Chapter 2 Stranger in the Woods
Stranger in the Woods
Caramyn
Aglow of misty white light poured in from the single window, falling on Caramyn's face as she stirred with the dawn. Sunlight didn’t reach the forest floor often, and there was always a grey haze overhead.
The chill of morning seeped into her bones like a damp cloth.
She stoked the dying fire to revive the barely glowing embers, then placed a kettle of porridge over it as the flames flickered back to life.
As she fetched cinnamon bark and dried berries from her cabinets, it was hard to ignore the unusual pounding in her forehead, but she disregarded it as no more than a bad night's rest. She hadn't slept well, and her dreams had been strange, with broken images of a bloody woman, a weeping child, and a shattered crown.
In hopes to forget the visions as her meal warmed, she sorted through her collection of books piled on the wooden wall of shelves.
Most were old tomes and spellbooks that were already here when she found the abandoned cottage the day she ran to the Woods, though many pages were missing or burned, and she could hardly make sense of the ones that were intact.
She’d tried her hand at some Spellbound magic from the bits and pieces she could put together, but despite the legend that anyone—even humans—could learn simple rune and relic-based magic, she never could quite grasp it, and thought it probably for the better.
She pulled a pile of her own books closer to her and traced her finger down their spines, grazing it over a range of fiction and nonfiction works.
Some she’d stolen from intruders, and others she’d bought in Havenswood.
She had read all of them, but she hoped that perhaps a title would jump out to her a second time.
Anything to pass the hours and distract her from the aching in her head.
Herbal Remedies Every Healer Should Know
Dragon's Breath and Blood Rites
Hunter's Recipes
The list went on.
Nocthar squawked. She took a bite of porridge straight from the kettle, sweetened with a handful of berries, and then put a hand to her throbbing forehead.
She rarely got headaches, so when she checked her apothecary table for the herbs needed to soothe it, she realized it was lacking one needed for that purpose.
The best remedy she knew would require some Pheonix Tail root, which grew close to the edge of the Woods.
"Come on, Nocthar." She sighed. “I have to take care of this before it kills me."
Opening the moss-covered door, she stepped out, letting the black bird fly out in front of her.
With each step, the pounding in her head worsened.
She pressed on, desperate to reach the edge of the Woods before the pain became unbearable.
But the farther she went, the more ill she fell.
Her body numbed with cold. Her joints ached.
The outlines of tree branches against the sky twisted into curling, sloshing tentacles as the earth tilted, and she staggered.
Distorted shapes and shadows pulsed in her mind as the pain reverberated like a drum between her ears.
She could no longer tell how many paces she'd gone, or how long it had been since she left the cottage.
The drumming was deafening, and darkness blotted her mind's eye, visions of the strange woman from her dream flashing in between. And then the voice came.
Of Vaerwynd blood you are not.Suffer the death of a flesh-cursed rot.If worthy to live, you should somehow prove.The ring only Vaerwynd can remove.
The forest blurred as Caramyn clutched her hand with a sickening revelation. The ring she’d taken from the men—it was a magic relic. A cursed one. How could she have been so damn foolish?
Stumbling, she tried to use her last bit of strength to remove the ring, but it was sealed to her finger like bone and skin.
Drained of her strength, her body went limp and paralyzed.
The bleak, nearly barren treetops above her swirled against a white sky, and she could do nothing but watch as her raven circled her cawing, helpless.
She was falling down a tunnel, watching the opening above her grow smaller and smaller until empty darkness was all that was left.
Caramyn awoke to needle-like talons scratching against her hand, and the thumping of flapping wings.
Nocthar was frantic, pulling at her hair and nipping her fingertips with his beak.
She fluttered her eyelids and found that it was all she could manage.
Her limbs were still useless and weak, and the forest continued to spin. But at least she wasn’t dead.
With a grunt, she tried to stand, to roll over, to even just sit up. But her body refused to obey. She hadn't even brought her bow. Only the hunting knife that never left her side.
