has soaked through and dried brown.
Mirabella stumbles to her friend and drops to her knees, clutching Elizabeth’s skirt. “No,” she moans.
“They held me down,” Elizabeth says. “But that was for the best. They used their knives to saw through, you see, and it took more time than with an ax. So it was better that they held me. It felt good to be able to fight and struggle.”
“No!” Mirabella shouts, and feels Bree’s hand on her back. Elizabeth touches the top of her head.
“Do not cry, Mira,” she says. “It was not your fault.”
But it was. Of course it was.
WOLF SPRING
“She will forgive him soon,” Madrigal says, speaking of Jules and Joseph. “As angry, and as hurt, as she is, she misses him more. And I believe him when he says he loves her. I don’t think he has smiled once since she sent him away.”
“How do you know?” Arsinoe asks, and Madrigal shrugs.
“Because I have been down to the docks,” she says. “I have seen him working. All frowns. Not even your Billy can make him laugh.”
Arsinoe’s lips curl despite herself when Madrigal calls Billy that. Hers. It is a lie, but it is a funny one. And it is true what Madrigal says. Jules will forgive Joseph soon. And so will Arsinoe. It has not been easy for her either, to think of him with Mirabella. In some way, it has felt as though he betrayed her too.
“It does not suit him.” Madrigal sighs. “Sandrins are not meant to be so serious. So sad. They were made to laugh and have not a care in the world.”
“He deserves his misery,” Arsinoe says. “Every cruel word she gives, and some from me besides. Who will take care of Jules if I fail and do not survive? I was counting on him to look after her.”
“I will look after her,” Madrigal says, but she does not meet Arsinoe’s eyes when she says it. Madrigal has never been good at looking after people. And Jules would never allow her to.
“I suppose our Jules is perfectly equipped to take care of herself,” Arsinoe says, her anger cooling. “And perhaps she will never have to try. I still may become queen.”
“You may, indeed,” Madrigal says. She takes up her small silver knife and passes it through the fire. “But the time for waiting is over. Now we will make something happen.”
Madrigal picks up a jar filled with dark liquid. It is mostly Arsinoe’s blood, both fresh and from the soaked cords she collected before. The cords have been rewetted with water from the cove. She walks to the trunk of the bent-over tree.
“What are you doing?” Arsinoe asks.
Madrigal does not reply. She splashes the jar onto the side of the hill, across the exposed slabs of sacred stone, across the trunk of the twisted tree and the roots that web through the rocks and bind it there. When she whispers something to the bark, the tree seems to breathe. To Arsinoe’s astonishment, coffee-colored buds pop out along the tree’s branches like gooseflesh.
“I didn’t know it bloomed,” she says.
“It does not, or at least not often. But tonight it must. Give me your hand.”
Arsinoe walks to the tree and holds out her hand, expecting pain. What she does not expect is for Madrigal to yank her palm against the trunk and drive her knife all the way through it.
“Ah! Madrigal!” Arsinoe screams. The pain streaks up her arm and into her chest. She cannot move. She is trapped, pinioned, as Madrigal begins to chant.
Arsinoe does not know the words, or perhaps it is only that they are spoken too quickly. It is hard to hear anything over the pain of the knife in her hand. Madrigal walks back to the fire, and Arsinoe drops to one knee, trying to fight the urge to tear her hand free. The blade is buried deep into the wood. She pulls on the handle gently, and then harder, but it will not come out.
“Madrigal,” she says through her teeth. “Madrigal!”
Madrigal lights a torch.
“No!” Arsinoe shouts. “Leave me alone!”
Madrigal’s face is determined in a way that Arsinoe has never seen before. She does not know if Madrigal means to fuse her hand to the tree, but she does not want to find out. She takes a breath, preparing to pull loose, even though it will mean cutting between the bones of her middle fingers.
Quick as lightning, Madrigal reaches forward and yanks the knife out of the trunk. Arsinoe scrambles