“Keena, you saved me,” she whispered, her fingers digging into the thick fur as she pushed herself to a seated position and hugged the wide head against her chest.
“Strictly speaking, the troll saved you… but I do suppose that the crocotta deserves some credit for getting you down the staircase to my lair without dropping you on your head,” the female at her side observed in a wry voice.
Peering around Keena’s bulk, Diana eyed her, her fingers clutching at the fur as she remembered Raskyuil shoving her into the darkness as that thing—Cacus—devoured Alseida. In the darkness, she had heard Raskyuil’s roar of fury and pain.
Glancing toward the staircase illuminated by only a few strategically placed torches, she didn’t see any sign of him. Diana couldn’t hold back a hoarse sob. “Please tell me he’s okay,” she choked out.
The red eyes studied her. “He lives yet. I feel him digging himself out from the rubble of the wall that collapsed on him, though Cacus has fled.”
“How do you know all this?” Diana whispered.
The female smiled. “I know because I am Dorinda, the vegoia trapped beneath Arx. I see and know many things, just as I know that you are the uxorem of my brother Selvans. You know him better as Silvas, the irritating god playacting as a king.”
“God…? How can that be?” Diana asked as a shiver betrayed just how much she was unnerved.
Silvas couldn’t be a god. Despite everything, even if she was deceived on the nature and depth of their relationship, she did carry his vinculum marcam. He was hers… wasn’t he? How could a woman be married to a god?
Dorinda made a disgusted hiss as she rose and shifted away, moving toward a crevice in the wall of the cavern. “My brother is a fool, that’s how. He wanted to escape from himself and hide away, living with the casual freedom of a simple spirit instead of the role for which he was born. We share one mother, he and I, but his destiny was far greater than what he made of it—and the pitiful condition of the Eternal Forest shows it. I recall the way the forest looked when it was young. Did you know that during the day the trees would part to allow the glorious light of Usil, the king of the sun, shine down and nourish us all? It wasn’t this dark pit of despair. All manner of beings called this place home as they traveled between the worlds. I loved the monokerata most.”
“What’s a monokerata?”
Dorinda smiled, the expression making the female’s face seem younger, erasing the lines of bitterness. “Amazing creatures. Large horses, white as snow except for their necks and heads, which are red. From their brow sprouts a single horn that is white, black in the middle and then red at the tip. The horn provides all manner of wellness, for which men once coveted the magical creature.” Her smile slipped. “They were nearly wiped out from the Eternal Forest when my brother took Alseida to his bed. Her greed weakened the borders that hid the entrance from mortals.”
She peered at Diana as her smile turned smug. “You wouldn’t have found your way into our world without help. Mother brought you here even as Cacus hunted down and chased his victims into the woods where he could consume them at his leisure.” She sighed and brought forth a jug and two cups. “But at that time, it was not the case. The monokerata were nearly hunted to extinction for their horns.”
Diana gaped at her. “Are you talking about unicorns? They’re real?”
“They are, but they stay hidden in the few parts of the forest that still see the sun. I miss seeing them, but that was before I was enclosed within the earth,” Dorinda said, her face hardening.
“Boy does that sound familiar,” Diana muttered. Shaking her head, she looked askance at the serpentine woman. “I don’t understand. If Silvas… er, Selvans… is your brother, why has he locked you away all this time?”
Dorinda snorted as she set down the cups on a flat rock that almost seemed to be fashioned like a table. From the jug, she poured a rich red liquid.
At Diana’s questioning look, she smiled. “Wine to settle our nerves is called for, I believe. As for your question… To his credit, he did not intend to trap me in here, but he did not correct the situation either. He decided that it was what