The Tower: Part 4: Yule (Entire)

Oct 27, 2024

(If you are a new subscriber, you might want to start at the beginning of the Webbd Wheel Series with The Hanged Man. If you would like to start at the beginning of The Tower, go here.)

PART 4 YULE

Winter solstice. Return of the sun; birth and growth.

The Card: The Fool

Beginnings and endings; freedom from convention; innocence; impulsiveness; creative vitality; unlimited potential

CHAPTER 9

HADES

Hades stood looking down at the grave. Snowflakes fell dreamily, clinging lovingly to the young brambles Demeter had planted, one on either side of the simple polished marble slab Hades had chosen instead of a traditional marker. The stone was black, splashed with a golden color that reminded Hades of Persephone’s hair. He had not wanted carving on it, and rather than standing it at the head of the grave he laid it flat over the disturbed earth, leaving the surrounding ground scarred and bare so Persephone could plant flowers when she returned.

If she returned.

Hades shook his head. She would return. He must cling to that.

“Brambles are healing,” Demeter had said. “They symbolize remorse and protection from evil. They will watch over my granddaughter.”

Hades thought Persephone would approve, and so he and Demeter had planted the brambles together on the day he laid the marble over the grave.

Now, weeks later, the ground was frozen and the bramble canes looked spindly and dry. The land lay stark under a steel sky. A few days before a tremendous storm of wind and cold rain had felled trees and torn branches. Hades had brought a simple, slender wreath of spruce, cedar and hemlock and laid it atop the marble.

Image by Press 👍👍 Love you 💖a from Pixabay

Every few days he left the Underworld and visited the barn where he housed his stallion, along with Persephone’s rabbits and other animals. He visited each stall and pen in turn, feeding cabbage leaves to the sheep and goats, scratching the pigs’ backs and grooming his black stallion while the horse searched his pockets for the apple he always brought for a treat.

Those who worked in the barns, garden and orchard greeted him with a nod or a smile as they went about their business. He had become a familiar figure, though a lonely and silent one.

After visiting the larger animals, Hades inspected the rabbit hutches lining one end of the barn. Since Persephone had left, he had not harvested any rabbits, nor allowed anyone else to do so. Persephone would return and see to them herself. He closely inspected their hutches, opening the doors and handling the soft creatures, stroking their coats and offering carrots and hay. When he had assured himself of their health and comfort, satisfied their cages were spotless with clean bedding and fresh food and water, he left the barn to visit his daughter’s grave, which lay next to Persephone’s garden, dormant and desiccated with winter.

These visits above ground provided a welcome break from the demands and chaos in the Underworld, a sideways step into his private life and away from his responsibilities. The peaceful winter scene and small grave at his feet held more reality for him in these moments than the dead souls in his care.

The loss of the child and Persephone’s subsequent absence had marked the beginning of a series of crises in the Underworld. Earthquakes, which had not troubled the Land of the Dead before, began to strike, making the earth groan and grinding stone together in a dreadful sound of anguish. Tunnels and caverns collapsed, blocking the steady flow of souls traveling across the Underworld’s threshold. Every spare hand, living and dead, worked to clear away the rubble, rebuild and shore up.

In these days his brother Poseidon had become his strongest support. He visited frequently, bringing news from the sea and its people. The two spent hours sitting by the fire discussing rumors and stories collected from the dead.

Poseidon, unlike his quieter brother, was gregarious and liked to travel. In these days he made it a point to explore parts of his kingdom he hadn’t investigated before, becoming familiar with the shyest and strangest sea creatures, searching for references to or information about Yrtym.

He also sent volunteers to assist in keeping the River Styx unblocked and flowing as it exited Hades and ran underground until it drained into the sea. Not only was Styx his gateway to his brother’s realm, but they did not know what effect blocking the river would have on the Underworld. If Hades flooded, what would become of the dead?

So many questions, Hades thought wearily, and so few answers.

Still, he must do what he could to save his kingdom and his people, and he felt grateful for his brother’s good humor, practicality and friendship.

If only he could have saved his queen and his daughter from tragedy and death.

He roused himself, lifting his bowed head and straightening his snow-dusted shoulders. He was cold. Delicate flakes frosted the evergreen wreath. Movement caught his eye and he squinted through the thickening snow toward the tree line, disheveled now with fallen and uprooted trees.

A cloaked and hooded figure approached him, moving with a kind of weary grace he recognized. He took a step forward, straining his eyes. Could it be?

The figure came faster. He took another step forward. She threw back her hood and her eyes were the only color in the world, blue-green, blazing with emotion, warm and passionate as a tropical sea. He opened his arms, still disbelieving, and Persephone cast herself into them.

CLARISSA

“I suppose you know the story of Orpheus and his lyre,” said Seren.

“Of course,” replied Clarissa, watching him unwrap his instrument. “Orpheus was the greatest musician the world has ever known. He married Eurydice, an olive tree nymph, but she died almost immediately, and his grief was unending. He went to the Underworld to beg Hades himself to return Eurydice to life, and Hades agreed she could follow Orpheus back to the living world as long as he didn’t look back before he’d led her out of the tomb’s shadow. He refrained from looking back all the long way up from Hades, but jubilant because he thought he’d restored her to life, he looked back before she’d left the tomb’s shadow, and she turned away and returned to the Underworld. After that, Orpheus played only for grief. He refused to take another wife and wandered the world, playing sorrow and pain, until he died. His mother, Calliope, one of the nine muses, set his lyre in the sky so the world would remember him. It’s called the Lyra Constellation.”

The wrappings revealed a tortoiseshell lyre, lovingly polished. Gut strings stretched between two gracefully curved arms.

“I’ll tell you a secret,” said Seren. “This is Orpheus’s lyre. Euterpe, another of the Muses, is a special friend of mine, and she thought it a shame Calliope refused to share Orpheus’s instrument, so she retrieved it, leaving other stars in its place so Calliope need not know. Euterpe said my skill is at least equal to Orpheus’s. After all, I’m living and he’s dead. He betrayed his talent because of a woman, but I’ll never betray mine.”

He ran his fingers lovingly over the strings; the sound shimmered in the stone-walled round room.

Clarissa, who had reached out a tentative hand to touch the lyre, retracted it when Seren pulled it out of her reach, set it in his lap and began to strum. “It’s beautiful,” she said, watching his graceful fingers caress the strings. “Will you tell me about the Norns? Have you made a story?”

“I have,” he said, looking down at where she sat at his feet and smiling fondly. “A new story, and you’re the first to hear it. You’re becoming my muse, Clarissa!”

“Once upon a time, before the shining stars learned to sing enchantments, a tree stood at the center of the cosmos. Its roots wove together a planet and its branches supported the sky. It was a mighty Ash tree with three trunks, and it drank from the well of Urd. Mirmir, a great serpent, guarded the tree, whose name was Yggdrasil.

Yggdrasil, the pivot around which the wheel of life turns, the axle that turns cycles and seasons, ends and beginnings. Yggdrasil, the top of which cannot be seen and the roots of which are endless as they weave a world of rock and soil. Yggdrasil, the spinning distaff around which life is wrapped before being spun, cut and woven, though none can see it whirl.

For long ages, Yggdrasil stood, kingly and inviolate at the center of all, but one day something changed. Perhaps the invisibly spinning distaff faltered. Perhaps the Well of Urd became tainted, or the serpent Mirmir grew old. Life and death became unbalanced. Beginnings and endings fell out of symmetry.

Suddenly, the whole world of Webbd was threatened.

In times of fear and breakdown, people look to heroes, those with brave hearts and superior skills. The terrified world implored one such man to journey to Yggdrasil and discover and heal whatever was wrong. This man possessed the gift of music, and the whole world stopped to listen when he played. Trees and rocks uprooted themselves to follow his song, and every creature within hearing of his voice and instrument was touched with magic as he passed.”

Seren paused and played a lilting melody. Clarissa thought she’d never seen anyone as beautiful. His grey eyes shone with dreams, his mouth curled in a smile, and his long, sensitive fingers caressed the strings with skill and confidence, making her mouth go dry when she imagined them on her body.

He met her gaze and smiled into her eyes. She felt as though his look penetrated to her very bone, making her thoughts and desires visible to him. His eyes were light and clear, almost silvery, without depth. They were like stars, those eyes, like the white light encircling his brow when he was a baby. Clarissa thrilled with the knowledge that behind those eyes such talent lived, words like gems, stories of passion and adventure, music so piercingly beautiful that mountains and forests leaned down to hear it. His sensuality and passion matched her own.

And he was here, with her, at the lighthouse, and called her his muse.

“Humbly, the chosen hero agreed to undertake the journey to Yggdrasil and see what might be done. With his lyre he traveled, and music, poetry and stories graced his path. As he journeyed, he thought about beginnings and endings and formed a plan to rebalance them.

Others were drawn to Yggdrasil as well, a child, a group of elders, a Dwarve and a young mother. From every direction they journeyed to the center, not knowing they were the coarse material from which the hero would weave healing with his music, his words and his stories, and thus restore Yggdrasil and save Webbd.

When the hero arrived, he found everyone waiting for him. The old women who lived near the tree and used its power to spin thread and yarn greeted him reverently and joyfully. At his request, they hung fabrics of silk, linen, velvet and cotton over Yggdrasil’s lower branches to fashion a tent large enough to work in, using braziers for heat. The hero gathered everyone around the trunk and instructed them on his plan. He helped them understand beginnings and endings are forever bound together, and such things as seeds, bones and dead souls constitute both. Thus, he directed them in gathering these ingredients, certain that he, with is musical skill, could combine these ingredients into life, into endless beginnings arising from endless endings. He proposed to weave the strands of chant, lament, seed blessing and harvest prayer together, along with drumbeat for the tree’s roots, the horn for its crown and the lyre as a musical loom and shuttle.

Trustfully and respectfully, they followed his direction until at last he felt ready to begin. He sent a silent prayer to the star that had touched his brow with white light and began to play.

He never knew how long it went on. The horn soared in a wordless lament of closing gates and sky darkened by flocks of birds on the wing. It spoke of dark winds and starless nights under a sickle moon. It moaned of loss and bitter grieving, of wounds that never heal. The horn summoned the lost spirits of the dead, summoned them, gathered them and lay them down with bones, and the bones themselves made a scaffold, a framework, as he chanted over them, chanted and danced, pouring his words and music over them. When bones and spirits were joined together, he turned to the seeds, which he held, a handful at a time, letting his silver words and holy breath wash over them as he recited a blessing for growth, for bud and flower and fruit, for death. These he sprinkled over the bones and dead spirits, and each seed was like a glowing ember, a firefly, a warm-hued gem, because of his blessing.

All the while, whether chanting, blessing, singing a prayer or giving voice to horn and drum, he played his lyre, the heart of his skill and talent, and the lyre ascended above all the other elements and bound them together until the distaff of Yggdrasil spun again, the spinning wheel revolved, and new thread flowed through the old spinner’s fingers.”

“Oh!” breathed Clarissa. “How beautiful! How lucky you were there! I wonder if fixing Yggdrasil will fix the other strange things happening.”

In the magic of Seren’s presence and storytelling, she’d forgotten her worries and put away the ominous feeling that never quite left her these days. Now she remembered.

The sea had withdrawn from the land. She was still trying to believe it. She’d stood on the cliffs, or looked out from the tower windows or down from its apex more times than she could count, but even as she looked at the bare sea bed and the distant haze of water, she couldn’t quite accept what she saw.

She’d gone to visit Marceau, a sea king who was like a grandfather to her, expecting comfort and reassurance, but found none. In many places along coastlines the sea withdrew from the land. No one knew why. No one knew what to do. In addition, the ocean appeared to be warming due to superheated vents opening in the sea floor and unusual volcanic activity. The increased temperature killed many sea creatures. It was so bad that Poseidon, who usually left governing to the sea kings, had called for a gathering to share information and discuss the situation. Clarissa had never heard of Poseidon taking an interest in anything other than his wolves, horses and beautiful women.

After talking with Marceau, Clarissa returned to the lighthouse. Rapunzel, though preoccupied and concerned, was more comforting company than the merfolk, who felt their very existence to be in jeopardy as the food web unraveled. Persephone had left the lighthouse to return to Hades and her husband, and Clarissa missed her. Rapunzel lacked Persephone’s maternal warmth. On the other hand, Rapunzel was full of stories, fascinating facts and bits of witchlore, and Clarissa, lonely and frightened by the sudden wrongness of the natural world, found forgetfulness and relief in learning from Rapunzel.

Rapunzel had discovered the cellar, and Chris’s mural.

“If you’d asked me, I would have told you about him,” she said to Rapunzel. “When I came back, after my father was gone, I didn’t even think about the cellar because of meeting all of you, and the dance, and then Seren. That’s usually how I visited, through the pool in the cellar, but now I can’t use it, obviously.”

“No. Your brother swam as far as he could and walked the rest of the way. It turns out there’s also a passage into the cellar from Dvorgdom.”

“Dvorgdom?”

“The underground kingdom of the Dvorgs. I’ll tell you about it. Chris brought me a letter from Radulf.”

“I love Radulf. I wish Chris had waited; I haven’t seen him since Father died.”

“We didn’t know when you’d return, and he wanted to get back to Radulf.”

Seren, after leaving the tower a few weeks previously, had traveled to Griffin Town, where he reclaimed his lyre and other belongings from the ship he’d been thrown from. He’d sent word to Clarissa from there that he traveled to Yggdrasil, the Tree of Life, where there was evidently some kind of trouble.

In his absence, Clarissa tackled her father’s papers and books, a task she’d felt unable to approach until now. Persephone and Rapunzel had looked through some of his writings before they’d met Clarissa, but after she revealed herself Irvin’s desk remained undisturbed, waiting for her attention.

The sharpest edge of her grief had dulled, which made her feel vaguely guilty. It seemed wrong to forget him so soon and so easily, as though she hadn’t really loved him. She dreaded reading his words and handling his beloved books, and was surprised to find comfort rather than pain as she paged through familiar volumes, reading a stanza here and there and finding well-loved but half-forgotten illustrations, for these had been her books, too, companions of her childhood. She well remembered Irvin reading aloud to her and her brother.

Her father had collected and written far more stories than she’d realized, many of which sounded familiar, but she hadn’t realized originated with him. His stories sounded as though they’d been handed down for generations, and without his notes she couldn’t recognize oral tradition from new material. Rereading them, she heard her father’s voice in memory and discovered an intense desire to pass the stories on, though she would never be the storyteller her father had been.

Clarissa gleaned from Rapunzel every bit of information she possessed about the Tree of Life. Rapunzel had not seen it herself, but friends of hers had, and she’d learned about the Well of Urd; Mirmir, who guarded the well and tree; and the three Norns from Elizabeth, her foster mother. She didn’t know exactly what was wrong with Yggdrasil, but she told Clarissa she’d lately heard one of the Norns was ill, and their work with Yggdrasil interrupted.

“He also said Yggdrasil is dropping twigs and branches from its top. You remember I told you no one has ever seen the top of the Tree of Life?”

Clarissa nodded. “How do they know the twigs and branches are coming from the top, then? And who is ‘he’, the one who told you? Did someone come while I was gone?”

Image by Hands off my tags! Michael Gaida from Pixabay

“I’m told the twigs and branches are crusted with stardust,” said Rapunzel matter-of-factly. “That’s how they know they’re from the very top, where the upper crown entwines with the night sky. ‘He’ is an old friend of mine. You remember I told you about the tower I lived in when I was your age, and how I cut off my hair and climbed out?”

Clarissa nodded again.

“While I lived there, I made friends with a colony of bats roosting in the tower above my bedroom.”

“A bat told you about Yggdrasil?” Clarissa was astounded.

“A little brown bat, to be precise. His name is Ash. He hunted around the lighthouse and one night I spoke to him in his own language, and he recognized me.”

“Aren’t bats dangerous?”

“No. Bats are highly intelligent creatures, and most of them eat insects or fruit. They can bite, but generally only will in self-defense. They eat millions of insects, bats. Without them, we’d be overrun with flying insects. Ash is quite charming. He’s a mimic -- can impersonate anyone. He should be hibernating by now, but I made him a proposition and sent him on an errand. I’m waiting for him to reappear. If he doesn’t, I’ll know he decided to find his colony and hibernate, but I’m hoping he’ll help me this winter.”

“How can a bat help you?”

“He can gather news for me. He’s great friends with Mirmir. That’s how I heard about Yggdrasil. Bats can be in buildings, in caves and caverns underground, and in hollow trees. They’re noiseless on the wing and people rarely see them, as they only move around in the dark. Their hearing and eyesight are excellent. Ash would make a first-rate spy, and he could bring news from places I can’t reach.”

“What’s the errand you sent him on?”

“I sent him to find a volunteer insect to help him stay alive this winter. I could charm it so it never loses its life and Ash can eat it as many times as he needs to. An insect would be lightweight and easy for him to carry with him. He only eats insects; that’s why bats hibernate, because there are no flying insects for them to eat during the winter.”

“But nobody would volunteer to be eaten again and again, surely!” exclaimed Clarissa.

“Maybe not. We’ll see.”

“If he comes back, can I meet him? Will he mind?”

“He won’t mind,” Rapunzel had said, smiling. “I’ll let you know if he comes back.”

“Clarissa, you’re a million miles away,” said Seren, frowning.

Abruptly, Clarissa recalled herself to the present moment. “I’m sorry,” she said. “Your story made me forget, but now I remember again how frightening everything is.”

“You mustn’t be frightened. I’ll take care of you.” Seren set the lyre down and cupped her cheek with his hand. His touch made her belly blossom with warmth. She lost herself in his eyes, longing for more.

“You’re beautiful, little sea maiden. Your eyes are almost as lovely as mine. I’ve never met a girl like you.”

“But you must know all kinds of women; beautiful, rich and powerful women who’d be proud to be by your side and support your talent.”

“Yes,” said Seren. “I like women, and they’re attracted to me, but you’re not like them. When you’re listening to me, I feel like a god. You inspire me. I’d like you to always sit at my feet, just as you are now.”

Clarissa turned her head against his hand, allowing her teeth to graze the fleshy mound below his thumb, and kissed his palm, letting him feel her breath and her moist mouth.

“I’ll sit at your feet as long as you want me to,” she said. “I can’t think of a better way to spend my life than to support who you are in the world.” She closed his fingers over her kiss and returned his hand to him.

“What a shame you’re not human,” said Seren. His pupils dilated and she knew her kiss had excited him.

“I’m half human,” she said quickly.

“Are you? Is that enough?”

“Enough for what?” she asked, puzzled.

He looked away, as though embarrassed. “Never mind. I shouldn’t talk to you about such things. You’re not warm-blooded like humans. We have certain ways of interacting … physically, I mean. I have yet to find a worthy partner, someone who properly appreciates my sensitivity and passion. You wouldn’t think it, but the kind of skill and talent I possess come at a heavy price.” He sighed. “So many times, I’ve thought I’ve found the right one, but in the end she always disappointed.”

He talks like a man twice his age, Clarissa thought with tender amusement. He was only three years older than she.

“Seren,” she said, “if you’re talking about sex, I know what that is. How did you think merfolk children are made?”

“I haven’t thought about it,” he said. “I’ve heard the merfolk are cold and passionless, neither male nor female.”

“Don’t I look like a girl to you?”

“Yes, like a beautiful girl, but when you’re in the sea and have a tail, you don’t have a girl’s body. Perhaps you can look like a boy on land too, and choose not to.”

Clarissa had already learned how easily Seren was hurt, so she chose her words with care. “It’s true people make up stories about us because they don’t know any better. Most aren’t like you, so generous and interested in what’s true. The merfolk believe all life depends on a balance of male and female power. It’s the holy binary. We are like humans, in that we have either male or female bodies and reproductive abilities. We pay less attention to our presentation than humans do. Male and female merfolk decorate their bodies and their hair however they please and possess equal power in private and public matters. We rejoice in our physical forms. Merfolk are passionate and sensual, and we honor our bodies and those of others. I’m female. I could choose to look like a human male if I wanted to. No one would care. But I couldn’t be male, because I’m female. I look the way I want to look and I live in my body with joy and gratitude.”

“I see. Then how do your people …?”

“How do we have sex? The same way humans do, but our bodies are evolved in such a way that sexual violation isn’t possible. If we do not consent, our bodies cannot engage sexually. For us, sex is a sacred act of intimacy as well as procreation, and may take place between any combination of men and women. Sexual expression must be freely given and received in order for our bodies to allow it to take place, but we have no other rules controlling sexuality. Females also choose when to conceive. We cannot become accidentally pregnant.”

“I see,” said Seren thoughtfully. He slouched in his chair, Clarissa cross-legged on the floor at his feet, facing him. At some point she’d rested a hand on his knee and he’d taken it in his own and played idly with her fingers as she spoke.

“I’m hungry,” Rapunzel announced, coming down the stairs winding along the curved wall. She’d been on top of the lighthouse and wore a heavy cloak. She threw back the hood and hung the cloak on a hook beside the door. “It’s getting cold out. Shall we heat up the chowder?”

Clarissa gave Seren’s hand a squeeze and disengaged herself, joining Rapunzel in the kitchen. Seren announced he was going out for a breath of air and left after carefully wrapping his lyre and setting it aside.

Ever since Seren’s reappearance at the lighthouse, Clarissa had felt tension between herself and Rapunzel. Their growing companionship was disrupted, though Seren was reasonably quiet and always agreeable. Obviously, Rapunzel didn’t much like the musician, which Clarissa thought was mean of her. How could she dislike the greatest musician who ever lived? And he was so gentle, so sensitive and kind!

It was a bleak and bitter Yule at the lighthouse. The wind drove hard particles of snow against the tower and cliffs and salty ice crusted the exposed sea floor. Clarissa hadn’t spent so much time out of the sea before, though she’d frequently visited the lighthouse for a day or two when Irvin was alive.

Now it felt to her like a haven of warmth and comfort. The stove burned night and day and the light at the tower’s top sent its warning message into the long dark hours, even though no ship could come near the fanged rocks because of the sea’s withdrawal from the land. Still, Rapunzel tended the light in hopes one day or one night the sea would return to its accustomed place. For Clarissa, life centered around Seren, the sound of his voice, the shape of his hands, his slim male body and his eyes, so changeable and expressive.

She knew he might have spent Yule anywhere, been warmly welcomed wherever he wished to go, and felt grateful beyond words he chose to be with her, for certainly Rapunzel was barely civil and took delight in teasing him. Clarissa had discovered Seren didn’t like to be teased. It made him cross, but she knew the crossness hid a deep hurt, and she did her best to become a buffer between Rapunzel’s sharp tongue and Seren’s vulnerability.

It was a strain. Worth it, because Rapunzel was like … not a mother, perhaps, but the best kind of older sister, wise and full of information Clarissa wanted to know, and Seren was … well, he was everything. If she’d looked for a hundred years, she couldn’t have found such a perfect mate.

