“Seize her!” the doctor cried. “Seize that wicked child, and restrain your master before he does himself an injury!”
The guards hesitated, uncertain exactly how to follow both commands at once. One of them took a threatening step toward Benedict then paused when the others didn’t follow.
Suddenly a wild laughter filled the hall, resounding from all sides, and accompanied by a wilder roaring of wind. One of the guardsmen was lifted off the ground, and he bellowed and kicked and lashed at nothing with his pike while the others looked on, gaping.
Doctor Dupont screamed, his voice higher pitched than Benedict had ever before heard it. He pointed at the poor, struggling guard and cried out, “See! See there! It’s witchcraft, I tell you! It’s the evil spirit come to life! We must stop it, we must extract it from our young lord!”
His voice was almost inaudible, lost in the thunderous voice of the sylph. But the other two guards, understanding the doctor’s gestures more than anything, hurled themselves at Benedict as the probable source of their comrade’s distress.
Just before they fell upon him, Benedict turned to Heloise and shouted, “Go!”
Heloise stared at him, her mind a storm of indecision. Then, plunging her hand into her pocket, she drew out the three-part branch. As the sylph’s laughter and the doctor’s screams filled her ears, she darted behind Rufus’s great chair and approached the mirror. She lifted the branch, and the diamond end gleamed bright. She saw no hint of her lost reflection, only the solid surface of glass.
She plunged the branch at the mirror even as she leaped up to grab hold of the redwood frame. The glass shivered and rippled like water.
Heloise fell through into the silent Wood Between.
She’s in! She’s through! O Lights Above be thanked!
But now . . . Oh, now . . . I’ve watched them die. I’ve watched them live. For years now, I’ve seen them suffer, one by one. And every time, the end is the same for me and for my daughters.
The three-part branch will be the key.
I see one, I see two . . . but where is three?
THIRTY-SEVEN
“Dragons,” Heloise muttered, and the wood around her shivered in disgust at the sound of her voice, like a fine lady who has just happened upon something dead. Though the silence remained absolute, Heloise felt the trees draw back their limbs as though gathering up skirts. She felt the ripple under her hands and knees as roots moved and shifted below the ground. The trees pulled away and left her in a small clearing as bright as daylight.
Daylight . . .
“Dragons!” she growled again, pulling herself upright and clutching the three-part branch like a weapon in one hand. “Dragons, dragons, dragons!” Daylight was the last thing she needed! The sun had been on the very verge of setting! Night was supposed to fall, and Le Sacre was supposed to play, and . . . and all of this would take place in the Hall of Night!
But this was not that hall. She had stepped out of her world, to be sure, but not into the right other world.
“What am I supposed to do now?” she asked the disapproving trees. None of them would deign to answer. Though they had no faces that she could discern, they gave off the strong impression of not looking at her. They drew together so thickly that she could not see a place to pass between them. She was, for all practical purposes, imprisoned in this brilliant little clearing, the shadows of crisscrossing branches at her feet like the shadows of the gibbet’s bars.
She closed her eyes, willing the image of the gibbet to leave her head. But then, in the darkness behind her eyelids she saw Benedict’s pale face, desperate and full of coming death as his own guards bore down upon him from behind. What would happen to him now? What would Doctor Dupont do to him?
Would she ever know?
“It doesn’t matter,” she muttered. “I’m here now. I must finish this task.”
She waited a moment longer, her mind straining for any sign or whisper that might be Princess Alala. But the princess had not been present inside her head since their meeting at the top of the Tower. Her role was played out.
The rest of this burden fell upon Heloise’s shoulders alone.
Heloise opened her eyes and stared at the surrounding trees. Had they drawn closer, moving in, ready to crush her even as the silver forest had? But that couldn’t be right. The law forbade the Family of Night from preventing her attempts to break the curse. But were these trees in any way governed by the Family of Night? She rather thought not.
The sun would set soon. Or would it? Here in this world the air was full of a strange sort of Timelessness—as though yesterday, today, and tomorrow had somehow become confused for each other . . . no. No, that didn’t make sense. Heloise had no words, no reasoning that could clarify what she felt, standing caught in this place. Somehow she knew that the Night would wait for her. She had only to find her way out of this clearing, find her way back to the Great Hall.
Moving around the periphery of her slowly shrinking cage, Heloise put her hands into the leaves, pushing on tree limbs and trunks, testing their resistance. They didn’t like it. Several of them lashed back at her, and she came close to losing an eye—a true danger since she had come here in her real body, not in her reflection. But one tree shivered at her touch and, rather than resisting or fighting back, simply pulled away, creating a little space.
The memory of the crushing silver forest all too present in her mind, Heloise nevertheless took the step and pushed against the next tree and its branches and leaves. She used the hand holding the three-part branch, vaguely thinking that perhaps the trees would recognize something of their own. As she pressed forward, she found more space opening before her, reluctant but passable.
Ahead of her she glimpsed something—something big. A shadow on four legs. Another few paces, another glimpse, and she knew she saw a massive head of black mane.