Shattered gods. I’m an idiot.
She lay there, fighting to stay awake, studying the trees.
She traced the outlines of the gnarled branches with her eyes, noticing the faintest cracks of sunlight fighting their way through the great boughs and tree limbs that cracked like veins against the skyline.
And she realized…she was lying at the very edge of the Shadow Woods, just a few footfalls away from the tree line that marked the edge of the forest—the edge of her protection.
Nocthar's cries alerted her to something approaching. He took flight to investigate, a rush of wind from his wings stirring the leaves on the ground.
Caramyn tried once again to rise to her feet, digging her fingernails into the dirt as she pushed to no avail, her body cold and paralyzed with weakness.
In the half decade spent in these woods, she had always been so calculating, so easily adept at recognizing a trap. And yet she had failed this time.
She turned her head to see silhouettes of riders along the outside of the tree line. "What’s that over there in the woods?" A male voice broke through the border of the forest. The thought of someone—a man—being here with her in this state pricked her spine like a dagger to the back.
The solid crunch of hooves and creaking of leather drew near.
There were at least four, no—five. Caramyn wiggled her hand towards her belt to clutch the hilt of her dagger, but her grip was weak.
She pulled it loose from her belt with two fingers curled around the handle but her feeble strength wasn’t enough to keep it from plopping into the dirt beside her.
As fast as he had flown away, her raven returned and snatched the knife up off the ground in his talons, only to disappear into the sky as the strangers neared.
Nocthar, what the hell? That knife was my only defense!
"It…it looks to be a young woman, Sire." This voice was different.
And as gritty as sand against cobblestone, followed by the sound of someone else dismounting.
Heavy footsteps, unhurried, grew closer and closer.
Let him come near. Let him cross a single step over the line into the Woods.
Let the Shadows come for him. For all of them.
But what if they didn’t?
Her mind raced through possible maneuvers she might use to escape when he reached her if the Shadows didn’t get to him fast enough.
The feeling in her arms was faintly coming back.
If she had been able to grip her hunting knife, she could wait until the damned fool leaned over her, then plunge it through his shoulder.
Or she could kick him off balance and swipe her blade across his throat before he could catch himself.
If only her muscles didn’t feel like jelly.
..and if she only still had her knife. But there was certainly more than one of them.
She didn't stand a chance like this. Not unless the Shadows intervened. She was surprised they hadn’t already.
Was it a Blackwynd soldier? An Inquisitor of the Order?
She didn't hear armor. But only someone of high rank would be addressed in the manner she'd heard. Sire. Surely the king himself had no business here. And if he did—well, she would relish the opportunity to end him and his reign right here. That is, if she wasn’t too weak and delirious to move.
Desperate, and curious to see if she could stall long enough to get them talking more, she closed her eyes and played the part to survive—for now.
"She's unconscious." The man's voice lowered, and she could feel him kneeling beside her.
Blood rushed through Caramyn at his nearness, her heart pounding wildly at the threat so close.
She risked a peek out of desperation. His positioning was obviously strategic, crouched at her side from a safe enough distance. He was no ordinary damned fool.
"It's a miracle she's even alive out here. No place for a lady," the cobblestone voice replied from the back of his horse on the other side of the forest. "No place for anyone with a sense of self preservation, actually."
The kneeling man beside her said nothing, but Caramyn could feel his eyes searching her.
She wanted to vault up and over, leaving her dagger buried in him, and disappear between the trees.
She felt some parts of her body returning to her now with each pump of her racing heart.
But her legs still refused to cooperate.
And she still felt feverishly ill. Where were the Shadows?
The man spoke again, startling her as his smooth voice became sharp. "But the perfect place for a fugitive."
She felt a breeze of wind graze her skin as he reached for her. Her eyes flew open, and she found just enough strength to strike out and block his hand with hers.
Drawn crossbows clicked in the same fraction of a second she had moved.