Not that they were mates yet, exactly. In fact, that was part of the strain. Rapunzel didn’t leave the tower, except to take a walk. Clarissa and Seren had no place in which to be private. Clearly, he couldn’t accompany her into the sea. He probably owned a fine home in a far-away city. Perhaps next year they would go there, so she could meet his friends.

She hoped it was near the sea, because she didn’t like to leave it for long.

She longed to be alone with him during the short, cold days and long nights. She imagined decorating the largest tower room where he slept, Persephone’s old room, with candles, imagined the deep soft bed freshly made with heavy linen sheets. She dreamt of being alone with him in front of the stove, the floor laid with thick sheepskin and strewn with pillows. She imagined being able to lock the lighthouse door and having all night to explore the texture of his kiss, discover every nerve ending and fold of skin. She imagined the heavy languor of her tail against his legs, then wrapping her own legs about him to pull him down against her, into her. He would run his fingers through her hair, cradle her face in his hands, and teach her what love could be between male and female. He would initiate her into the arts of pleasure, and she would learn how to please him. She would be the one he’d always searched for.

She would never disappoint him.

But the lighthouse wasn’t hers and Rapunzel lived there. During the days, Rapunzel stayed busy and, if anything, avoided Clarissa and Seren. They spent their days by the stove, talking. Clarissa worked in the kitchen and fed the fire. Every day Seren unwrapped his lyre and performed, and from him Clarissa collected a treasure trove of lyric, poetry, story and melody, much of which she wrote down so as not to forget, though he made it clear she was not to re-tell his material.

In the evenings, the three settled by the wood stove after dinner. Clarissa knew Seren much preferred the time she and he spent alone together, because Rapunzel insisted on taking turns telling stories in the evenings. Naturally, it was painful for someone as accomplished and talented as Seren to listen to stories poorly told, and Clarissa writhed internally when her turn came, knowing the inferiority of her language and presentation. She couldn’t even play an instrument. She watched Seren carefully, and as his face became aloof and distant, she pruned and truncated whatever she was telling so as to finish quickly and put him out of his misery.

Rapunzel, on the other hand, took a perverse pleasure in annoying Seren. She deliberately chose long tales and appeared to take no notice whatsoever of Seren’s pained expression or inattention. She told as though Clarissa was her only audience, and at times Clarissa became so compelled by Rapunzel’s story she selfishly forgot Seren’s discomfort.

During his turn, Seren came alive. He liked to stand with his lyre, sometimes moving gracefully around the room as he played and sang and other times telling stories with music weaving through the words like a gold thread, his grey eyes compelling, reading every nuance of his audience’s expression and reaction.

***

One day, just at dusk, as Clarissa set the table for their evening meal, Rapunzel came down from the tower’s top where she’d been lighting the beacon and said Ash had returned.

Clarissa wiped her hands. They went back up the stairs together. In Rapunzel’s room, upside down in the corner between the curved stone wall and the underside of the wooden floor above, hung a small creature with dark brown fur, about the size of Rapunzel’s hand. As they approached him, he spread his wings, and Clarissa saw thin, hairless membrane over a delicate scaffold of bones.

“This is Ash,” Rapunzel said. “Ash, this is my friend Clarissa.”

The bat swooped down, soundless and quick as a shadow, and attached himself to Clarissa’s heavy sweater. He examined her face with shining black eyes, his own shrunken visage so comical and wrinkled she smiled. He returned the smile, revealing sharp teeth.

“And I’m Beatrice,” came a tiny, shrill voice. A black beetle crawled out of Ash’s fur in the vicinity of his chest and waved her antennae. She was the same shining black as the bat’s eyes.

“Ah,” said Rapunzel with satisfaction. “You found a volunteer!” She leaned close to Clarissa and extended a finger to the beetle.

Beatrice strolled casually onto the offered finger and Rapunzel lifted her close so she could both see and hear the little creature.

“I’m Rapunzel, Beatrice. Ash has explained to you what we’re trying to do?”

“He has. You need information about the Tym, which is breaking down. My people are at risk, as well as Ash’s people and yours. The trees are dying. If he is to gather information for you through the winter, instead of hibernating as usual, he will need insects to eat.”

“That’s right. I can charm you so you won’t die, no matter how often Ash eats you. If you agree, you can sustain and companion him and he can keep you warm and ensure you’re fed as you travel.”

“We spent the day in a hollow tree and I am well satisfied for the time being,” said Beatrice. “But Ash is hungry. The flying insects are gone and most of the insects in the tree we roosted in hid under its bark. Please enchant me quickly so he can eat.”

As Rapunzel worked her spell, Beatrice, Ash and Clarissa watching, Clarissa thought the friendship between bat and beetle the strangest she’d ever seen.

“There,” Rapunzel said, and offered the beetle, still on her finger, to Ash. He regarded Rapunzel’s finger without moving, his face screwed up in dismay.

“Are you sure?” he asked, but Clarissa didn’t know if he spoke to Rapunzel or Beatrice.

“Yes,” said Rapunzel at the same time Beatrice said firmly, “Quite sure.”

“I trusted you,” said Beatrice. “You said you wouldn’t eat me and you didn’t. Now I trust her.” She nodded her tiny black head at Rapunzel. “You must eat, or you’ll starve and then neither one of us can help fix whatever is going wrong.”

Ash squinched his eyes shut, his tongue darted out and Beatrice disappeared. Ash munched once and swallowed, wincing. A moment later a shining black head parted the fur on his chest and Beatrice appeared again. “Here I am! Nothing to it!” Clarissa felt like cheering.

“It’s time for us to eat, too,” said Rapunzel. “We’ll leave you. The window’s ajar, if you’d like to go out, or you can spend the night in here, where it’s warmer. I’ll bring up some water. Later, we’ll talk and make plans.”

Rapunzel observed Yule, and as the solstice drew closer, she and Clarissa planned a dance to honor the new cycle. The day before, Clarissa took charge of decorating the old storeroom at the top of the lighthouse. Seren had mentioned several times he loved dance, and she could hardly wait to share the intimacy of it with him.

She was determined to look her best and chose carefully from the finery Ginger had left behind when she departed. Clarissa chose a lustrous grey skirt that caught the light and made her think of Seren’s eyes, and slid several thin silver bangles onto her arms. She would begin with a light tunic of the same fabric, but as the passion of the dance warmed and loosened her, she would take off the tunic and dance bare-breasted. She would show Seren she was a woman, his equal in passion, and a worthy partner. Perhaps in the glowing aftermath of ritual and sacred practice they would at last find a way to lie together, in spite of Rapunzel’s presence in the lighthouse.

Seren was restless and frequently went out to walk, in spite of the bitter weather. He’d explained to Clarissa he was accustomed to towns and cities, places lively with intelligent people and discussion where he could mingle with other well-traveled and sophisticated men. The lighthouse, isolated, lonely and without bright lights and entertainment, provided no scope for his talents. He remained only to be with her. He found their plans for honoring Yule quaint and rather old-fashioned, smiling indulgently at Clarissa’s preparations.

She supposed, from his point of view, honoring the cycles and seasons was childish, the kind of thing provincials did. Yet Persephone, Ginger and Rapunzel had revealed to her female power raised and shared through dance, and she couldn’t now imagine her life without it. She suspected Seren hadn’t danced as a part of a powerful female group, and could hardly wait to show him what dance could be. She would allow her body to express her desire and love for him in dance, and he would understand and join with her. She made preparations while Seren busied himself elsewhere, hugging her joyful anticipation.

Clarissa laboriously carried rocks up the tower steps, stacking and arranging them with candles of different size and thickness around the walls. She scattered shells and added a dried starfish and the coral lump Irvin had kept on his desk.

When the storeroom was arranged to her liking, she took two sheepskins that lay on the floor near the stove outside into the icy wind and beat them until they were fluffy and clean. She plumped up pillows and added candles to the main room. Usually, she spent the nights in the sea, returning to its embrace and song after a day spent on land, but she had slept by the stove before, and if she made it enticing enough, perhaps Seren, knowing she lay there, would join her after Rapunzel retired. It was the most perfect way she could imagine to honor the cycle’s longest night and celebrate Yr’s return.

The day of the dance, Seren and Clarissa went out together into the teeth of a rising gale. Wind blustered from all directions. As they stood on the cliffs looking out across the eerily exposed sea bed, the sky draped heavily over the lighthouse tower and it began to snow in billowing, rippling curtains. Clarissa spread out her arms and turned in a circle on the cliff, feeling the wind buffet against her and the cold tingle of flakes melting as they struck her skin. She laughed with delight, feeling primitive joy in the wild storm and the power of stone, sea and sky.

Seren laughed with her, suddenly seizing her in his arms, drawing her close and kissing her laughing lips. His skin felt cold and wet, but his mouth warm and the kiss pulsed through her body like a glowing sun. It was a kiss of seeking and finding; of promise given and received. It was rapture, passion, the heat of belly and thigh. It took Clarissa’s breath away and made her heart swell painfully with joy and gratitude. Nothing needed to be said. That single storm-beaten kiss contained the entirety of their commitment and joy in one another.

Clarissa spent the rest of the day in a daze. They ate their evening meal of thick stew and fresh bread early. They had let the fire go out just long enough for Clarissa to remove the ash and clean the stove, and the three of them lit it again in a ritual of gratitude and welcome for the returning light. Seren produced his lyre and tenderly unwrapped it.

“Oh, will you play for us?” asked Clarissa with pleasure. “I didn’t like to ask because I wanted you to be able to dance without worrying about making music, but if you and Rapunzel both play you can each dance as well.”

“I thought you and I would settle down by the fire while Rapunzel dances,” said Seren. “I know several Yule stories, and you set the stage so enticingly for me! I’m sure Rapunzel won’t mind.” He paused, looking at Rapunzel expectantly, but she didn’t say a word, her face a careful blank.

“But, Seren, we can tell stories after,” said Clarissa. “Sharing dance is the most important thing!”

“The most important thing to me is spending Yule with you,” said Seren, “but if you prefer to dance with Rapunzel rather than stay down here with me, go ahead. I’ll just wait for you.” He sat down and folded his arms.

Clarissa felt bewildered. “I thought you loved to dance. I thought you were looking forward to dancing with us. It’s an amazing practice to share, and I wanted to show you …”

“I do like to dance, I just don’t feel like it tonight. I wanted to do something quieter, something for just us two. I’ve been working on my Yule stories and songs as a surprise. I thought you’d be pleased.”

“I am pleased,” she said, distressed. “Thank you! It’s just Rapunzel and I made plans, too, and I thought you wanted to join us.”

“Do whatever you want,” he said. “I’ll wait until you can spare time for me. Go dance, by all means.”

Clarissa looked at Rapunzel, hoping for support. Rapunzel met her eyes. “It’s up to you,” she said. “What would you like to do?”

Please you both, thought Clarissa. Make you both happy.

“I’m going to go up and light the candles,” said Rapunzel. She climbed up the stairs and out of sight.

Clarissa knelt at Seren’s feet. His folded arms shut her out, and she reached for his hands, which he unwillingly allowed her to take. “Don’t be angry,” she pleaded. “We’ve only just found each other, and we’ll have all the time together we want. Nobody will ever mean more to me than you. But I love Rapunzel, too, and she’s counting on me tonight. Dancing is an important ritual for us.”

“Well, I’m so sorry to let you down,” Seren said irritably. “It’s your ritual, not mine.”

“You haven’t let me down. You couldn’t let me down. I was wrong to assume you’d be interested in joining us. I should have asked what you wanted to do. It doesn’t matter, though, because I can do both. I’ll go up and dance with Rapunzel and then come down and be with you. I’m going to sleep here tonight, so we can spend all night together if you want.”

Seren looked away. “I’m weary, and by the time you’re ready to hear me play I’ll be wearier still. I don’t think you appreciate how much of myself I put into performing, even if it’s just for one person.”

“I know. And I do appreciate how hard you work and how much your art takes from you. If you like, after you sing and play for me, I’ll work on your neck and shoulders, help you relax so you sleep well. Remember when your hands were tired after playing and I rubbed them with birch oil? I could do that again.”

His expression softened. “Yes, that did feel good. I suppose I can sleep a bit while I wait for you. After all, you girls don’t need much time to dance.”

Clarissa abandoned a post dance ritual she’d created with a traditional yule log made out of driftwood and candles without a second thought, and resolutely pushed away the anticipation of sitting with Rapunzel in the candlelit tower room, shaping the power raised by their dance into prayers and chants to send out into the dark night for new beginnings and the light’s return. Seren was her mate and her partner. It was her business to ensure he felt like the priority he was. She could no longer act like a selfish child. Now she was loved, her loyalty and allegiance essential in supporting one of the greatest artists in the world.

“You rest, and I’ll be back down before you know it. I can hardly wait to hear your Yule stories and songs! I’ll look forward to it while I’m dancing.”

Clarissa made sure he was comfortable with pillows and a hot drink at his elbow, built up the fire so he needn’t disturb himself, and slipped up the stairs, feeling guilty for keeping Rapunzel waiting.

In the candlelit storeroom, Rapunzel beat gently on her drums. Her hands and fingers dripped with blue violet light, the spirit candles that appeared every time they danced in the tower. Tonight, the lights gleamed like a handful of blue sparks around the candles.

Clarissa swallowed her anxious apology to Rapunzel, took a deep breath and relaxed, realizing only then her tension. Rapunzel was clearly not anxious or in any way waiting. Clarissa knew she could sit for an hour communing quietly with a drumbeat, sunk deep in a meditative state. Rapunzel’s face looked smooth and peaceful. The drumming was reassuring and grounded, the room serene and beautiful in its simplicity of stone, wood, flame and candle.

For a shameful and fleeting moment Clarissa felt glad Seren chose not to join them. She wasn’t sure how to combine her own dance with the complicated dance of relationship, and with Rapunzel she need please nobody but herself.

It was a relief.

She’d laid her dancing clothes ready in a corner. She changed and began stretching and swaying, turning so her skirt flared out, then collapsed smoothly against her legs. Outside the windows snow fell thickly, illuminated by the lighthouse beacon. The tower room was warm, but the stone walls felt cool to the touch. Silver bangles made thin music as they slid on her wrists.

Rapunzel’s drums and Clarissa’s feet spoke to one another in a language of beat and step, and Clarissa turned away from her mind’s chatter and rested in her body. She felt like a half-open flower, not a shy flower like an anemone or a daisy, but an exotic, fleshy blossom, heavy-petalled and intoxicating with scent, nectar and pollen. Seren’s kiss still sizzled in her nerve endings. Her breasts felt heavier than usual, her nipples more sensitive. She pulled off her tunic and weighed her breasts in her hands as she danced, running her fingers over her ribs, hips and collarbones as Rapunzel’s drumbeat became insistent and voluptuous.

Clarissa let her vision blur until the room filled with a galaxy of warm points of candlelight and blue and violet stars. Rapunzel’s hands rose and fell in a blue mist. She drummed with her whole body, dancing in place, her small bared breasts firm with jutting nipples and a sheen of moisture on her upper lip.

Clarissa danced for Seren, though he wasn’t there to see her. She danced her awakening sexuality, her hungry skin, her fiery lips and her swampy center, swollen and wet with desire. She danced for touch, for texture, for hair and fold and the intimate landscape of bone and flesh. She danced for new beginnings, for light and not light, for long winter nights warmed by bare flesh, the taste of salt and musky scent. She danced for ripening womanhood. She danced for Webbd and Delphinus, for the Star-Bearer and Seed-Bearer and their twins.

Rapunzel quickened her tempo, pounding the drums in a driving, insistent beat. As though in response to Clarissa’s powerful youthful eroticism, she wore her ugly woman face and body, and now the blue light outlined knobby, gnarled hands, thick-fingered and scarred, and the violet jeweled nipples crowned lumpy, misshapen breasts. Snarled hair framed her face, which wore an unholy grin baring discolored teeth. Rapunzel whooped, her hands moving faster and faster, and Clarissa felt the rhythm pick her up and shake her by the scruff of the neck. She whooped too, a sound of defiance and exultance, and her pounding feet echoed the rhythm of Rapunzel’s hands.

Clarissa, at one with the rhythm, lost all sense of time, but eventually the drums stopped driving her and began to hold her, to support her, and her feet slowed and quieted. She wrapped her arms around herself and felt the muscles in her back and hips move under damp skin. The candles melted and dripped, leaving wax pooled and puddled on the rocks beneath them. She turned and turned again, her hair swirling around her shoulders, her arms and hands graceful, her breathing quieting. The drumbeat still carried her, lifting and moving her feet gently, but slowing all the time, slowing until her steps were small and sliding and her skirt brushed against her legs as she swayed.

When at last the drums slid away into silence, Clarissa felt a pang of regret. She had been somewhere without time, without constraint or limitation, without effort or fear, and in that place, she felt beautiful, powerful and elemental as the sea. Now she was back, and it was surely getting late, and her lover waited while she danced in heedless ecstasy.

Rapunzel had reclaimed her true visage. She left the drums and moved about the storeroom, stretching her shoulders, hands and fingers and twirling in slow circles as though to an internal melody.

Clarissa looked out a window and saw nothing but falling snow, eerily lit. She thought longingly of the stove, the sheepskins, the pillows and Seren, waiting for her below. Her body sang, warm and alive, humid and supple.

Rapunzel tossed a couple of cushions on the wood floor and she and Clarissa sat. Ginger, Persephone and Rapunzel had taught Clarissa to linger in the space of dance for a time, basking in the power they raised and the intimacy of the practice. It served the dancers to slowly find their way back to spoken language and their everyday lives together, rather than attempt an abrupt transition.

Clarissa controlled her impatience to rejoin Seren and tried to sit quietly, but tension hardened her shoulders and neck.

Rapunzel watched her. “I’m glad you joined me,” she said.

“I’m sorry about Seren,” said Clarissa. “I shouldn’t have assumed he was joining us.”

“Not everyone is a dancer,” said Rapunzel.

“Oh, I’m sure he’s a dancer! He’s often talked about dancing. He didn’t feel like it tonight, I guess. Rapunzel, I made a Yule log and brought it up, but Seren’s waiting for me, so I’ll let you do that part alone. Do you mind?”

“I don’t mind,” said Rapunzel. “Do you?”

“A little, but I know I’m selfish. Seren’s plans are as important as mine are, and I promised I’d go down to him as soon as I could.”

“Go, then. Enjoy yourself. I won’t be down again tonight.”

Clarissa met Rapunzel’s eyes. “Thank you,” she said gratefully.

As Clarissa came down the stairs into the living area, she found Seren sitting with his lyre in his lap, fingering the strings as though in casual conversation with the instrument. He glanced up at her briefly, but didn’t mention her dancing skirt and tunic or notice the silver bangles on her slim wrists. She felt as brilliant and palpitating as a star and was sure she looked her best, but some of her confidence seeped away as he looked aside and said, “At last. I thought you were never coming.”

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I came as quick as I could.” She set aside a small bottle containing birch and almond oil. Moving swiftly, she lit the candles, put wood in the stove and blew out the lamp, intending to honor both light and darkness and create serene, sensual atmosphere. The body’s language needed no light.

“What are you doing? How will you be able to see me perform if you blow out the lamp? The candles are too dim.”

Feeling guilty, she hurriedly re-lit the lamp. Clearly, he felt rejected and betrayed, especially after the kiss they’d shared. Now she must do everything possible to earn his trust again. In the generosity of her love and admiration, Seren would forget his hurt and kiss her again, but this time they wouldn’t be muffled to the ears in a storm. The whole long night stretched before them, but she would need to give as well as take.

“How’s this?” she asked Seren, setting the lamp so it illuminated the spot where he liked to stand while he performed.

“It’s fine, I suppose,” he said. “Are you ready now?”

“I’m ready. Where would you like me to sit?”

“Sit here, at my feet, and look up at me. I play my best with you there, and you can watch my face and hands.”

She settled herself on the floor, smoothing her skirt against her legs. She looked up into his face and said, “This is what I’ve been waiting for!”

To her relief, he smiled back, his face warming.

As he played and sang, his face intent in the warm lamplight, she tried to concentrate on his stories and songs. She was developing a reverence for story, avidly collecting them wherever she could, and now her own notes grew nearly as extensive as her father’s, because Seren knew such a treasure trove of new material. Seren discouraged her from creating her own versions of traditional material, especially anything he used in his repertoire, because it would be disloyal and foolish to compete with him, but Rapunzel freely gave her permission to tell any of her stories. Clarissa noted the bare outlines of the traditional stories, songs and poems in her growing collection, just for the pleasure of preserving them.

However, on this night her body, fully awakened by the dance and Seren’s kiss, distracted her from listening. Her eyes drank in the sight of his face, his mobile mouth, his fleeting expressions as he sang and spoke, the silvery glow of his eyes as his gaze met hers. She imagined herself in the lyre’s place, spread across his lap, his hands fingering, plucking, strumming her flesh, and flushed with desire.

When the last notes and words died away, she felt as though she woke from some kind of trance. She searched for words to convey her admiration and reassure him of his place in her life. Moved by the beauty of this shortest day, the storm, the kiss, the dance and now this man, tears rose in her eyes and overflowed down her cheeks.

No words could have pleased him more. He caught a tear on his finger. “Tears for beauty, or tears for woe, little one?”

“Tears for your beauty,” she assured him. She laid her face against his knee and he stroked her dance-disheveled hair. His touch was mesmerizing, and she would have happily stayed like that the rest of the night, but he stopped stroking, gave her a pat and moved restlessly. At once, she lifted her head and clambered to her feet.

“I brought the birch oil down,” she said. “Would you like me to work on your muscles? It’s warm here by the stove.”

“If you like,” he said.

“May I blow out the lamp now? I don’t need it to work on you.”

“Yes, blow it out.”

“If you’ll take off your shirt and lie down on your stomach, I can get to your back.” She found a clean towel, picked up the birch oil and knelt beside him as he lay on a sheepskin.

He lay with his face turned away from her. She hadn’t seen him without a shirt before, except briefly on the day he’d staggered out of the sea, and his back, pale and fine-grained, broad at the shoulders and tapering towards his hips, lay exposed before her, bisected by the delicate ridge of his spine.

Clarissa pulled off her tunic and set it aside, along with her silver bracelets. The oil would stain the fabric, and the wide sleeves would be in the way. She spread the towel over her lap to protect her skirt, shook the oil mixture into her palm and rubbed her hands together to warm them. The sharp, astringent scent of birch mingled with the warm air. Closing her eyes, Clarissa laid her hands gently on Seren’s back.

