“If you’re worried about the wolves, then we had better get going while we have this much daylight.” I dismounted and tossed him Lady Gray’s reins.
His brows shot up as he caught them.“You don’t plan to abandon your mount, do you?”
“I have to walk when I go herbing, sir.”
Grumbling to himself, he led the horses to a yew tree across the road. I had my own reasons to grumble. I needed to be alone to follow the vision. The man was trouble.
Sir Giles tied the horses’ reins to the bushes and rubbed each one’s neck. “We won’t be gone too long,” he promised, taking his bow and quiver down along with the provisions bag he’d crammed with food and a plump ale skin for the journey.
He followed me over the wall, then stood back adjusting his quiver. “You’re not planning to go too far in?” he asked nervously. I didn’t answer.
“Dragons and fey patrol their sanctuary, mistress.” He looked around warily. “The fey might turn us to Treegrims if we’re caught in here.”
“My mother told me that story too, Sir Giles. I’m sure it’s a made-up tale to frighten people and keep them out of Dragonswood.” I suspected the game was plentiful in the vast forest. Poachers would be tempted to come in after the meat if they weren’t afraid to step inside.
“I’m not so sure,” Sir Giles said, frowning at a stunted oak that hunched between two pines. “I’m not passing that poor sinner,” he added, crossing himself.
Holy Ones! How could I shadow my Path Animal with this man along? Was it like this for Father when I’d followed him herbing? At least I’d trained myself to be silent, not complain or ask foolish questions. “You will have to walk a good way behind me,” I said. “Move quietly and do not speak.”
“Yes, Your Highness.” He gave a mocking bow.
I checked the sun’s position. I had three, maybe four hours of hard walking to find the herbs before the sun set. I abandoned the grassy spot near the wall and gave the gnarled oak a wide berth as I looked for the place I’d seen the flash of orange tail. Soon we moved into the tall whispering trees. The air felt moist and cool. Branches dripped on the earth as they had in my vision. It seemed a good sign that I was on my way at last.
The forest floor muffled the sounds of Sir Giles’s boots. It did not soften the grumbling noises coming from his mouth. I needed to concentrate. “I asked you not to speak,” I said, glaring back.
He shrugged. “I didn’t say a word, mistress.”
I was used to traveling miles on foot each day in the mountains, but I had always followed the Adan. I had never walked in such an unfamiliar place. The forest changed as we moved deeper in. Layered scents swirling in the breeze made a rich, giddy tonic. With each step, I felt I was moving deeper into Dragonswood’s wildwood magic.
Sir Giles had stopped his grumbling, silenced by the towering evergreens in this part of the wood. But I saw he’d drawn his knife. There’s an Euit saying: Sharp weapons do not vanquish fear. I did not say this to the man behind me.
We hiked mile after mile under the boughs. Clouds scudded over the treetops, sweeping eerie shadows along the forest floor. Courage, mi tupelli. Farther along, thick canopy darkened the way almost completely. I had to push through a creeping fear that was taking hold.
I chose a new path. The fleeting glimpse of a bushy tail led me on again. The wider path cutting through the trees left a blue river of sky above, more light, more air, less gloom.
“Well now,” whispered Sir Giles with an audible sigh, though he still gripped his dagger.
I began to sense ancient presences all around me, as if the spirits in the trees saw me moving here among them, knew why I had come, what I was looking for.
Somewhere far off a whippoorwill sang, the bright sound startling me in the deep silence. Taking the low foothills toward Morgesh Mountain, I came to a place where the path split in two directions.
Sir Giles took a few noisy gulps from his ale pouch. “Where now?”
“Shhh.” I hadn’t seen fox for some time and didn’t know which way to turn. The forest gave no clue. I did what I’d seen Father do a few times when he was following a vision. I closed my eyes, waiting to feel my way. The map is within me, Father once said.
If the Holy Ones had given me this vision, the map was in me now.
I felt a low heartbeat in my back as if I still leaned against Vazan’s broad chest. A twinge of heat shot down my right arm. I turned that way, taking the trail bringing us closer to the mountain. A few moments later the sight of a fox tail far ahead confirmed the choice I’d made and my heart did a little joyful flip. We stepped over thick roots and large tumbled rocks.
