“That’s insane!”
“He’s also claimed you arranged the death of your husband—ordered the men in the hunting party to kill Reglan and blame it on the bear.”
“That doesn’t even make sense. You were there, Hegner. You fought the bear. It took your hand!”
Hegner shook his head. “No. It didn’t.”
Persephone blinked. Maybe she hadn’t heard right. “What?”
“Your husband fought well, Persephone.” Hegner raised his stump. “But he couldn’t win against all of us.”
She stared at Hegner as overhead the breeze tossed the leaves about and patches of moonlight shifted.
In the hanging silence, Hegner continued, “Konniger was also the one who sent me, Sackett, and Adler to kill you. Been waiting for a second chance for you to have an accident, but you haven’t left the dahl, and it’s too risky killing you inside the walls. That’s why he told you about Suri and Maeve. He hoped you would follow them so you, too, could be killed by the bear.”
“What’s with the moonlight confession?” Raithe asked, slowly passing Persephone her spear, which she took with unsure hands.
“Adler, Sackett, Krier, Holliman…they’re all dead.”
“So?”
“They’re also the ones who helped kill Reglan.” Hegner spat at Konniger. “Krier wasn’t killed by no bear. Did you really think I’d believe that? It’s only a matter of time until I have my own run-in with The Brown.”
“So you’re not as stupid as you look,” Konniger said. He took a long drink, lowered the skin, and wiped his mouth. Then he shook his head. “Well, no. I take that back. Would have been smarter to just run off. You would have lived.”
“I’ll help you fight,” Hegner told Persephone. “And when we get back to the dahl, I can testify for you and explain what happened. I’ll tell everyone how Konniger betrayed Reglan. That it wasn’t you who ordered his death. In return, you just need to pardon me for my role in all of this.”
Help you fight. Persephone squeezed Math’s spear in both hands. We have to fight? There are so many of them. I’m going to die here, right here, right now—Raithe and Malcolm, too.
She considered pleading. She knew most of these men, some of them since they were children. Maybe if I explained Konniger was lying…but that wouldn’t work. Konniger probably promised them the best lands, the best homes, and the women of their choice. That had to be why Moya was betrothed to Hegner. She was a reward.
“So that’s your grand plan, is it, Stump?” Konniger laughed. “Not a very good one.” He tossed the waterskin back to Riggles then without warning lunged at Hegner with the edge of his shield.
Hegner blocked with his spear, creating a hollow thud when the haft met the board. He also created a wide opening. The chieftain of Dahl Rhen took advantage of it and thrust the stone point of his spear up under Hegner’s rib cage.
Persephone watched in horror as Konniger jerked and twisted. Blood ran down the spear’s shaft, soaking Hegner’s leigh mor. The Stump managed to remain standing for several seconds as if his body were too confused to realize he was dead. It caught on soon enough, and he fell among the ferns. With desperate, watering eyes, he looked first at Persephone and then at Konniger. He gasped, convulsed, spit blood, and then lay still.
Konniger looked down at him. “You’ve always been a disappointment, Stump. But you were right about one thing. That bear was bound to kill you, too.”
—
Suri and Maeve sat in the rear of the cave, their backs against the wall. The sun had set hours earlier, but the full moon managed to illuminate the cavern with a patch of pale light that moved from right to left.
“I want to thank you for this, Suri.” Maeve sat on her knees, leaning forward, watching the entrance with wide eyes. “You can’t know what this means to me. I’ve been cursed for so long. I believed the gods hated me, that I was being punished. I didn’t care. I deserved it, but for them to punish my daughter, my little girl, who was innocent…”
Maeve wiped her eyes and blew her nose. “How could they do this to her? I blame myself, of course. I shouldn’t have come back. I should have stayed away. Most important of all, when I found out what Konniger was planning to do, I should have grabbed a sack of food and run away to Menahan. Maybe that’s what Mari wanted. Maybe it’s why she cursed us, because I was a coward. I let them take my child and leave her in the forest. I’m not a coward anymore. You’ve given me hope for the first time in years.” She reached out, took Suri’s hand, and squeezed. “Thank you so much for this. I know I can die now. I know I’ll be forgiven if I can just see her face again. All I want is to know she’s all right, that she’s free and safe.”