For the second time that night, she allowed herself to sink into a deep, wordless state of being, the same place from which she danced. Her mind and its chatter became as distant as the dark sea outside the lighthouse, and the language of words sloughed away like a shed snakeskin. Now the language of the body filled the room, filled the night, the language of hair, nerve, cell and muscle fiber, the language of tissue, membrane and bone. Clarissa allowed her hands to fill with desire, longing, moist scent and passion. She warmed the oils in her palm and disclosed her love with touch, stroking and smoothing first and gradually increasing the pressure. His flesh softened and relaxed as she worked, his muscles flattening and warming into smooth sheets rather than ropes. His skin absorbed the oils, wakening into supple sensitivity. Her strong fingers probed his neck and shoulders; she discovered every tension point and released it.

As in dance, she lost the sense of time. She knew only the tingling scent of birch, the stove’s warmth and the wordless conversation between their two bodies, the question and answer of her flesh and his, the eroticism of silent unrestrained discovery. Her hands buzzed and tingled with heat as she poured herself into communicating her love, her reverence, her desire, through touch. She swayed above him, her bare breasts heavy and aching to brush against him, and imagined his excitement if she allowed her hair to brush his skin, or her nipples to graze him.

But no. This touch was for him, freely given. She must give before receiving. She must be worthy, for he was a great man, a great artist, and to him she was still only a girl of no special talent and mixed parentage. He didn’t yet know what she was capable of. This touch was her offering, her demonstration of passion and sensuality, her assurance that she was a worthy mate and companion.

When he understood he would roll over and pull her down next to him, claiming her, welcoming her, and together they would explore the body’s language and limits.

She worked until he felt as warm and relaxed as a sun-soaked cat. Her own hands ached and her shoulders felt tense from effort. She corked the bottle and rubbed the excess oil off his back and her hands with the towel.

He groaned with pleasure, turned his head to look at her, and said, “That felt marvelous. I don’t think I can move. I don’t think I want to move.”

She laughed with pleasure. “Don’t, then. I’ll put the oil in the kitchen. Shall we let the candles burn or blow them out?”

“Might as well blow them out. I don’t need them while I’m sleeping. Are you going out, or do you want to sleep upstairs in my bed tonight?”

She had been in the act of pulling off her skirt. She stopped. “I’m sleeping here tonight, remember?”

“Oh, that’s right. You can use my bed, but be sure you don’t get oil in it, will you? And will you pull a blanket over me before you go? Thanks. I hope Rapunzel doesn’t come down too early. I could sleep for a week.” He turned on his side, pulling a pillow into place under his head.

Clarissa pulled her skirt back into place and reached for her tunic. Suddenly she felt cold all the way to her bones. Cold, worn out, and as wooden and aching as though she hadn’t danced in weeks. She made her way through the firelit room to the stairs. Seren already breathed deeply and contentedly in sleep. The room smelled of birch oil and extinguished candles.

She took off her skirt and tunic without lighting a lamp. Seren’s unmade bed felt cold and unwelcoming. She searched his pillow for his scent, but the strong smell of birch oil from her hands overwhelmed subtler aromas. She lay awake for a long time, trying to warm up. When she finally turned on her side, pulling the quilts closely around her, the pillow beneath her cheek was sodden.

CHAPTER 10

ROSE RED

Rose Red missed Eurydice. She hadn’t realized how much she counted on the fellowship of another woman who lived on the community’s edges rather than within it. Eurydice’s role as gatekeeper, and her own role as protector of the forest, meant they stood like bridges between Rowan Tree and the wider world. With the portal no longer open and Eurydice’s absence, Rose Red felt the full weight of maintaining connection between the people and the rest of Webbd; every day her confidence weakened along with the oak tree.

After the Rusalka left she made a real effort to spend more time with the community. She ate a meal in the hall at least once a day, and made it a point to visit Maria, Ginger and Kunik frequently.

After a long and busy harvest season, Rowan Tree settled in for winter. They culled the domestic animal population for meat, leaving only breeding stock. The root cellar was full and stacked firewood leaned against walls and filled sheds and empty animal pens. Outside work ended for the season. Now their energy went into fireside tasks such as spinning, weaving, working with leather and skins, and carving. Stories and songs were shared, and those who could play an instrument sweetened the dark hours of evening. Yule, the longest night, approached.

Photo by Alexander Krivitskiy on Unsplash

On a late morning of iron sky and bitter wind, Artemis appeared at Rose Red’s door. She shivered, and Rose Red realized she’d never before seen Artemis affected by temperature or weather. She wore a deerskin tunic and leggings and short leather boots, with a cloak and hood in the coldest weather, but Rose Red hadn’t seen the cloak she now appeared in. When Artemis threw back her hood, Rose Red saw a lining of coarse-haired, cream-colored pelt.

Rose Red put her in a chair close to the fire and heated water for tea. Artemis leaned toward the flames, rubbing her hands together, the cloak still draped around her shoulders. She wore her thick hair short, and with a pang Rose Red noticed grey in it.

She’d never thought of Artemis as aging. She seemed eternally youthful, both in looks and lithe strength and endurance. Mistress of Animals, Protector of Wilderness, it was inconceivable she would age and weaken and, perhaps, one day, die. The thought made Rose Red feel cold. One by one, the most important people in her life seemed to be leaving.

She made tea, and at the same time put soup on to heat. Artemis looked as though she needed it.

She handed a steaming cup to Artemis, who gratefully wrapped her fingers around it, before sitting with her own cup. “Are you warming up?”

“Yes. It’s one of those days that’s far colder than snow. I’m glad to be here. I wanted to see you.”

“Is everything all right?” Rose Red asked, feeling childishly fearful. “I mean, everything’s not all right. I know that. But do you bring bad news?”

“I bring news. It sounds as though you have some, too.”

“You go first.”

Artemis sipped her tea, which contained a good slug of Gabriel’s mead, sweet and heady.

“Mmm,” she said with appreciation. “This is wonderful. Just right on a day like today.”

“Gabriel makes mead every year.”

“Good for him.” She set the cup down on the hearth. “Rosie, the White Stag is dead.”

Rose Red heard, but couldn’t understand.

“What?”

“The White Stag is dead,” said Artemis clearly and slowly, holding her gaze. “He’s gone. This is made from …him.” She turned back an edge of her cloak and ran her fingers over the white pelt.

“But…how?”

“He sacrificed himself at a Samhain ritual. I was there, and Baba Yaga, and Hecate. Odin and Death were there, and Rumpelstiltskin. Morfran and Vasilisa participated, as well as the Rusalka, and Heks, Eurydice and Persephone.”

“Eurydice? But she and Heks left for Yggdrasil weeks ago!”

First, they traveled to Baba Yaga’s birch forest. From there they traveled to Yggdrasil with Rumpelstiltskin. They successfully helped the Norns, and they’re on their way back here now, except for Rumpelstiltskin, who’s spending some time with his people.

“I can’t believe it,” said Rose Red blankly. “I thought the White Stag was eternal.”

“Yes and no. His true name was Cerunmos. He was the Horned God. The Horned God is eternal, but he doesn’t always inhabit the same body. The White Stag was a shapeshifter. He could take a man’s shape. He was my sacred consort, and we worked together for many years, but Cerunmos is always sacrificed in the end, and he and I both knew the sacrifice would come one day.” She looked away from Rose Red, into the fire, her face bleak.

Dead. The White Stag was dead. Rose Red sipped her tea, feeling numb. The hot liquid burned the roof of her mouth. She set it down carefully, folded her hands together in her lap, and studied them. Without warning, tears fell down her cheeks. Dead. As though her tears dissolved some kind of armor, then she did feel. The White Stag, that kingly, stately creature with his glowing coat and big, dark eyes, was dead. He had comforted her, walked beside her, been there during every difficult moment of breaking away from her parents and finding her place in the world. He was gone. Forever gone. She wouldn’t see him again. And if she grieved, how much more must Artemis grieve?

She wiped her streaming eyes and nose ineffectively. “Oh, Artemis, I’m so sorry. I don’t know what to say.”

Artemis shook her head wordlessly, and Rose Red realized she too wept. She wondered if Artemis had mourned with anyone since the ritual, or if she’d been alone, traveling through bony forests and frostbitten hills.

Tears for the White Stag and Artemis became tears for her parents, whom she loved but felt unwanted by; Rowan; her oak tree; the loss of the Rusalka, and Eurydice’s absence. For a few moments Rose Red gave herself up to grief and fear, finding comfort in the presence of another woman’s tears.

“Everything is changing,” she said when they were quieter. “There’s so much loss and uncertainty. I’m afraid of what’s coming next.”

“Change is hard,” said Artemis. She drained her cup. “I feel uncertain and frightened, too. I’m also weary. I can’t protect the wild by myself. Cerunmos was more than a lover. He was my mate, and our roles required we work together.”

“What about us -- all your handmaidens?”

“You are each essential,” said Artemis, “but a sacred pair is required, a balance of male and female energy. The forests, the hills, the animals -- they all depend on that balance. People speak of me as the virgin goddess, the chaste protector, because I control my own sexuality, but I’m neither virgin nor chaste. Nothing is more powerful than union arising from commitment and consent between male and female. It fuels the very roots of life. I have honored that power with my body and my choices, as did Cerunmos.”

“What will you do now?” asked Rose Red.

“I’m not sure. I haven’t thought much past coming to tell you. I suppose I ought to visit my other handmaidens and spread the word that the White Stag is gone, but this isn’t the time of year to travel, especially alone.”

“Stay here with us,” Rose Red urged. “Spend the winter and set out in the spring.”

“Perhaps,” said Artemis. “You’ve heard my news now. What’s yours?”

“I don’t know where to start,” said Rose Red.

“Start with what you wept for.”

Encouraged by Artemis’s loss and her unapologetic frankness regarding her relationship with the White Stag, Rose Red told her about Rowan, from the first time she’d met him on a night she and Artemis woke the trees to the last time she’d seen him. Although several of her friends understood she and Rowan were lovers, she hadn’t fully revealed their history or her experience of the relationship before, partly out of innate shyness and delicacy and partly out of shame that an animal had such power to rouse her passion.

“I didn’t think we’d stay together always,” she said. “I understood he was a wild animal. He could take a human shape, but even then, he was all fox. The truth is when we first came here, I felt lonely for a human mate, a man who could help me plan and build. Rowan saw no need for either, and felt no interest in the future. He hunted, ate, slept and mated as naturally and thoughtlessly as any other animal. When I was with him, there was nothing but now, nothing but flesh and scent and passion. He didn’t feel embarrassed or ashamed or self-conscious, and I do all the time. He freed something in me, and with him I became a different person. With him I became as wild and primal as he. It scared me, but I also love that part of myself -- the part that responded to him.”

“He was exactly the right lover for you,” said Artemis. “You’ll remember what he taught you, and you won’t be satisfied with anyone who’s unable to rouse the same passion in you.”

“But we weren’t a sacred pair, like you and Cerunmos,” said Rose Red. “We had no commitments to one another.”

“And now you’re both free to go forward with what you taught one another,” said Artemis, and Rose Red felt comforted.

The conversation moved on to the oak tree, the Rusalka’s revelations about mother trees and their departure, Eurydice’s observations and fears about Rowan Portal, and the community’s small doings.

After a bowl of soup and a fresh pot of tea, Artemis related the events of the Samhain ritual and what she knew of Eurydice, Heks and Rumpelstiltskin’s travels. While in Baba Yaga’s birch woods, she had talked at length with the Rusalka, and learned for the first time of Yrtym. She too had noted the dullness of the falling leaves and dead and dying trees. Autumn had brought heavy winds, and weakened trees fell by the dozens, blocking paths and lying down swathes of forest.

“I wanted to tell you about the White Stag before Heks and Eurydice did,” she said to Rose Red. “I also want to hear what they found at Yggdrasil and how it is with the Norns. I’ll stay at least until they return. We need information, but information will be harder to share if the portals break down. I know the birch wood portal and the one here are affected, but there are others connecting one place and people and another.”

“Have you heard anything from Gwelda?” asked Rose Red. “I thought about trying to get a message to her. She and Jan will certainly notice problems with the trees, and they may have heard other news.”

“That’s a good idea,” said Artemis. “I haven’t heard anything from her.”

“I’ve sent Rowan with a message for her before,” said Rose Red, “but I don’t expect to see him again.”

“And I would have asked Cerunmos to go to them,” said Artemis. “We’ll find another way.”

Artemis agreed to stay with Rose Red, and they spent the rest of the day talking. Late in the day the sky became heavy, the air smelling of snow. Snug in Rose Red’s little house, with plenty of food and firewood, they stayed where they were for the evening. After a meal they sat by the fire until Artemis began to nod. She crawled gratefully into Rose Red’s bed. The wind rose outside, and when Rose Red stuck her head out the air was thick with snow. She blew out the lamp and joined Artemis under the quilts and the White Stag’s pelt. Comforted by Artemis’s presence and the cloak’s weight and warmth, she slid into sleep.

The following morning, they woke to drifts of wind-driven snow. Just outside Rose Red’s door the ground was bare, but they waded through hip-high drifts on Rowan’ Tree’s sloping hill to reach the community hall. Smoke rose from chimneys and several bundled figures with brooms and shovels worked, clearing paths to the animals, the root cellar and the large communal building, where breakfast no doubt cooked.

“We have a couple of new people,” Rose Red said to Artemis as they labored through the drifts. The wind had diminished, but the air felt icy. “They both turned up recently and asked if they could spend the winter with us. One is called Chattan. He hasn’t said much about how he came here, but he stayed with Kunik when he first appeared and Kunik is impressed with him. He knows a lot about living off the land and is willing to do any kind of work. He’s quite strong. There he is, see?” she indicated a figure shoveling a path to the goats with powerful thrusts.

“The other man is called Mingan. He was the second to arrive. He came with news of trouble. Fighting and conflict in his old home drove him out. He says people are behaving unnaturally and turning against their own kind. He asked Maria to let him stay here, at least for the winter.”

After brushing the snow off one another with a broom outside the community center door, the two women entered into the warmth and scent of frying meat and toasting bread. Maria worked in the kitchen, along with several other women. Two young girls watched a baby lying on a blanket on the floor near the fire. Artemis was greeted warmly but without fuss, and she and Rose Red joined in the cheerful chaos of a snowy morning requiring cooperative effort.

As food was ready, those present sat down to eat, and gradually those working outside made their way in to warm up and dry off. By that time, Rose Red and Artemis had enjoyed a hearty breakfast and Rose Red was washing dishes.

Artemis made no mention of the White Stag. She was introduced to Chattan and Mingan when they appeared, faces red with cold. She moved from the kitchen to the gathering space near the fire to the long dining tables, talking to everyone at least briefly. Somewhat to Rose Red’s surprise, she greeted Heks with an embrace. Heks, making no concessions to old womanhood, had been out wielding a broom with the men and seeing to Maria’s chickens.

Rose Red, watching from the sink, recalled Heks had attended the Samhain ritual in which the White Stag was sacrificed. She understood the bond shared ritual created, as she and Kunik had been through an Ostara ritual together. Aside from Eurydice, he was her closest friend at Rowan Tree. He’d been one of the last to come in, and he sat eating with Chattan and talking to Artemis.

“Rosie.”

Rose Red swam up out of deep sleep. She lay on her side, back-to-back with Artemis. The fire had burned down to a glow.

“Mmm?” she said.

“Listen.”

Rose Red, trying to wake herself enough to listen properly rather than fall back asleep, turned on her back and folded down the quilts, letting cooler air stroke her body. She lay still, listening hard.

“There,” said Artemis quietly. From somewhere in the dark winter woods came a low, wailing cry followed by desolate sobbing, as though the winter forest itself wept for the end of warmth and light. It raised the hair on the back of Rose Red’s neck.

“It’s not the trees, is it?” she asked confusedly.

“No. It’s moving closer.”

It was. The sobbing trailed away to a moan, and now Rose Red thought she could hear something huge and heavy moving in the dark. Weeks ago, a freak wind storm had knocked down hundreds of trees which, in addition to the recent heavy snow and drifts, made travel in the forest difficult, even in daylight. Whatever approached moved steadily though, breath coming in sobs, and Rose Red could hear heavy objects being shifted as the footsteps drew inexorably closer. Was it moving fallen trees out of its way?

Something nudged at the back of her mind, some memory of a time she’d heard something large moving through the trees before. Not a bad memory, a good one.

“It’s not an animal,” whispered Artemis. “Too big.”

“Yes,” breathed Rose Red in agreement.

“Rosie?” the thing outside said. “Oh, Rosie, I need help!” The words trailed away into sobbing. At the sound of the voice, Rose Red leapt out of bed and flung the door wide.

“Gwelda! Is that you? Artemis, make a light, will you? Gwelda?”

Lamp in hand, freezing in bare feet and nightgown, her gaze traveled from a pair of leather boots, each the size of a sled and lined with fur, up legs like tree trunks swathed in yards and yards of green canvas that reminded Rose Red of a tent, and a thick leather belt. The light provided by the lamp in her hand illuminated no higher. With a “whump!” the figure sat down in the snow and she recognized her friend Gwelda, a giantess who, with her human husband, Jan, planted and harvested trees and assisted Artemis in protecting the wild forests. What appeared to be a large, heavy blanket was pinned at her throat like a cloak, and a clumsily knit scarf of pink and orange swathed her head and neck. On one hand she wore an immense hide mitten. A dirty white cloth with an end dangling wound around the other hand.

At the sight of Rose Red, Artemis at her shoulder, Gwelda’s green eyes overflowed with tears. They fell down her cheeks and added another layer of ice to the scarf, crusted from her condensed breath and previous tears.

“He’s dead! They’ve killed Jan …burned the house…” She rocked back and forth, sobbing.

With great presence of mind, Artemis dressed and built up the fire. She poured what remained of Rose Red’s mead into a large bowl.

“Gwelda, drink this. We must get you warmed up. Here, let me pull this off for you.” Artemis tugged at the mitten, which slid off, revealing rabbit skin lining. Gwelda’s fingers looked red and stiff, and Artemis rubbed them briskly. “Get dressed, Rosie. It’s too cold to stand here without clothes on.”

Rose Red dressed hastily while Artemis coaxed Gwelda to take the mead. Rose Red longed to bring the giantess inside, put her in a chair in front of the fire and feed her, but she couldn’t possibly fit in the house, or in any building at Rowan Tree. She and her husband visited in fine weather, when they could live outside. And now Jan was dead, Jan with his humor and his sharp axe and devotion to Gwelda. Who could possibly want to kill Jan?

In the end, Gwelda sat as close to the open door as possible and Rose Red stoked the fire until it roared. She and Artemis felt quite comfortable and Gwelda’s front, at least, warmed. She unwound her scarf, revealing disheveled hair, fading purple in color and showing an inch of brown at the roots, and they hung the scarf near the fire to dry. As they tended her, Gwelda sat passively, tears continuing to stream down her face, though she stopped sobbing.

Rose Red thought she looked dreadful. Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, her lips cracked, and she looked as though she hadn’t slept in days. The unraveling bandage around her left hand concealed an angry-looking burn, blistered and oozing. Rose Red didn’t know what to do with it, so she tore up a linen sheet for a clean dressing. In the morning, she would consult Maria about how to treat such an injury. Gwelda mopped her eyes, blew her nose, accepted a towel wrung out in warm water and wiped her face.

“Thank you,” she said, handing the towel back to Artemis. “I’m sorry to get you up in the middle of the night. I didn’t know where else to go…” her lip trembled.

“Of course you’d come to friends when you were in trouble,” said Rose Red. “Where else? I’m only sorry we can’t do much for you until morning.”

“You were here,” said Gwelda. “That’s what I need more than anything.”

“Can you tell us what happened?” Artemis asked.

Gwelda heaved a sigh, running her uninjured hand through her lank hair. “I don’t know what happened,” she said. “I mean, I know what happened, but not how or why or who. Jan and I noticed something wrong with the trees this fall. Healthy trees are dying, and they all appear to be weakening. A tremendous wind blew a few weeks ago, and it knocked down hundreds of trees.”

“It happened here, too,” said Rose Red.

“Well, we’ve been worried, and Jan began to travel more, trying to understand what was wrong. Since he wasn’t working as much as information gathering, I stayed at home. I’ve traveled, too, but I can go a lot farther in a day than he can, so I’ve been returning home for the nights.”

“What did he discover?” asked Artemis.

“Not much. Nobody seems to know what’s happening, but he heard reports of trouble everywhere. It’s not just the trees, either. Jan noticed people seem less friendly and are surly and suspicious, though we’re well known and have generally felt welcomed wherever we went. He couldn’t understand it. The buildings we helped with are sturdy and strong, and the trees we’ve planted are growing. We’ve done nothing to give offense to anyone, just harvested wood, planted new trees and tried to help where we could.”

“What did you find?” asked Rose Red.

“I avoided towns and villages and went into forests and mountains,” Gwelda replied. “I wanted to see if the trouble with the trees was just local or more widespread. We thought perhaps there was some kind of disease at work in the trees and its effects were limited.”

“It’s everywhere, I’m afraid,” said Artemis.

“That’s what I found, too,” said Gwelda. “Everywhere I went, it was the same thing. The Mother trees are the most affected but smaller trees are dying by the hundreds, or already dead. It frightens me.”

“Me, too,” said Rose Red.

“Anyway, Jan came home a few days ago. He was worn out and discouraged, and we decided to stay at home for the rest of the winter and wait for spring. I hoped by then I would have seen you, Artemis, and the White Stag, and we wanted to come here to Rowan Tree and see how things were.”

“We wanted to talk to you, too,” said Rose Red.

“We should have come here,” Gwelda said, beginning to rock and weep again. “If we’d come to spend the winter here, Jan might still be alive.”

“Oh, Gwelda,” said Rose Red, feeling helpless.

“Tell us what happened, my dear,” said Artemis.

Gwelda gulped, wiped her face and blew her nose again.

“He was restless and worried. Every day he walked in the forest. It was terrible to watch the trees grow weaker and weaker. He couldn’t help, but he could be with them and love them, so that’s what he did. Then, one evening, he didn’t come home. I thought he’d be back any minute, and I waited while it grew dark, but he still didn’t come. I waited all night. I was afraid to search for him in the dark. I thought I wouldn’t be able to see his footprints and the forest is such a mess with the fallen trees. I was afraid he might be lying unconscious somewhere and I wouldn’t see him. As soon as dawn came, I went out … and I found him … he’d been attacked …”

While Gwelda sobbed, Rose Red and Artemis looked at one another. Rose Red had assumed Jan had been killed by a falling tree, or some other accident connected with working in the forest.

When Gwelda had pulled herself together again, Artemis asked, “Who attacked him? Do you mean a wild animal?”

“Yes. No.” Gwelda shook her head and sniffed. “I mean, yes, it looked like a wild animal, but I can’t imagine what kind of animal. He was bitten and mauled and torn apart, but he wasn’t really eaten.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense at all,” said Rose Red, feeling bewildered. “If an animal killed him, it would have been for food, surely.”

