The Iron Raven

by Julie Kagawa

  “Easy.” Ash’s smile was grim. Gripping his blade, he looked in my direction, raising an eyebrow. “Ready, Goodfellow?”

  I felt a tiny flutter of vindictive defiance and squashed it down. “Just try to keep up, ice-boy.”

  We sprinted toward the giant, flailing tree in the center of the clearing. Coaleater had managed to set part of its foot on fire, and the treant was not happy with that little development. It howled and lashed out with a gnarled limb, finally catching the Iron faery in the shoulder and smacking him into the thorns. I heard an angry bugle over the crashing and snapping of branches, and figured the iron-encased horse was more annoyed than hurt.

  “Oy, big ugly!” I bellowed. Ash paused, and I felt a pulse of Winter glamour go through the air as I continued to charge forward. “Look this way!”

  The treant turned toward me, eyes blazing. With a roar, it sank its fingers into the earth, and thick black briars erupted from the ground, curling toward me like talons. I skidded to a stop, dodged a spiny branch that swiped at my head, and leaped through a knot of thorns that tried closing around me. More brambles surged into the air, and I grimaced. “Hey, ice-boy, you can help out anytime.”

  Through the writhing branches, I saw Ash drop to one knee and sink his blade point down into the earth. A ripple of freezing glamour spread out from the point of the sword, but directed underground instead of on the surface. Suddenly, the thrashing, flailing brambles and thorns surrounding me slowed, then stopped moving as a thick layer of ice crept up the stalks, freezing them in place with sharp crinkling sounds.

  The treant gave a bellow of surprise and rage and tried pulling back, but his fingers were frozen solid now, and he couldn’t break free of the ice.

  I grinned viciously. “What’s the matter, spiky? Got a bit of the frostbite on the ol’ fingers, there?” Ducking beneath the ice-covered brambles, I raced up to the giant and leaped onto a gnarled leg. Now that the treant wasn’t thrashing around, it was much easier to balance on the giant tree without being tossed about like a ship in a storm.

  Nyx dropped beside me, golden eyes glittering with a dangerous light. Her moonblades were in her hands, and bits of twigs and leaves were caught in her hair as she shook her head, glaring up at the monster tree. “I can’t reach its heart. It’s too well protected.”

  I smiled, strangely proud that she knew that. One of the only reliable ways to kill a treant was to stab it in the heart, which, if you could reach it, was oodles easier than chopping or hacking at the monster tree until it died or squished you like a bug. Unfortunately, treants hid their hearts in weird places, like the soles of their feet or their armpits, and protected them behind layers of bark and thick wooden skin. You had to literally peel back their armor to get to the heart, and no treant was going to sit still and let you do that.

  Fortunately, we had a few tricks up our sleeve, too.

  “Worry not, Miss Assassin,” I told the dubious Forgotten beside me. “This overgrown topiary is already chopped, it just doesn’t know it yet.”

  I reached for my Summer glamour, sent it deep into the ground and felt the earth respond. Leafy vines erupted from the dirt, slithering up the treant’s legs. They coiled around its ankles and wrapped around its limbs, anchoring it to the ground. If the treant hadn’t already been occupied, such a trick wouldn’t have worked, but the monster tree was a little distracted with a very bad case of frostbite, so the vines continued their journey until they reached the thing’s chest, then continued to slither up toward its head.

  “That’s not going hold it for long,” Nyx said calmly, watching the creeper vines coil around the massive tree.

  I grinned. “We don’t need long,” I told her, and raised a dagger with a wink. “Just long enough for this.”

  Across the clearing, another ripple of magic went through the air, only much more powerful. The Iron Queen, wielding the glamour of both Summer and Iron, blending them together in the way only she was capable of. The magic raced across the ground and sank into the vines tangling the treant, and the little creeper vines swelled into thick brambles, ropy and flexible but tough as steel. The treant gave a roar as it was suddenly encased in a knot of trunks and branches. It thrashed, rocking its huge body from side to side, making the brambles shake and creak violently, but it wasn’t going anywhere.

