Moonkind (Winterling) Read online

  To her surprise, as that spark flared, the stilth pulled away. At first going through was as hard as climbing the wall of the tower where she’d been imprisoned. But as she pushed, the stilth receded from her touch. Pulling the others behind her, she stepped out of the Way and onto the pebbly bank of the Lake. Her bees, exhausted, settled over her shoulders. Behind her, panting with effort, came the pucks and Phouka. Last of all, the giant spider heaved its way through and crouched wearily beside Rook.

  Ready for an attack, she gripped her bow and drew an arrow from the quiver on her back. But no attack came.

  The stilth was in the nathe.

  The air was heavy and still and the land was stuck in the blurry, gray time between day and night. The cloud-covered sky pressed down on them. All along the edge of the Lake, and spilling out over the grass all the way to the gray wall that surrounded the nathe, were people. Many of them sat huddled around campfires that had gone out, dark, lumpy shapes in the chilly air. Some were hidden away in tents. Others stood watching the Lake with dull eyes.

  Her feet crunched loudly on the pebbly bank; the water was absolutely still. She could feel the stilth in the Lake, heavy and waiting. None of the people moved as she stepped closer to them. They didn’t even react to the crowd of pucks that lurked behind her.

  “Okay,” she said softly, and her voice sounded loud in the stuffy air. “Here’s what we’re going to do. Tatter?”

  The healer-puck stepped up beside her. “Here,” he said.

  “They’re wildling,” she said, and handed him her knapsack. “You know what to do?”

  “I do, yes,” he answered, but he didn’t move.

  She glanced aside at him. He stood staring out at all the people. The little spider he’d taken as a pet crouched on his shoulder. The stilth, she realized. It was affecting him, too. “Tatter!” she said loudly.

  He started, as if waking up. “Right,” he answered, and shook his head. His pet spider poked him with its front feelers.

  “Try to hurry,” she told him. Hurry in the face of something that wanted them all to slow down until they were still and silent. “Be a puck,” she said. Be stubborn and snarly and tricky, she meant. “Fight it.”

  Tatter nodded and, collecting Phouka and another puck with a nod, found a clear area and started unpacking herbs and tinctures from the pack.

  She called a few of her bees to her. “Keep an eye on them,” she said, pointing to Tatter and the other pucks. “If they start slowing down, do something.”

  Zmmmmrm, the bees said.

  “Yes,” she answered. “Sting them if you have to. The spiders should help.” Anything to keep the pucks from falling under the influence of the stilth. Now for the next thing. “Rook?”

  She heard his feet scuffing over the pebbles. “This is much worse than it was before, Fer,” he said, coming to stand beside her with the spider looming behind him. “We don’t have much time left.”

  “I know.” She could feel it: the stilth seeping through this land, flowing into the Lake and from there into all the Ways, spreading its stillness and death. “The Forsworn are here, just as we thought. Can you get the spider started?”

  Rook looked around. “It’s too light here.” He nodded toward the gray wall that surrounded the nathe. “Maybe in the forest there’s enough darkness.”

  Leaving a few bees and half of the pucks and Phouka behind to help Tatter with the medicine and the wildling people, Fer led Rook and Asher and Rip and the rest of the pucks to the viney, gray wall. She was a Lady, so it opened under her touch, but slowly, the vines oozing apart to leave a narrow opening that the spider barely squeezed through. The forest beyond was shadowy and dark.

  Rook led the spider under the eaves of the trees, where he spoke softly to it. Slowly the spider eased into the darkness; then it squatted and, with its long, spindly back legs, started drawing lengths of shadow-thread from itself; with its front legs it wove the thread into a thick, clotted web that it hung from the trees’ branches like heavy curtains.

  “Can you see to this?” she asked Rook. “We need to be sure there’s enough web for all the Forsworn, and hopefully for the other Lords and Ladies too.”

  He shook his head. “You’re going into the nathe, aren’t you?”

  Fer nodded. She had to give the Forsworn one last chance to fulfill their oaths to her. This would be the third time asking, and the most powerful, so she had to try it.

  “Then I’m coming with you,” Rook said firmly. “Ash can stay here.” He turned to the other puck. “Can’t you, Brother?”

  “I can do that, yes,” Asher answered after a long moment.

