve cut off all your hair. And you brought that puck with you.” She gave Rook a long, appreciative look. “He looks much nicer now than he did before.”
Fer heard Rook give a low growl.
“Thank you for coming, Lady Gwynnefar,” Lich said with a proper bow. “And I think your hair looks very nice.”
It was funny how these two were always with each other. Fer gave them a little bow in return. “Are you . . .” She wasn’t sure what they called it here. Back in the human world it would be going out or dating. “Are you, um, bound to each other?”
“Ha!” Gnar said. And shot a fiery glance toward the swamp-boy.
“Fire and water do not mix, Lady,” Lich said soberly.
But Fer saw the steamy look he gave Gnar in return. They weren’t together, maybe, but they were something.
“The High Ones are waiting,” Gnar said, and opened the door to the nathewyr.
To Fer’s surprise, the great hall was empty and dark, except the platform at the other end, which was lit by a few dim crystals.
“We can’t come in with you,” Lich whispered.
With Rook a step behind her, and her bee a comforting presence on her jacket sleeve, Fer set across the echoing, empty hall. When she’d been here before, the High Ones’ wisdom and power had filled the room. It was a place where time didn’t pass; it just was. This had been a place of silence and stillness, of darkness and depth, and of old, old age. It had made her feel small, and very young.
But now it was a place of empty echoes.
As she approached the platform, the two High Ones gazed down at her. To her they looked the same as always—hair as bright as braided sunlight, dappled skin, white robes edged with gold, ancient eyes as deep as forest pools. They were beautiful even though they didn’t wear glamories, and never had.
“What do you see when you look at them, Rook?” Fer whispered.
“They are what they look like,” he said, without lowering his voice at all. “They’re not liars like the rest of them.” The rest of the Lords and Ladies, he meant. He stopped, and Fer stopped too and turned to face him. “They look different too.” He shook his head. “They’re tired.”
Fer turned back and studied the High Ones. Now that he pointed it out, she could see it too. Their golden beauty looked tarnished somehow. Hopefully they’d still be able—and willing—to help. They had tested her before admitting she was the true Lady of the Summerlands. She still didn’t know if they approved of her or not.
Fer knew she was expected to kneel to the High Ones and speak solemnly. Instead she climbed onto the platform and gave them a quick bow. “Hi,” she said. Her voice sounded muffled in the heavy air.
“Lady Gwynnefar,” one of the High Ones responded. Her voice was cool and smooth, like water in a stream running over stones. “You know why we have called you here.”
Fer nodded. “Some of the Lords and Ladies are forsworn because they won’t take off their glamories. I guess they’re causing problems.”
The High One inclined her head in a graceful nod. “The oaths they have broken were sworn to you.”
“So you want me to deal with the consequences,” Fer said. She understood that. She just didn’t know what role the High Ones were going to play in this. “Are you going to help me?” she asked.
The High Ones gazed at her, their faces blank. “We have summoned you,” one said.
“You are part human, Gwynnefar,” added the other, “and you have brought change to these lands. We are unchanging.”
“You act alone in this,” said the first.
Fer felt a sharp pang of dismay at that. And then a tingle of warmth from the thread that connected her to Rook.
“No, she doesn’t,” he put in from a step behind her, his voice rough. “I’m with her.”
Fer glanced over her shoulder. “Thanks, Rook,” she whispered. Then she turned back to the High Ones. They were truly a mystery. They were ageless. Around them, time slowed to a standstill. Yet they seemed to want the change that she brought to the lands.
The High Ones rose from their thrones and Fer caught another glimpse of their weariness. As they turned to leave, one of them, blank-faced as always, paused
and spoke to Fer in a low voice. “Gwynnefar. We cannot see what is coming to pass. Yet we sense that danger awaits us all.”
Yes, she knew that. “I have to get them to fulfill their oaths, right?” she asked. “That will mean they’re not forsworn anymore, and nothing bad will happen?”
“If you can,” one of the High Ones breathed.
“But I can’t force them to do it,” Fer said.
The High One passed a dappled hand over Fer’s head, then sighed. “Do be careful, Gwynnefar. Do.”