Suri didn’t feel this was the best time to mention that she hadn’t cast out a morvyn before. Not that it should matter. Tura had trained her well. Her mentor had explained about good-luck charms, crimbal rings, and the effect of salt on the unnatural. Loud noises scared demons, as did metal. The knowledge about metal was neither here nor there since she didn’t have any. But still, it was a good thing to know.
Tura had explained how sleeping near a spider’s web could catch nightmares and that knots prevented people from finding common ground. If you see people having an argument over nothing, look for a knot in their hair or clothes, Tura had said. Untie it and the disagreements will vanish.
The old mystic had taught Suri how mistletoe bracelets helped in healing and the importance of smoothing away an impression left in a bed after sleeping. If you didn’t, a witch could use it to cast a curse on you. Tura had known everything, but Suri lacked firsthand experience. As she and Maeve waited, she wondered if she might be a little overconfident.
When they had set out, Suri had been certain it would work…practically certain…mostly certain. The longer she sat, the less certain she became. Tura had trained her, but Tura also said never enter Grin’s cave. Perhaps the old mystic knew that Grin was a morvyn and that Suri wasn’t strong enough to fight it.
Maeve interrupted her thoughts. “I feel like such a fool for taking so long, but I’d like to offer my condolences for the passing of Tura. So much has happened in the last few weeks that, well…I should have said something before now. Your mother was a wise woman.”
“Tura wasn’t my mother.”
“Oh? But I thought…” Maeve looked puzzled.
Suri shrugged. “Our best guess is that I was stolen out of my cradle by crimbals who wanted to take me to Nog. But something happened on the way, and either they dropped me in the forest where Tura found me or I somehow escaped. Tura thought I was a little strange, so she figured the latter was more likely.”
“How horrible,” Maeve said with genuine sympathy. “How old were you when Tura took you in?”
“Don’t know; young, though. Tura said I was tiny. Said I was so small that she would’ve missed me in that pile of leaves if I hadn’t been crying. Apparently, I had nearly buried myself in them. Anyway, I cried so loud she said she could hear me over the roar of the cascades. We figure maybe that was why the crimbals dropped me; I could wail like the North Wind.”
“Tura…” Maeve narrowed her eyes. “Tura found you in a pile of leaves…near a cascading stream?”
Suri nodded. “She showed me the place. I used to go there and sit, sit and think. Wondering, you know? I thought maybe I’d catch one of the crimbals and they might tell me how I came to be there. They might know who my parents were and why they didn’t come looking for me. But crimbals are impossible to catch, hard to see even. You only get a glimpse of them out of the corner of your eye. When I was young, I imagined the crimbals hadn’t stolen me at all, that maybe they had saved me. My parents could have been monsters, or maybe they’d been killed. Maybe I was carried away for my own good. It’s possible my dying mother called to Wogan for help, and he sent the crimbals. I can still picture her handing me over to their keeping. Wogan might have told them to bring me to Tura rather than Nog, knowing she would take care of me.”
Maeve was looking at her intently. Normally, the old woman struck Suri as flighty. She was the sort who didn’t listen when a person talked, or at least she didn’t look at people. At that moment, Maeve focused on Suri to the exclusion of all else, and she found the intensity of that attention disturbing.
“I recently learned that parents of unwanted children leave their babies in the forest. I hope I wasn’t one of those.” Suri disliked the way Maeve was peering. That sort of thing would cause a moose to charge, but she guessed the old woman didn’t know any better. “I’ve been thinking…that…well…if Tura hadn’t found me, I could have suffered the same fate as your daughter. I suppose that’s part of why I’m here. Aside from the whole stopping-the-demon-from-killing-everyone thing, of course.”
“How old are you, Suri?” Maeve asked, her voice trembling, her eyes tearing.
“Not certain about that, either. Depends on how old I was when Tura found me. Fourteen, maybe?”
Maeve reached out and took hold of Suri’s hands. The old woman was shaking.