“That’s why it’s so terrible,” said Gwelda. “If a hungry animal killed him for food, I can accept it. I don’t know how to go on without him, but it’s a natural death. It feeds the forest, and Jan would be glad about that. But this seems so unnatural, like the trees dying for no reason, and it terrifies me. What’s wrong in Webbd? What’s happening?” She looked out of her swollen eyes from Artemis to Rose Red and back again.

“We’ll tell you what we know later,” Artemis said. “Go on about Jan.”

“His axe was there, with blood on the blade. The ground was torn up, mostly leaves and other tree debris. I couldn’t see any tracks. I took off my cloak and wrapped it around him and took him home. We had a special place, the place where he proposed to me, and I buried him there. That night our house caught fire.”

“Oh, Gwelda,” breathed Rose Red.

“How?” Artemis asked sharply.

“I don’t know. We built that house ourselves. I hadn’t left a candle or lamp burning, and I’d banked the fire for the night. I think someone set fire to it.”

“But why?” Rose Red asked. “Who would do such a thing?”

Gwelda shook her head without speaking. “I only had time to grab a couple of things,” she continued on dully. “By the time I woke up the roof was burning. I burned my hand trying to get out. It burned all night, and when daylight came, I started for here. I didn’t know where else to go.”

***

Dawn brought a sunny winter day. Artemis and Rose Red went out with Gwelda to find a place she could lie down and sleep. She was utterly exhausted, even her hunger outweighed by fatigue. Rose Red and Artemis agreed, while eating a hurried breakfast, it would be best to talk to the people of Rowan Tree before producing the giantess. Most of the community knew Jan and Gwelda, as they had helped build Rowan Tree, but only a few had a personal relationship with her, and the newcomers didn’t know her at all. It would take time to plan how and where to house her.

They found a spot in the forest near Rose Red’s oak where downed trees had created a sunny clearing. Gwelda piled trees so as to enclose a space big enough for her to lie down in. Fallen trees had protected the ground from snow and the low sun provided some warmth. Gwelda was well accustomed to camping and living outdoors and thought nothing of sleeping on the ground. After the relief of talking about what had happened and finding herself among friends, she wanted nothing but sleep’s oblivion.

***

It was still early when Rose Red and Artemis asked Maria and Ginger, who lived together, and Kunik to meet them in the community hall. The two women found the hall empty, which suited them well, and by the time the others arrived a fire burned in the fireplace and breakfast was cooking. Kunik arrived with Chattan, his temporary guest, as there was no empty housing.

Chattan was a young man with thick, sandy hair and eyes of an unusual shade of pale gold. Rose Red had hardly spoken to him, but knew Kunik thought highly of his skills and enjoyed his company. Still, she would have preferred it if Kunik had left him at home. She was uncomfortable exposing Gwelda’s grief to a stranger.

Perhaps sensing this, Chattan went out of his way to be helpful, setting one of the long dining tables, tending the fire and making sure everyone had a hot drink. As they sat down, Gabriel appeared, looking surprised to see such a large group early in the morning.

Gabriel had been one of the original villagers to settle at Rowan Tree. He and others from his old town had left after the murder of a local woman amid religious divisiveness. Gabriel had transformed from a bored, rather lonely plain-speaking old man to a respected elder at Rowan Tree. Friendly, inquisitive, active and talkative, he camouflaged his intelligence and skill at sizing others up with a gossipy, humorous manner. Rose Red enjoyed watching him lull others into conversation with his garrulous old man routine and then sit back and listen, ask occasional probing questions, and gather far more information than most realized they revealed. He and Maria, Rowan Tree’s informal leader, had become good friends, and Rose Red knew Maria relied on Gabriel’s observations and assessments of the various dynamics at work in the community. Men underestimated him and women liked him, and he didn’t miss a gathering. At present he played host to Mingan, the other newcomer, but Mingan was not in evidence this morning, for which Rose Red felt thankful.

As Gabriel joined them and plates of ham, bacon, sausage and eggs were passed, Artemis and Rose Red told the others about their disturbed night and Gwelda’s arrival. The group listened in somber silence, apart from Kunik filling details in for Chattan, who hadn’t met Jan or Gwelda.

When they had finished the meal, Chattan stacked plates and took them to the kitchen. Gabriel took out a pipe, filled and lit it.

“Poor girl,” he remarked. “I liked that young man. Now what’s to be done?” he turned to Rose Red. “Do you propose she stay here with us?”

“Of course,” said Rose Red. “She’s one of us.”

“Hmm,” said Gabriel around his pipestem.

“We’ll need to build a house for her,” said Kunik, “and fast. She can’t stay out during the winter. It’ll be hard work this time of year. Can she help us? You say she’s injured a hand?”

“She has a bad burn,” said Artemis. “She needs treatment. I can look through the herbs in the root cellar and do my best, but we need someone with better skills than mine, like you, Maria, or Heks, but she’s not here.”

Maria was watching Gabriel closely. “What do you mean, ‘hmm’?” she demanded. “Is there some reason she shouldn’t stay here?”

“Not so far as I’m concerned,” he said equably. “Do you intend to put it to a community vote, then, or make an executive decision?”

Rose Red felt bewildered. “Nobody would vote no, surely. Gwelda and Jan helped build Rowan Tree. It’s the dead of winter. We’ve accepted two other newcomers without a vote.”

“Yes,” said Gabriel, “but those were humans. At least so far as anyone can tell.”

“What are you saying?” Kunik’s voice had an edge to it.

Gabriel cradled his pipe bowl in his palm. “I’m saying conflict and disconnection are happening everywhere.”

“You mean it’s happening here, too,” said Maria flatly.

“Not until recently, but I am beginning to notice short tempers. Folks are feeling frightened, and frightened people can be manipulated into behaving in ways they ordinarily wouldn’t. Frightened people want someone to blame, and who better to blame than those who are different? Some say privately Rowan Gate broke down because of the Rusalka, and losing them and the portal are good for Rowan Tree, as both were uncanny and unnatural. If Eurydice wanted to try to open the portal again, few people would come to help.”

“But many of us are different,” said Kunik heatedly, and Rose Red knew he thought about his own parentage, as he was half ice bear, half human. Eurydice was a tree nymph and Rose Red herself had taken a fox for a lover.

“But not so obviously different as Gwelda is,” said Gabriel. He turned to Maria. “I’m only suggesting you might find resistance to the idea of Gwelda living here with us.”

“I can’t send her away,” said Rose Red. “Where can she go?”

Chattan spoke up for the first time. “If Rowan Tree won’t accept her presence, can’t we build her a place somewhere in the forest? She’d still be close to friends, but she wouldn’t be in the community.”

“Good idea,” said Artemis.

“It won’t be necessary,” said Maria. “I can’t believe anyone will object to having her here.”

“In times like this, we should look to our own.”

“We don’t have enough food to share with a giantess!”

“You’d risk the community by bringing in a monster? I’ve heard giants eat children! I’d never feel safe again!”

“Isn’t there enough trouble and uncertainty without allowing a giant in?”

“This is women’s foolishness! It’s time for a man to lead this community. We need someone with a clear head to make these decisions!”

The last comment came from David, a tall, clean-shaven, middle-aged man who had been a town leader before coming to Rowan Tree with the other founders. He called himself a lawyer and frequently settled disputes at Rowan Tree. He had great respect for rules and regulations and let it be known from the beginning he thought Maria’s informal leadership inadequate.

It was noon. The entire community had squeezed into the community hall. Artemis and Maria led the discussion, briefly recounting Gwelda’s story and suggesting she be invited to stay, at least until spring.

Rose Red, who rarely addressed a meeting and happily allowed Artemis to speak for her, sat against a wall, slightly apart from the group crammed onto the benches around the long tables.

Gabriel had been right. There was resistance, and in some cases outright hostility to the idea of Gwelda joining Rowan Tree. Rose Red felt a chilling sense of dislocation. She knew every person in the room; had worked, eaten and lived alongside them, never guessing at the bitterness and resentment demonstrated now. Maybe I don’t belong here, either, she thought. Maybe if they really knew me, they’d cast me out.

Gabriel rose to stand next to Maria, pounding on the wooden floor with his stick until the room quieted.

“We’re not here to discuss community leadership,” he said. “We’re here to talk about inviting Gwelda to join us.”

“Put it to a vote, then,” said David. He stood, his tall figure commanding every eye. “Any further discussion?”

Maria, Artemis and Gabriel stood mutely, watching as David smoothly took control of the meeting.

“All in favor?” said David.

Rose Red and several others raised their hands, but she could see they were not in the majority.

“…five, six, seven, eight …” said David, smirking.

He’s enjoying this, thought Rose Red. He likes everyone looking at him and he likes humiliating Maria and Artemis. She scanned the rest of the faces, noting anger, distress, concern and fear. Chattan and Mingan both voted for accepting Gwelda. Chattan’s face was expressionless, but he too watched the group carefully. Rose Red wondered fleetingly about his impressions. Mingan, like David, smiled, though he’d cast a losing vote. He grew a thick beard of yellowish grey brown.

“All against?” said David, and once again began counting hands, this time with a triumphant note in his voice.

“The nays have it,” said David, resuming his seat amidst a clamor of stamping and raised voices. The group loosened. People turned to one another and began speaking and the meeting ended, having been taken completely out of Maria’s hands.

Rose Red joined Maria, Gabriel, Ginger and Artemis.

“Put a good face on it,” Gabriel said quietly to Maria, who looked furious. “We’ll talk about it later, but for now ignore it.”

“What are we going to say to Gwelda?” Rose Red asked Artemis.

Just then the community center door opened and two figures stepped in. Two familiar figures. Heks and Eurydice had returned.

Kunik flung his arms around Eurydice before she’d taken off her hood. He lifted her off her feet and she laughed with delight. When he set her down with a thump her hood slid off, revealing her thick black hair with its purplish sheen. Others greeted their arrival more casually, although Rose Red embraced Eurydice as well. Heks, looking sharply from face to face as she unwound her scarf, said to Maria, “What’s going on?”

“Not here,” said Artemis. “Let’s meet up at Rose Red’s house in an hour.”

***

Kunik, Eurydice, Maria, Ginger, Artemis, Rose Red, Chattan, Gabriel and Heks met behind Rose Red’s house, which stood on the brow of a shallow hill above Rowan Tree. The winter day was sunny and pleasant as they assembled out of the community’s sight, sitting on fallen trees.

After bringing Eurydice and Heks up to date, Artemis said, “You’ll clearly need to address power and leadership issues at Rowan Tree. David is forcing your hand, Maria. I have nothing to do with that, but I am in charge of what happens in the wild. Rowan Tree has no authority over the forest. That power lies with Rose Red and me. Chattan had a good idea earlier, to build Gwelda a place in the woods, nearby but not as part of the community. Given the number of fallen trees, Gwelda’s strength and willing helpers, I think we can build a home for her here, at least temporarily. Now more than ever we need everyone who fosters and nurtures the trees. If the forests die, we die. Gwelda is an important resource as well as a friend.”

“I’ve been thinking about the birch wood,” said Rose Red. “It’s not too near Rowan Tree, but it’s near enough we could visit every day. I haven’t been there since the windstorm, but if a lot of birches came down, we can use the trees for building and the bark for roofing and siding. I think Gwelda would be happy and safe there.”

“Did she bring anything with her?” Maria asked.

“She lost everything in the fire,” said Artemis. “She’s using a blanket as a cloak.”

“I tore up a sheet for a bandage,” said Rose Red ruefully.

“Never mind,” said Maria. “We’ll weave whatever she needs.”

“There’s plenty of wood to build furniture with,” added Kunik.

“She won’t need much,” said Rose Red. “She’s used to camping and likes to live simply. The most important thing is to get a roof over her head. She can feed herself as soon as her hand heals.”

“Until then, we can hunt for her,” said Artemis.

“Is she in danger?” asked Eurydice. “Who killed Jan?”

“She said he was torn apart, but not eaten,” said Artemis. “No animal I know of would do that.”

“So you think it wasn’t an animal?” asked Gabriel.

“Not a normal animal.”

“And how did the house catch fire?” asked Eurydice. “An animal didn’t do that!”

“Did she find any tracks?” Chattan asked.

“The ground was heavily disturbed where she found Jan, and she left the house while it was still burning. I don’t think she looked for tracks there,” said Rose Red.

“I’d like to look for myself,” said Artemis.

“So would I,” said Chattan unexpectedly. “I have some experience tracking.”

“Well, if you two want to go investigate, the rest of us can start building,” said Kunik.

“The first tasks are to get her fed and take care of that hand,” said Rose Red.

“Let’s go talk to her,” said Maria.

***

They found Gwelda sitting with her back against a stout oak near the rough sleeping place they’d contrived. A sinuous white weasel vanished beneath the edge of her blanket cloak as they approached. Gwelda always had creatures about her person. Seeing her in daylight, Rose Red noted lines in her face and her air of desolation. Her normal sparkle, humor and talkativeness were quenched, and she sat still and silent as though too indifferent to do anything else, cradling her bandaged left hand.

When Gwelda saw Rose Red and Artemis, her tears overflowed again and continued falling through introductions and greetings. Rose Red, torn between tenderness, pity and fury at Rowan Tree’s rejection of Gwelda, felt helpless. She longed to hold Gwelda in her arms while she wept, feed her, give her a comfortable bed and surround her with the warmth and support of friends, but each of these tasks, if not impossible, was at least far more complicated and difficult than it would have been if Gwelda had been human-sized.

Rose Red didn’t know where to start.

Unemotionally and without fuss, Maria took charge.

“Artemis, would you go hunting? I’m sure Gwelda needs a good meal.”

“I’ll go with you,” said Chattan. He’d demonstrated excellent hunting skills since he’d joined the community and Artemis made no demur. They disappeared between the trees.

“If some of you would get to work making a fire and gathering wood, maybe Heks would look at Gwelda’s hand,” Maria continued.

Kunik, Eurydice, Ginger and Gabriel found a flat spot and cleared the ground of snow, vegetation and tree debris. They dug a shallow pit, ringed it with large stones and gathered firewood. Meanwhile, Rose Red, Maria and Heks unwound the bandage.

Image by Anja #pray for ukraine# #helping hands# stop the war from Pixabay

Heks supplied herbs and a pot for heating water, and Maria produced several lengths of linen. Heks carefully inspected Gwelda’s hand, asked questions, probed gently and even sniffed the oozing blisters.

When the fire was burning, she directed Maria to heat water and steep certain herbs, and she and Rose Red thoroughly swabbed the injured hand with the resulting warm infusion. When the injury was quite clean, Heks put a thin layer of salve made from comfrey, lavender and other healing herbs over it and redressed it.

During their ministrations, Gwelda hardly spoke. Once or twice, she winced as the women worked on her hand, but she held still, docilely following Heks’s directions, and Rose Red thought she looked easier when the hand was cleanly rewrapped.

“Is it better?” she asked the giantess anxiously.

“Yes, thank you,” said Gwelda, like a well-mannered child.

“Burns are painful,” said Heks, “but it will heal. You must keep it clean.”

Artemis and Chattan returned with a deer, which Chattan expertly field dressed and quartered. Kunik took charge of the fire and cooking the meat on spits he contrived from saplings.

Rose Red began to feel better. The fire cheered and comforted. Gwelda’s hand was seen to and shortly she would have food. Her friend had come to her for help, and she was giving it. They were giving it. She looked around at the group with gratitude.

“They don’t want me, do they?” Gwelda asked conversationally.

In the flurry of exchanged looks, Maria answered composedly, “No. Several people are concerned about you joining the community. We voted.”

This straightforward talk seemed to do Gwelda good, somewhat to Rose Red’s surprise. Her tears stopped and she looked and sounded quite calm.

“I’ll leave as soon as I can. I didn’t mean to cause trouble for you.”

Gabriel spoke up. He sat on a fallen tree, surveying the activity, his stick between his hands. “The trouble is none of your making, girl. Some folks are like sheep. They spend their whole lives looking for a leader to follow, someone who’ll tell them what to think, what to fear and who’s to blame.”

“He’s right,” said Artemis. “Have you ever heard the word Yrtym, Gwelda?”

“No. What does it mean?”

Artemis explained, and then Rose Red and Eurydice recounted their conversation with the Rusalka, which the others had already heard about. Taking up the story, Heks and Eurydice shared the events of the Samhain initiation in Baba Yaga’s birch wood, including the White Stag’s death. Finally, Heks and Eurydice related their visit to Yggdrasil and the three Norns.

Rose Red saw her own consternation on every face as the travelers revealed the extent of not only the mysterious ailments of the trees, including Yggdrasil itself, but tensions and disconnection between Dwarves and humans and Rusalka and humans.

“What’s happening now is affecting all of us,” said Artemis. “It’s bigger than all of us. We’re caught up in something we don’t understand. Fear is a natural reaction to the unknown, but fear and suspicion will drive us apart. That’s happening at Rowan Tree, not because of you, Gwelda, but because of the wider picture we find ourselves in.”

“Do you think Jan was killed because of me?” Gwelda whispered.

“I don’t know,” Artemis replied. “Even if that is true, you and Jan had a remarkably beautiful and loving relationship that enriched not only the two of you, but the people you worked with and the trees you planted, including at Rowan Tree. If anyone is evil, it’s those who seek to destroy such connection, not those who build it.”

“Gwelda, you’re not the only one who’s different,” said Kunik. “My father was an ice bear and my mother a human. Eurydice is a tree nymph.”

“I took a fox as a lover,” said Rose Red, and felt enormous relief mingled with chagrin as no one appeared either surprised or revolted.

“The White Stag was my sacred consort for many years,” said Artemis steadily.

“You are one of us,” said Maria. “You will always have a home with us.”

“But--“

“We wanted to make you a proposition,” interrupted Kunik. “We wondered if you might like to live in the birch wood where the Rusalka lived, at least for the winter. We haven’t been there for some weeks, but if there are lots of downed trees, like here,” he gestured around them, “we could help you build a shelter. You wouldn’t be at Rowan Tree, exactly, but you’d be close by, and not alone.”

“Please stay,” said Rose Red, a lump in her throat. “We need you, Gwelda. I need you. Please don’t go.” She looked up into Gwelda’s face, and the giantess picked her up carefully so Rose Red could kiss her tearstained cheek and cling to her neck in a fierce hug.

Kunik announced the meat was adequately cooked, and Gwelda fell on it with appetite. She ate one handed, some color coming back into her cheeks, and even giggled once or twice as the talk turned to lighter subjects.

When her hunger was satisfied, Maria said, “Whatever you decide, we’ll support you. What would you like to do?”

“Could we go look at the birch wood?” Gwelda asked.

Ginger, Maria, Gabriel and Heks stayed with the dying fire, Heks packing her salve, herbs and dressings in her pot while Ginger and Maria dealt with the remaining meat and flung away the gnawed bones. Gabriel inspected Gwelda’s makeshift bed, adding boughs and branches over the low walls to insulate and keep off moisture, and reinforcing the sides.

CHAPTER 11

VASILISA

As Vasilisa wove her way through the dark forest, her footsteps noisy in the hard snow, she saw a light in her tiny cabin’s window and knew she had a visitor.

Feeling unbearably restless and exhausted at the same time, she’d flung herself out of the cabin four hours earlier to seek distraction, if not comfort, in the winter woods. She had no fixed goal in mind, but allowed her feet to wander where they would. Baba Yaga’s house on chicken legs stood in its accustomed clearing, the shades pulled partway down over the windows like half-closed eyelids and smoke coming from the chimney. She gave the house a wide berth and followed an animal trail, noting deer tracks and the delicate tracery of rodent paws and bird tracks near thickets.

She longed to take some kind of action. After the initiation into Motherhood, the White Stag’s sacrifice and Eurydice, Heks and Rumpelstiltskin’s departure for Yggdrasil, she waited for her own role to become clear. She looked for a guide, a companion, a journey or a task, something useful to do countering the dreadful feeling of unraveling everywhere. She was Vasilisa the Wise, initiated into Motherhood by Baba Yaga herself, yet she stayed here, in this remote birch wood, unable to be of use to anyone she loved or the world she called home.

The Rusalka, distant now rather than coolly friendly, had withdrawn into the plunge pool, taking their mermaid forms for the winter. Vasilisa wasn’t sure if the pool still functioned as a portal and the Rusalka, after the Samhain ritual, made it clear outsiders were no longer welcome in the bathhouse. Sofia and Morfran treated one another with wariness, Sofiya torn between her mate and her people and Morfran unwilling to cause further tension.

Baba Yaga brooded in her house on chicken legs, uncommunicative and seldom seen, but the weight of her presence was felt throughout the woods.

Vasilisa longed to leave, but where would she go? Where was she needed? What could she offer in such troubled and frightening times? What was the point of the Samhain initiation when she had no mate, no children, no wider community and her only nearby family was her nephew Morfran?

The short days were silver, grey and white, the forest animals intent on surviving the cold and finding food. Even the chickadees were businesslike rather than cheerful. Vasilisa paced, took care of the fire, cut and stacked wood and spent hours walking aimlessly through the forest, furious with herself for waiting, half forming plans only to discard them, and wondering what was happening outside this quiet winter wood. How were things at Yggdrasil and Rowan Tree? What was Odin doing? What was happening with Marceau and the merfolk?

Seeing evidence of occupation in the cabin now, hope flared. Perhaps the visitor brought news, or some kind of call to action. She quickened her pace and opened the door eagerly.

Sofia and Morfran sat on a wolfskin before the stove. Vasilisa smelled rabbit stew. In a rush of gratitude, taking no time to edit, she said, “Sofiya, I’m so glad to see you! I’ve missed you.”

Sofiya smiled, her round golden eyes warm. Morfran gave Vasilisa a hug before dishing the stew.

They ate together in easy silence, mopping up the stew with rye bread Vasilisa had made the day before. Vasilisa stacked the bowls and cups in the kitchen for washing and rejoined the other two by the stove, looking expectantly from face to face. Morfran looked relaxed and happy, and her heart lifted. They hadn’t brought bad news, then.

“My sisters and I have talked,” said Sofiya, “and Morfran and I. We seek a way forward, the right way, the way to healing the Yrtym.”

“I don’t think about anything else,” said Vasilisa frankly. “I don’t know how to choose a way forward without understanding what’s going wrong, so I feel paralyzed. I’m afraid to make anything worse, and I don’t know how to make it better.”

“Exactly so,” Sofiya agreed. “In times like this, my sisters and I dance small.” She rose gracefully from her place on the floor, closed her eyes, and swayed back and forth as though dancing. She raised her arms and they became sweeping wings, white feathered, changing into arms again as she lowered them.

“Dancing small -- do you mean dancing with yourself?”

“I mean returning to self long enough to remember who self is, what it wants, what it needs, what it feels, what it knows. If life is too confusing, our dance is too big. We slow down, take the dance back to the center of ourselves.”

“Have you done that?”

