I whirl back, panicked, only to spot an unfamiliar face among the townspeople. He is tall, with a strange beard and—
Gods above, I know that face. He is one of the scholars from the library. Jerred, wasn’t it? I drew the vuldor for him.
The horn piercing my middle throbs as memories threaten to sink me into the earth.
Jerred runs up to me. He is elated, his eyes wide, his mouth smiling. “I’ve finally found you! You said a day’s ride, but I didn’t know what direction! My search led me—”
“Run,” I interrupt. There is no time. “If you want to live, run.”
I turn my back on the scholar, on opportunity, a second time and hurry my father out of town, ignoring the questions and jeers that fall upon me from the locals. I answer only, “There is no time!” We head west, parallel to Fendell and away from the wildwood. We do not cover even an eighth of a mile before the shrill giggle of a grinler raises the small hairs on my neck.
My father stops and turns back, drawing his heavy blade.
“Papa, please,” I beg, but his clear eyes narrow at the great forest behind us.
They emerge in broken lines—grinlers, orjans, goblers, freblon. Another serpentine slyser like the one who appeared from the summoning circle in Maekallus’s glade. Even two dark-haired narvals march among them, and the sight of their menacing horns and switch-like tails hits me like a blacksmith’s hammer. They look nothing like him, yet they are so similar. The woman is taller than the man, her hair brushing the ground, her chest exposed.
They leak from the wildwood like mortal corruption, and I wish our realm would devour them faster and turn them into sludge. A strange part of me feels betrayed by the wildwood, that it would let so many of our enemies trespass. Yet I’ve always known what the wildwood was. I’ve always been told to beware it, even when its sun warmed my skin and its land fed my belly.
I hear a scream in the distance, followed by shouts. Some in Fendell have seen the monsters pour from the forest. The small army, at least seventy-five mystings, does not move toward the town, however. They march toward me and my father, and at their head is a tall orjan wearing a gold-plated sash, from which hangs what I assume to be large teeth. Scroud.
He is far more menacing in the sunlight. His black eyes hold eternal depths. His tusked scowl, a thousand promises of suffering.
My father crouches, his sword ready. I grab his elbow. “Stop.”
“We will die valiantly, Shenard,” he whispers. I don’t recognize the name and can only guess it belongs to an old fellow in arms.
The army passes my home. In the distance I see a smattering of men armed with knives and pitchforks on the road from Fendell, but they hesitate. They are outnumbered. Never have we seen so many of these creatures at once.
A chorus of grinler giggling fouls the air as the setting sun turns the sky red, filling me with memories of the Deep. I pull the rag from my wrist. I feel Scroud’s gaze like a poisoned arrow in my cheek.
I grab the stone, gasping as chilly agony shoots up my arm and into my shoulder, instantly immobilizing the joints. It webs across my back, tightening the muscles and twisting bone.
In response, somehow, the conical horn in my breast warms, driving back the worst of the pain. Still, my teeth chatter and my palm burns. I clench my jaw until my head aches.
“Stop.”
Scroud hesitates. The narvals slow, and most of the others do the same. A few grinlers continue forward, shoving each other and making that horrendous screeching, laughing sound. Scroud growls loud enough for the sound to carry the distance between us. He takes one labored step forward, then another. He bellows at me, and I cannot tell if it’s in my tongue or his, for the words are too low and harsh. They are nails in my ears, hammering down into my brain.
I squeeze the stone harder. The broken horn heats to a feverish temperature.
“Stop.”
My entire body tingles with the power of the Will Stone. It’s as if I’ve shot an invisible wall out from myself and the army has collided with it. The soldiers freeze and look about in either anger or confusion.
My body is shaking, as though the Will Stone draws its energy from my own soul. Beside me, Papa says, “Enna?”
I don’t answer him. I don’t dare break my concentration.
The goblers inch forward.
“STOP!” I bellow, and my voice echoes against the wildwood. The mystings hit my wall again. The horn burns so hot I fear my body will crumble to ash around it. The Will Stone is so cold in my fist I can feel it searing a hole through my flesh. I meet Scroud’s dark gaze head-on.
“Go. Go!” I scream. “You will not come back here! You are banished! You will not come back here!”
The wall pushes at them. I can’t feel my legs. The simple act of standing is excruciating.
The army doesn’t move. Scroud balks at me, but he does not look away. I can feel the intensity of his will. Of his desire, his hatred, and I am its focal point.
My father gasps with what I can only assume is clarity. Recognition. And I believe Scroud recognizes him as well.
“Leave!” I stagger. My father grabs my arm, the one not paralyzed by the stone, and holds me upright. I lean into him, pushing what strength I have into the stone. My breast is on fire, driving back the ice in my shoulders and gut. “Return whence you came. Leave this realm and never come back. Leave. Leave. LEAVE! ”
A bolt of the bitterest winter spikes through me, filling every crevice of my body. I gasp and collapse into my father’s strength.
He drops me to my knees. The cold has abated, but I tremble with the memory of it. The fire has left, too, but my body tenses as if run through by a sword. I lift my eyes to the wildwood just in time to see the flicking tails of the two narvals as they vanish into the trees.
They’re gone, all of them, as if they never were. Folk from the town begin filling in the almost battleground, lowering their weapons, exclaiming and whispering all at once. They look back at me, their eyes astonished or bewildered. I am grounded enough to recognize Tennith among them, dressed in soiled farming clothes, a scythe in hand. His dark eyes meet mine. He is confused, yet his brows draw together as though he is angry. As though I’ve removed some sort of mask and he doesn’t like what’s underneath.
Trembling, I manage to stand and take a step forward. “T-Tennith—”
His father, behind him, sets a heavy hand on his shoulder. Tennith allows himself to be pulled away, his expression never lifting.
I was clearly the target of the mystings’ attack. I rang the warning bell. My voice shouted mad commands at them. Mad commands they heeded. I have given the townspeople good reason to reject me. I know instinctually that they will no longer buy our mushrooms or sell to us. They will close off their conversations when we venture near. Were I to knock on Tennith’s door again, it would not open to me.
Something sharp bites my right fist. I wince as I open stiff fingers. I can barely see for the tears in my eyes.
The Will Stone, the dark gem my father risked his life to secure for me, rests in a dozen pieces against my palm.
CHAPTER 31
Two Months Later
The town of Crake is a modest one. I had thought Fendell small, but Crake is half its size, barely large enough to be called a town. We have a wisewoman, a biweekly farmers’ market, and little else. One must travel to Caisgard for supplies that cannot easily be homemade.