In the place where the trail leveled out again, I saw elms and oaks growing between the pines, but it was the row of beeches like the ones I’d seen in my vision that made me run. A great gust of wind sent hundreds of leaves swirling down as I raced toward them. I caught the golden hope in my hands and threw the leaves up again. The knight stood back, making tutting sounds as I played. The kea was near. I knew it.
Fox darted out ahead. I followed her, leaving the beeches for the dogwood trees, and there they were, the kea plants, a great green patch of them ready to be cut. Fox glanced at me with a look of satisfaction, then she vanished in the underbrush.“Tuma-doa,” I called after her. Thank you.
I fell to my knees and pulled out my blade to cut the stalks.
“Need help?” Sir Giles asked.
I glanced up at him, surprised. He had a knife and the work would go faster with two. “Yes,” I said. “Thank you.”
“No trouble,” he said with a shrug as he came closer. “Thorny buggers, aren’t they.” He bent down. “Too late for the berries. They’re all shriveled up.”
“It’s the leaves and stalks I need to boil for their rich cure, Sir Giles, not the berries. Cut the stalks low to the ground, like this.” I showed him. “We’ll pile them up and tie the kea stalks in bundles when we’re done.”
“We can reach the road before dark if we start for it soon,” he said, kneeling and cutting with his dagger. I didn’t tell him I still had to find huzana vines. I needed both herbs for the fertility cure. Back home I’d climbed the oaks Father’s Path Animal, owl, showed him growing near a kea patch, and pulled the heart-shaped leaves from the creeper. I looked up now. No oaks here, and I didn’t see any vines in these trees. Kea first, I told myself. The rest will come.
• • •
I SCANNED THE branches for huzana vines as we walked. Three boulders marked the place where the trail leveled out. They tipped one to another like giants’ heads in conference. A stream ran behind them. We stopped to drink and fill my water pouch before starting off again. The rope around the kea bundle had rubbed my fingers raw. Thorns caught at my cloak as I took it in my left hand. The scar along my palm and middle finger would complain soon. I would have to switch hands again before too long.
Sir Giles carried his bundle a few feet behind me. We had miles to go yet. Like Sir Giles, I wanted to reach the road before dark. I also knew I had to find the huzana. Torn between rushing back and holding out for the plant I needed, I set an uneven pace for the two of us. Walking fast at times, other times slowing to look up, checking the branches for vines. Where was fox? Why hadn’t I seen her again? Didn’t my Path Animal know how much I also needed the huzana? It didn’t seem right that she’d deserted me.
The chilled air felt cold as lake water in the dense trees.
“Look,” Sir Giles said, pointing at the low gray mist beyond the brambles. No, not mist. The hair rose on the back of my neck. Wolves. Creeping low on their haunches, heads down, ears back, stalking us on silent paws.
I drew out my knife. They burst through the underbrush snarling and snapping their jaws. “Run!” screamed Sir Giles, jumping in front of me. He shot one through its eye before it reached us. But there were more careening through the t
rees.
A wolf bounded up, knocked him down, jaws snapping around his throat. I screamed, stabbed its back, kicked it, stabbed again as I tried to pull it off. Blood spurted from Sir Giles’s neck, covering his attackers’ fur, my skirts. The wolf bit my hand. I screamed, reared back, grabbing my hand, losing my knife. Three more wolves bounded toward me. I ran and threw myself against a tree, desperate to scramble up, but the branches were too high to reach. The trees on either side of me were the same. No way to climb.
A wolf leaped at my back. I clung to the tree, tried to shinny up. I’d trapped us both in my desire to get the medicine. We would die here.
A terrible burning heat washed up my back. I turned and saw a figure leaping from his horse. Roaring fire. Wolves yelped and scattered, some racing past me, yowling, fur ablaze. Bright yellow flames screamed around me in furious scorching rivers, as if the sun had fallen to earth, destroying all with its fire. More wolves fell in the burning. I panicked and ran.