“I have. We have. My love for Morfran is true. We do not seek to limit or control one another or anyone else. To be without our connection is to be impoverished. I do not believe our relationship has a negative effect on anything healthy and good. If that’s so, it follows friendship between Rusalka and human is not negative but positive. We learn from each other. We dance together. We cooperate. The people of Rowan Tree came together to help Eurydice ensure our way home. We are not enemies.”

Vasilisa found herself struggling with tears. She hadn’t realized how much she missed the Rusalka’s companionship. Her concern had been for Morfran, clearly distressed by the distance between himself and Sofiya.

“I’m glad,” she managed to say.

“You do not wish to distance yourself from us?”

“No.”

“Then It’s time I told you more about the Rusalka. It’s rare for one of us to take a permanent mate, as I have Morfran.”

Vasilisa could well imagine most men were not equipped to deal with the Rusalka’s shifting forms, let alone their secretive nature, magic and wisdom. In addition, any man who took a Rusalka in essence gained Baba Yaga as mother-in-law.

“As you know, we are fertility spirits. We come into the birch forest in the spring and fertilize the Green World with the water we live in during the winter. You also know all life depends on a balance between male and female. As females, we cannot provide fertility on our own. Each of us breed in our season with a male animal of the shape we shift into. In my case, until Morfran, I took an owl as a mate every season.

You’ve learned the White Stag, Cerunmos, was sacred consort to Artemis. He could take a man’s shape, and he represented wild male energy, as Artemis represents wild female energy. In our human forms, we too joined with the Sacred Consort each spring, as well as our animal mates, to ensure fertility for the next cycle.”

“What will happen now the White Stag is gone?”

“We’re not sure, but we think another Sacred Consort will appear. Mother Baba will not explain, but she isn’t concerned. It is our intention to find, as usual, an animal mate, but we don’t know if that will be enough to keep ourselves, the forest, the rye and the poppies healthy and thriving.”

“I see.” Vasilisa waited for more, but Sofiya remained silent.

“Sofiya, is the plunge pool still working as a portal?”

“That’s the second thing I wanted to talk with you about. The plunge pool worked imperfectly until the Samhain initiation, after which we Rusalka retreated to it for the winter. Since Samhain, we have not been able to use it to visit the sea, Rowan Tree or anywhere else. Many levels of this birch forest, the bathhouse and the pool exist, as Morfran knows, but we are no longer able to smoothly access all of them, or perhaps any of them. The portal is a confusing place and it’s not easy to tell exactly where one is when using it.”

“Do you know how to fix it?” asked Vasilisa.

“We thought it might have broken down because of the different people using it,” Sofia replied. “We thought perhaps it was only for our use, and the portal’s magic and power weakened when humans or others used it. We considered too that the presence of males caused problems, though both Odin and Morfran used the bathhouse over extended periods of time with no obvious ill effects on the portal.”

Sofiya paused and looked from Morfran to Vasilisa.

“We believe we were wrong to distance ourselves from you and restrict your access to the bathhouse. For weeks we’ve been the only ones to use it, and the portal remains firmly sealed. My sisters and I have not been at peace. I’ve grieved for Morfran, and others have missed him as well. Our isolation has only fed our fear and uncertainty. We have not danced together since before Samhain, and every one of us felt the loss of dancing with you when we kept away at Samhain and only played so others might dance. Even that we grudged, and would not have done if Baba Yaga hadn’t insisted. On behalf of all of us, I’ve come to apologize to you both and ask for your help.”

“I’ll do anything I can,” said Vasilisa at once. “You were only trying to protect yourselves and your way of life. I might have done the same, Sofiya.”

Sofiya inclined her head wordlessly. “You are kind, Vasilisa the Wise.”

Embarrassed, Vasilisa said, “What do you want us to do?”

“I want you to come back to the bathhouse and use it and the plunge pool freely. It occurs to us perhaps the final breakdown occurred because we restricted the portal to only ourselves. Perhaps the key is not in controlling it, but in sharing it. Perhaps the portal is not ours at all, but a thing of magic belonging to the forest, the sea, Rowan Tree, and the other places with which it connects. If that’s true, adding the energy of two half-humans, one of them male, may help. We hope so. We don’t know to what extent Yrtym supports the portal, but it appears to be the scaffold upon which all life depends, and life is varied and dynamic, not isolated and mechanical.”

“I’ll be glad to use the bathhouse again,” said Vasilisa. “I’ve missed it. It doesn’t seem like much to do, though.”

“Imbolc approaches,” said Sofiya, “the beginning of the season of fertility, the return of the wild maiden. If the Sacred Consort arises in time for this cycle, he will reveal himself by then. Sexual energy is powerful, and the creation of life a sacred affirmation. We hope the mingling of the Rusalka, wild creatures and the two of you will work against disconnection and breakdown and perhaps heal the portal enough for some limited use so others may come through and lend their energy to it as well.”

RAPUNZEL

Rapunzel ached for Clarissa. Overnight, she’d gone from a young woman with starry silver eyes and blooming cheeks to a hesitant, rather gauche girl with shadows under her eyes. Something had happened between her and Seren, something a long way from the sensual intimacy she knew Clarissa had been picturing.

Rapunzel concealed her concern and her fury with Seren. She longed to throw him out of the tower, but she knew such an act would only drive Clarissa further into his arms. She knew the natural outcome of Clarissa’s infatuation and Seren’s vanity would be a physical relationship and saw no point in trying to avoid it. If Clarissa’s first experience must happen with such an immature, egotistical brat, better it happen where Rapunzel could provide support and answer questions, at least.

But Clarissa neither sought support nor asked questions. She came and went as usual, a youthful blend of helpfulness and carelessness, but with a new and palpable air of shame, or perhaps guilt. Rapunzel noticed she was increasingly attentive to Seren, hanging on his every word, anticipating his every wish, constantly attentive to his comfort and convenience. He reveled in her attention and Rapunzel thought him more puffed up and obnoxious every day. He clearly considered Clarissa’s attentions no more than his due, and repaid her constant care with an occasional casual caress, as though, Rapunzel fumed, Clarissa was a pet dog.

Rapunzel decided the only way out was through. Clarissa, though inexperienced, was no fool, and whatever Seren’s glamor, it would eventually wear off. He was at his worst when the spotlight was off him, and Rapunzel began to consider how she might manipulate him into a position where Clarissa had ample opportunity to observe how selfish and arrogant he was.

Ash provided the answer.

Rapunzel had heard the story of the “miracle,” as Clarissa put it, at Yggdrasil, when Seren wove together music and words to allow Verdani to spin Yrtym itself and thus create new beginnings. Skuld rose from her sick bed and began to work again, and, according to Seren’s account, all was again healed and whole. Clarissa did not tell the story as Seren had told it to her, apologetically explaining to Rapunzel he preferred nobody else told his stories. “Naturally, he doesn’t want an inferior teller or musician to use his material,” she had explained earnestly to Rapunzel, “but I don’t think he’d mind if I told you the broad outlines.”

A few days after that, Ash and Beatrice arrived. Rapunzel woke to find they’d come in the window she left slightly ajar and Ash was roosting in a dim corner. She set out water and left him to sleep. When she went up to light the lighthouse that evening, the little bat was awake and stretching his leathery wings.

They talked long into the night. Ash and Beatrice told Rapunzel every detail of the scene they’d witnessed in the makeshift tent around Yggdrasil’s trunks, Ash imitating each participant with gusto as Beatrice described the event.

As Rapunzel had suspected, Seren had mightily magnified his own part while diminishing and belittling everyone else, and it appeared Odin himself had taken pains to keep the young musician’s ego in check.

“Seren came back here,” she said, “but he tells rather a different story of a “miracle” he performed.”

“I’ll bet he does,” said Ash, and arranged his face in a prideful smirk while strumming an invisible lyre. He wrapped himself in one of his wings for a cloak and took a few sweeping steps, strutting and bowing with his nose in the air as though he were a prince of inconceivable elegance and importance.

Beatrice giggled.

“Clarissa believes every word he says,” said Rapunzel ruefully, “and she’s more unhappy and under his spell every day. I’ve been trying to think of a way to get them both into a community of some kind so Clarissa can see him through the eyes of others.”

“Send him to Rowan Tree,” said Ash. “Eurydice and Heks are both there, and I don’t think either of them was too impressed with Seren.”

“On what pretext?”

“Their portal is broken down, too,” said Beatrice. “They are trying to come up with some kind of a group connection that might open it, since connection appears to be a key to healing the portals, if not the Yrtym. Suggest to Seren he go perform another “miracle” at Rowan Tree!”

“I don’t think Clarissa can be that far away from water for so long,” said Rapunzel. “They’d travel overland, and I don’t trust Seren to take care of her.”

“If Seren decides to go, Clarissa will figure out a way to follow him,” said Beatrice. “Girls that age believe in romance. I was seduced in my youth by a handsome young beetle with blue-black wings, and I followed him to quite the wrong kind of tree. The bark made me sick, but I was prepared to spend the rest of my life in adoration mixed with indigestion if only I could chew bark alongside him.”

“What happened?” asked Ash, fascinated by this glimpse into the private life of bark beetles.

“A woodpecker ate him, right in front of me,” said Beatrice. “For quite some time I nurtured my broken heart, but I recovered.”

“I wish something would eat Seren,” muttered Rapunzel.

“All sugar and air and no substance,” remarked Ash, “like a caddisfly.”

“I mustn’t tell him too much,” mused Rapunzel. “If he knows Heks and Eurydice are there, he might not go. On the other hand, he keeps saying how bored and isolated he is here. He might not be able to resist the chance to show off in front of a handful of backwoods peasants! And Clarissa has met Heks and Ginger, so they wouldn’t all be strangers.”

“Kill two moths with one swoop,” advised Ash. “Tell Seren and Clarissa about the broken portal at Rowan Tree. Make it sound like a desperate emergency. Do you think he’ll worry about whether Clarissa can come or not?”

“Not for a minute. She’ll be frantic to go with him. He won’t make any effort to help her do so.”

“Good. Stay neutral. Don’t encourage or discourage. Emphasize the portals and shake your head over their breakdown. I’ll bet you a Luna moth Clarissa will find a way to join him. If she can’t, nothing is lost. They’ll be separated. She may suffer for a time, but it sounds like she’s suffering now, and at least she’d be out in the world having adventures with other people in other places.”

“Travel is very enlarging,” put in Beatrice. “I met all kinds of people on that foreign tree.”

“The fact is we’re going to Rowan Tree too,” said Ash. ‘We have more to tell you.”

“Tell, then,” said Rapunzel.

“After the Norns resumed their work, the portal under Yggdrasil opened. Rumpelstiltskin decided to go through it in to Dvorgdom. For years he’s lived aboveground and cared for young women. I suppose you know about the Dvorgs and Dwarves, and Pandora and the Dvorg Jasper?”

Rapunzel nodded.

“Well, anyway, I told Rumpelstiltskin about the tension between the Dvorgs and Dwarves, and what the fire salamanders said, and the passage in the cellar between Dvorgdom and the lighthouse …”

“Wait,” said Rapunzel. “You know Rumpelstiltskin? And what did the fire salamanders say? You haven’t told me this part, either.”

“Oh. Sorry. I get mixed up about who I’ve told what. Or maybe I should say what I’ve told to who.”

“Whom,” said Beatrice primly.

“Whom. Certainly I know Rumpelstiltskin. The Dvorgs and bats have always lived together, you know. So, this is what I told him …”

“As I was saying,” he wound up, “Rumpelstiltskin decided to return to the Dvorgs and see for himself what’s going on. When the portal opened, it seemed like an invitation, and he took it. He and Heks and I talked—”

“Wait, you know Heks, too?”

“I do,” said Ash. “She’s powerful, that one.”

“We decided,” said Beatrice, “Ash, Heks, Rumpelstiltskin and I, we would visit Rowan Tree and bring Heks news, just as we do with you. We told them about you, of course. We can also visit Dvorgdom and check on Rumpelstiltskin.”

“We’ll carry news and messages back and forth between you all, so you see we can easily let you know about Seren and Clarissa, as well as everything else,” finished Ash.

“It’s too bad,” said Rapunzel, shaking her head. She drained her tea cup and rose briskly to her feet to begin clearing the breakfast table. “I wonder where it will end. What we need these days is a hero who can discover how to heal the Yrtym and return Webbd to normal.”

“Where exactly is this Rowan Tree?” Seren asked. He made no move to help, but Clarissa stacked their plates and carried them to the kitchen.

“Oh, it’s quite a journey from here,” said Rapunzel airily. “Not an easy trip in the dead of winter. It’s a good-sized community now, but rough, of course. They’ve built everything themselves. It’s not at all sophisticated, like a proper town. Without the portal they’re pretty cut off. I don’t suppose anyone there has any idea how to cope.” Mentally, she apologized to the Rowan Tree people for this portrayal of their considerable talent, wisdom and resourcefulness.

“How did you hear about this?” Clarissa asked.

“I received a message,” said Rapunzel briefly. She didn’t know if Clarissa had told Seren about Ash and Beatrice, and wasn’t anxious to explain their collaboration if she hadn’t mentioned them.

“Well,” said Seren, inflating his chest and setting his empty cup down firmly, “perhaps I can be of assistance.”

“Oh, would you?” asked Rapunzel. “That would be wonderful!”

Clarissa shot her a surprised look at this unctuous reply and Rapunzel, not wishing to overplay her hand, turned away from Seren and began washing dishes.

“I won’t be able to come with you,” Clarissa said to Seren.

“I don’t suppose you will. You need to stay close to water, don’t you? That’s an unfortunate limitation, but it doesn’t affect me. I’ll just have to do without your spoiling, won’t I? You must learn to share me, my dear.”

Clarissa picked up a dishtowel and began drying the dishes, eyes downcast, expression bleak.

Rapunzel, scowling, washed the rest of the dishes wearing her ugliest woman in the world face.

Nobody noticed.

***

“He’s going,” Rapunzel said to Ash and Beatrice that evening.

“Good,” said Ash. “We’ll go on to Rowan Tree and let Heks know. What about Clarissa?”

“She’s crushed, of course. I didn’t try to help her.”

Beatrice sighed.

***

The next morning, Seren left. He carried all the food they could do without, his lyre and his warmest clothes and a blanket. Rapunzel had provided him with directions to Rowan Tree. Rapunzel tried to hide her glee at his leaving and started to withdraw discretely so the young people could part privately, but Seren gave Clarissa a kiss on the cheek and a casual good-bye, turning away before Rapunzel could exit.

“I’ll miss you,” said Clarissa to his back as he went out the door.

“Me, too,” he said, waving without looking back.

“Want to come up to the light with me and watch him out of sight?” Rapunzel asked.

“No,” said Clarissa. “I think I’ll take a walk. Maybe swim for a while.”

“Good idea,” said Rapunzel, wincing at the hearty sound of her own voice. She hadn’t realized what delicate handling young people took. It was exhausting.

She wrapped herself in her wool cloak and stood for a long time on the platform at the top of the lighthouse. Seren, heavily laden, walked inland out of sight while Clarissa, looking as though her heart weighed as heavily as Seren’s burdens, made her way down the cliffs and along the exposed sea floor to the distant wall of water.

That night, after Clarissa and Rapunzel ate together, they settled by the wood stove. Clarissa lit candles and turned off the lamps. Rapunzel knew she loved the candlelight, but Seren preferred to be well-lit while performing, so they rarely sat by candlelight any more. It pleased Rapunzel to see this small act of rebellion. Clarissa had not, at least, forgotten her own preferences.

“It’s a long way to go alone in winter,” said Clarissa. “He won’t know anyone there.”

“He’ll know Heks and Eurydice,” said Rapunzel. “They were both at Yggdrasil.”

“Were they? I don’t remember him mentioning them.”

Naturally not, thought Rapunzel, but merely said, “Mmm.”

“I should be with him,” said Clarissa. “I know his ways now. I could look after him, make his life easier so he can concentrate on fixing the portal. He’s not used to living rough.”

“It’s too bad,” said Rapunzel sympathetically. “You could get there by portal if they functioned. There’s one from the Rusalka’s birch wood to the sea. You remember, I told you about the bathhouse?”

Clarissa nodded.

“The bathhouse portal used to be connected to the Rowan Tree portal, but with everything breaking down, I don’t suppose it still is.”

“Do you know the bathhouse portal is broken?”

“I don’t know for sure. Of course, the Rusalka and Baba Yaga are powerful. Perhaps they’ve found a way to keep that one open.” She heaved a sigh. “It’s the way of the world, Clarissa. Men go out and have adventures and explore and women stay at home and worry and wait for them to return.”

“That’s not what the merwomen do,” said Clarissa with some violence.

“No? What do your people do?”

“We go out and explore and have adventures, just like the men. We don’t have to stay at home and wait!”

“Well, as Seren’s gone, I suppose you could spend some time in the sea with your people …”

“But if Seren wants me, he’ll leave a message here, at the lighthouse. What if he needs me and can’t reach me? I told him I’d wait here.”

“Oh. Well, I guess that’s it, then.” Rapunzel stretched and yawned. “Do you want to tell stories?”

“No, not tonight. Do you mind if I sleep here by the stove?”

“Of course not, but wouldn’t you rather be in Seren’s bed? We can put clean sheets on it.”

“No,” said Clarissa. “I don’t want to sleep there.”

Rapunzel climbed the stairs as Clarissa spread out sheepskins and pillows near the stove, satisfied she’d try to find a way to follow Seren. She judged she’d said enough, but not too much, and now needed only hold her tongue and let Clarissa do the rest.

***

Sure enough, in the morning she found sheepskins and pillows shaken out, plumped and returned to their usual places, the candles set carefully aside, the stove burning and a note on the table.

I’ve gone to spend some time with the merfolk. Back in a couple of days, or I’ll send you a message. Love, Clarissa

SEREN

Seren thoroughly enjoyed his journey to Rowan Tree. He possessed plenty of money, as there was no need to spend as a guest at the lighthouse. His presence and nightly performances more than repaid the small amount of food he ate and his comfortable bed.

He had no intention of sleeping rough, especially during the winter, and timed his travels to coincide with a town large enough to support at least one good inn at the end of each day. Upon introducing himself, every innkeeper begged him to favor the evening patrons with a performance, which he did, though often chilled and worn out from traveling. However, ale and cider flowed freely, as well as the finest food available, and it felt good to be in company again, good to be appreciated and applauded and admired.

Clarissa was sweet, but young and rather limited. Her frank speaking about sexual energy and passion made him uncomfortable. Gods knew he was no prude, a fact proven by his enjoyment of women at every gathering who were attracted to his talent and good looks. Occasionally one was even delicious enough to take to his bed. He was a skilled and experienced lover, but Clarissa’s talk of passion and sacred connection had been a bit off-putting. He suspected her plain speaking covered innocence, inexperience and a certain embarrassed denial about the well-known sexual ambivalence of her people.

It had taxed his patience considerably to have to listen to Rapunzel and Clarissa tell stories. Really, these people! As though just anyone could tell a good story! Taking turns had been Rapunzel’s idea, of course. Clarissa wouldn’t try to steal his spotlight. Rapunzel had been unpleasant and difficult from the first, immune to his charm and sophistication, stubborn, spiteful and offensively ugly with her short hair. He’d never liked her, and felt certain she was jealous of his and Clarissa’s relationship. She possessed far too much influence over Clarissa.

He looked forward eagerly to Rowan Tree. He didn’t expect proper appreciation for his talent or intelligence, but he would give them some simple stories and songs -- something they could understand -- and fix their portal. Surely, in comparison to Yggdrasil, it would prove an easy task. The small, idyllic community, beseeching for help, and the sudden appearance of someone as powerful as himself would make a good story, or perhaps a set of stories if he found anyone there worth getting to know.

Speaking of a set of stories, maybe he should seek out other portals and travel to each in turn to repair them and rightfully earn the gratitude and adulation of those who depended upon them. That was a thought. How many portals were there, exactly?

Performing, musing, enjoying warm fires and good food and drink, as well as occasional willing female companionship, he made his way through the heart of winter. He kept to well-traveled main roads. The woods were inhospitable and recent high winds had laid down whole tracts of trees. He didn’t enjoy solitude, being a gregarious, outgoing, likeable man, and he preferred to travel in company.

SLATE

Slate heard rumors of a Dwarve visiting the underground kingdom of the Dvorgs weeks before he met Rumpelstiltskin. The idea of a Gob intruding into the caverns, quarries and mines of Slate’s home infuriated him. How dare this traitor of race and tradition, this unnatural aberration, this deformity, pollute Dvorgdom? It was outrageous.

He quickly silenced any curiosity, speculation or interest in the Dwarve and his purpose. He redoubled his efforts to spread whispers about outsiders stealing tools and secrets of working the stone.

Putting aside his preference for solitude and dislike of interacting with others, he began to engage every Dvorg he passed in the tunnels in at least a moment’s conversation, carefully testing his allegiance.

“Have yuh heard ‘bout the sals?”

“Nah. What’s up with ‘em?”

“They been stealin’ the best gems for years. Someone found a cavern stuffed full.”

“I thought the offerins’ went to Earth-Shaper Pele.”

“Pele? Oh, she’s nothin’ but a myth, havnah yuh heard? Where yuh from?”

“ ‘Round Larch Straydle.”

“Maybe yuh havnah heard the news there. Pele’s just an old superstition. We dunna recognize her anymore, and we dunna make offerings. I hear the sals been usin’ our offerins’ to pay Gobs to make us slaves, take away our tools and steal treasure.”

“They daren’t!”

“I don’t know.” Slate would shake his head dolefully, turn aside and spit sunflower shells on the tunnel floor. “We need to be prepared. We canna trust outsiders.”

Reaching into his pouch, he would toss a few seeds in his mouth and stride on, satisfied that another Dvorg would spread the word.

He’d begun to realize the taint of Dwarves spread even into the Dvorgs. A few continued to worship Pele with ritual fires and offerings, and it was impossible to adequately police all Dvorgdom’s tunnels and caverns and put a stop to this behavior. Others had friends or family who were Dwarves, and refused to condemn their deviance.

Still, Slate knew every stone could be cleaved, if one had the skill to find a flaw or weakness, and he took advantage of an increasing uneasiness among the Dvorgs. For some reason the straydles produced fewer children, and relations with the Gobs had never been so strained. There were shortages and other trade problems, and the Dvorgs depended on food and commodities from the Green World. A few carefully chosen words was all it took to ignite a flame of greed, suspicion and fear in most of his kinsmen.

Slate realized the power of fear. The more uneasy and frightened the Dvorgs were, the easier they were to manipulate. He heard a strange rumor that had not originated with him about a massive mine catastrophe killing many Dvorgs is some far-off reach of Dvorgdom. Some said the sals brought the news, and others the bats. No one could say exactly where it happened, or how, or how many were killed, but Slate recognized yet another chance to leverage fear and swiftly associated the rumored collapse with the Dwarves’ behavior. It was further proof that allowing such disgusting behavior threatened the Dvorgs’ very existence.