The mounted guard would surely fire if she so much as flinched from here.
The man smirked at her as though she was as pathetic as a child caught in a prank.
But it faded quickly into a face void of emotion.
A handsome face that wore the strength of battle beneath the refinement of royalty.
By instinct, she turned her head when his silvery eyes met her gaze, looking away.
He had the eyes of a Lightborn. At least one of them. The right eye was a soft grey. Human. And the other—metallic silver. A steel singer.
He pulled his arm from her feeble grasp and stilled her hand with his. Each motion was like swimming through molasses in a dream. Her chest tightened as she held her breath. She would not show fear.
She refused to look at him, but she felt his gaze on her.
At least the Shadowblood marking was covered by her sleeves, but she couldn’t hide her face.
"Look at me." He spoke gently as he turned her head with a finger under her chin.
His stare met hers, and she waited for his reaction to her potent violet eyes. But none ever came.
The nobleman addressed the riders but continued looking at her. "Put the crossbows down. She's not armed." Then she understood why Nocthar had flown away with her dagger—to keep this bastard from taking it. "She is no threat here."
His words stung. If only he knew. Were she not under this spell, she would have already taken out all five of them from the treetops. They lowered their weapons as the tension in their bows eased out like a sigh. One of the horses snorted and stomped.
“Just because she’s not armed doesn’t mean she isn’t dangerous.
Caution’s saved me more than kindness ever has.
Look at those eyes. Those aren’t ordinary Lightborn eyes.
Who knows what strange magic conjured her up.
” Cobblestone raised a thick reddish eyebrow at her.
Even from afar, Caramyn could tell he was the oldest of the group, and the venom in his voice made her feel like she was a poisonous insect beneath his lifted boot.
“Magic or not, Wyran, she’s half-conscious on the border of the Shadow Woods. Something’s wrong.” The handsome man beside her said, strangely fixated on her hands. He looked at her again. “Can you speak?”
Caramyn’s stomach turned. She couldn’t find the coordination to form a sentence.
Her tongue felt heavy. So she just blinked, silently begging the Shadows to help her.
As her vision steadied, she inspected the broad-shouldered stranger looming over her.
He reeked of royal blood, undeniably by the Blackwynd Crest he wore.
He was far too young to be King Daemar, but he was certainly nobility.
His midnight hair brushed a bit down over his eyebrows, turning in subtle waves just barely framing his prominent cheekbones, where the faintest scar curved upwards if she looked closely enough.
He peered down through those steely grey eyes that emphasized the contrast of his black overcoat and cloak draped over his tall, broad form.
“I can’t tell if she’s sick or drunk. She can’t even answer me. ”
“Such a wasted journey.” Wyran groaned. “A damn shame we came all this way for nothing.”
“Perhaps it wasn’t wasted. Not now.” The princely man lifted her hand, his face swiftly hardening from pity to concern as he eyed the signet ring on her finger.
Then he slipped it off with ease before tucking it away into his pocket.
The sound of wailing Shadows groaned in the distance, approaching, and a twinge of relief hit Caramyn.
But the prince stood to his feet, clearly aware of his looming fate if he lingered.
"We can’t stay here. But we’re bringing her with us.
I must know who she is, and why she has my mother’s ring. ”
Caramyn’s breath hitched in her chest. If the ring was Vaerwynd, and it really was his mother’s, then that would mean he was the son of the dethroned Lightborn queen.
A magic queen. And yet on the clasp of his cloak he wore the crest of the Blackwynd throne—the throne that sought to eradicate magic like a plague.
He bore claim to two conflicting identities.
One that should have died with the Lightborn Court, and one that would have been its executioner.
But as long as he had anything to do with the Blackwynd Court, Caramyn was determined not to let him ever step foot in the Shadow Woods again.
And she’d do whatever she had to do—play along with whatever game he was about to drag her into—if it meant keeping him as far away as possible from the refuge of her Woods.
Trust no one…Guard it with your life.