  No, he couldn’t; not if he was stuck in the stilth. Fer stepped closer to him and dared to reach up and take his chin so she could look right into his flame-colored eyes. His pet spider scurried to the top of his head and clung there. “Listen, Ash,” she said firmly. “The stilth will try to stop you. Don’t let it.”

  He jerked out of her hold, his glare suddenly fierce. “Leave it, Lady,” he growled.

  “I won’t,” she growled back. Then she grinned. “Be a puck, okay?”

  He barked out a surprised laugh. “Oh, I think I can manage that.” He sobered. The spider waved its front feelers at Fer, as if reassuring her. “Take Rip with you to the nathe,” Ash said. “He’ll keep you out of trouble.”

  “Get us into trouble, you mean,” Fer muttered, but she nodded. She left a few bees behind with Asher. Then, with Rook at her side and Rip a step behind, she headed toward the nathe.

  The forest here had always felt ancient, but now the stilth weighed on it so heavily that the trees’ heads were bowed and their branches drooped; their leaves hung limp. The trees barely noticed her as she passed, leading Rook and Rip through air as thick as honey, but dry as dust. The three bees she’d kept with her flew lower and lower, as if pressed down by the heavy air. Finally they landed on her shoulder and clung there, buzzing with annoyance. Trudging, she and the pucks emerged from the forest. The wide lawn that lay before the nathe had once been green; now it was gray-brown, the grass shriveled and dead. Across the lawn the nathe itself loomed, its windows empty.

  “So this is the nathe, is it?” came Rip’s rough voice from behind her.

  That’s right; he’d never seen it before. Fer nodded.

  “It’s full of nathe-wardens that hate us pucks,” Rook put in. “So watch out.”

  “I like it,” Rip said.

  Fer glanced over her shoulder to see that he was grinning. Well, Rip was one puck who never forgot his fierceness; he’d fight the stilth harder than anyone. He was the right puck to come into the nathe with her and Rook.

  The nathe. They were almost there. It was time to confront the Forsworn and get them to fulfill their oaths.

  With his brother a step behind him, Rook followed Fer over the dry grass and up one of the gnarled stairways that led to one of the many doors into the nathe. She stepped inside, and when he stepped after her he felt as if he’d run headlong into a stone wall—and then gotten stuck in the stone itself. He took a breath. It was like trying to breathe with a weight of rocks on his chest. Then another. Then a blink that took a thousand years. Something felt cold and smooth under his cheek. Somehow he’d ended up sprawled on the floor. All the bruises he’d got from trapping the spider awakened with a yelp.

  “Are you okay, Rook?” Fer asked. Her voice sounded very far away.

  He started to nod, and then she was by his side, crouching, her eyes full of worry. “You’re not moving,” she said. She touched his forehead, and time started again, and he dragged in a deep breath. She turned away, and he realized that Rip was on the floor beside him, also caught in the grip of the stilth.

  He felt her hand take his, and he let her drag him off the floor. With her other hand, she held Rip. “Hold on,” she said. “As long as you stay close to me, you should be okay.”

  “Okay,” he echoed. He heard Rip growl his agreement.

  Staying close, he a
nd Rip followed Fer through the silent, dark hallways. At last they reached the nathewyr, the grand hall at the very center of the nathe. Sitting in front of the double doors were Fer’s friends Gnar and Lich. They were huddled together with their arms around each other and their heads bowed.

  “Hello?” Fer said.

  Neither of them moved.

  Leaving him and Rip, Fer bent and put a hand to Gnar’s dark cheek, and then to Lich’s pale one. At her touch, they looked slowly up. Gnar blinked. The usual fires in her eyes were banked, the color of ashy embers. Lich rubbed his face with a heavy hand. “Lady Strange,” Gnar croaked, as if she hadn’t spoken in a long time.

  Fer knelt by their side. “Are you okay?”

  Lich spoke as if he was forcing the words out. “It’s too late, Lady Gwynnefar.”

  Gnar shoved at Lich with her shoulder. “Maybe not too late, Dewdrop, now that the Strange One is here, with her pretty puck.”

  Rook growled at that. Stupid spark-girl.

  “The Forsworn are inside?” Fer asked, pointing at the double door.

  “They are, Lady,” Gnar answered, suddenly solemn.

  Fer got to her feet, and then helped Gnar and Lich stand up. She nodded at Rip. “Can you stay with them?”