Her heart ramming in her throat, Heloise leaped forward, pushing against the trees more urgently than before. They gave way now without resistance, and soon she was running, chasing after not the shadow itself (for it had vanished) but the idea of where the shadow might have been. The path became clearer beneath her feet, gold earth, bare of grass and ferns and fallen leaves. Her dirty soles pounded without a sound, and her breath came in voiceless gasps.
Was the Lion-Prince leading her? Had he come to find her, to guide her through this endless forest?
It didn’t matter. All such thoughts and speculations vanished as she found herself standing before two massive oak trees. Only they weren’t oak trees at all; they were pillars to which the chains of a drawbridge were attached. Heloise recognized it at once. It was the same drawbridge she had crossed with her family when entering the protective walls of Centrecœur.
Somehow she had come back around to the Great House itself. Only it was the Great House of dreams or nightmares, like Centrecœur in essence, but much bigger, much wilder, much stranger. Across the drawbridge Heloise glimpsed a lawn like the dancing lawn upon which her family had danced Le Sacre each spring for generations uncounted, though this lawn, unlike the forest in which she still stood, was dark with the gloom of swiftly approaching night.
Sudden movement startled Heloise, and she turned to her right. Out of the trees stepped none other than Aunt wearing both her woman’s shape and her skull mask. She passed Heloise without a glance or word, proceeding over the drawbridge and into the darkened landscape beyond.
Another movement, and Heloise turned in time to see Uncle, flanked by two of his great-shouldered, spotted monsters. Here, in the golden light of the Wood, Heloise saw clearly that his face was indeed a skull, the white bone polished to shine. But though the sight was gruesome and strange and otherworldly, Heloise recalled Princess Alala’s words: “Uncle, at great risk to himself, stood up to Father. As a result, his face was destroyed . . .”
Thus, though his appearance was horrifying to her mortal eyes, Heloise felt her heart beat in sudden response at the sight of him. She saw that he
was a hero in his own way, a being willing to sacrifice himself for the sake of one he loved. She could not hate him. She could fear him—and indeed, as he passed close by her, it took all the strength in her spirit to keep her feet firmly planted—but she could not hate him.
Uncle disappeared over the drawbridge as well, his two beasts pacing close behind him. More dark beings appeared from the Wood and flowed past Heloise in a steady stream. She saw them both as people—beautiful, dark-skinned people—and as animals. Both forms were true among this strange Family of Night, and it was impossible to view one form without thinking of the other.
All progressed across the drawbridge, through the gate, and into that darker world beyond. So Heloise, adjusting her grip on the three-part branch, stepped forward and passed with the shadowy Faeries into their world.
She found herself standing, not on the grass-grown lawn but in the looming Hall of Night.
She recognized it at once; she would never forget this place as long—or as short—as she lived. The endless ceiling above, darkening with dusk. The polished black floor gleaming with reflected lights so that her eyes swam at the sight of it. And the dais before her, where the black throne of the Queen of Night waited with a brazier beside it. Someone had already lit the coals inside, and white flames reflected brilliantly off the chair’s many angled surfaces.
Heloise felt the hugeness of that hall in a way she had not experienced when walking in her reflection. For now she was herself, her dowdy mortal self wearing an ash-filmed, peasant-spun gown and her own flimsy body. It did not matter if she was stronger than she thought, not here. No amount of mortal strength, even blessed as it was with Faerie blood, could be a match for this immortal world.
Brilliant blue eyes watched her secretively from the shadows. Whenever she turned her head, trying to meet one of their gazes, the eyes instantly blinked and disappeared. She felt terribly alone as she walked on that hard, cold floor. She had not noticed how cold it was when she was here before.
A certain sensation of heightened attention alerted Heloise, and she turned to see Mother appear in the doorway. It was no longer the drawbridge gate but the same enormous doorway Heloise had seen the last time she came to this world. Beyond it Heloise saw only more shadows, no glimpse of the green-gold Wood and its resentful trees.
Mother stood alone, a black figure only just discernible from the lesser blackness behind her. She waited patiently, as though Time itself would bow to her if she so willed it. Heloise could not guess how many seconds or minutes—or hours—passed. None of those gathered in the hall dared breathe or move as they watched the Queen of Night.
At last the Lion-Prince emerged from the darkness behind her. As he approached, he shifted from his mighty lion form into that of the prince. Heloise watched as he smoothed back his hair, bowed to his mother, and offered her his arm. Even as they had the night before, the two of them proceeded across the hall. Mother’s eyes were tightly shut, and Heloise could only pray they would remain so. The memory of her own reflected self caught within the endless darkness of Mother’s gaze would haunt her forever.
But Mother gave no sign to indicate she was aware of Heloise’s presence. The Lion-Prince led her across the hall, and they passed within a few feet of where Heloise stood trembling. Neither turned. Neither spoke. Neither paused.
At the dais Mother mounted the steps, stopped before the brazier, took up the white fire with her hands, and allowed it to cover her completely. Heloise wondered if she would ever understand this incomprehensible fey ritual. Did the Queen of Night seek to purify herself somehow? To absolve herself of some sin? There was no way to know, no way even to guess with certainty.
Mother took her seat upon her throne. As she did so, the sun set.