The yelping sounds lessened and faded. The great golden fire died away. I stopped, clinging to my hand in the swirling smoke. The silence was deafening. A figure raced through the thick smoke. Jackrun threw his arms around me. “Are you hurt? Did they hurt you?”
“I’m . . . all right. Sir Giles?”
We went to him. The knight’s throat was torn wide open, exposing the muscle and bone. Sir Giles had trained up to battle men, not ravaging wolves. His chain mail hadn’t protected him in this attack.
“I tried to fight the wolf off,” I said, my ears ringing. “It went right for his throat.” My shaking voice sounded very far away.
Jackrun tugged off his cloak and draped it over mine. It did not stop my trembling.
“You’re bleeding,” he said, tugging my left hand toward him. He tore a strip from the hem of his shirt to bind the puncture wounds.
“I have bandages in my basket,” I whispered.
“Too late to tell me that.”
I clenched my teeth against the throbbing pain as he wrapped the linen strip around my hand.
“I’m hurting you.”
“No. It’s good to wrap it.”
I swallowed, glancing down at Sir Giles’s dull, unseeing eyes. His jaw was defiant even in death, but there was horror in his fixed gaze. I wanted to wipe the terror from his face. I didn’t seem to have the power to kneel down and do it. I didn’t even have the strength to drag the sob I felt crammed down in my chest all the way up my throat.
Jackrun said, “I could have saved his life if I’d come sooner.”
“You saved mine.”
He spotted my blade, fetched it, and wiped the blood from it. “You harmed one of the wolves at least.”
“It wasn’t enough to save him. If I’d come in here alone he’d—”
“Alone to Dragonswood?” Jackrun put his arm around me. “It’s dangerous in here.”
“You seem to be alone,” I said, my cheek against his chest.
“That’s different. I’m a trained warrior.”
“So was Sir Giles.”
“What are you doing in Dragonswood?” he asked.
“Herbs.” I nodded at the bundles we’d dropped on the path. “For the queen.”
“Still fighting the good fight, I see,” he said.
I looked down at my bloodstained gown. “I had no choice but to come.”
“Why, what happened?”
I shook my head, too tired to tell him about the stolen medicines right now.
Jackrun knelt over Sir Giles and closed the dead man’s eyes. “A good man. I used to fight him in the weapons yard. We should cover him with rocks at least before we go.” I shuddered, wanting to leave now, but the wolves might return to eat their kill if we didn’t do something to cover him.
Jackrun was not afraid to stay a little longer. If the wolves tried to attack us on our way out of Dragonswood, he’d burn them again. We were safe enough. He gathered stones from the trail’s edge, piling them in the crook of his left arm. I wondered at the powerful blaze I’d seen pouring out of him—too much fire for an ordinary man to house in his body, even if the man was Jackrun.
The task would take less time if I gathered stones too. I walked weak-kneed up the trail to seek out rocks the right size, using the time to think more before I spoke to Jackrun about the power I’d seen. We covered the knight’s body, but for the base of his left leg and his booted feet. I went to gather a few more stones to finish what we’d started.
My back was turned when I heard a terrible guttural sound. I swung around. A wolf had pounced on Jackrun’s back, knocking the wind out of him, flattening him on the trail. It had planted its paws on Jackrun’s spine, pinning him down. A wild growl came up my throat. I flew. Hurling rocks at the wolf. I couldn’t tell if Jackrun was moving or if the jolting motions were from the wolf shaking him in its powerful jaws.
I jumped on the wolf’s back, threw my arm under its thick, furry neck and tugged with all my might until I forced its head back, drove my blade into its gullet, and slit its throat.
The wolf’s eyes rolled back. It made a strange gurgling sound before collapsing atop Jackrun.
“Jackrun? Are you all right?” Holy Ones help me! I tried to push the wolf’s dead body off. So heavy. I spread my hands on its furry side, heaving my full weight against it and straining. At last the wolf rolled onto the ground with a sickening thud.
Jackrun was motionless. His clothes and skin were torn. He was covered in blood.