  I grinned at Nyx, who was watching all this unfold with a stunned look on her face. “Things are a little different when you’ve got a queen behind you. So, where did you say its heart was, again?”

  She blinked and shook herself, then pointed a moonblade toward the treant’s chest. “Under the left shoulder,” she replied, “right below where the collarbone would be, if treants had bones.”

  I tipped an imaginary hat to the Forgotten and leaped onto an overhead branch, making my way up to the top. The treant’s shiny black eyes suddenly fixed on me, and its lined face contorted with loathing.

  “Filth,” it rumbled. “Flesh pods, destroying everything you touch. Kill you all. Crush your bones, turn you to rot, feed you to the roots.”

  “Sorry, big guy.” I hauled myself up the final branch, so that I was right below the monster tree’s face, looking at the spot Nyx had pointed out. It was covered with thick wooden plates, but between the cracks, I could see a faint pulse of greenish light. “Afraid you’re not going to be crushing anyone’s bones today.”

  “Insects,” the treant howled as I took a step toward the pulsing light. “Filthy destroyers of all that is green. Kill you all! Return you to the earth. Feed your tainted blood to the worms and saplings. The Mother wishes it.”

  The Mother wishes it? I felt a chill crawl down my back as I raised a hand, Summer glamour flaring to life once more. Okay, that’s not good. It’s definitely time to end this. Closing my eyes, I felt the connection to the magic and everything it touched, the earth, the forest, even the treant beneath me. The monster tree was strong, but it was still a tree, and I was Robin Goodfellow. The forest, and every living flower, sprout, and tree within it, bent to my will.

  The plates covering the green light shuddered, then peeled back like a flower opening. A cloud of darkness billowed out of the crack, smelling of rot and decay and anger. It buzzed around my head like flies, and the onslaught of rage, loathing, and hatred that accompanied it made my head spin.

  With a splintering crash, the ice covering the brambles shattered. The treant wrenched its arms free, surging up with a roar, and I lost my footing on the narrow branch. As I fell backward, I saw the treant’s arm, spiny claws gleaming like polished wood, coming right at me, and I changed into a raven just before the thorny talons sliced the air overhead.

  Wheeling around, I ducked the other arm and flapped over its head, intending to spin around and finish the job. There was no need. Nyx leaped off its shoulder, swung on a vine, and drove her blade through the glowing hole I’d opened in the treant’s chest.

  An ear-piercing wail rang out. The treant staggered, curling its arms around itself, and swayed in place for a half second. Quickly, I swooped to a branch, changing into my normal self as Nyx vaulted off the treant into the boughs of a tree and Ash scrambled out of the way.

  “Timber!” I called as the monstrous tree crashed face-first to the ground with a rumble that shook the forest floor.

  We waited until the dust settled and the forest was still again before dropping to the ground and warily approaching the fallen giant. The treant’s face was turned toward us, but the light had gone from its eyes, the magic that had sustained its life missing. It looked like a huge, vaguely man-shaped pile of moss and branches, rotting in the dirt.

  A somberness descended as Meghan and Ash joined us in staring at the dead treant. This wasn’t like slaying a dragon or some vicious monster that had tried to swallow you whole. The treants were near immortal, or they might as well be with how long they lived. Regardless of age, they had always been revered as the wise, pea
ceful guardians of the forest. Killing one felt like an affront to Faery itself.

  The Iron Queen let out a long sigh, a pained look crossing her face as she gazed at the once living tree. “I’m sorry,” she murmured. “I wish we could have spoken, but I had no choice.” Her mouth thinned before she glanced around at the rest of us. “Is everyone all right? Any injuries?”

  “Only my pride,” Coaleater muttered, shaking leaves from his mane as he stomped up, swishing his tail in an irritated fashion. Twigs and branches jutted from the chinks in his metal hide, and he had a few dents that weren’t there before, but seemed fine otherwise. With a snort that singed a stubborn leaf to ashes, he gazed up at the fallen treant and pinned his ears. “My apologies for not being able to aid you in battle. A pity the creature is dead, but it should have known better than to attack a queen of Faery.”