To Fer’s surprise, the High One turned next to Rook, who took a wary step back as she raised her hand. “And you, young puck,” she said, and Fer thought she saw the faintest smile ripple across her calm face. The High One stepped closer to him, then reached out and touched his chest, right over his heart. “Stay true.”
And then they were gone.
Seven
Rook followed Fer through the darkened hall toward the double doors.
The place where the High One had touched him tingled—it was right where the heart thread tied him to Fer. What had she meant, stay true? He was keeping his promise to Fer; he wasn’t planning any betrayal. And he was doing really well so far, with the best behavior.
He shook his head. Taking a few quick steps, he caught up with Fer, then took his left hand out of his coat pocket and opened it, reminding Fer about the shadow-web, the smudged black lines that crossed his palm. “It’s time for the test?”
Fer stopped and faced him. “I have to find the Forsworn, but I only want to talk to them. We’re not using the web.” She pointed to his hand.
Rook frowned. The Forsworn were dangerous. The Mór had been like that. She had broken her oath to her Lady, Fer’s mother, and then everything in that land had gone wrong—the winter had frozen out the spring; the people had turned wildling; the wild hunt had spilled blood, staining the land even more.
“How many Forsworn are there, do you know?” he asked.
“Around ten, I think,” Fer answered. “Before I try anything else, I have to talk to them, convince them to take the glamories off.”
“Fer, they’re not going to—” he started.
With an echoing boom, the double doors of the nathewyr swung open. Four Ladies and a Lord loomed in the doorway, shadows robed in gray, dark against the brighter light outside.
Rook felt a prickle at the back of his neck. His dog self would be growling and sniffing the air for danger. Fer didn’t want him using the shadow-web, so with his right hand, he felt in his pocket for his shifter-tooth. If there were a fight, his dog form would be best.
Fer’s bee felt the same threat; it lifted from Fer’s sleeve to buzz around her head in tight circles.
The five robed shapes stepped farther into the hall. As one, they lifted their hands and jerked back their hoods.
The Forsworn. They dazzled; the nathewyr was lit brightly by the brilliance of their glamories. Beside him, Fer gasped and ducked her head, blinded.
Rook blinked and used his puck-vision to peer beyond the brilliant light. He gave a grim nod. It was the Forsworn, their true selves shriveled and ugly behind their overbright glamories.
Beside him, Fer stumbled; then she straightened, as if throwing off the effect of all those glamories lined up against her. She was a Lady. She couldn’t see through the glamories, but they couldn’t affect her much either. They couldn’t rule her.
“She’s here,” said one of the Ladies to the other Forsworn, and stepped forward. She appeared to be a tall, slender birch woman with pale skin splashed here and there with black, and hair like golden leaves woven together. Behind her glamorie, Rook could see, she was something ancient and dark, like a spindly trunk with branches bare of leaves. She looked down her long nose at Fer, then cast a sneer of deep disgust at him. He knew that one—the nasty puck look.
The other four Forsworn spread out slowly, forming a circle with Fer and Rook in the middle.
Rook felt a growl building in his chest. He gripped his shifter-tooth and pulled his web-smudged hand out of his pocket, ready to use it if he had to.
The Forsworn glided over the stone floor, closing in around Fer and Rook.
“Wait,” Fer said clearly.
To Rook’s surprise, the Forsworn stopped.
“I just want to talk to you for a second,” Fer said. “You swore oaths to take off your glamories. You swore them to me. Now you’re forsworn, and I have to put things right. Will you give up your glamories willingly?”
“You are human,” the Birch-Lady said, “and thus you are nothing more than an insect caught in a river of time rushing past. You change, and you cannot understand us. We will never remove our glamories.” The other Forsworn nodded, agreeing with this.
“I am a Lady, just like you,” Fer said steadily. “I am connected to the Summerlands and its people, just as you are connected to your own lands and people.”
“You think you are like us?” the Forsworn Lord asked from behind them. Glancing over his shoulder, Rook saw that he had shiny, kelplike hair and skin tinted green, and his glamorie shone like the sun glinting off the sea. Under the glamorie, Rook saw, the Sea-Lord looked like a crab-man crouching in a watery cave, his beady eyes watching, his claws ready to reach out and snap. “You are nothing like us, human girl.” He looked around at the Ladies, and they nodded, and he continued. “If we take off the glamories, time will flow and we will be swept away. Why not have time circle around us like a whirlpool? Why not remain unchanging, as we are?”