“Are you cold?” Suri asked.
Maeve pulled Suri up. “We have to get out of this cave. We have to get out, right now!”
As Maeve grabbed hold of Suri’s hand and started to pull, the light changed.
The moonlight coming in the cave’s mouth was blotted out, leaving them in darkness. A heartbeat later the great bear’s outline was obvious and nearly filled the entire opening. It took one step inside, hesitated, and then roared. The sound was deafening.
Grin knew they were there. Knew before she entered, most likely, and Suri was certain the bear didn’t like unexpected guests. The great padded paws thumped on the dirt, her nails clicking on the rock. She advanced slowly, then roared again. Maeve screamed and threw her arms around Suri, squeezing her and crying, “No!”
“Remember to call your daughter’s name when Grin reaches the salt,” Suri whispered. She’d already told Maeve this twice but felt it was important to remind the old woman, since her former courage seemed to have fled at the sight of the bear. Such a thing was easy to excuse. Even Suri was having second thoughts.
Grin bounded forward in a charge and stopped right on the nest—directly on the spray of salt Suri had laid down.
“Now!” Suri told her. “Do it now.”
“Suri!” Maeve cried.
“No, not me! Call your daughter’s name. Call for Shayla.”
Grin roared and reared up. The beast’s head brushed the cave’s ceiling, and its body blocked the exit.
Maeve ripped Tura’s staff from Suri’s grasp and shouted at the mystic, “Run!” Then the old woman raised the stick high above her head. “Back! Back, you vile beast! You can’t have my daughter!”
Suri was both bewildered and amazed as the old woman advanced on the bear that towered over her, rolling its head as it growled. Maeve got in one good swing. Tura’s staff struck Grin on the side. Then the bear brought a forepaw around and caught the old woman. Maeve shattered like an egg struck by a hammer. Long white hair and a dress fell to the stone.
The bear rose up again and roared at Suri—the last intruder.
It didn’t work. The salt failed. Maeve went crazy and forgot her daughter’s name. What a disaster.
The mystic retreated as far as she could, pressing against the rear wall. No escape, no place to go, no shelter, nowhere to hide.
You’re always right, Tura.
The bear sniffed at the silent, still body of Maeve, then began its charge. The lumbering force of rippling fur and muscle drove forward, propelled by rock-gouging claws. Suri held her breath, bumping the back of her head against the rear wall as she tried to flee through stone.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Trapped
I looked often for that famous place. I wanted to see it for myself, to peer into the brink and test myself. I never found it. That forest has a way of keeping secrets, the good and the bad.
—THE BOOK OF BRIN
“Malcolm, Persephone,” Raithe called. “Like before, with the wolves.”
They both knew what he meant and put their backs together. Persephone pulled the shield off her back and hooked her left arm through the straps. The enarmes were made for bigger men, and she couldn’t properly reach the leather grip, catching it with only the tips of her fingers. In her other hand, she held the legendary spear, which also felt too big, too heavy.
“I don’t know how to fight,” she whispered over her shoulder.
“Neither do I,” Malcolm admitted.
“Doesn’t matter,” Raithe replied. “There’s too many of them. We’re going to die.”
Some of the men heard, and smiled. In the moonlight, they looked like grinning ghouls. Persephone hoped Raithe had said it to make them overconfident, a ploy of some sort, but they didn’t look like they needed any reassurance. The brutes were in no hurry. They took more swigs from their waterskins, then slowly began spreading out, circling them, putting shields on, laughing with one another as they did. Most of the faces she didn’t know, and she didn’t want to. They were men from Nadak, and madness was in their eyes, the same sort of madness she’d seen in people during the famine. The Nadak men were starving, but what they hungered for was revenge—against her, against anyone.
She looked at Devon, the son of Derick, a gifted woodsman. She’d awarded the lad first prize for his calf in the autumn fair eight years earlier. He had been about twelve then. She still remembered placing the token over his head and how he’d smiled. He hardly showed his teeth because they weren’t straight and had a terrible gap, but that day he couldn’t help himself. Rosy cheeks, unabashed teeth, and one arm around his cow’s neck—that was how she remembered him. Devon was grinning at her again, showing the same crooked whites, but there was no happiness in his eyes—just anger.
