Nell Larkspur's Arc

Chapter 15 of 23

The three Fae stood inside the ring with him. Their bare feet crushed the mushrooms. The nearest one tilted its head and breathed in slow, tasting the air. Nell held Linny tight against his chest. Her purple hair stuck to his neck. Her breath was warm and thin. He kept the axe up. "Betrayer's blood," the tall one said. Its voice was soft. "Your mother wore it too. She left us. You will not." "Let me pass," Nell said. "The girl is dying. Let me pass and you keep the ring." The second Fae laughed. The sound was wet. "We keep the ring. We keep you. Your mother's place is empty. You will fill it. Root and vine. Quiet forever." It stepped forward. The mushrooms bent under its foot. Nell thought of Lena in the cellar, barring the door. Waiting three days. Then walking down the slope with Moss and the fox because he had not come back. He thought of her father, gray on the pillow. He thought of Linny's weight, going lighter in his arm. Something in his chest cracked open. He had held it down his whole life. The half of him the villagers smelled. The half his mother left behind like a coat on a hook. He had never worn it. He wore it now. His eyes burned. Green light spilled across the moss. He set Linny down at his feet and put his palm flat on the pale trunk behind him. "Hold her," he said to the tree. The trunk shuddered. Bark peeled back. A branch reached down and curled around Linny's shoulders, lifting her clear of the ground, cradling her against the wood. The Fae stopped smiling. Nell pushed his hand deeper into the trunk. He felt the roots under the moss. He felt every root in the ring, braided together like fingers. He pulled. The ground opened. Roots came up thick as arms and caught the first Fae around the waist. It shrieked and clawed. The roots dragged it down to its ribs. The second Fae leapt for the canopy. Vines whipped from the branches and lashed its wrists to a limb. It hung, kicking. The third came at Nell with its teeth bared. He swung the axe. The blade struck bark that grew up to meet it. The trunk closed around the Fae's arm to the shoulder and held. All three screamed at once. The sound was not a word. Nell lifted Linny from the branch. The tree let her go. He stepped out of the ring. Behind him the forest groaned. Not the Fae. The trees. The moss. The whole floor of the woods. Something vast had felt him take the reins, and it did not like the hand on them. A wind moved through the trunks toward him. Not cold. Aware. Nell ran. Linny bounced against his shoulder. The path west was half a mile. The forest came after him, root and branch and breath, and he did not look back.