xli. In which Arthur plants an acorn, which does not go as expected
The next morning, as they headed for the heart of the wood, Charlotte told Arthur about her journey, and Elspeth. It distracted
him from his unease at being wrapped in Calyx’s vines, far too high above the forest floor, and the bone-deep cold and all-over
ache he felt despite the cat purring in his lap. Charlotte fiddled with the acorn Elspeth had left her as often as she fiddled
with John’s wedding ring. At their side, on Maurice’s back, Sasha regaled Ira with a dramatic retelling of her own adventures
in the forest.
At midmorning, a horse riding the other way at a smart trot caught up to them. It skidded to a halt, its rider dismounting
almost before it had stopped: a woman with tawny skin and a black braid, improbably wearing trousers.
Charlotte cried out, struggling to dismount Calyx. The plant creature helped her down.
The women flung their arms around each other. Arthur had been worried when Charlotte cried out, but now he relaxed; this must
be Elspeth.
“Told you I’d find you,” Elspeth breathed, pressing her forehead to Charlotte’s.
To Arthur’s astonishment, his sister melted into her. Of course Charlotte had told him the nature of their relationship, but to see her like this—forgetful, for once, of all eyes that might be on her—was a shock.
Charlotte’s fingers curled around the other woman’s collar. “And—your scar—is it . . . ?”
“Sickness ain’t come back, Lottie, I’m fine.”
Sasha launched herself at them. “Miss Elspeth!”
Charlotte pulled away, pink cheeked, as her daughter hugged Elspeth tight. Elspeth laughed.
“How now, my little bug! Here I thought your mam told you to go to the convent if’n we didn’t come back.”
“Jonas and I had to find you,” Sasha told her solemnly. Hanging back with Ira and Maurice, Jonas was as pink as Charlotte,
but they nodded when Elspeth smiled at them.
“Guess it’s just as well.” She tugged one of Sasha’s pigtails. “It was on account of hearing your voice I found you all so
easy. Must be entertaining the whole forest, huh?”
Noticing Arthur, and his bandages, she whistled.
“Didn’t quite find you in one piece, did she? You’re the brother, I take it.”
“Yes,” Charlotte said, too loudly, and Arthur was even more astonished. Charlotte was flustered. “This is Arthur. Arthur, this is Elspeth. Did you find Maggie?” she asked Elspeth.
Elspeth shook her head. “That’s why I was coming back. I made it to the tree, but there’s a work camp been setting up all
morning, and I don’t think I’ll find Maggie long as they’re there. I tried to make out like I was another worker, but they
chased me off when they realized I was a woman. They won’t let anyone near that stump who’s not part of the camp. They mean
to uproot it.”
Ira’s jaw tensed.
“What do we do?” Arthur asked.
Before anyone could answer, Ira groaned and bent double. Charlotte stepped toward him, her brow furrowing in medical concern. Tendrils shot from Calyx’s sides.
Ira screamed. Charlotte flinched away, shielding the children.
“The hell’s wrong with him?” Elspeth asked.
Arthur dislodged the cat, struggled out of his seat, and slid down Calyx’s side awkwardly. He leaned against the plant creature,
rubbing his chest; his heart and lungs strained. “The camp must’ve started working. He can feel it. Whatever they do to the
forest, he can feel it.”
Ira’s eyes flashed white, filled with images of logging machinery. Arthur knelt before him, cupping his face in his hands.
“Stay with me.”
Ira’s eyes squeezed shut. With a moan, he leaned into Arthur’s chest. Arthur wrapped his arms around him, hugging him tight
like that could squeeze the pain out.
“How close are we?” he asked.
Ira shuddered in his arms. “Close.”
“Just back that way,” Elspeth said.
“We have to get to that camp,” Arthur said. “We have to stop them uprooting the stump, or he’ll—”
Ira went rigid. Arthur gripped him tighter, certain he was about to transform and run off to murder woodsmen. “Stay with me,
Ira.”
Ira shot to his feet. His eyes rolled; his nostrils flared. Arthur clung to him, repeating, “Stay with me—Ira, please—” but
suddenly he was clinging to a stag’s mane.
Mostly a stag. The stag had a wolf’s tail, and fangs, and its pelt was shaggy with moss and lichens. Calyx’s tendrils waved
in alarm. Freya hissed.
“Ira—”
The stag shoved him aside with its nose, tossed its head, and bounded away. Arthur staggered, heart pounding so hard he felt sick.
“Come on,” he rasped to Charlotte. “He said we were close. We can catch up to him. If he distracts the workers, we can—”
She nodded. “Stay here, children.”
“I want to come,” Sasha said immediately, but Elspeth lifted her onto Maurice’s back.
“Not this time, bug. Who’ll watch the horses if you come with us? Or the cat? Mind your mam and stay here. We’ll be back soon.”
The three adults climbed onto Calyx’s back with the help of its tendrils.
“Follow him, Calyx,” Charlotte said, and the plant creature slung itself through the trees. The humans ducked to avoid getting
whacked in the face by branches.