“Only the stone,” he muttered to himself as he plodded along, cracking seeds between his molars and deftly separating the meat from the shells with his tongue. “The stone above all.”

It occurred to him the greatest fear of all was the fear of death, not only one’s individual death, but the death of one’s people. The stone endured. Why should the Dvorgs not endure as long as the stone? It would not matter if fewer Dvorgs were born in the straydles if he could outplay Death himself. He had been sent to guide his people out of slavery, to help them regain their pride and purity, but perhaps his greatest gift would be to lead his people to eternal life.

As he stumped through the tunnels, chewing sunflower seeds, fingering his marbles, and ruminating; collecting, embellishing and passing on rumors, he considered Death. All beings were subject to it, but did they have to be? Perhaps no hero had yet come along to challenge Death. Perhaps it was not inevitable. Perhaps Death, like tul energy, was for lesser, weaker beings, and his people, lords of the stone, could rise above it. After all, the Dvorgs certainly had no need of tuls.

Thinking about Death naturally led him to Hades, a subject of long grievance. For decades Slate had dwelt on the insult of Gobs intruding and colonizing what was clearly part of Dvorgdom and turning it into a noxious pool of dead souls, not properly sorted and segregated but mixed up together. It was appalling. It was demeaning. It was insupportable.

Perhaps the time had come to lead his people to reclaim the kingdom of Hades for their own, to take back their rightful territory. With Hades disassembled, Death would be neutralized. The Dvorgs would rise above the petty weakness of the flesh.

Slate traveled toward the place where Dvorgdom and Hades lay close together, separated only by a few feet of rock. As he moved slowly through tunnels and caverns, he heard muttered rumors on every side of earthquakes, collapses and blocked tunnels. One day he himself encountered a tunnel collapse and had to retrace his steps until he found another tunnel going in the direction he wanted.

After traveling for many days, Slate came to the very edge of Dvorgdom. The tunnels began to seep with moisture and Slate found himself slogging through mud rather than striding on clean stone and earth. He saw fewer Dvorgs every day, always moving in the opposite direction to the one Slate traveled. The ground was not suitable for digging or mining, and the place smelled unsavory and damp. He stopped one of the last Dvorgs he saw and asked, “What is this place?”

The Dvorg, sullen, did not meet his eyes. “Pele’s navel,” he said shortly.

“Pele is nothin’ but a myth. Havna yuh heard?”

“Feneos is no myth,” the Dvorg said stubbornly. “It’s stinkin’ and wet, and the River Styx flows from it into the Underworld. They say the river makes yuh invulnerable.”

“It’s no place for a Dvorg,” said Slate, looking with distaste at the seeping tunnel walls.

“It’s a cursed place. I wish I never come. Go no further. Turn back.” He pushed by Slate and walked away without looking back.

After a few minutes of walking, Slate stepped from the tunnel into a large, flat plain, roofed with rock. The ground underfoot was uneven and wet, oozing and foul-smelling. Clusters of pale, rubbery looking things, cone-shaped, dotted the ground. He smeared several under his boot, his face a rictus of disgust. He moved away from the tunnel, keeping close to the stone wall stretching out of sight, enclosing the place. Feneos, the Dvorg had called it. A sinister name for a sinister place. Following the wall, he came to an oily black ribbon of water. Just watching it move so unnaturally made him feel sick. It quickly widened out into an ominous, muscular torrent, silent, dark, and with an icy breath.

This, then, must be the River Styx, gateway to Hades. Slate wondered if what the Dvorg had said was true. Did the river confer invulnerability, and, if so, how? Did one drink from it? Slate shuddered at the thought. Or bathe in it? An even worse thought. Still, if it was true, it would be worth the risk. Did the Underworld’s king and queen know about the river’s power? Was that part of their strength?

What would happen if the river was dammed and no longer flowed into and through Hades? Perhaps if it was dammed and tamed the Dvorgs could learn how to use it to their advantage. After all, it clearly belonged to Dvorgdom. Like the precious jewels the sals and Pele stole, this river and its secrets belonged by rights to the Dvorgs. If they reclaimed the River Styx, would the power of Hades weaken, or even be broken?

Slate wished he’d paid attention to the stories told in the straydles and around the fire pits when he was a young apprentice. All he could remember was that dead souls found their way to the River Styx and a boatman ferried them across it into Hades. Was that the only path into the Underworld?

He shook his head. He squatted against the stone wall, chewing seeds and spitting out hulls, watching the terrible dark water rush by. He stood, easing his popping knees. The first step was clear. He must send a team to this place to dam the river. Then they would see.

CHATTAN

Chattan and Artemis made steady progress to Gwelda and Jan’s house. In summer it was an easy three days’ walk straight through the forest, but at the farthest reach of the sun and light, with layers of snow and ice on the ground and shattered trees jumbled like giants’ kindling, Chattan thought they’d done well to reach it in five days. He knew every passing day would make tracks harder to read. He could have left Artemis to find her way alone and traveled more swiftly on his own, but he wanted the time with her.

By the time they arrived, during a waning afternoon of weak, slanting winter sunlight, they were in perfect accord.

Following Gwelda’s careful directions and her unmistakable footprints, they went first to the place where Jan’s body had lain in the forest. The ground was churned and disturbed for several yards in every direction. Even Gwelda’s heavy footsteps were hard to discern in the mixture of blood, snow, ice and disturbed leaves and understory.

Chattan, well accustomed to hunting and field dressing animals, had never seen the remainder of such a slaughter. It looked as though ten men had been torn apart, not just one. Artemis, her eye caught by a splash of color, picked up the torn corner of what had once been a gay bandana of orange spots on a turquoise field. It was crumpled and stained with blood. She handed it to Chattan, who examined it carefully.

“I’ve seen Jan wear that. Gwelda loves color, and she gave it to him.”

After surveying the scene, they began a careful search of the periphery, circling in an ever-widening pattern. They found animal paw prints, lots of them, but they were indistinct after so many days.

When his eyes had told him all they could, he employed his nose.

Squatting, he smelled blood. Blood and death, especially on the churned-up ground. The smell of a man, unique in his olfactory presence. The torn bandana, another fragment of cloth and a scrap of leather all smelled like the man.

The smell of the man and his death, however, were only threads through a background scent, powerful and unmistakable. Chattan’s upper lip rose in an unconscious snarl, along with the hair on his neck.

Artemis, ceasing her search when she noticed him pause, came toward him. “What is it?”

He glared up at her wordlessly.

“Chattan? Talk to me.”

He recovered himself, growled low in his throat and said, “Bodark.”

“Can you tell how many?”

He turned away and continued his examination, sniffing around trees and footprints and searching for signs of passage through the winter bracken and thickets. Artemis circled with him, staying out of his way so as to avoid confusing the picture he pieced together. She kept her inspection at her own eye level, looking for any sign on tree trunks and taller vegetation.

At the foot of a large old oak tree, Chattan found shoe prints next to a shallow depression in the thin snow. A pace away, he discovered a print of a naked human foot, reasonably clear because of the foot’s warmth, and then a line of smaller footprints trotted away. Again, he snarled softly.

“Chattan.” He glanced up. Artemis stood before the oak, studying the bark closely.

“Look here,” she said, pointing to a thin cut in the bark. “And here’s another, and another.” The cuts were about two inches long, each between five and six feet from the ground.

“We’ve seen enough,” Chattan said. “It’s getting dark. I don’t want to be caught outside without shelter.”

“Let’s go look at the house. Jan built a shed he used as a workshop. Maybe that’s still standing. It was some way from the main house. I’d like to be able to retrieve his tools for Gwelda.”

The house was nothing but charred rubble, acrid and sour with the smell of burning. The shed, however, stood intact, though the door, which had been chained, was hacked to pieces. The shed had obviously been looted, though some tools remained.

Chattan did what he could to prop the door’s remains against the cold and they lit a lamp they found on the workbench. Neither felt much like eating. They unrolled blankets and laid side by side on the dirt floor, wrapped in their cloaks, Chattan closest to the door and Artemis between him and the wall. Artemis’s bow stood in a corner, casting a faint clean silvery light.

When they were settled, Chattan blew out the lamp, setting it carefully aside so he could reach it quickly if the need arose.

“Four or five are in the pack,” he said in a low voice.

“Is he one of them?” Artemis asked.

“Yes.”

“We must to warn them.”

“Is that best? He has friends. Not everyone will believe, and if we warn one, we must warn all. A secret like this can’t be kept. If he gets wind of it, he can set the pack on Rowan Tree and wipe them out, the animals too. There may be others, beyond this pack, as well.”

“Do you think they’ll come after Gwelda again?”

“Probably. And anyone else ‘unnatural’.

“I’ll hunt them down.”

“It’s too dangerous. They’re sly, and you can’t scent them. Now that your consort is gone, you must rely on other help. I need to go to the Rusalka. It’s nearly Imbolc. As soon as the ritual is finished, I’ll return to Rowan Tree as fast as I can. You take care of Gwelda, and try to discourage any talk about her. You can rely on Kunik. I trust him, and he’s only half human himself.”

“What about Rose Red?”

“It’s not time for her to know. She’s too vulnerable. If she suspected him, she’d be unable to hide it. The safest thing is to let him think none of us know.”

Image by Shannon Robertson from a Pixabay

“At least then we can keep an eye on him.”

“Exactly. When I get back, we’ll decide how to go forward.”

“He’s living with Gabriel. I wouldn’t be surprised if he suspects something’s not right. He doesn’t miss much.”

“Can he keep his mouth shut?”

“He never keeps his mouth shut. He’s always talking, but that’s part of his garrulous and harmless old man façade. I have a feeling he knows a lot of secrets. He and Heks both work at being underestimated, but I think they possess greater power than everyone else put together.

“You know them better than I do. I trust you to do what you think is best. You can fill me in when I return. Just keep an eye on her for me, will you?”

“Of course. If something happens to her the wild cannot survive, even if we can repair the Yrtym. You and she are essential, and I’m getting very tired.”

“Will you be all right if I leave you first thing in the morning?”

“Yes. I have my bow.” Her voice sounded grim in the dark.

“Get as far away as you can tomorrow.”

“I will.”

They were silent then. He felt Artemis turn on her side, facing away from him. She pressed up against his back for warmth.

“Chattan?”

“Mmm?”

“Do you think this is the end?”

“If it is, it’s also a beginning.”

He felt her slide into sleep and her breathing deepened. He lay quietly, his eyes fixed on the broken door. The night was still and peaceful. He wondered if the pack roamed somewhere in the cold dark, or if they, too, slept.

He closed his eyes.

HEKS

“So, Seren’s on his way here to play the hero and fix Rowan Gate,” Ash said. “We expect Clarissa won’t be far behind, if she can find a way to come through the portal herself.”

“It won’t please him to find Rowan Gate repaired without him,” Heks said.

They talked in what Heks thought of as her cave. In fact, it was an underground home, dug out of the hillside at Rowan Tree with Gwelda’s help. Heks, who never had a home entirely of her own before, had known exactly what she wanted.

The dwelling consisted of one room extending fifteen feet into the hillside. The front of the house, stretching twenty feet, looked south across the river. Two thick columns supported the grassy roof. Except for the tell-tale stone chimney, the place was invisible from the hill above.

It was Heks’s kingdom, and Ash and Beatrice felt perfectly at home in it. They had spent the day roosting in the dimmest corner at the back. Now, dusk thickened into night and waning Noola rose. The next new moon would usher in Imbolc.

A fire flickering in the stone fireplace provided the only illumination. Ash and Heks had both eaten. Heks and Beatrice had been introduced, and Heks told them about her journey home from Yggdrasil with Eurydice, Gwelda’s arrival and the subsequent tension in Rowan Tree, the departure of Chattan and Artemis and the group helping Gwelda build a place for herself in the Rusalka’s birch wood.

“Do you think the problems in the community and the death of Gwelda’s husband are connected to the Yrtym?” Beatrice asked Heks.

“I don’t know. It feels as though it must all be connected, but I can’t see how,” said Heks. “We’ve gotten along well at Rowan Tree until recently. The only new people are Chattan and Mingan. Chattan lives with Kunik, and Kunik is one of Rowan Tree’s leaders. I don’t think he’d be so friendly with a troublemaker. Mingan is staying with Gabriel. That old man gossips ceaselessly about what doesn’t matter, but he talks to everyone and he doesn’t miss much. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s keeping an eye on Mingan.”

“Have you talked to him?”

“Not yet. We’ve been busy trying to get Gwelda settled, and I’ve been seeing her every day to treat her hand. She had a bad burn, but it’s healing. As soon as Gwelda has a roof over her head, we need to regroup. David won’t be happy until he -- or some other man he can keep under his thumb -- leads the community rather than Maria. Eurydice is concerned about Rowan Gate, of course. Rose Red is upset about Gwelda and her oak tree. The White Stag’s sacrifice at Baba Yaga’s Samhain ritual hit Rosie hard, too. She’s too sensitive for her own good.”

“Seren is not going to help matters,” said Ash.

“Just what we need — a pair of star-crossed lovers,” said Heks sourly.

“Not a pair,” said Beatrice. “The only star-crossed lover is Clarissa. Seren has another agenda. It will be interesting to see how everyone reacts to his demands for attention.”

“Rapunzel hopes Clarissa will see him more clearly when he has to share the spotlight,” said Ash. “He doesn’t know you and Eurydice are here, and he told Clarissa about what happened at Yggdrasil, casting himself as the star. He made it into quite a story.”

“We must be sure to invite him to tell us that story,” said Heks. “I’d like to hear it.”

“If Clarissa arrives, it means Rowan Gate is at least partially repaired,” Beatrice pointed out, “and the bathhouse portal as well.”

“Eurydice and Kunik are working on our portal,” said Heks. “I’d like to know what’s happening in Baba Yaga’s birch wood. Can she and the Rusalka repair the bathhouse portal, at least enough to use? Opening the portals appears to have something to do with connection and working together. Rumpelstiltskin left through the portal at the base of Yggdrasil after we spun new beginnings out of endings, and the Rusalka passed through Rowan Gate with the help of the whole community, but I don’t think we can count on Rowan Tree coming together like that now.”

“Perhaps Ash and I can visit the Rusalka,” said Beatrice.

“I haven’t been to their birch wood,” said Ash.

“One of the Rusalka shape shifts into a bat,” said Heks. “Her name is Izolda.”

“I was going to visit Mirmir next,” said Ash, “or try to find Rumpelstiltskin. But maybe we should go to the birch wood instead.”

CHAPTER 12

VASILISA

Vasilisa began using the bathhouse again with a renewed sense of purpose. If what Sofiya and the Rusalka suspected was true, her presence in the birch wood was not useless. She wasn’t an outsider, but part of a network that fed the portal, and perhaps even the Yrtym. She continued her winter walks in the forest, though not as driven by doubt and restlessness, and every three days she spent a couple of hours soaking up the steamy heat and refreshing herself in the plunge pool. She made no effort to either avoid or encounter the Rusalka or Morfran, but rarely found the bathhouse and pool empty.

In the plunge pool she flowed easily into her mermaid shape. She’d grown up believing herself to be entirely human and had only recently discovered her true father was not a poor peasant but a sea king, Marceau, who was also Morfran’s grandfather.

Vasilisa wasn’t a shapeshifter, although she’d spent some months as a frog after Baba Yaga enchanted her. After meeting Marceau, she’d learned to transform her two legs into a muscular tail, and thus discovered a new world and new family in the sea.

Eventually, she’d traveled through the bathhouse portal to the birch wood where Morfran lived with his mate, Sofiya, and the rest of the Rusalka, and Baba Yaga kept a home base.

Since the Rusalka had restricted the use of the bathhouse at Samhain, she’d missed the water, and she knew Morfran had, too. Now, once again returning to the sensual ritual of steam and heat and cold water, she felt grateful.

One afternoon she found Sofiya and Morfran lying on the wooden shelves, the steam-scented air heavy with the smell of birch oil, which the Rusalka used for any physical ache, pain or injury. Morfran had been born with a twisted hip and it frequently pained him, especially in cold weather. Vasilisa greeted them, fed the stove, poured water on the hot rocks and stretched out naked on an unoccupied shelf.

For some time, she relaxed and dozed, and then, feeling suddenly stifled in the hot, heavy air, she stepped out the narrow door to the plunge pool. She drank icy water from a bucket outside the steam room door and slid into the pool.

The shock of the cold water on her overheated body made her glow with exhilaration and woke her thoroughly. She dove into the bottomless pool, her powerful tail thrusting her downward, and suddenly felt the space around her widen. Light filtered down from above her, not the dim bathhouse light, but the white light of a winter afternoon.

She’d swum through the portal into the sea.

For a moment she hung, suspended in the water. Should she go back and tell Sofiya and Morfran? Could she go back through? Or should she find Marceau, discover what was happening in the sea and tell him about the birch wood portal?

She decided to find Marceau. Sofiya and Morfran would understand her disappearance could only mean the portal was functioning, and perhaps bringing merfolk back through it would strengthen it still more.

She set out for Marceau’s home, filled with pleasure at seeing her new family again. As she swam, the light overhead faded and night blanketed the sea. Once or twice, she paused and surfaced, treading water and gazing at the stars.

At last she saw ahead the muted underwater lights marking a large cluster of merfolk habitations, surrounded by undersea gardens. She swam straight to Marceau’s house and banged on the door with a knocker shaped like an anchor.

The next moment, she found herself in Marceau’s sinewy scarred arms, his grizzled hair rough against her cheek. “Vasilisa!” He drew her inside and shut the door with a thrust of his tail.

The merfolk settlement had taken advantage of an old shipwreck in water shallow enough to allow filtered sunlight to reach the sea floor. The wreck had broken into two pieces and come to rest on its side, and the merfolk used its bones to enclose separate, distinct areas, private but clustered together. Their living space consisted of one or two rooms. They crafted platforms for relaxing together and sleeping.

“’Lisa!” A young merwoman flung her arms around Vasilisa. Bewildered, Vasilisa gently withdrew herself from the embrace.

“Clarissa? Is it really you?”

“It’s me!” Clarissa’s abalone eyes gleamed with pleasure. Her hair floated in careless disarray around her head and shoulders, streaked blond and brown. Since Vasilisa had seen her, she’d left the last of her gawky adolescence and blossomed into lovely femalehood.

“It’s so good to see you, ‘Lisa!”

“And you. I hardly recognized you. How is Chris? Is your father here?”

Clarissa’s smile dimmed. “My father is dead.”

“Oh, Clarissa.” Vasilisa reached out for her and held her close, rocking. Gentle, dreamy Irvin, so kind and sensitive, dead. Looking over Clarissa’s shoulder, she saw Marceau watching them affectionately.

Another man watched them as well, a handsome man with dark hair, olive skin and a sensual mouth above a strong, square chin. Muscle sculpted his thick body and his skin was heavily scarred. He caught her eye and gave her a crooked smile, full of mischief and frank admiration.

Vasilisa returned the smile with more warmth than she meant to. The stranger was powerfully attractive. Clarissa pulled herself from Vasilisa’s arms, her silvery eyes very bright.

“It’s all right,” she said with determination. “It’s getting better now. Oh, Vasilisa, I have so much to tell you!”

“I want to hear about it,” Vasilisa said, smiling into her eyes. She looked at Marceau. “That’s why I’m here, to exchange news.”

“Your timing is excellent,” said the strange merman. “Allow me to introduce myself.”

Vasilisa, turning her attention back to him, received a swift impression of a long-handled trident, each tine tipped with a shark’s tooth, leaning against a nearby wall, and noted for the first time the stranger’s tail, covered with copper scales, touched in places with green verdigris. The effect of the warm burnished copper rippled with shades of green and blue was striking, unlike anything she’d ever seen before, though she’d heard of such a tail.

She inclined her head respectfully. “My Lord Poseidon,” she said.

“My daughter, Lord,” said Marceau, “Vasilisa.”

“Vasilisa the Wise,” said Poseidon. “I’m honored to meet you. No need to bow, my dear, and stop calling me Lord,” he said irritably to Marceau. “You know I hate it!”

Marceau grinned unrepentantly. Poseidon scowled at him, but his dark eyes danced with amusement. He turned back to Vasilisa. “My friends,” he said with great dignity, “call me Posey.”

Clarissa giggled.

When everyone had made themselves comfortable, Marceau called the meeting to order.

“Where have you come from, ‘Lisa?”

“The bathhouse portal in the birch wood.”

“And Clarissa has come from a lighthouse at the sea’s edge, whose keeper is the witch Rapunzel. Posey has been visiting his brother and Persephone in Hades, as well as traveling all over our kingdom. We have much to tell and hear.”

Poseidon began. Vasilisa listened with consternation as he described the sea withdrawing from the land in many places, along with rising water temperatures due to sudden and unprecedented volcanic activity on land and underwater.

“New volcanic vents are appearing in the sea bed. Hydrothermal vents are generally areas of great biodiversity and support many kinds of life, but so many are opening the water temperature is increasing too fast. It’s killing the organisms at the base of the food chain, and, we think, damaging the Yrtym, which grows like an invisible net in all water, both salt and fresh. The Yrtym is conscious; it communicates, moves nutrients back and forth, and shares information, but as it becomes disrupted it’s unable to function well and the entire system is affected.”

“Why is the sea withdrawing from the land?” asked Vasilisa.

“We don’t know, except it seems many connections are disrupted or broken. The shore is a threshold place, rather like the portals, and whatever is happening appears to attack points of connection. It’s in my mind to visit some of the other sea guardians, Sedna, for example, and see what she knows.”

“Sedna?” asked Clarissa.

“She’s a sea goddess, old and very powerful, and lives in the farthest northern places. She’s not friendly and generally I leave her alone, but given Webbd’s current state, I intend to check in with her. Perhaps she’s unaffected. We’re not sure how widespread the problems are.”

“What about the volcanic activity?” Vasilisa asked.

Poseidon frowned and looked away. “I may have an idea about that,” he said with reluctance. “I’m not sure, and I don’t want to talk about it right now.”

Marceau gave him a level look. “Do you think it can be stopped?”

“I tell you, I’m not sure!” Poseidon snapped.

“What’s the news from Hades?” Marceau inquired, ignoring the tense moment. “That’s certainly a threshold place.”

“It is. Persephone and Hades tell me volcanic activity affects them, too. Even they can’t tell the extent of Hades’ kingdom, but the dead speak of tunnel and cavern collapses, and the River Styx is blocked by an avalanche of rock and lava. I can still reach Hades, but it’s necessary to travel overland for some distance, and the river is down to a trickle. Hades’s boatman spends his time playing marbles now, as his boat is grounded. Also, many of the dead who are ready to move on are unable to, so the Underworld is becoming increasingly congested and chaotic. The flow of transformation from one thing to another is interrupted. Hades and Persephone are doing their best, but they’re beginning to get overwhelmed.”

