mounds of blue and white at the side of their path.
Syresh did the hunting, and Andiene and Lenane laughed together at the sight of a soldier of the King reduced to throwing stones to try to kill grasskits for the evening meal.
Once or twice, when they could find no food, Andiene went off by herself and brought back grasskits. She would not let them see her hunting. Syresh suspected that she used some magic, too great a secret to be trusted to Lenane. He had not seen her use her powers since the minstrel joined them. They carried coals to start their fires. She had never given her name.
But Lenane asked no questions. They ate well, for there was blaggorn to be gleaned, though it grew far from the great fields that fed the cities. Here it grew one grassy plant at a time, stiffly holding up its stalks of dry-ripe black kernels that shattered easily from the thin stems. They gleaned it as they walked along, and Lenane gathered pot-herbs, seeming to know every kind of wayside weed that man could eat.
Travelers have other things to fear than starvation. In a week, they were at the edge of the forest.
The sight of it sobered Syresh’s spirits. Though that night they camped well out of its dark shadow, still he felt its presence.
“I did not want to go this way,” Lenane said once. “Especially not in company with one who has torn down the trees of the forest.” When she sang for them, she began with a riddle song.
Greenwood torn from living tree
Crieth out in witchery
Mother, they tear me!
Mother, they burn me!
Mother, hear my plea!
Paths are webbed with treachery
Souls are trapped within the tree
Mother, they tear me!
Mother, they burn me!
Mother, set me free!
Greenwood torn from living tree
Whispers to me warningly
Though they tear me …
Though they burn me …
Vengeance will come to me!
“Croak a merrier tune to us,” said Syresh, but no jester’s song would have lifted his spirits. In his dreams that night, a dragon loomed, old and cruel as the pitiless forest. It watched him, but did not speak. He felt the weight of its green glare upon him, even after he woke.
The forest lay dark before them; they reached its edge soon. “We have this map, for what it is worth,” Syresh said, as he looked doubtfully at the map that a villager had given him. Strings were knotted together like lace, and the knots were cunningly tied so they would not tighten. They slipped back and forth on the strings; if he was not careful, they would slide together in an unsolvable tangle.
Still, he spoke confidently. “We have enough food, dried meat and blaggorn, to keep us even if we do not find much to eat in the forest. But the safeholds are not always easy to find. We must find one by nightfall or risk our lives.” He glanced to Lenane for confirmation.
“We should camp here for a few days,” she said, not answering him directly.
“Why?”
“Have you not seen the stars, so clear, so bright? These forest creatures have more power then. Wait till the patterns break—then we may travel in safety.”
“What do you say, my lady?” Syresh asked.
Andiene regarded him. Her storm-gray eyes had the fierceness that he had seen when he first met her. “I told you before, I mean to spend the summer in the palace of Oreja. I will not sit here and do nothing while I wait for the omens to be right.”
Lenane looked from one to the other. “What is this talk of palaces?” she asked. Syresh suddenly saw himself and Andiene as they must seem to her. She knew nothing of them. She would see nothing but a pair of ragged wanderers.
“If I were wise, I would turn my steps to the south,” the minstrel said. “There is a city there, across the river, as good as any to the north.”
“If you are afraid, then you may leave us,” said Andiene.
“Did I say I was afraid? I have a feeling that if I live, there will be the bones of a fine song in your traveling.”
Syresh looked at Andiene. She was not afraid. When she looked at the forest, there was an eager light in her eyes. He felt that he knew what she was thinking—that her power would be enough to fight the forest creatures and win. For a moment, his fears betrayed him. Indeed, she is half-kin to them already.
Chapter 13
In the forest, winter steps softly when