Maria felt her fury rage against the flatness of the man, and the place. "Listen, you! I'll make your life a misery for all that long life you've said I'd have, unless you do something now! About my baby. About the siege. About Renate. NOW!"
Her voice seemed louder somehow than it had when she'd shouted earlier. And edges to everything seemed sharper, clearer.
"You have a beautiful, strong spirit," he said, with what could almost be a smile. He reached toward her and she saw the hands were like Benito's brother's hands. Long and shapely. And the almond seemed to glow. "Come. Join me then, avatar of the great Goddess. Join me and then I can do this 'something' you demand."
She reached out her hand, opening it to reveal the almond. Her hands were work-calloused and rough compared to his. "Doing something is always better than doing nothing," she said firmly.
As their hands clasped, the two almond halves touched. She felt them draw toward each other.
Click . . .
The seed began to swell and then burst into growth. The roots were wriggling against their clasped hands and leafy shoots came questing upwards. And Maria found she could see things in the strange shadows of this place. People and places, myriads of them.
"It's a strong tree. The strongest I have seen in centuries," he said. His voice was definitely warmer now. And somehow he seemed less inhuman. "Let us plant it."
"It needs light, and earth and water," snapped Maria. "Not shadows. And I need to get on before it is too late for little 'Lessi."
The place was definitely lighter. "Then get on. Make earth and light and water for it." His voice was deeper, stronger and more powerful now. And there was definitely a gleam in those gray eyes.
It was a test of some sort, she knew. And she had no idea what to do. She looked into the strange shifting shadows, looking for a place for it.
Instead she saw Alessia, lying still and pale. Renate just beyond, fetal and breathing so faintly you could hardly see movement in that frail chest. And a great yellow-furred dog-creature. It was scratching symbols with undoglike precision on the stone floor of the temple. Drool hung down from its jaws.
She searched her memory of all the things the priestess had said, desperate for a clue. All she could think of was Renate saying calmly: "Use your anger. Channel it with your will."
She looked around at the pale, shadowy hall. Either she was getting used to it or it really was more substantial and more clearly defined than it had been. There was a dead piece of wood there, in the middle of the floor. She channeled her will at that place.
Let there be earth, rich fecund . . . earthy, steaming with the scents of morning, as she remembered it from the forests of Istria. That wonderful earth that could support a hundred thousand mighty trees, growing strong and tall and straight.
Let there be sunlight, as warm as a lover's caress, as golden as . . . as the morning sun on the wings of the Lion. Oh, she remembered that, too, that sunlight that was so full of life you could drink it like wine, light that touched hurt and left healing behind it.
Let there be water, cool and clean and refreshing as the water in the temple had been that first time she'd gone to pray for Umberto. Water, oh blessed Jesu, let there, of all things, be water!
She felt the power answer to her will; where it came from she did not know, but she launched it as she had launched a thousand rocks at the enemy, as she had launched herself into this voyage, as she had launched Alessia into life—
By the hotness of her anger at wrongness of all this, by the love she held for all of them, let them BE.
And . . . they were.
The earth-smell, that had been so strange to her when she first came to the forest, tickled her nose with its lush scent. Sunlight welled around the dead stick, coming from everywhere and nowhere. And there was a mist, curling, lush with water, around the remains of the last bride's tree. And suddenly, the hall seemed very small to contain such richness.
He actually laughed. "I'm grateful you left me some hall! Come, let us plant this tree, and see to your need."
They walked forward into the sunlight, off the cold flags and onto the loamy earth. Using their free hands they dug a hole into it, and then put the seedling into the soil. The rootlets actually started reaching through their fingers and pushed hungrily into the earth. It was growing, growing even as they formed the soil around it.
"It will be the finest tree I have had here in many millennia." There was respect there; interest, too. Still holding her hand, he turned to point earthy fingers at the shadows. The yellow dog was howling there. "Let us see what happens with the half-jackal first—the cursed one. In a way it is protected from me. It cannot die."
In the shadows Maria saw the creature now for what it was: No dog. One removed from the dog-line. A cross between gray wolf and golden jackal, a howling half-domesticated creature from the wet northern forests that could have been the father of humankind's four-footed loyal companion.
Could have been. It had once fawned and guarded, and pretended loyalty. And when the man and the woman had left it to guard their most precious thing, it had eaten the child. The one they had trusted was cursed, cursed to live until it had been forgiven for the betrayal that was now long forgotten by men. But the memory and the shame were with all dogs—whose ancestors were cousins to it—and man's other ally, the horse, forever. The hyena they would hunt and hurt as often as possible. They could hurt it, even if they couldn't kill it.
There was also a shadowy person in there. Someone who had taken the cursed creature's name. The shaman had taken the form and with it the curse. He thought not being able to die a good thing, and cared nothing for the rest.
"How do we deal with it?"
The lord of the dead shrugged. "We protect your babe, and that is all we need do, for now. The great Goddess is dealing with it already, as She does with all those who work magics here. This is the place of the great Goddess. You know what the earth of Corfu does to foreign magic. The greater the magic—the faster it will draw that power. The creature relies on magic for its being. It would have been dead millennia ago if nature were to have run its course. The magics it uses now would kill it—were it not unkillable for magical reasons. The more it does, the more the earth of Corfu will draw that power that sustains it."
She understood now. The Goddess was absorbing anything worth having from the creature, and the longer it remained, the more She would take. Even the curse that kept it alive would be affected.
It was diminishing itself.
Still—this was that passive defense again, and that was not enough. "Surely there is something I can do," she said, feeling her anger welling again.
The God shrugged, very much amused. "You are She. And my power is yours. Take it up, my bride."
And she did.
Chapter 98