  His brother grinned and gave her a sharp nod.

  “Get out of the nathe if you can,” she told them. She waved her hand, and one of her three remaining bees flew to Rip, where it hung over his head, buzzing. “And back to the Lake. You go too, Rook.”

  “The stilth won’t get us, Lady,” Rip said. He bared his teeth at Gnar and Lich. “Get up, you two.” The fire-girl and the swamp-boy climbed to their feet.

  Gnar was staring at Rip. “He’s got a huge spider on his neck,” she said, pointing.

  “You think this spider is huge?” Rip shot back, grinning. “Come on, fire-girl. I’ll show you a real spider.” He pushed Gnar and Lich, and holding hands, they started down the hallway.

  Before following them, Rip leaned in to whisper into Rook’s ear. “You’re staying true to the Lady, Pup? Like you said?”

  “I am, yes,” Rook whispered back. “Go on.”

  Rip gave a sharp nod and, followed by Fer’s bee, went after Gnar and Lich.

  Fer had turned to face the double doors of the nathewyr. She took a deep breath, as if steadying herself. “All right,” she whispered. “I can do this.”

  “You can,” he told her, even though she hadn’t been talking to him.

  “Rook,” she said, turning to him. “You didn’t go.” She frowned. “You should have gone with Rip; it’s not safe here.”

  “I’m staying,” he said. Staying true, he meant.

  “Okay,” she said, then paused, as if thinking. “Actually, I need you to do something. Go and find the Birch-Lady and bring her here, to the nathewyr.” She flicked a finger, and one of her two remaining bees left her shoulder and bumbled through the heavy air to land on his shirt collar, where it buzzed a low greeting. She gave him a quick, sharp grin. “The bee will sting if the stilth starts to get you.”

  “Oh, sure it will,” he grumbled. On his collar, the bee gave a smug buzz.

  “Hurry, okay, Rook?” she asked, suddenly serious.

  Yes, he would hurry, as fast as the stilth would let him go. He was not leaving Fer to face the Forsworn alone.

  Twenty-Seven

  Fer took off her quiver and set her bow at the side of the double doors, then opened them and stepped alone into the nathewyr.

  Dazzle.

  She blinked and then squinted. Her bee buzzed with alarm. It was blindingly bright inside, like looking into the sun. It made black spots dance in front of her eyes.

  And the stilth. The air was so heavy that to breathe she had to suck the air into her chest and then push it out again. She took a step forward, and it was like wading through hip-deep mud. Time had stopped here and then stagnated.

  The hall was crowded with Lords and Ladies, all glittering with glamorie. They were not Forsworn, but in coming here to hide they had forsaken their lands and their people, and they’d been caught up in the stilth. They needed to change too, to give up the false rule of the glamories.

  The end of the room, on the platform where the High Ones usually sat, was even more dazzling—so blazingly bright, she couldn’t even make out any figures.

  You are a Lady, she told herself. This false glamorie had no power over her. The room darkened; the glamories faded, and maybe the pucks’ ability to see truly had rubbed off on her, because she saw the Lords and Ladies as they really were. Some were bent like gnarled trees; others were pale and faded, almost like ghosts; still others were squat and rough-skinned, like toads. They didn’t look beautiful or noble anymore.

  All of them were stuck like statues, caught in the grip of the stilth.

  “Come on,” she whispered to herself, and started toward the platform at the other end of the nathewyr.

  The first time she’d been here the Lords and Ladies had stared at her in disgust, and sniffed as if they’d smelled something nasty. Not a true Lady at all, they’d whispered. Part human, they’d sneered. But now they looked at her differently. Their eyes were wide, and as she passed she felt them trying to pull away, even as the stilth pressed down upon them.

  They almost looked . . . frightened.

  Well, they should be frightened, Fer figured. Their lands and their people were dying, and they would die too, if the stilth kept spreading.

  She stopped and bent to peer at a hunched mole-Lord who had a long, pink nose and a bald, pink head patched with peltlike, black fur. The mole-Lord’s eyes were tiny, but Fer saw truly: the Lord was afraid.

  He was afraid of her.

  She straightened, surprised. She wasn’t a frightening person. Was she?