Fer’s eyes widened as if she’d suddenly realized something. “If you don’t change, then you’re not really alive. Everything changes all the time; it has to.” She’d gone very pale. “If you won’t change, then your lands won’t either. That will be the price you pay for breaking your oaths. Your lands and your people will suffer. You’re connected to them. Don’t you feel any love for them at all?”
The Birch-Lady spoke. Her voice was beautiful, like a breeze rustling through leaves. But her words were cold. “That does not matter anymore. We will never remove our glamories.” She nodded sharply at the other Forsworn. “Now. Get rid of the puck and take her.”
At her order, the Sea-Lord and two Ladies lunged forward, grabbing Fer, who shouted and struggled in their grip.
In a flash, Rook shifted into his dog shape; snarling, he leaped at one of the Ladies, slashing with his teeth. She shrieked and fell back, and drops of blood spattered from her arm. Rook whirled to snap at the Lord. He and the other Lady let Fer go and backed away.
“Rook, we have to get out of here,” Fer gasped.
He shifted back to his person form. “We do, yes,” he said grimly.
The Birch-Lady strode forward. Behind her, the other Forsworn closed in.
Rook growled and raised his web-stained hand.
“Rook, no—” Fer started.
“Take her!” the Birch-Lady cried, and reached out to seize Fer.
Instead Rook stepped between them and grabbed the Forsworn Lady’s arm with his web-stained hand.
“Ugh!” she cried, and jerked away.
For a moment, he thought it hadn’t worked. Then she lifted her arm and stared at it. “What did you do, Puck?” She turned a venomous look onto Fer. “What has your puck done to me?”
As they watched, the glamorie covering the Lady’s arm burned away, turning to greasy black dust that sifted to the floor.
“What have you done?” she screamed. The rot had set into her glamorie. It spread up her arm and over her shoulder, and she scrabbled at it with her other hand, trying to hold it back. The rot crept on, and she clawed at it as her glamorie shredded into muck and ruin.
The Sea-Lord and other Ladies scrambled away from her, their eyes wide.
The rot crept like a blackened crust up her neck and over her face, and the last of the glamorie melted away, and her screams turned to moans as the hidden creature was revealed. She stood for a moment, hunched and gnarled, then collapsed to the floor, covered with the muck of th
e rotten glamorie.
The thing that had been the Birch-Lady dragged herself over the stone floor, reaching with one spindly, muck-smeared arm toward the Lord and other Ladies, who backed away, horrified. “Give me . . . glamorie,” she moaned. “Just for . . . little while. I will give it back, I swear.”
“Don’t let it touch you,” one of the Ladies screeched.
A howl rose up from the thing on the floor. The stench of the shadow-spinner spider filled the hall. The howl turned into a moaning sigh, and the creature subsided onto the floor like a heap of sticks, and lay still.
The Sea-Lord edged forward, then bent to examine the Birch-Lady. “I think it’s dead.” He and the Ladies backed away until they stood in the double doorway of the nathewyr, as if being too near the dead Lady would contaminate them.
One of the Ladies pointed at Fer with a trembling finger. “You did this. Your coming brings terrible changes upon us. Abomination!”
“Let us flee,” said the Sea-Lord. “Quickly. Before the human and her puck kill us all.”
The Lord and Ladies scurried out the door, leaving Rook and Fer standing in the nathewyr with the dead Birch-Lady in a heap on the floor.
Rook clenched his hand around the shadow-web. He hadn’t told Fer about what had happened after he and his brothers had tested the web. The glamorie web had turned to dust, yes. But as he and his brothers had left the bare rock land of the spiders, the ruined moon-spinner spider had scuttled to the top of the spire, where it had clung, keening a high-pitched wail and reaching with its long legs toward the moon, lost to it forever. Its cry had been full of horror and desolation.
And, he realized now, full of death.
Eight
Her heart pounding, Fer looked away from the heap of muck-covered sticks that had been the Birch-Lady.
A Lady, dead. Dead.
How had she let this happen?
A few paces away, Rook stood with his hand clenched around the bit of shadow-web on his palm, staring at the dead Lady.
Moonkind (Winterling) Page 4
