Chapter 22
Chapter
Twenty-Two
I felt it before I saw it — the sickening hum of magic that rattled deep within my chest. It was ancient and all-consuming, foreboding and magnificent.
Based on the way it made my skin prickle, I wouldn’t have been surprised if all the power of the Ravenous Woods radiated from this spot.
Adriel had gone rigid, and Sorsha’s expression was unusually serious. I couldn’t see Kaden’s face, but the stiffness of his body told me he felt it, too.
The swath of trees along the path seemed to part, giving way to a spacious clearing. No birds sang from the canopy. No chipmunks darted among the rotting logs. The ground was nearly devoid of plant life due to the shade cast by the enormous tree that stood at the very center.
“Tree” wasn’t really the word for what it was. The Great Oak was a creature, looming over the forest with an ominous, almost sentient presence.
I shivered. After those monstrous trees had almost killed Sorsha, I decided we did not want to tangle with this one .
The base of the oak was the size of a house, with gnarled and knotted bark. Its lower branches were wider than my whole body, forming serpentine coils that sagged to the forest floor.
Kaden shifted in front of me as he dismounted, his expression tight as he approached the Great Oak. I clambered off behind him, keeping my eye on the enormous roots in case they began to move.
Halting at the base of the tree, I looked up and gasped. The trunk was covered in shimmering golden runes — a net of symbols and woven magic that intertwined in a dizzying design.
The tapestry of gossamer threads was denser near the roots, and at the very center of the trunk, tucked into a divot large enough to stand in, was a locking rune so complex I would have no idea how to replicate it.
The impression formed a crude threshold, though there was no door. That locking rune sealed an unseen entrance — a gateway that led to the Three.
I turned to Kaden. “The tree asks for blood.”
“Yes,” he said, his expression wary as he approached the alcove.
“It speaks to you,” Sorsha whispered in awe.
“No, but the runes do.” I gazed up at the tall trunk, my head spinning as I tried to follow a line of symbols all the way along the curve of one enormous branch. “It’s covered in them.”
“Only you can see the runes,” said Kaden. “Let’s hope you can see the threads of Fate as well.”
I swallowed. He didn’t say it, but the implication was clear: If I could not discern the magical threads that made up the tapestry of Fate, we had no chance of severing the demon king’s ties to the innumerable souls he had taken.
Kaden turned to me, his expression grave. “Adriel will go with you.”
“Why can’t you go?” I asked, panic clawing up my throat.
“I can’t,” said Kaden. “Sorsha and I must remain outside to unlock the entrance with our blood.”
I swallowed, and Kaden leaned in, taking my clammy hands in his own. “I do not know what awaits you inside. But whatever happens, whatever you see, just remember why you are here.”
I nodded.
“Stay with her,” he growled at Adriel. “Guard her with your life.”
Annoyance flashed in the royal guard’s eyes, but he merely inclined his head.
“Does it say how much blood it needs?” Sorsha asked, staring up at the tree with apprehension.
I shook my head, squinting at the curving line of runes that glittered above the locking rune. “It only says that three courts must give their blood to greet Fate.”
“A small amount should suffice,” said Kaden, drawing a long dagger from his belt and passing it to his sister.
Taking the knife, Sorsha made a careful incision along her index finger and pressed the wound to the bark, smearing her blood across the very center of the rune that was invisible to all but me.
Kaden took the dagger from his sister, palming the blade and twisting the hilt. A rivulet of crimson ran from the center of his hand as he pressed it over the mark Sorsha had made.
We waited in tense silence for one heartbeat, then two. If Kaden was wrong — if his mixed blood did not suffice to represent two courts — then we’d come all this way for nothing.
But then the intricate golden lines that covered the tree flared to life, the runes glowing as if lit from within. That shimmering light grew brighter and brighter, and Sorsha’s sharp intake of breath told me that she could see them now too.
I glanced down at the mark the siblings had made. The stain began to vanish before my eyes, as if the blood were being sucked into the bark itself.
The rune at the center began to change, the intricate lines rearranging themselves to form a new marking — a salutation and a warning.
The trunk split with a deafening snap, and I watched as a crack spread from the base of the tree, curving to form the outline of an opening. Bits of bark and wood shavings drifted down like snow, the fissure deepening until an arched doorway appeared.