  “Something was wrong with it,” Nyx said quietly. “When I stabbed it, the heart felt...tainted.” She shot a glance at me. “Not unlike those Forgotten we battled in Phaed.”

  “Yeah,” I agreed. “You don’t think the big ugly himself is here, do you?”

  “If it is,” Meghan said, “it would save us the time of finding it. Though if it’s powerful enough to corrupt a treant in such a short time, it’s even more dangerous than we thought.”

  “Worse than that, I think,” Ash broke in, sounding grim. He nodded to the motionless treant. “Did you hear what it said? The Mother wishes it.” He shook his head. “If that is true, then things are more serious than we know.”

  “I am unfamiliar with this ‘Mother,’” Coaleater announced, tossing his mane. “I was not aware trees had such things.”

  “It’s referring to the Mother Tree,” Nyx replied gravely. “The oldest tree in the forest. The Mother Tree is responsible for the birth of all sentient plant fey—dryads, treants, even a few of the piskie tribes. The treants are connected to her, as are most of the trees in the area. If the Mother Tree perishes, the forest will wither, the treants will all die, and the land will turn barren and lifeless. It would be a death sentence to the Briars, or at least, this part of it, for miles around.”

  “Oh,” Coaleater said in a much more subdued voice. “That is...very troubling.”

  “Very much so.” Meghan rubbed a hand across her eyes. “I think we need to find the Mother Tree,” she announced, earning a nod from both Ash and Nyx. “If she is in danger, then the whole forest is at risk. And if the Mother Tree is the one inciting the treants to attack...” She trailed off, as if she couldn’t bear to think about the repercussions. “Grimalkin, can you take us to the grove of the Mother Tree?”

  “I can, Iron Queen.” The cat appeared on a fallen branch, like he had been there the whole conversation. “It is not far, though I would advise caution while traveling through the territory of the walking trees. There are likely more treants surrounding the grove of the Mother, and fighting a pair of them, or more, would be most inadvisable. I realize it is difficult for certain members of the party to restrain themselves...” He paused and looked directly at me. “But I would suggest keeping the noise level to a minimum. Do give it your best attempt at least, hmm?”

  17

  GROVE OF THE MOTHER TREE

  We didn’t run into any more hostile trees, though not for lack of them trying. If you think a giant, murderous tree stomping around is easy enough to avoid, you’d be wrong. Turns out, treants are very good at looking like...well, like trees. Normal, nonhostile trees that will not come to life and try to squish you for passing in front of them. Fortunately for us, both Furball and Nyx were experts at spotting which trees were trees and which trees were looking to step on our heads. Following the two masters of stealth, we managed to sneak around the half-dozen or so treants on our way to the grove without being spotted by any of them. Even Coaleater.

  Finally, the briars and trees opened up, and we stood at the edge of a small clearing. I say small, but only because there wasn’t a lot of space left, due to the biggest tree you’d ever seen in your life sitting smack in the center. I didn’t even know what kind of tree it was, just that it was huge, dwarfing even the biggest treant. It would probably take a hundred or so people to stretch their arms around the gnarled trunk, and its branches soared up until they disappeared into the canopy overhead, spreading out like a leafy ceiling. Moss, mushrooms, creeper vines and toadstools grew from the trunk and around the massive roots, and a continuous rain of leaves drifted from the branches above, spiraling to the ground like feathers.

  “I take it this is the Mother Tree,” Coaleater remarked, craning his neck up to stare at it. Pinning his ears, he snorted and tossed his head. “Let’s hope it isn’t hostile, because it would take a very long time to chop down.”

  “You cannot chop down the Mother Tree,” Nyx said, sounding faintly horrified. “The forest would die, as would all the treants and dryads attached to her. This tree has been here longer than any of us.”

  Coaleater blew a puff of smoke into the air. “Then perhaps we should ask the Mother Tree why she has been sending her children to kill everyone else.”

  Warily, we stepped into the clearing. There were no explosions, no twiggy hands surging out of the earth to grab at us, so we started walking. Toward the huge tree in the center of the grove.

  “Puck.” Beside me, Nyx shuddered, causing all my alarm bells to go off. “Can you feel it?” she whispered.

  I gave a slight frown. “What are you—?”