Crypt skull image by Craig Bak from Pixabay

“Playing marbles, did you say?” asked Vasilisa, incredulous.

“Taught him myself,” said Poseidon, with modest pride.

“My observations and concerns are the same as Posey’s,” said Marceau. “On every side I hear reports of the sea withdrawing from the land, catastrophic volcanic activity and earthquakes, and sea life sickening or dying. The bathhouse portal hasn’t worked for weeks, so we’ve been cut off from the Rusalka and you and Morfran. Clarissa brings me news from the land, but I’ll let her tell you herself.”

Clarissa related the death of Irvin, Rapunzel and Persephone’s arrival to the lighthouse, and the visits of Ginger and Heks. She mentioned Cerus, and Poseidon exclaimed, “I’d forgotten to mention the stars. The night sky is changing, the constellations disappearing or moving. Navigation grows difficult. The movement of water away from land causes rising sea levels and changing currents.”

“Cerus fell out of the night sky?” said Vasilisa. “I’d no idea the problem was so big!”

“Delphinus saved someone else, too,” said Clarissa eagerly, eyes and cheeks glowing. “He rescued Seren and brought him to the lighthouse!” She looked eagerly from face to face, clearly expecting excitement and awe.

“Seren,” Poseidon mused, searching his memory. “Ah, yes, the child Ceridwen gave to the sea until his time arrived. Delphinus protected him in his magical coracle and steered him to his foster family when the time was right. He was the child with the white light shining around his brow.”

“He’s the greatest poet and musician who ever lived,” said Clarissa worshipfully. “No one can tell stories like he can. That’s why I’m here. Seren has been mending portals on land, and he’s gone to a place called Rowan Tree. Their portal has closed. I couldn’t travel overland with him and be so far away from water, but Rapunzel said if I could use the bathhouse portal it connects to Rowan Gate and then I could help Seren. I know what he likes, and I know what he needs. I can help him so he can put his energy into repairing the portal.”

Privately, Vasilisa doubted one young man, no matter how talented, possessed the ability to repair all the portals.

“Seren was one of the company at Yggdrasil who helped the Norns,” said Poseidon. “Odin mentioned him.”

“He told me,” said Clarissa. “He made a new story out of it, how he played the sound of the drums and the horn and wove together prayer, lament and chant so the Norns could spin Yrtym and create new beginnings. I wish I’d been there! That’s what he’s going to do at Rowan Tree.”

Vasilisa saw Marceau and Poseidon exchange the merest flick of a glance and smoothly changed the subject.

“I’ve news from the Rusalka and the birch wood,” she said and proceeded to describe the Samhain ritual and everything that had happened since.

“So, now it appears the portal did respond to Morfran and me using the bathhouse again,” she finished. “When I was in the plunge pool it opened and let me through after weeks of being closed.” She addressed Marceau. “I hoped you’d travel back with me so we can try to go back through from this side. Maybe the more people who use it, the stronger it will get.”

“We’ll take Clarissa with us,” said Marceau.

“I’ll come, too,” said Poseidon. “I’d like to see the birch wood and bathhouse for myself, as well as old Baba Yaga. Perhaps she’ll invite me to tea!”

Marceau shook his head at him. “Better you than me, my friend. With the White Stag gone,” he asked Vasilisa, “how will the Rusalka ensure the fertility cycle?”

“They’re worried about that,” she replied. “Sofiya says they hope the new Sacred Consort will appear. If not, they’ll choose animal mates and hope for the best, but the birch wood isn’t healthy. None of the forests are, even Yggdrasil, as you know.”

“What will happen?” asked Clarissa fearfully. “Will everything die?”

“Where there’s life, there’s hope,” said Marceau firmly, and put an arm around her. “Perhaps the Rusalka know a way to help the Yrtym and the portals, and maybe your Seren can help, as well.”

Clarissa’s strained look evaporated and she glowed at Marceau’s reference to ‘her Seren.’

CLARISSA

As Clarissa rose to the surface, propelling herself with her tail, she sensed narrowing walls around her. Flickering orange light shining somewhere above beckoned her. Vasilisa swam beside her, clasping her hand, and Marceau on her other side. There were others in the water. First, she only sensed movement, but as they swam up and the light increased, she could see merfolk tails, and then pale skin above the tails, and then her head broke the surface in a rush of bubbles and froth.

She found herself in a pool about twenty feet in diameter, enclosed by four wooden walls and a roof. After the underwater silence, the sounds of water and talk seemed noisy. In a corner a familiar skull perched on a long staff, glowing orange and red with fiery light.

“Vasilisa! The portal is opened, then?”

“For now,” said Vasilisa, breathless and smiling. She addressed a woman with long dark hair floating like a cape around her bare shoulders. “I brought some friends.”

“So I see. You’re most welcome, Lord Poseidon, and you, Marceau. Varvara, go tell the others we have guests. Morfran will want to greet his grandfather.”

One of the Rusalka left the pool, regained her human form and disappeared through a narrow wooden door, closing it behind her. Near the door, on the floor, sat a wooden bucket and dipper.

Poseidon and Marceau heaved themselves out of the pool with identical movements of their strong arms and shoulders, turning neatly so they sat with their tails still dangling in the cold water. Valeria and two other Rusalka also clambered out of the pool. Poseidon handed his trident to Valeria and she leaned it against the wall near the fiery skull.

“This is Clarissa,” said Marceau, helping her exit the pool. “She’s one of us and also half human. She’s a friend of Vasilisa’s and under my care.”

“You, most of all, are welcome,” said Valeria. “We need a maiden for our Imbolc ritual.”

Clarissa felt both embarrassed and warmed. To be needed in this magical place by the powerful Rusalka restored confidence she didn’t know she’d begun to lose until it returned.

“Thank you,” she said sincerely, and wondered uneasily what role she was expected to play as a maiden, and how long it would take. She must get to Rowan Tree and back to Seren!

She sat close to Marceau, watching and listening while other Rusalka came through the narrow door, along with Vasilisa’s nephew, Morfran, and his Rusalka mate, Sofiya. She envied Poseidon his poise. His charm, humility, good humor and confidence gave him a magnetic quality, and he soon had everyone laughing and relaxed, effortlessly remembering names and relationships.

She was here, in the Rusalka’s birch wood. The bathhouse portal had let them through. Would she be able to go through it again and reach Rowan Gate? Was Seren there yet? Perhaps she would be there waiting for him when he arrived! She imagined his warm delight at finding her, his embrace, the feel of his lips on hers. Perhaps away from the lighthouse and Rapunzel, in a new place where they were obviously a couple, they would consummate their relationship. If what the Rusalka suspected was true, and the portals responded to unity and connection, their physical relationship might even be part of the repair Rowan Gate needed. Her love for Seren felt strong enough to open any number of blocked portals.

He would understand she was not passive, but strong and determined, a fit mate for him. She was capable of going out into the world and having her own adventures, taking her own journeys. He’d be delighted with her, proud of her.

A yawn made her eyes water, and brought her back to the present. She felt cold and tired. Marceau pulled her closer to his side.

Vasilisa observed the yawn. “It’s been a long day,” she said to the Rusalka. “I’ll give Clarissa, Marceau and Poseidon a place for the night and we can talk again in the morning.”

“No need,” said Poseidon easily. “I prefer to spend the night underwater. I’ll stay here. You take Marceau and Clarissa with you.”

The Rusalka provided the visitors with linen tunics and fur-lined capes. Vasilisa retrieved her own clothing from a row of hooks inside the bathhouse door, and they went out together into a cold, still night, their footsteps noisy in the crusty snow.

Vasilisa led them to a crude log cabin with a galley kitchen, a squat black woodstove radiating gentle heat from a banked fire, and a single room furnished with a table, stools and a heap of animal skins and blankets.

Gratefully, Clarissa lay down on a pad made from a folded wool blanket and pulled a heavy cover of pieced-together wolfskins over herself. She dove into sleep as though diving into a wave, embracing it like a lover, Marceau and Vasilisa’s quiet conversation a fading murmur in her ears.

The next morning, over crusty rye bread, bacon and innumerable cups of strong tea, Clarissa learned more about the Imbolc ritual Valeria had spoken of. She was relieved to find the ritual would take place the following day. Rapunzel had said it would take at least a week for Seren to reach Rowan Tree, and it had only been three days since he left the lighthouse.

Vasilisa, with the Rusalka’s permission, shared with Marceau and Clarissa their role as fertility spirits and the need for the new Sacred Consort. She also spoke of Baba Yaga.

Marceau was familiar with the Mother of Witches, who also made appearances in the sea as the Sea Witch. It had been the Baba who helped his daughter, Marella, follow her love for a human onto land. Marceau, sitting cross-legged on a wolfskin, told the story with passion and feeling, captivating Clarissa.

“May I tell your story?” she asked when he finished.

The sadness in his face brightened. “Of course. In that way, Marella won’t be forgotten.”

Gently, Vasilisa led them back to the subject of Baba Yaga.

“This birch wood is her home base, and it’s she who will oversee the Imbolc ritual. She knows of your arrival.”

“What will I have to do?” Clarissa asked, feeling nervous.

“The ritual consists of two parts. Tonight, we’ll dance together to welcome the return of the Maiden and raise power for her. Tomorrow night the fertility ritual takes place, but you, Marceau and I won’t be involved in that.

“I know about dance,” said Clarissa, feeling relieved. “I’ve danced with Persephone and Rapunzel and Ginger.”

“That’s all you have to do,” said Vasilisa. “Baba Yaga will be there, but you mustn’t let her intimidate you. She appreciates people who stand up to her, though she’ll never admit it. Be polite and respectful, but don’t take anything she says too much to heart. She possesses great power and wisdom and no tolerance for weakness or silliness. She’ll try to hurt your feelings and embarrass you.”

“What about today?” asked Marceau.

“Today we prepare for the dance. We’ll cleanse in the bathhouse and plunge pool, and you can spend time in the water if you like. If you dive deep enough you can find plenty of fish for food, or you can eat with me. We’ll visit with the others and share information. The Rusalka want to speak at length with you and Poseidon. Baba Yaga is here. Her house on chicken legs is in the clearing where the Rusalka dance in the winter, though lately we haven’t danced because of all the trouble. Tonight will be important, because it signals renewed collaboration between merfolk, human and Rusalka, in addition to celebrating Imbolc.”

After breakfast, Marceau returned to the bathhouse and Vasilisa took Clarissa out into the birch wood.

Snow fell in wet, feathery flakes through the humid, still air. Columns of sentinel birches marched in every direction, their slim black and white bodies fading gracefully into the thick snow. The woods felt alive and watchful to Clarissa. Horizontal black markings on the white trunks looked like eyes, and they followed her as she and Vasilisa wound between them.

“There’s Baba Yaga’s house,” said Vasilisa in a low voice, pointing.

The house on chicken legs stood motionless and dreamlike in the hushed snow, its windows blank. It was situated at the end of a large oval clearing.

“That clearing is where we dance. There’s a fire pit, but the snow has covered it.”

“Will we dance in the snow?”

“Baba Yaga will take care of it.”

They turned and started back. It snowed so hard their footprints were already filling in.

“It’s so lonely and wild,” said Clarissa.

“Yes. It’s a place of deep invisible power. I can’t see it or hear it, but it hums in my bones. Wait until you see it in the dark. Dancing with the Rusalka is not like dancing with anyone else. Their shapes flicker, flowing between creature and human. When I dance with them, I am utterly free. Nothing I can be is ugly or shameful. Every feeling, every expression and movement and desire is powerful and sacred.”

“Vasilisa?”

“Yes?”

“Do some people think desire is unattractive?”

“Are you talking about sexual desire?” Vasilisa kept her tone casual.

“Yes.”

“I think some humans do. Some humans are confused about sex. They make social rules about what’s attractive and appropriate, what it means to be male or female.”

“That’s what my mother’s like! She’s always talking about appropriate behavior and following God’s rules to stay safe.”

“Yes. Some people are fearful about living freely and naturally. They think it’s dangerous. The problem is, different people believe in different rules. The merfolk’s attitude is much simpler. You grow up honoring your bodies and sexuality. The sea holds and touches you from birth. Your bodies ensure sexual expression can only occur with mutual consent. Passion and desire are natural feelings with no shame or restriction attached to them. I envy you, growing up like that.”

“Did you know some humans say merfolk are neither male nor female because of our tails? And we’re passionless?”

“I have heard that. Silly, isn’t it? Where do they think merchildren come from?”

“Isn’t all life based on a balance of male and female power? That’s what I learned.”

“That’s right.”

“Some people don’t know that?”

“Some people are so busy with their rules, trying to take power away from others, or their own self-hatred or fear, they lose track of the big picture, the sacred dichotomy of male and female biology, each distinct, each equally necessary and powerful.”

“Why do people hate themselves?”

“Because they’re deeply wounded or confused. Humans create different rules for men and women, and that causes problems. You fully inhabit and share the power and body you were born into. Not everyone does. Look at the Dvorgs. Some of the old conservative Dvorgs hate all women on principle. They despise female energy of any kind. There are no female Dvorgs.”

“How do they make children?”

“It appears their children grow in underground nurseries. I don’t know much about it, but I’m certain female energy enters into the process somewhere.”

“What do they eat?”

Vasilisa laughed. “An excellent question! They eat plants and animals, like the rest of us.”

“But plants and animals exist because of male and female energy. Don’t they know?”

“They choose not to know.”

Clarissa shook her head. “I don’t understand why people make things so complicated.”

“Relationships are complicated, and sexual expression is part of adult relationships.”

Vasilisa’s little cabin became visible through the curtain of falling snow.

“Here we are. Shall we eat something, and then go to the bathhouse?”

“Yes. Will the Rusalka be there?”

“Probably, at least some of them.”

“They scare me a little.”

“I know what you mean. They’re wise, though. They know a great deal about male and female energies and how they work together. They must, as fertility spirits. Talk to Sofiya. She’s Morfran’s mate, the one who shifts into an owl.”

As Vasilisa pushed open the bathhouse door, the snow turned to rain, changing the lovely, feathery coating to sodden slush. Clarissa and Vasilisa shed their clothes in the anteroom, wrapped themselves in linen towels, and opened the door to the sauna. Sofiya and Valeria were the only ones there, and the nervous knot in Clarissa’s stomach loosened. Vasilisa lay down on one end of the wooden shelf Valeria stretched out on, and Clarissa tentatively settled down on the same shelf as Sofiya, making herself as inconspicuous as possible. Nudity didn’t bother her, either her own or the other women’s, but the Rusalka intimidated her, as did her maiden status. She was the youngest and least experienced, and felt like an ignorant child tolerated by a group of adults. She longed for their confident sensuality and wisdom.

The little room was heavy with steamy heat, scented soothingly with something light and flowery. Gradually, the heat relaxed her tension and she closed her eyes and breathed, aware of the silky steam on her skin and the hard wooden boards beneath her. Someone moved, but she felt too languorous to open her eyes. She heard water being scooped from a bucket and then sizzling and spitting as it trickled onto the hot rocks on the stove. Then someone drew near and she opened her eyes.

Sofiya smiled, her round golden eyes glowing in the dim little room. She held a stoppered bottle in her hand.

“We use lavender to honor the Sacred Maiden.” She spoke quietly. “We’ve scented the steam with it and mixed it with oil. Morfran’s hip troubles him sometimes and I massage it for him. Would you like me to rub you with it?” She unstoppered the bottle and held to Clarissa’s nose.

“Mmm,” said Clarissa. “I like that! I don’t know anything about perfumes.”

“Of course not, living in the sea,” Sofiya said. “This is better than perfume. It’s the essential oil of the lavender plant, both healing and relaxing. I use birch oil on Morfran, because that’s good for aches and pains. Will you lie on your stomach?”

Clarissa complied, and felt Sofiya run her hands down her back from neck to buttocks, as though introducing her touch. The hands went away briefly and then returned, slippery with oil.

“I’ve used birch oil before on a … friend.”

“Yes?” The scent of lavender wrapped Clarissa in steamy arms and the intimate touch released grief she didn’t know she carried.

Among the merfolk, touch provided constant connection and affection, and Clarissa had been hugged and held all her life by her own people, but humans were less free with touch and during her time at the lighthouse she’d grown hungrier and hungrier for it. Seren had fully ignited her sexuality, and his physical withdrawal and withholding made her wonder, for the first time, if something was wrong with her. Perhaps she was unattractive, at least by human standards. Perhaps her mother was right, and Seren would like her better if she followed at least some human rules. Perhaps – the thought made her wince – he would like her better if she acted more like her mother.

Sofiya’s touch, sure, confident and skilled, brought tears that eased away some of her heartache. She’d longed for the nurturing touch of a woman without knowing it.

Sofiya took no notice of her tears and Clarissa let them roll down her cheek and wet the boards. She drifted, comforted and relaxed, while Sofiya worked on her neck, back, buttocks and the back of her legs, turning sleepily onto her back when requested and surrendering her arms, hands and fingers. As Sofiya worked down to her legs, Clarissa realized they were alone. Valeria and Vasilisa must have gone to the plunge pool.

“Sofiya?”

“Yes?”

“What am I supposed to do tonight?”

“Nothing but be yourself and share your dance.”

“That’s all?”

“That’s all. You’re the strongest maiden among us. Each of us carry a maiden, a mother and a crone, including you, but your maiden strength is at its apex and shines bright with young female energy. The Maiden contains enormous primitive power, unchanneled and undisciplined, yet to be discovered and harnessed. It’s the essence of fertility, that unfettered, chaotic passion. We Rusalka are deeply troubled about Imbolc and our roles in the next cycle’s fertility.”

“The Sacred Consort is dead.”

“Yes, and not only that. We feel the breakdown and disconnection around us in the death of the forest and the blocked portal. You give us hope again. You came through the portal, which gives us assurance repair is possible, and you arrived just in time to fill the most important role in the Imbolc ritual, one none of us here could fill. You are both blessing and gift, and we’re grateful.”

Sofiya had been working on the sole of Clarissa’s right foot. She wiped it with the corner of a linen towel before moving to the left.

“I’m nearly finished. Then you must drink. It’s not good to lie in the heat too long without replenishing.”

“I want to swim anyway. Suddenly I feel smothered.”

I set out a bottle of lavender shampoo for your hair, in case you want to wash it. There’s plenty of time. Swim for a while and cool off. Sleep the next time you’re in here.”

“I don’t have any clothes to dance in.”

“Don’t worry. We Rusalka are famous for our linen and embroidery. We’ll provide you with a robe.”

“Will it be warm enough?”

“It will. Mother Yaga will take care of that.”

ASH

The last thing Ash expected when he and Beatrice arrived in the Rusalka’s birch wood in the hour before dawn was to become part of a fertility ritual.

They could not enter the bathhouse, so he hung upside down near the door and waited for someone to enter or leave, notice him, and hopefully summon Izolda.

It was cold. Beatrice huddled against Ash’s chest and he covered her protectively with a wing. The wooden wall of the bathhouse radiated a faint heat, and Ash pressed himself against it as they waited, absorbing what warmth he could.

It wasn’t a long wait. An owl flew silently down to perch on a tree near the bathhouse, golden-eyed and dressed in cream, brown and grey feathers. She preened for a moment, straightening her feathers, then drifted soundlessly to the ground and became a woman, naked and retaining her round amber eyes. As she opened the bathhouse door, letting out a draft of warm air, Ash squeaked and stretched out a wing to catch her attention. She looked up, her round pupils enlarging, and entered the building, shutting the door behind her.

Ash and Beatrice waited. After a few minutes, a figure in white linen robes emerged, turning to look up into the dim shadows below the roof with eyes as dark as Ash’s own. Ash saw a small woman with dense brown hair.

“Are you Izolda?”

“I am.”

“I’m Ash, and I brought a friend with me, Beatrice.” Beatrice cautiously parted Ash’s fur and poked out her black head, waving her antennae. “We’ve come from Heks, and from the Norns and Mirmir, too, I suppose. And from Rapunzel. I think you know her.”

“You’re cold. Will you come into the bathhouse? We can talk there.”

Ash flew down, gripping Izolda’s robe collar with his feet. Inside the door was a small room with a wooden bench under pegs along one wall. A black iron stove jutted out from an inside wall, radiating heat. Izolda shed her robe, cupped Ash in her hand and opened another door, revealing a room lined with tiers of wooden shelves. The atmosphere was hot and steamy and smelled of lavender, though the room was empty. Opening a third door, Izolda entered a large room containing a plunge pool, in which several sleek heads bobbed. Here the roof loomed higher than that of the rest of the building. Dawn light came through two high windows and a lit lantern sat in a corner on a bench next to a neat pile of folded linen towels.

Ash heard male and female voices as those in the plunge pool talked together. No one took any notice of Izolda or her companions.

She nudged Ash onto a wooden peg in the wall above the bench, from which he hung upside down, and made herself comfortable on the bench.

“Now, tell me why you have come,” she said.

Ash, with help from Beatrice, told the Rusalka about Rowan Tree, Rapunzel’s lighthouse and recent events at Yggdrasil. Izolda listened attentively, asking no questions and making no comments until Ash wound down.

“Clarissa is here,” she said. “She arrived just in time to join us in our Imbolc ritual as the Maiden. Tonight we dance, raising power for the strengthening light and the Maiden’s return.”

“Your portal is repaired, then?” asked Beatrice.

“We don’t know to what degree it’s repaired,” said Izolda. “It allowed Vasilisa, one of our friends, to go through into the sea and return with Clarissa, Lord Poseidon and another sea king, kin to Vasilisa and Morfran and friend and guardian of Clarissa. As they discovered at Rowan Tree and Yggdrasil, the portals appear to function when powered by the connection of those using them. When we restricted this portal to Rusalka only, it remained closed. Opening the bathhouse to the half-humans Morfran and Vasilisa, and perhaps to the Dwarve, Rumpelstiltskin, may have opened the portal.”

“So, Clarissa will now try to go through this portal and access Rowan Gate,” said Ash.

“That is her intention.”

Ash yawned widely.

“You can sleep here,” said Izolda. You’ll be quite safe and sheltered, and it’s warmer in here than outside.”

“I’m hungry,” said Beatrice. “Could you direct me to a dead or dying tree? I could spend the day eating and rejoin Ash tonight.”

“Certainly,” said Izolda. “How do you eat in the wintertime?” she asked Ash.

“I eat Beatrice,” said Ash, straight-faced.

Beatrice giggled at Izolda’s surprised expression. “Rapunzel enchanted me,” she explained. “Ash can eat me as many times as he wants without taking my life. That’s how it’s possible for us to collect and carry news from place to place during the winter.”

“Remarkable,” said Izolda. She paused for a moment, observing the inhabitants of the plunge pool as they talked. Ash, watching her, admired her jaw’s delicate modeling and the curve of her dark brow.

