Still, she forged on. She had committed herself to this rendezvous and would not turn back unless she had real reason to believe she had been deceived.
Damia walked on. Roots seemed to shift themselves underfoot as though trying to trip her. Branches scratched at her arms and face. Then she noticed something that troubled her.
The owls had fallen silent.
Not only the owls, but all of the creatures of the forest. Nothing moved in the branches or the underbrush. Even the wind seemed to have gone still. For the first time since embarking on this journey, Damia Beck took a step backward.
“Hello?” she said, her voice echoing back to her.
From the corner of her eye, Damia glimpsed motion. She turned, but saw only trees. Then something shifted near the trunk of a thick oak and she frowned in confusion. It seemed that the tree itself had started to move. Branches became arms and fingers. Bark took on a shape, rough and jagged. It was a woman, naked and thin, but her flesh had the texture and color of the tree. Or perhaps it truly was bark.
Something snapped behind her. Damia spun to see another tree-woman peeling herself from the trunk of an oak. Her eyes opened like a newborn’s, gleaming black in the moonlight that filtered down through the branches.
Damia drew her sword and backed away. But a wet, cracking noise came from behind, and again she spun to find a third tree-woman standing in the shadows. The creatures were unsettlingly sexual, their bodies ripe and alluring in spite of their rough texture. As they circled her-and a fourth and fifth appeared-their flesh grew smoother and lighter, until they almost could have passed for human in the darkness.
“I am Commander Beck,” she said. “I travel the Oldwood under the seal of the King of Euphrasia-”
“Not our king,” one of the dryads said, her voice sultry and full of warning. She extended one long, ragged finger. “Our king is here. ”
Sword held before her, Damia turned. The dryads had surrounded her, but now two of them stepped back to make way as a huge, gleaming stag came toward them.
She blinked. It was no stag.
He had a pelt of thin, sleek brown hair, but a body like a man. Huge and gloriously muscled, he towered over her. Atop his head was a massive rack of antlers that would have tangled in the branches of the trees…if they had not drawn back from the path of the Lord of the Oldwood. In ancient times, the Celts had called him Cernunnos, and that had served as his name ever since.
Cernunnos stood gazing down at her with hard, intelligent eyes of the brightest green. His antlers threw criss-cross shadows over Damia’s face.
“You are the Lost girl who summoned me?”
For a moment she hesitated. Then she cursed herself silently for becoming so enchanted. She stood up straight and sheathed her sword, then bowed her head in respect.
“I am, Lord Cernunnos. You honor me and my king by agreeing to meet here.”
“I avoid involvement with the lands beyond the wood,” the master of the forest said, his gaze sage and a bit sad. “But my people are afraid. They whisper of a dark time beginning. They fear war and fire in the wood. Are they right to be afraid?”
Damia raised her chin, meeting his gaze without wavering. “Yes, milord. They are. Atlantis has betrayed the Two Kingdoms. The truce is broken.”
Cernunnos waved a hand in the air. The trees seemed to sway away from him. But when he spoke, it was as if they leaned in to catch his every word.
“That has nothing to do with Oldwood. The legends here care nothing for kingdoms or kings.”
Still, she did not waver. “Would that they could continue to live without caring, sir. But the war will not leave the Oldwood unscathed. The armies of Yucatazca have invaded, with spies from Atlantis amongst their ranks. They will come. And those prophecies of fire may well come true. You will be a part of the war, whether you wish to or not.
“If you want to keep the Oldwood safe, you must help us. I have sent a portion of my soldiers to the west of the forest. The southern army will see them and will pursue them. My troops hope to retreat into the Oldwood, to draw the invaders in. We’d like to fight them here, in the wood.”
All the quiet wisdom went out of his eyes. Cernunnos’s face darkened with rage. His lips peeled back from his teeth and he quaked with anger.
“You dare much, Lost girl,” he sneered. “The war might have passed us by, and instead you ask to bring it here?”
The dryads hissed and circled closer, fingers hooked into talons. From the branches and the underbrush came a stirring of bestial sounds and the snapping of twigs. Eyes glowed yellow and red in the darkness, hidden behind trees and in bushes.
Damia steeled herself. “And what will you do then? Eventually, they will come to subjugate you and all of Oldwood. As angry as you are, you should recognize an ally when you see her. Hunyadi does not interfere with you. Do you think Atlantis will afford you that courtesy?”
Cernunnos scowled at her, his nostrils flaring. Then he held up a hand and the dryads withdrew.
“And how much time do I have to prepare?”
“Tomorrow, with your permission, a company of my soldiers will lead the invaders into the Oldwood from the west. I have three more companies, making a full battalion, waiting on the eastern road, with two regiments of cavalry and a platoon of Borderkind. I’d like to move them into the forest tonight.
“But I need to know, milord. When the battle begins, will you help?”
Cernunnos took a long breath, then nodded, his head heavy with those wicked-looking antlers.
“Yes, Commander Beck. We shall help kill your enemies.”
A shudder went through Virginia Tsing’s sleeping form. Rising almost to wakefulness, she drew her blanket up to her neck and huddled under it. This far north and east, the nights could get chilly, but she enjoyed sleeping with the windows open. Her bedroom was above the cafe and faced the Sorrowful River. Sometimes she felt she could hear the gentle sigh and weep of the waters, but usually it was only the soft rush of the river rolling by. The sound comforted her, eased her mind when she lay down at night.
Again she stirred. Half aware, she frowned and reached up to rub at her eyes. Her nose wrinkled. The place was always full of the smells of the cafe-of coffee and baking bread, of cinnamon and moon cakes-and underneath it all the thick, starchy odor of dough and flour.
Without opening her eyes, she tried to discover what had woken her. There had been a sound that was not the river, and a smell that was not the cafe. The odor had an earthen quality to it and it tickled her nose.
She burrowed deeper under the covers. The aches of an old woman’s body pained her, but when she settled down again, they retreated. Her breathing was steady, but her forehead had not lost the crease of the frown she wore.
The sound came again. Not the creak of a floorboard or the sound of voices that might have reached her if Ovid had a lady friend visiting late. This was not the river. It had a scratchy quality, skittering across the floor.
Virginia’s nose wrinkled again. Her breath hitched and she brought her hand up, but could not prevent herself from sneezing. When she sneezed, her eyes flew open.
And there he stood.
Death had come for her, a hooded figure that seemed to shift and rasp with each movement. Its body flowed with motion and she realized it was made of sand.
The Sandman stared at her with bright yellow eyes. It smiled, showing sharp black teeth.
“What do you want?” she asked.
The creature slid toward her, its tread scouring the floor.
“Kitsune,” it rasped. “The Borderkind who traveled with the Legend-Born…the Bascombe. I am told that the fox is here, and that you will know where.”
Her heart fluttered with fear. Those eyes were dreadful to see. But Virginia Tsing would not crumble. She was far too proud. Perhaps that was the thing she had most in common with her son. Even terror could not break her.