  Maybe she was. She was a Lady, with all a Lady’s power, and she had demanded oaths from other Lords and Ladies—oaths that had been impossible for them to fulfill. She had wanted them to change everything about the way they lived and ruled. When she had come to the nathe before, to demand that they fulfill those oaths, she hadn’t been careful, and—as far as they knew—she and the puck she’d brought with her had killed the Birch-Lady. Now she was here again, the only Lady with the power to resist the stilth. They had no power at all compared to her.

  No wonder they were frightened.

  Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you, she wanted to tell him, but she knew he wouldn’t believe her.

  Fer went on faster now, pushing through the stilth to the blaze of glamorie where the nine remaining Forsworn awaited her on the platform. When she reached it, she stopped and examined them carefully.

  Their glamories were desperately bright, like sunlight reflecting from hot metal. And inside . . . it looked like the Forsworn were being stretched out to nothingness by their glamories and by the stilth. They were shriveled and gaunt. Their eyes were wide with terror, and with enmity, too.

  “Be careful,” she whispered to herself.

  Slowly she climbed onto the platform. The pucks, she knew, didn’t think much of her plan to talk to the Forsworn. But maybe it wasn’t so stupid after all. “What I could see before,” she told them, “was your power. But now I see what you really are.” The Forsworn were shriveled, bitter, malevolent creatures, clinging to their power with trembling claws, terrified of any change. She stepped closer. When she continued, her voice rang out through the nathewyr. “I ask you a third time to fulfill your oaths to me and take off your glamories.”

  One of the Forsworn Ladies gave a wail of rage; two other Ladies gripped each other’s hands; the rest cowered.

  The Sea-Lord—their leader, Fer realized—scuttled a sideways step closer to Fer. His seaweed hair hung dry and limp from his head, and he was hunched into himself. “We cannot remove the glamories,” said the Sea-Lord. His eyes narrowed and Fer caught a malevolent glint. “The fault lies just as much with you, Lady, as it does with us. You should never have demanded such an oath.”

  For just a second,
Fer felt a tingling of regret. “It’s true,” she admitted, “that I didn’t think through the consequences of asking you to swear an oath to me.” She went on, growing more sure of herself. “But I was right to ask you to take the glamories off. The glamories make power too important. You don’t need them to be connected to your land and people. Even now it’s not too late to make things right.” She bent to look into the Sea-Lord’s eyes. “We brought a shadow-spider with us. If you step through its web, the glamories will be removed. All you have to do is step through. That’s all.”

  The Sea-Lord shrank away from her, and the other Forsworn hissed with dismay. “No, Lady,” he spat. “The web will kill us, as it killed Marharren.”

  “She seeks our deaths!” the Forsworn Lady wailed.

  “No, the Birch-Lady is alive,” Fer explained. And she could prove it. Where was Rook? She turned and peered through the brilliance of the nathewyr. There—a dark blot against the brightness. Rook was standing in the doorway of the hall, not moving. Another dark shape stood beside him. “Come with me,” Fer ordered.

  The Sea-Lord nodded, but edged around her. The other Forsworn followed, and she led the shuffling group through the Lords and Ladies to the door of the nathewyr, where Rook and the Birch-Lady waited. The other Lords and Ladies gathered behind them, moving slowly like stone statues come to life.

  Fer stepped past the Birch-Lady to stand beside Rook. He had a reddening bump on his neck where her bee had stung him. “All right?” she asked.

  Rook gave her a slow nod. “She’s been hiding in Old Scrawny’s room. He’s coming too.”

  Arenthiel? She nodded. “Good.” She touched Rook’s hand to keep him out of the stilth, then looked at the cluster of Forsworn and at the other Lords and Ladies, and pointed at the Birch-Lady. “See?” she asked them. “She’s not dead.”

  The Birch-Lady stepped forward to meet them. Like an ancient birch tree, she was gnarled, with gray patches at her knobby elbows and knees and a fall of withered, leaflike hair hanging over her face. She had dark eyes set into the mass of wrinkled, barklike skin. She was ancient, but she wasn’t ugly. She gave the gathered Forsworn a brisk nod. “Listen to the girl, you fools. She is right about the glamories. When my glamorie was gone, the puck told me to go back to my land and my people, and so I did. The stilth had been strong there, and the people needed me. But with my oath fulfilled, the stilth was leaving my land, and I could help them.” She pointed at Rook. “Let the puck touch you with his cursed hand, as he touched me,” she said. “It is painful, and you may die of it, but your oath will be fulfilled.”