The shawm-like instrument began to play.
The high, sighing, soaring strain filled Heloise to the brim of her spirit. She realized suddenly that she had never before heard this song. Not truly, not completely. Her reflection had heard it only the night before, but that time had not been so . . . so real. So ancient and so compelling. She knew then how wrong she had been to think, even to imagine that dancing Le Sacre in her reflected form would suffice! How could she truly dance when she could not truly feel?
How could there be a sacrifice without the whole of the heart and soul involved?
The song played on, moving through her heartache, moving through her fear like a weaver pulling the various threads, tightening them, crushing them together in the taut rack of the loom. Hearing the song played in this place as it was meant to be played was a beauty beyond anything Heloise had ever hoped to experience.
She knew now exactly why no mortal could survive this dance. It had nothing to do with the length. It had everything to do with the truth. For this song sang the truth of Death. There can be no truth more deadly.
The shawm-like instrument flung its voice maddeningly high, joined even as it crested the very peak of its range by the other, lesser instruments. Heloise’s gaze rose to that place where, in her own world, the minstrels’ gallery would be found. But she saw only the crowned heads of oak trees and glimpsed no sign of musicians or their instruments. It was as though the Night itself played this melody, these complex harmonies.
DOOM!
The drum sounded. Heloise felt it shiver her bones, and she gasped as she fell to her knees and bent double in sudden agony. She had not expected that; which was foolish, she now realized. The drums . . . the drums would beat her with their truth. The drums, not the shawm-like instrument, would slay her.
The twelve maidens appeared. Heloise, still shuddering with the pain of that single drumbeat, at first saw only their feet, which were bare like hers. Their gowns were not the beautiful starlight gowns she had seen when she came here in her reflection. They wore only rags, tattered rags.
Heloise sat upright, still clutching the three-part branch in her hand, and stared at the girls who surrounded her. She saw Ayodele. She saw Cateline. Then she saw Evette. She could not tell if they saw her, for their empty gazes were fixed upon an unseen mark straight before them.
Doom-doom! DOOM!
Heloise tried to scream, but pain clutched the sound in her throat so that it could not escape. Her bones shook in her body. But she knew this song. She knew each rising and falling note. She knew each beat, each moment when the drum would sound. The echoes of the drum faded, followed by silence.
Heloise gathered herself. She had no use for the glittering, three-part branch, so she stuffed it into the pocket of her gown. Holding herself as straight as she could, she raised her arms as she had seen the Chosen One do every year, every spring.
The maidens—her sisters—performed their silent paces, following the rhythmic beatings of their own hearts. When the shawm-like instrument began to play again, Heloise’s eyes filled with tears at the plaintive sorrow of its voice. She held perfectly still, even as she had the night before.
Evette danced before her, her eyes unseeing but her face wrung through with pain and sorrow. Did she know Heloise was near? The dance drew her closer. With a turn and a sweeping motion of her arm she came right up beside Heloise, their faces so close they were nearly touching.
“I’ll save you, Evette,” Heloise said, though she did not know if it was a promise she could keep.
The circle parted. Evette and the others dispersed and vanished into the shadows. Heloise stood still, waiting for her moment, the moment when she must sing. She opened her fists and reached to the blackness of the ceiling-sky above as though begging a boon of the heavens themselves.
When her moment came, she opened her mouth and sang:
“Cianenso
Nive nur norum.
Nive noar—ugh, arg, bleh!”
Her face flamed red with embarrassment, an odd and yet completely natural emotion here in this most terrible slice of time. For in her mortal body she hadn’t the skill she needed to hit those high notes. She hadn’t the range or the training. So her voice broke, and she feare
d that the song itself had broken . . . that she had failed Le Sacre and Evette already.
But the music went on. Even as she recovered and forced the next words from her throat, the black figures around her joined their voices with Le Sacre. She heard their Faerie words shift in her head as they sang:
“Evening comes to promise
All my children
Of a deeper night.”
The dance beckoned. Heloise obeyed. Last night, she had moved as though she could not make a wrong step. Tonight, she was awkward, uncertain. She knew the dance, she knew the paces, but she was only herself, and she’d never done this before, not really, and never in front of such an audience. She saw the strange formations of the Faerie folk as they ringed her and danced in their many circles, weapons clashing and flashing in the light of the stars and the white fire of Mother’s throne.
The drum roared.
Heloise gasped again, though she had known this was coming. The booming shattered her, and she stumbled. But she did not fall, not this time. “I’m stronger than I think!” she said, though her voice was lost in the music. She forced herself into the next pace, and the next after that.
The drum sang: Doom, doom, doom!
Heloise screamed at each beat, but her feet went on moving. Her hands went on clapping and forming the signs and figures in the air. Sweat rolled down her face and trailed white streaks in the dirt. She felt the music killing her. No mortal could dance Le Sacre all night through. Not the true Le Sacre. No mortal could survive the music.
No mortal could survive the drums.
“Shadows of the Night,
Dance with me,
Dance with your arms entwined.
Shadows of the Night,
Sing with me,
Sing with your voices combined.”
A Branch of Silver, a Branch of Gold Page 34