Rowan Switched's Arc

Chapter 7 of 25

Rowan stepped through the split in the hollow tree. Inside, the trunk opened wider than it looked from the path. Roots curved up into a low ceiling. Small lamps hung in the branches, green and cold, the same light the fairy tribe carried. The crowned woman stood at the center on a bed of black moss. Six figures ringed her, tall and thin, their faces hidden under hoods of woven thorn. Rowan counted them the way they had counted the lanterns. Six witnesses. Any slip in front of them would give her a clean refusal. The crowned woman did not turn. "You brought the tooth." "I brought myself," Rowan said. The name Selene had given them sat under their tongue with the tooth. They had to speak it at the threshold, not after. They were still on the threshold. One foot on root, one foot on moss. Rowan swallowed the salt taste and said the crowned woman's true name aloud, clear, the way they had practiced in the dark. The ring of hooded figures went still. The crowned woman's shoulders locked. She turned then, slow, and her crown of black thorns caught the green light. "Say it again." "I said it once. That is the rule." Rowan kept their voice level. Their bound wrist itched under the cloth. "I am not here to ask. I am here for my deed. You keep it under the hill. Bring it out." They did not kneel. They did not step forward off the root. Thorn Nightwhisper had said do not kneel by the pool. Rowan applied it here too. One of the hooded six lifted a hand, as if to object. The crowned woman stopped him with a look. She reached inside her sleeve and drew out a folded square of pale skin, marked in brown ink. She held it up so the six could see it, then flicked it into the moss between them. "Take it. In front of witnesses. The debt is closed on my side." Her mouth was thin. "Your name is on the back. Read it later. Not here." Rowan stepped off the root and picked up the deed. It was warm. They folded it into their shirt against the skin. Behind them, in the split of the tree, Thorn's small shape leaned into the green light, antlers first. She was smiling. The crowned woman's eyes moved past Rowan to Thorn and back. "You paid her too, changeling. You will feel that bill sooner than mine." Rowan backed out of the hollow tree with the deed against their ribs. Thorn fell in beside them on the path. The lanterns on the ridge had gone out. Rowan had their birthright folded warm at their chest and a debt to a fairy who was not their friend, and ten nights still left before the dark moon.