I glanced at Adriel, whose jaw clenched. I had the feeling that he didn’t like the idea of walking into an enchanted oak any more than I did.
Could the tree tell that neither of us belonged to one of the three courts whose blood we’d used? What would happen if the Great Oak decided we were intruders? Would it simply spit us back out?
Swallowing down my unease, I palmed two of my favorite daggers and stepped over the threshold. My muscles tensed as I waited for the tree to sense I did not belong, but nothing happened as I walked through the doorway.
The scent of earth and wood shavings filled my nostrils, and my throat itched from the little motes of sawdust billowing through the air.
Adriel followed close behind, and the instant the royal guard crossed the threshold, there was a deafening crack and a hiss.
I turned to see fresh bark stretching over the opening, obscuring Kaden and Sorsha from view before thrusting us into total darkness.
A ball of faelight winked into existence, illuminating the tiny compartment. We were standing in the hollowed-out trunk of the Great Oak, surrounded by walls the texture of aged bark.
Adriel lifted his head, looking around with a frown. “Now what?”
As if in answer, the ground began to rumble. I threw out an arm to brace a hand on the inside of the trunk as the packed dirt floor shook and yawned.
Dirt and rock cascaded into the opening with a loud hiss, revealing a narrow earthen staircase that wound into the darkness. There was another crack, and roots the size of my arm ripped from the soil, twisting around to form a crude railing.
The stairway was as clear an invitation as any.
Adriel gave a monosyllabic “humph” and brushed past me to descend the staircase into the black abyss.
Tightening my grip on my daggers, I followed, the smell of must and decay intensifying with every step we took.
The faelight bobbed ahead of us like a loyal dog, illuminating the thin white tendrils of roots winding through the packed earth. Down, down, down we went until we rounded the last bend in the staircase. A burst of golden light exploded below, momentarily blinding me.
I collided with something hard and solid — Adriel’s stiff back .
Stumbling away from him, I blinked until my eyes adjusted to our new surroundings. We were standing in an earthen chamber ten times the size of the one above. Thick, woody roots formed columns along the perimeter, and more gnarled roots held flaming torches.
But the soft glow of the flickering flames paled beside the source of that stunning golden light, which emanated from a sort of tent that twisted down from a fathomless domed ceiling.
No, not a tent — a magnificent tapestry that reached as high as I could see, twisting and folding in on itself as it stretched up through the earth.
The fabric was slightly sheer with an impossibly intricate weave. Each thread appeared to be spun from pure golden starlight, which glistened with an otherworldly shine.
It would have been impossible to count the strands that formed the weave. There had to be millions of them. Perhaps hundreds of millions.
Then I remembered that the tapestry of Fate was the fabric of life itself — each thread representing a life. A soul.
That knowledge made the magnitude of the tapestry even more breathtaking.
A soft, insistent whirring caught my attention, and I peered around the folds of the tapestry to identify the source of the noise.
Three figures were absorbed in their work, all clothed in cream-colored robes. They each had hair long enough that it pooled at their feet, the strands as white as snow.
I hadn’t noticed them right away, concealed as they were by the billowing tapestry. The first sister sat hunched over a spinning wheel, which seemed to be fashioned from the same wood as the Great Oak itself. Tree roots formed the spindly legs, and she was spinning more of that gossamer thread.
Her skin was nearly as pale as her hair — smooth and ageless. She looked like an angel, sitting there weaving with a steady efficiency, her face aglow in the ethereal light of the thread she wove.
“That’s Clotho,” Adriel murmured. “She spins the thread for each new life.”
Clotho didn’t look up at the sound of his voice. She didn’t even seem to notice she had visitors.
The hairs along the back of my neck prickled.
“They can see us,” said Adriel in answer to my unspoken question. “They won’t hurt us as long as we don’t interfere with their work.”
I glanced at the other two sisters. Same white hair, same linen robes. They all looked like Clotho, but with slight differences.
The sister nearest the spinner had long graceful fingers that glistened with engraved golden rings. Her fingers moved deftly as she worked the tapestry, weaving her magnificent design.
“That’s Diem,” said Adriel. “She weaves the threads into the tapestry and determines which lives intersect and when. And that —” He nodded toward the last sister. “Is Morta. She wields the hand of Death. At the moment of birth, each soul’s thread is cut to Diem’s specifications.”