Chapter Thirty-seven
Dragonswood, Wilde Island
Death of Wolf Moon
September 1210
JACKRUN!” I TURNED him over. So much blood. I couldn’t tell how much was Jackrun’s, how much the wolf’s.
“Uma?” he said in a husky voice. I checked him more closely. Blood covered his ripped sleeve. There were teeth marks in his shoulder, perilously close to his neck. If I hadn’t killed the wolf when I did . . .
“Where does it hurt?”
“Everywhere.”
“Where does it hurt the most?”
“My arm.”
“Can you walk?” I had to get him to a safer place where I could clean and stitch the wounds. We’d passed boulders not far from here. Jackrun clenched his teeth and moaned as I helped him up. “If I’d tethered my horse,” he muttered. “We could ride out now.”
“There was no time to tether it, and anyway, you couldn’t ride out now in your condition.” At the boulders, I laid out the cloak Jackrun had given me, helped him to the ground, removed his short sword from his belt, and carefully peeled off what was left of his ravaged shirt and tunic.
“Press this against your skin to stop the bleeding,” I said, handing him a bandage from my herb basket. “I’ll be right back.” I ran for the provisions bag and the rest of the things I’d left near Sir Giles’s body, tossed them on the ground by our little campsite before soaking a bandage and potion sponge with a steady stream from my water pouch.
Jackrun winced as I washed the bite marks on his shoulder, the deeper wounds on his upper arm, and the bloody places below his elbow tearing down and through his dragon scale patch.
“Thank you,” Jackrun said shakily, “for killing . . .” He gulped in a breath, unable to finish. Pressing the damp gauze to his deepest wound, he watched me with utter faith as I threaded the needle. The look chilled me to the core. My hands shook. He did not know I’d never stitched a person, only a dragon’s wing, and that was just this morning. I braced myself to tell him how little experience I had, glanced at his face, fixed with pain, and lost my nerve.
Somehow I managed to thread the needle. Jackrun’s skin was soft and vulnerable compared to Vazan’s. I was afraid I’d hurt him. “This will dull the pain,” I said, lifting the potion sponge.
He waved it away. “I don’t want that.”
“Breathe in just
a little.” I held it under his nose.
“Uma, you can’t make me take this. I can handle . . .” He did not finish before his eyelids drooped over his eyes.
I bent over him in the last bit of daylight falling through the forest. I had to keep dabbing away the blood. My hands shook like windblown leaves. I couldn’t work this way. Help me!
Father’s voice whispered through me: Be present with what you are doing. I focused my mind on Jackrun, thought of nothing but the wounds I had to mend, the needle in my hand, the way Jackrun’s arm would look when it was whole again if I served him now with all I had.
I chanted Ona loneaih—be you well. Ona loneaih, Jackrun. Chanting in my home tongue warmed my chest. I took a long, slow breath. My hands no longer shook. The warmth had somehow steadied them. I would have called this feeling a gift of magic from this forest if I hadn’t felt the warmth earlier in Vazan’s cave. Tuma-doa—Thank you, Holy Ones. I bent closer, my sutures clean and straight and true.
The wound in the forearm wasn’t as deep or ragged as the one above. But the dragon scales made it more challenging. I gently lifted the torn scales, and stitched the blue-green skin beneath.
Dusk had dimmed the woods by the time I finished bandaging his wounds. I wrapped the cloak around him, covered him with the Euit blanket, and leaned back with a sigh, thankful Jackrun was still asleep and not awake yet to pain.
He breathed in and out. His expression was determined even in his dreams. I touched his cheek and ran my hand along the landscape of his fierce, beautiful face inch by inch. My fingers traced his cheekbone, his nose and strong chin.
Ona loneaih—be you well. Leaning closer, I brushed his mouth with my fingers, kissed him in his sleep. His lips were sweet and smoky. When they parted in a moan, I kissed him once more, lightly this time, and was drawing back when he awoke.
“Hurts worse now than before,” he said with a half smile.
“That would be the sutures. Can you sit up?” He did so gingerly. “Drink now,” I said, handing him my water pouch. He took three long gulps and wiped the droplets on his chin with a shaking hand.