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I really wanted a bath. No, I needed one. Desperately.
But then I caught a whiff of fresh, hot food, and found another tied-up bundle waiting for me.
I devoured the soup and bread, burning my tongue on my tea. All I wanted was to eat and find a way to wash myself. If Torr had promised me protection, I had to at least trust him on that.
My stomach felt almost distended by the time I worked my way out of the blankets again. There was another bundle next to the food, and I found a clean dress and a small cake of soap.
The dress was black, the hem of the skirt covered with red embroidery. I ran a finger over the scarlet thread, trying to imagine the woman who had created such a thing.
It certainly hadn’t been stolen from Vostok. No woman there would ever create a garment with red thread. It was proscribed by the Father, because red was the harlot’s color. The only proper shades for a woman to wear were white and blue.
They must have taken the dress from one of the caravans that sometimes braved the wayroad through the Wood, along with the dishes. I traced the outline of a red bird dripping flames, then refolded the dress and tucked it in the front of my own shredded clothes.
I finally crept outside, and nearly fell out of the knothole. My crow friend sat on a branch, his beak almost in my face. “Kraaah,” he declared.
“Good to see you, too,” I grumbled, drawing out of pecking distance.
Climbing down the latticework branch bridge was more stomach-turning than I’d anticipated. The knothole was twenty feet off the ground, and the way the lattice swayed a little under my hands and feet was a bit sickening.
But it was solid enough to bear the weight of a Beast, so it would carry me. I didn’t look down as I climbed hand over foot, finding plenty of places for my toes to grip. The crow followed me down, fluttering from branch to branch, cawing when he felt I wasn’t moving fast enough.
The only problem with not looking down was that I didn’t see the Beasts. When I landed on soft grass and turned to gather my bearings, I saw at least five hulking shapes in the shadows around the enormous tree.
They were all staring back at me, eyes gleaming in different jewel-like shades of amber, green, and even a pale blue.
I licked my lips, my mouth suddenly feeling dry. “I need to wash,” I rasped out. My throat still hadn’t recovered from the screaming. “Where can I do that?”
The Beasts just stared. Finally, one clawed hand extended, pointing north.
I wondered what they were doing around the mind-bendingly large tree. Did the Beasts have their own society? Did they live here when they weren’t terrorizing the wayroad?
There was no sign of Torr, but apparently his word was in fact law. Some of the Beasts looked at me askance from the shadows, but none of them tried to touch me. One even moved further away, as though I might accidentally walk into him.
I didn’t understand what I was to them at all.
They might not have answered me, but I had no trouble finding my way. I had to circumvent the massive trunk, climbing under roots that arched over my head like buildings, sometimes climbing a path that dipped beneath the earth in a little tunnel and came out again on a hill. The crow followed, still grumbling at me, occasionally taking off into the treetops and coming back.
It was slow going. My body was healing, but I still moved like an old woman. The Father and Augur had done more damage to me than they knew.
Tiny lights danced around in the air as I finally made it to the other side of the trunk, and found a footpath leading into the side of a rocky mountain.
It was impossible to really understand where I was going. Mist crowned the trees, so there was no sun or stars to guide me, and something about the path I’d taken made the entire walk feel a little unnatural.
I recalled stories of Fee roads, the paths the little folk of the forest—the faeries— used to use. They said humans who walked into a circle of mushrooms or between two rowan trees would find themselves on a Fee road, where time stopped and up and down made no sense.
No one told stories of the Fee when the Father was around. Freya’s grandmother insisted the Fee had always lived in the Wood with the Beasts, but the Father had put a stop to it, telling her that she was telling tales of devils to children.
But he hadn’t stopped her before she planted the idea in our heads. She said the Fee had been furious at human incursion, and thus the Wood hated humans so much and why we had to pay a token to enter safely.
I wondered if the tree itself was a sort of Fee road. It certainly made no sense that a tree could possibly be that big.
The mountain path led to massive boulders, and a strong mineral tang tinted the air, coating my tongue.
But I was practically gleeful when I came to the first little hot spring.
A Beast was in it, his back to me. I watched as he ducked his head under and came back up, shaking his head and spraying water everywhere.
Then he saw he had an audience, and I found myself backing away. He had gray patches in his fur that I didn’t recognize; I would only put my full trust in Torr for now.