  And then I felt it.

  A taint on the air, in the earth and trees and rocks surrounding us. The same malevolent, roiling glamour we’d felt in Phaed. Disgust and loathing, and a deep, pulsing rage toward the insignificant fleshy creatures who defiled the forest and used her children for their own gain. The flesh creatures did nothing but exploit and waste and destroy, and it was the forest that suffered the most. Perhaps it was time that the trees rose up to do a little damage of their own.

  Oh boy. This was going to be interesting.

  “Mother Tree,” Meghan called, taking a few steps toward the massive trunk. A root as thick as she was curled back as she approached, like a snake getting ready to strike, but the Iron Queen didn’t flinch. Ash, however, slid his body between it and Meghan, one hand on the hilt of his sword.

  “I am Meghan Chase, Queen of the Iron Realm,” Meghan went on, facing the giant trunk. “I bring no trouble, Mother Tree, to you or your children. I wish only to talk. Will you speak with us?”

  “Insects.”

  The branches overhead rattled, shaking the canopy and sending a shower of leaves hissing to the ground. In the center of the trunk, the gnarled bark shifted, moving around like wax, forming the vague impression of a face. A pair of eyes emerged, shiny and black, and a slash formed in the trunk as words spilled forth, slow and rusty, as if they had not been spoken in centuries.

  “Parasites,” the voice whispered, though it still caused the ground to shake and the branches above us to tremble. “Weevils and termites, digging into my flesh, burrowing through my blood. Carrying your diseases, leaving nothing behind. What do you want? Haven’t you already taken enough?”

  “Mother Tree.” Meghan stepped forward. “My friends and I have taken nothing, from you or this forest. We wish only to pass through in peace. Likewise, the Thorn Sisters have great respect for you and the woods in which they hunt. Why do you send your children to attack them? Have they offended you in some way?”

  “Offended me?” The Mother Tree didn’t sound amused. She sounded disgusted—as disgusted as an ancient tree could sound, anyway. “Their entire existence is an offense to the forest,” she rasped. “They, and all the other flesh creatures who take and take and take and give nothing back. They have become as greedy and destructive as the humans in the mortal realm, who raze the trees and destroy the earth with no thought or regret, unable to hear how the land screams out in pain.”

  “Surely th
at isn’t true, Mother Tree,” Meghan reasoned. “At least, not here. I’ve seen no signs of destruction. No swaths of cleared forest or chopped trees. Perhaps your anger at mankind is what’s driving this, but the fey who live in the Briars are not deserving of your wrath.”

  “You think not, flesh queen?” Oh, this wasn’t going well. The Mother Tree’s voice had turned icy, which caused Ash to step closer to Meghan, every muscle in his body coiled to react. “How many trees have they felled to build their homes?” the Mother Tree went on. “How many saplings have they uprooted to craft their bows, spears, and weapons of death? How many branches have they ripped asunder and burned in their firepits?”

  “That is just basic survival,” Ash broke in. “The fey of this world have always depended on the forest for their homes and tools. This is nothing new, Mother Tree.”

  “The wolves do not uproot my trees to hunt,” was the uncompromising reply. “The deer do not build fires to keep themselves warm. The bears do not need bows to fell their prey. Only the fleshy two-legs must continuously destroy to survive. Like a colony of termites, eating, eating, eating, until the tree they depend on for their home is consumed and chewed to nothing. Then they simply move on and find another tree to kill.” Branches rattled, and all around us, the roots of the tree coiled beneath the ground like giant worms. “You...you are an infestation, all of you. Why should we not take offense to this?”

  Meghan’s voice was hard, as if she realized talking to this fanatical, overgrown shrub was getting her nowhere. “Is that why you sent the treants to kill the fey who live here?”

  “I did not send my children to do anything,” the Mother Tree said. “I do not order or give commands. The younglings simply realized the stain and took it upon themselves to remove it from the forest. They act without my guidance, but their actions do not displease me.”

  “Mother Tree.” Ash stepped forward. “The fey here depend on the forest for their survival. If you continue to allow your children to kill, there will be a war. And then more trees will die.”