Ahead of them, the stag bugled—but this camp seemed better prepared for the Lord of the Wood. Instead of screaming and the
distant crunching that signaled the forest was doing away with survivors, orders were barked back and forth. Guns fired. Arthur
bit his lip so hard he drew blood.
They broke through the trees and found chaos. Men ran back and forth with guns and powder, trampling recently erected tents.
“Get a net!” one of them roared, sprinting past Calyx without noticing.
In the midst of the camp, Ira stood snarling, a wolf now—mostly. His front legs ended in a deer’s hooves. A clump of woodsmen
faced him, aiming with shaking hands, but no one seemed to want to take the first shot, and Arthur was struck, again, with
the thought that these men were merely workers trying to get a paycheck in a world that demanded one.
But they were about to destroy the forest, too, and kill Ira, and he couldn’t let that happen.
“Ira!” he cried, but Elspeth sprang from Calyx’s back and dragged him with her. The second Charlotte had dismounted, too, Calyx threw itself at Ira. It lost its shape as it went, loosening into a mass of foliage. Vines shot toward the nearest woodsmen and dragged them away.
“Let the eldritch monster handle it,” Elspeth said. “It’s like you said. He’s keeping ’em busy. They’re not gonna bother about
us with a shape-shifting beastie bent on killing ’em right in their midst.”
She was nearly right. Most of the workers surrounded Ira, but a handful were by the stump, working shovels and machines.
The stump was so massive it seemed impossible that anything could uproot it. Yet, reluctantly, its roots relinquished their
grip on the soil. Tarnish spread across each one as it was loosed from the earth. Nearby leaves wilted and dropped with increasing
speed as more roots emerged.
Elspeth swore and pulled a knife from her belt. One of the workers came at her, shovel raised, but she jerked it away from
him.
“Go on,” she spat at Charlotte and Arthur, and she raised her knife at the other workers converging on her. They backed her
into the mossy trunk of a stunted tree—one of them struck at her—but Charlotte clenched her jaw and tugged Arthur onward.
Two workers abandoned Elspeth and jogged after them, but ravens burst from the trees and descended upon them. Charlotte cowered.
Arthur spotted a tiny brown rider with a shock of white hair riding the largest bird.
“Maud!” he cried.
“Go on, boy,” she called back, in her voice like a tree’s creaking. “My birds’ll keep ’em busy.”
The pair of workers sprinted away, swinging shovels fruitlessly. The ravens clawed at their hair. Maud cackled and swooped away to help Elspeth.
Another bugle. Calyx had been netted and was trying to tear itself free. Ira was a stag, mossy and fanged and alone, surrounded
by woodsmen.
A hand gripped Arthur’s shoulder, yanking him back. “What—”
One of the workers, trying to stop him from replanting the tree. Charlotte tugged the worker’s arm, but he threw her off.
She hit the stump with a yelp.
“Lottie!” Arthur cried.
Halfway across the clearing, the stag’s head whipped around at him. Ira kicked free of the woodsmen and raced toward the stump.
The worker gripping Arthur’s arm swore, let go, and fumbled for his abandoned rifle.
A shot rang out. Ira collapsed, legs kicking uselessly, and shivered abruptly back into a beast. Arthur’s breath caught.
Everything fell silent, as if the forest were inhaling.
When it exhaled, it exhaled explosively.
Trees burst from the ground, growing ten—twenty—fifty feet in a matter of seconds. Branches speared woodsmen through the stomach.
Vines whipped around their ankles or wrists and dragged them away. The camp rang with their screams. Maud’s ravens wheeled
through the sky, croaking.
In seconds, the clearing was regrown. In seconds more, the new trees and flowers drooped and died, dripping black ooze.
The woodsmen and their machines were gone. Birds sang in the canopy as if nothing had happened, but their song cracked and
broke and went silent. One at a time, they fell from their perches, their small, translucent forms showing delicate skeletons.
In a flurry of black wings, Maud’s ravens landed in the dying greenery, but they had a faded quality. Calyx shrank until it was nothing more than a sprout, a single vining tendril with a handful of thin, pale leaves.
In a patch of sunlight, collapsed against the silver stump, Ira slumped with blood blooming across his side. Maud hobbled
toward him. Calyx slithered out of the net and followed.
Arthur jerked toward him, but Charlotte, getting to her feet shakily, said, “The acorn.”
Arthur nodded, clutching the acorn tight. The tarnish spread before their eyes, but the stump’s heartwood was silver. It would
have to be enough.
He knelt with difficulty, pulling off the acorn and its chain. Without it, the thin black veins threading from his wounds
unwound farther across his skin, so much faster than they’d spread before. Charlotte sucked in a breath.
“It’ll be all right,” Arthur told her, but without the acorn breathing was a lot harder. “It’ll be fine.”
Praying he was right, he pressed the acorn to the heartwood. The acorn glowed, then melted into the stump. They waited, holding
their breath.
Nothing happened.