“This is close to where the wolves attacked,” Raithe said. “The waterfall is to your left, Seph. Remember?”
“Yes.”
Konniger circled them, shifting until he was in front of Persephone. Hegner’s blood dripped down the length of his spear.
Going for the easy kill? she thought. Such a brave chieftain!
“This isn’t personal, Persephone,” he told her. “I considered marrying you, but I already have a wife, and Tressa…well, you know Tressa.”
Off to the southeast, they heard a bear’s distant roar. The sound was chilling in the dark wood. Three times it thundered.
Konniger glanced in the direction of the sound and chuckled. “I think you’re too late.” Then he stopped and focused on Raithe. “Thurgin, get on his left; Devon, on his right. These other two can wait; he’s the problem. Remember, he’s fast. We all need to attack at the same time. Just as if he were a bear.”
“Not exactly fair of you,” Malcolm said, holding Reglan’s shield up and clutching his spear awkwardly.
Persephone didn’t know where he found the courage to speak. She was terrified. Glancing at the dead body of Hegner, she wondered what it would feel like when Konniger pushed the sharpened stone point into her.
“Fair?” Konniger replied, and pointed to the collar around Malcolm’s neck. “Being a slave, I would’ve thought you’d be past such stupid notions as fair. Would you consider it fair for the bear when the three of you surround it? That’s all this is, killing a dangerous bear, a bear and her two cubs.”
“Don’t hesitate, Seph,” Raithe said as the men spread out. Remember to whoop like Suri would.”
She knew what he meant and also what the attempt would cost. “I won’t do it.”
“They want you, not us,” Raithe said.
“He’s right,” Malcolm told her.
Konniger closed in, clutching his spear tightly. The others took their lead from him and closed the circle around Raithe.
“Now!” Raithe shouted.
His outburst made everyone flinch except Malcolm, who despite his admission of martial ignorance
stabbed with what Persephone thought was a skillful thrust. Malcolm’s spear tip cut the exposed shoulder of a man who screamed and dropped back. Malcolm followed this by running full tilt into Konniger, bowling him over with Reglan’s big shield.
The hole was opened before her. Dropping both shield and spear, she ran. The weapons would only slow her down. Maybe if she got away, they would leave Raithe and Malcolm alone. It was a hope, anyway.
Behind her, men cried out in effort and pain. She heard the crack of wood and another scream. It might have been Raithe, possibly Malcolm, but she couldn’t tell and didn’t dare look back, didn’t dare slow down. Following the moonlit trail, it led to the familiar hollow of fiddlehead ferns and the babbling stream. She splashed through it, praying she wouldn’t slip in the muck or catch a loose rock. Water sprayed, splashing her face and blurring her sight. She made it across, found firm footing again, and ran hard.
Only a few strides beyond the stream she heard someone crash through the water. “Can’t get away from me, bitch!” Konniger shouted.
Feet slapped the dirt just behind her.
She ran as fast as she could, but even with a shield and spear, Konniger was faster. The rapid beat of his strides closed on her. She could hear his breathing, great puffs of air. She expected to feel the tip of his spear in her back. Instead, she heard him curse and his feet slide.
Perhaps he fell.
He hadn’t fallen, but Konniger had stopped. They had reached the waterfall.
Persephone completely forgot to whoop as she ran off the edge.
—
Trapped against the wall of the cave, Suri panicked. She couldn’t think; she couldn’t move. The only thing in her head was the apology running over and over, I’m sorry, Tura. You were right. With her brain locked up, she watched as the huge brown bear lumbered forward. She saw it in perfect detail. Grin ran at her, lunging up and down, forepaws followed by rear. Thick fur undulated. Muscles on her shoulders rolled in waves as her claws reached out and scratched grooves into the dirt floor. Her head, which appeared small for her body, was nevertheless massive with its long snout. The bear roared, displaying four fangs, two long ones on top and two smaller ones on the bottom. All four resided in a mouth wide enough to envelop Suri’s entire head.
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