As though coming to a decision, she turned back to him. “We Rusalka are fertility spirits,” she said. “The birch woods and rye and poppy fields are under our particular care. Imbolc begins a new cycle of growth, and with the sacrifice of Cerunmos at Samhain we fear this year there will be no Sacred Consort. We’re determined to carry on with our Imbolc ritual as best we can, but we fear our ability to ensure the next cycle’s health. The birch forest sickens, we feel disconnection everywhere, and the Horned King is dead. Then Clarissa arrived through a portal we thought closed, a true maiden. Her appearance at this time gives us new hope. Tonight, she’ll add her power to ours in dance.”

“I’d like to see that,” said Beatrice.

“So you shall. Few have seen the Rusalka dance, as it is a sacred practice. But if we have learned anything, it’s that connection works better than disconnection.”

“Thank you,” said Beatrice.

“During this time, we Rusalka participate in union with Cerunmos in his human aspect, but we also seek mates among the creatures whose forms we take.”

Ash, beginning to suspect where she was going with this, felt his face grow hot.

“It is not my time now, in midwinter, to seek a mate among the winged shadows,” said Izolda, and she stretched out her arms, pale-skinned in the dim dawn light. As Ash watched, the arms became membranous wings stretched on a delicate boney scaffold. “But would you consider returning to me in the summer as my mate, so we might perpetuate the life of our kind?”

Ash, feeling elated and humbled at the same time, said, “I’d be honored.”

“Good. Thank you. I’ll leave you to sleep now, and I’ll take Beatrice to a place where she can shelter, rest and eat during the day. We’ll talk again, but now you’re tired and my sisters and I must prepare for Imbolc.”

As Beatrice crawled onto Izolda’s hand, the beetle said, “I don’t suppose there are any male Rusalka who take the form of bark beetles?”

“No,” said Izolda. “I’m sorry.”

“I didn’t think so,” said Beatrice wistfully.

As they left the plunge pool, Ash flitted up and found a convenient rafter in the shadows from which to roost.

CHATTAN

Chattan parted from Artemis in an icy pink dawn. She would return to Rowan Tree and he set out for Baba Yaga’s birch forest and the Rusalka. He traveled swiftly, pausing only to eat a snowshoe hare that crossed his path and sleep for an hour or two. As he moved north, the mixed hardwood forest changed gradually to birch. It began to snow thickly in wet, sticky flakes, soaking his outer coat. He gloried in it, moving soundlessly and invisibly through the muffled winter landscape. At midday the snow turned to rain, and the fairytale woods became drenched and sodden. Gradually, the heavy sky lightened and the rain stopped. The humid air, smelling vaguely of the sea, freshened and the temperature dropped. Slush froze into lumps under his feet. A thin wind nipped with sharp teeth, rattling ice-coated branches overhead.

As the weary sun fell below the horizon, leaving a clear sky aching with cold, Chattan sat under a spruce’s ice-laden drooping branches and surveyed a clearing guarded by a hut on a pair of towering chicken legs. Smoke came from the chimney and the windows, with arched tops on either side of the door, glared with orange light like malevolent eyes. Long wooly scarves in an eye-watering turquoise and purple pattern wrapped the chicken legs.

In the clearing a stone ring surrounded a shallow dimple, several feet wide, in which a bonfire burned. The wood cracked and popped in the furious flames as though desert-dry, and it appeared the fire had burned for hours. The ground in the clearing was free of snow, slush and ice, carpeted roughly in winter-sere grasses.

Chattan’s sensitive ears filled with the subtle sounds of the woods, the wind’s susurration and the chiming icy twigs, the fire’s crackle, the skritch of a small animal moving in the forest. He also heard voices, female voices, coming closer, and the cold air brought him the scent of women, women who smelled of saltwater and flesh, something fresh and flowery and also of animals. He caught the rich smell of pig; a fleeting impression of raptor; a dry, sunbaked reptile odor and the musk of fox, bear and cat.

The Rusalka approached.

They came out of the woods on the other side of the chicken legs, wearing long white robes with hoods over their heads. Some were burdened with instruments: drums, a stringed harp or lyre, and a couple of flutes.

They laid their instruments near the fire and took off supple fur-lined boots, showing no discomfort at being barefoot on the ground.

Light left the sky. The first stars shone and the trees echoed them, the firelight picking out gleam and sparkle of ice coating every surface. The clearing seemed surrounded by a wall of diamond trees. The women grouped together facing north, looking up at the sky and holding out their arms as though in worship or welcome.

“The Wild Maiden returns,” said one.

“Welcome, Brigid,” said another.

“The light quickens.”

They repeated gesture and words at the four points of the compass.

Others approached, and now became visible as they entered the clearing. Chattan saw two young women, one with a fiery skull on a pole in her hand. They smelled of human flesh, bone and blood, mingled with saltwater and flower scents. There was nothing of the animal in them. A man accompanied them, slim and lithe, moving with a limp. Two other men followed, older than the rest, smelling strongly of raw fish, the sea and the wolfskin cloaks they wore. One of these men held a trident in his hand.

A loud slam made everyone jump. Baba Yaga stood on her doorstep, hands on bony hips, surveying the clearing. Chattan smelled old fish, congealed blood and unwashed clothes. The chicken legs slowly bent at the knees, lowering the house. Scowling, Baba Yaga sprang onto the ground, quick and agile as grease spattering. She glared from one figure to another. Her gaze fastened on the face of one of the young women, who looked fearfully back.

Baba Yaga advanced on her, stiff-legged and menacing. She stalked around her, looking her up and down, while the girl cowered in her white linen robes.

“The Maiden, as I live and breathe! Aren’t you just too precious? A maiden still because he didn’t want you, did he? He didn’t dare, not him!” She sneered magnificently and spat. “Pretty words, weak words that twist and bend and lie, that’s what he has. That’s all he has! You hang on every one, don’t you? You dangle like a ripe fruit, plump and moist and willing. I can smell you from here!” She bent and sniffed loudly at the girl’s crotch.

The girl threw back her white hood, releasing a sweep of hair, and stiffened her spine. “You’re wrong,” she said. “He’s not weak. He’s powerful and…beautiful.”

Baba Yaga screeched with laughter. “Oh, yes, he’s pretty! He’s a pretty one, all right, but your balls are bigger than his, poppet! You’ll see! He’s not equipped to deal with the likes of you! Have it your way, though. May his pretty face bring you satisfaction! May he fill your cunt and make you scream with pleasure! Hah!”

She turned away, contempt in every line of her body, and stumped to where the man with the trident stood watching with a sardonic smile on his handsome face. “Why are you here, fish breath?” she demanded. “Fancy a different flavor, do you?”

“Perhaps,” he said with a crooked smile. “Perhaps I just felt like a game of marbles!” he dangled a bulging bag in front of her nose enticingly. “I’ve added some new ones to my collection recently.”

“You mean you’ve added them to my collection,” she snapped. “I’ll deal with you later.”

She whirled on her heel. “Put yon grinning fellow over there,” she ordered the woman with the fiery skull, indicating the edge of the oval. “And you,” she commanded the man with the trident, “make yourself useful! Put that there!” She pointed an iron-tipped finger.

He strode to the place she indicated and thrust the trident’s handle into the bare ground. A white-robed and hooded figure set out fat white candles and lit them. She pressed a candle base onto each tine of the trident.

“What are you waiting for, poppets?” Baba Yaga shrieked. “Do I have to do everything myself? Where’s the music? Finish setting out those candles! Dance, cripple! Dance, old men! Do you want a maiden of insipid rainbows and moonbeams or do you want one of fire and ice, claw and wing, tusk and tooth? Dance, damn you! Caper for the Horned King! Dance for the next cycle, whores, bitches, sluts! Now!” She held out her arms, opened her mouth and screamed at the star-glittered sky, making the iced trees tremble and chime.

Chattan sensed movement nearby. Something small heaved itself out of the pine needles and duff next to him under the sheltering spruce boughs. When Chattan caught its scent, he lifted his lip in a soundless snarl. The little creature trundled away, out from under the tree’s shelter toward the clearing, and Chattan’s sharp eye caught similar slow movement approaching from other directions. They were small rounded shadows, gleaming with points of light as they gathered among the candles in a loose ring around the oval clearing. The firelight revealed the salt and pepper spines and long noses of hedgehogs, each encrusted with ice beads, brilliant as crystals in the candle and firelight. Chattan could hear their soft grunting and squeaking.

Someone began a slow drumbeat. Chattan couldn’t see who it was from his vantage point, as the fire burned between him and the drummer. The steady, reassuring beat was like the forest’s heartbeat, slower than Chattan’s pulse, elemental, simple, and mesmerizing. Chattan watched as the beat loosened tense shoulders and hips. The Rusalka stood near drums or held other instruments in their hands. Others threw back their hoods. The two young women, also robed in white, mingled with the Rusalka. The handsome man who had held the trident joined the dancers, along with the dark-haired man with a limp. The second of the older men joined the musicians, and Chattan suspected it was he who drummed.

Baba Yaga squatted near her black cauldron, looking both pleased and not so pleased as she surveyed the clearing, overhung with icy chandeliers suspended from the trees and ringed with glowing candles and the glittering hedgehogs. The skull’s dome rested in front of her, and in each hand she held a long slender bone. She added the sharp tap tap of bone on bone to the drummer’s resonant beat, and, as though on cue, the flute and strings wove up through the beat together, ethereal and uncanny.

In the beginning, the music lifted the dancers on gossamer wings of silver and frost. They moved as silent and weightless as Chattan himself in their white robes. Even the man who limped revealed an odd, lurching grace, his body lithe and supple. The man with the trident mingled with the graceful women, dancing with confident strength and sensual enjoyment.

Other drummers joined in, and the beat swelled, became complex and compelling, the flutes and strings rising into their own demanding melodies, circling around the drums. Hood after hood was thrown back, and the Rusalka begin to flow and flicker from shape to shape, now with skin glowing paler than their white linen and sheets of hair in every shade from pale frost to ebony, and a moment later appearing with a clot of matted, knotted hair and the hideous visages of hags, snaggle-toothed, leering, squint-eyed and chicken-necked.

Chattan could feel power rising; the untamed, chaotic power of the Maiden, She, the female, the chalice, the cup and the cauldron. He sat still, but his own thick hair rose in anticipation and his genitals felt heavy between his back legs.

The music strengthened like a gale, like a mighty wave, like the rising sun. The one Baba Yaga called the Maiden threw off her robe, her hair heavy streaks of pale and darker shadow. She had small, firm breasts and strong thighs and was utterly unselfconscious in her nakedness. She laughed with pleasure, and the handsome man echoed her laughter. One by one, the Rusalka discarded their robes as well, and now the clearing became a flickering kaleidoscope of shapes and forms as the Rusalka flowed from their human aspects into those of animals and back again. Chattan found himself grateful they couldn’t take their merfolk shapes as well. The confusion of human and animal was enough to watch. Feathered wing, curving breast, sharp-toothed snarl, bare buttock bunched with muscle, the sinuous shape of a flat-headed snake dancing on its tail, a boar’s fiery small eyes and sharp tusks, all flickered and flashed in the clearing. He saw the smudge of pubic hair, pelt of bear, fox, wolf and cat. He glimpsed a bat’s membranous wing curving through the air with a graceful arm.

Baba Yaga abandoned her skull drum and sprang to her feet, uttering one eldritch shriek after another, which tore open the crystal-studded sky as she danced among them, turning and whirling. A Rusalka with an owl’s wing, smudged buff and grey, and round golden eyes hooted, low and deep; Chattan remembered nights muffled in fog and snow blurring winter outlines of grey and dark green. Again and again, she gave voice to her longing, seeking, inviting, signaling her knowledge that life must go on. A vixen sat on her haunches, muzzle pointed into the icy treetops, and gave a strangled cry, a combination of bark, shriek and screaming cat that made the hairs on Chattan’s neck rise again; the sound of a February night of musk and ice. Gradually, bellows and growls, shouts and ululating cries filled the night, and the net of the drumbeat held it all together.

All the while, the dancers danced. As though released by the sound of their own and other’s voices, the dance grew frenzied. Sweat gleamed on bare skin and Chattan smelled flesh flushed with awakened blood and the musky scent of arousal, of springing hair and humid hollow, though outside the sacred circle the frigid air became further chilled by the frosty fingers of the breeze. Not a drop melted from the trees surrounding and overarching the clearing. The small bejeweled keepers of the circle retained their icy glitter.

As the power built, Chattan watched the sensual celebration of body, not another’s, but one’s own. Women cupped their own breasts, rested their hands in the groove of their groins, luxuriated in the sweep of hair against neck and shoulders. Now most of the Rusalka chose to dance in their animal or hag form, and Chattan saw the powerful and secret sexuality of the crone who lives irreverently and playfully in her particular collection of bones and flesh, freed by age from the responsibility of bearing life and attracting a mate. Baba Yaga hopped among the dancers, cackling with glee, her up-curving chin and down-curving nose knitted together by a foul tangle of hair, withered buttocks waggling, hard potbelly rotating lewdly above a snarl of dark pubic hair, sagging breasts swaying. She was elemental. She was hideous. She was the essence of persistent life.

The men mingled with the other dancers, as unselfconscious as the women, dancing unashamed in varying degrees of erection, passing their hands along their lean flanks and the width of their chests, leaping, turning, punching and kicking the air in a primitive male display of strength and power, demonstrating their fitness as the sacred He, the Seed-Bearer, the potent phallus of life.

The exchange of touch was not for this night. The power of the Maiden was pure, raw and independent, smelling of wary interest and ambivalence. She chose her own seduction in her own time, from the apex of her power. Tonight was for the raising of sensual awareness and the snarling, clawing surrender to emptiness demanding to be filled, to life commanding renewal.

The music changed, the rhythm loosening, releasing the dancers into slower movement. Every chest heaved. The flickering transformation of the Rusalka diminished. Strings were no longer plucked. A lone flute wandered like a silver star and fell silent, leaving only the steady drumbeat.

Chattan stood and shook himself. He slipped out from under the spruce’s ice-coated boughs on silent feet and leapt lightly over the hedgehogs and candles enclosing the clearing. As he landed on the dry ground, the drumming stopped abruptly, and in the dance’s sudden death the power splintered and scattered, leaving the warm center and melting back into the watchful, icy-eyed birch wood. The crystal chandeliers hanging above the clearing from the trees began to drip. The hedgehogs left their guardianship and bumbled away, plain little creatures in their everyday muted spiny coverings.

Chattan sat, examining every face in turn with calm dignity. He breathed in the warm fire and flesh-scented air and began to purr, a deep, rumbling vibration that filled his chest and throat and pulsed in his bones.

“Hah!” said Baba Yaga disagreeably. “You took your time.”

She stalked to Clarissa and planted herself toe-to-toe before her. “You, chit, will take a trip with that one,” she nodded at Vasilisa, “and those fishy fellows. You will not go through the portal to Rowan Tree, not until you return. You leave in two days.”

She stepped back and clapped her hands. The fire and candles abruptly went out, leaving behind no scent of burning. Chattan felt the icy little breeze ruffle his thick fur, seeking to steal his warmth. Hastily, the humans and merfolk found their clothing and dressed. The Rusalka, not as bothered by the cold, donned their robes with less urgency and gathered their instruments.

“Go away,” said Baba Yaga. “I’ve had enough of your pasty faces. Be off!” She pointed at Poseidon, who gave her his mischievous grin. “Except you. You stay here.”

Chattan regarded her, unmoving, unblinking and still purring. When she glanced at him, he lifted his lip slightly in a snarl, showing sharp white teeth. “Don’t you snarl at me, kitty cat,” she said sourly. “Slink back where you came from. There’s nothing for you until tomorrow night. Scat!”

Chattan rose and, in a single thrust of his powerful hind legs, leapt over the extinguished, half-melted candles and disappeared into the woods.

CHAPTER 13

CLARISSA

The abrupt end to the magical dance left Clarissa feeling shattered. One moment she moved in the center and source of power she hadn’t dreamed of, and the next she was back in the strange wood in her own skin, exhausted, cold, bewildered and feeling as though pieces of herself remained scattered in the clearing to melt and disappear or be carried away to the hidden winter beds of the hedgehogs or forever lost among the ranks of black and white birch trees stretching, silent and cold, in every direction.

Though minutes ago she’d been warm and vivid with life in nothing but her skin, now the borrowed linen robe and hood felt thin and inadequate. She’d pulled on supple wolfskin boots so hastily that a fold chafed her ankle into rawness with every step. Vasilisa strode ahead, lighting the way with the fiery skull. Clarissa felt too tired to frame a single question, and at the same time too wound up to sleep ever again.

Vasilisa’s tiny cabin was warm and quiet, a haven in the icy birch wood’s heart, vibrating with such uncanny power. Clarissa sat wearily on a stool and watched dully as Vasilisa lit a lamp, fed the fire and hung their cloaks on pegs by the door. She limped slightly, as though injured or weary, but her face glowed with joy.

For some reason, Clarissa resented her delight.

“She can’t stop me,” she said, wanting to wipe away Vasilisa’s contented smile and the peace illuminating her face. “I’ll go through the portal to Rowan Gate if I want. I’ll go tomorrow.”

“She can stop you, you know,” said Vasilisa with calm certainty. “She’s more powerful than you can imagine. If she says you’re not to go, that’s the end of it. Poseidon intends to go and visit the one called Sedna, and evidently Marceau, you and I go with him. Morfran wants to come, too.”

“But why must I go? Seren needs me! He’s waiting for me!”

“I thought he didn’t know you were coming?” Vasilisa raised an inquiring eyebrow.

Clarissa, caught, looked away. “I’m going to surprise him.”

“You still can, after we see Sedna. Perhaps she needs you more than Seren does.”

“I’ve nothing to give a sea guardian!”

Vasilisa shrugged. She’d been heating water as they talked, and now she thrust a hot drink into Clarissa’s hands.

“Drink. Do you realize it’s nearly dawn? We danced for hours.”

Clarissa drank gratefully. “I didn’t think about the time. It might have been one hour or six. Nothing mattered but the dance, and that power!”

“Yes. Together we raised both the Maiden and the Horned King. It was more than I hoped for.”

“What Horned King? I didn’t see him.”

“You did. The lynx.”

“That was a lynx? But he wasn’t horned. Just the black tufts on his ears.”

“Cerunmos, the Horned King, takes many forms. Last time he appeared as a great white stag with mighty antlers. He was Sacred Consort to Artemis and part of the Rusalka’s fertility cycle. Now he’s risen again in a new form, and he’ll join with the Rusalka in the second part of the Imbolc ritual. He gives me hope we can find a way to repair the Yrtym.”

Clarissa swayed on her stool. Vasilisa took the cup out of her hand. “Go to bed. You’re exhausted. We’ll talk again after some sleep.”

Clarissa obeyed, burrowing gratefully under the warm wolf skin cover. As she sank into sleep, she saw again the clearing under the star-strewn sky, the trees laden with diamonds, the strange little grunting hedgehogs, crusted with jeweled fire, and the proud cat with his powerful hindquarters, pale gold gaze and thick coat.

It would make a good story.

She would tell it to Seren…

ASH

Ash, who had heard a great deal about Baba Yaga from Mirmir and others, had no desire to meet her. At the same time, he itched with curiosity to see her for himself. Izolda suggested he and Beatrice conceal themselves under the Yaga’s house perched on chicken legs. The legs themselves were wrapped in scarves, and it would be by far the warmest vantage point from which to watch the dance. The light, Izolda assured them, would illuminate the parts of the clearing in which the dance took place.

“I’ll take you to the clearing at dusk,” she said. “As my sisters and I arrive, you can fly in from a different direction and find a good place to watch from. No one will notice. Baba Yaga will likely not show herself until we’re assembled.”

Accordingly, as they approached the clearing, lit by a bonfire, Ash and Beatrice flitted away from Izolda, staying in the trees’ cover until only a few feet separated them from the strange little hut on chicken legs. The door, with a window to each side, reminded Ash irresistibly of a face, but it overlooked the dancing floor. They approached from behind. He darted out of the trees and into the shadow beneath the hut, feeling like a fugitive.

The scarves around the chicken legs were loose-knit and wooly. Ash squirmed his way beneath the wrapped material, and for a moment the leg quivered, as though feeling him there. Ash and Beatrice froze. When the leg stood still again, Ash settled himself, slowly and carefully, hanging upside down from his fuzzy perch, so he and Beatrice could look out and down on the clearing, where another group joined the Rusalka as candles were lit and instruments unwrapped and set out. With his back against the warmth of the chicken leg and nestled in the scarf’s folds, he felt quite comfortable. Beatrice, as always, was protected by Ash’s thick brown fur and warmed by his body heat.

For a few minutes, they watched the proceedings with interest. Then, Ash heard footsteps in the house above them, and even as he tensed in anticipation a slam like an explosion made him flinch. Beatrice squeaked in alarm.

“Shhh!” said Ash.

Slowly, the chicken legs began to bend. The knee joint of the leg they sheltered against was considerably below the level of their perch, so Ash simply clung on and hoped for the best. When the hut had lowered to the ground, Baba Yaga hopped nimbly off the doorstep. She moved, Ash thought, exactly like a grasshopper.

The ground in the clearing was quite dry and covered with last season’s dead growth. Izolda had told them Baba Yaga could keep the clearing both dry and warm, though the rest of the forest was encased in ice after an afternoon of freezing rain, followed by subzero air.

As Baba Yaga stalked toward a terrified-looking young woman, Beatrice murmured, “There’s Clarissa.”

“Yes, and the other with the fiery skull is Vasilisa,” Ash whispered.

“King Poseidon has the trident, and the man with him must be Vasilisa’s father, Marceau.”

“The young man with the limp is Morfran,” said Ash. “He’s paired with one of the Rusalka.”

“Sofiya,” said Beatrice, “the one with the golden owl eyes we saw outside the bathhouse when we came.”

“Shhh,” said Ash again. “I want to hear what they’re saying.

He felt both amazed and amused by Baba Yaga’s macabre figure. She was dressed in a filthy grey tunic, perilously short. Long, sharp-looking nails tipped her bare feet; he knew they were of iron. Her hair tangled in a clot around her head, and in profile her long nose dropped down to meet a sharp, upcurving chin. He thought Clarissa showed remarkable bravery in standing up to her.

Baba Yaga’s voice was harsh and cracked, and when she lifted it into a shriek Ash cringed and Beatrice tucked her black head against his chest.

“Look,” he whispered a moment later, and felt her part his fur again to watch.

One of the Rusalka lit thick white candles and scattered them around the dancing circle. These, with the bonfire, Vasilisa’s fiery skull and Poseidon’s trident, crowned with three candles, served to light the clearing. As Ash and Beatrice watched, small creatures moved toward the dancing circle from the forest on every side. At first, they were shadows on the shadowed ground, but as they drew nearer, they caught and reflected the light like crystals in the sun. They stopped among and between the candles, closing in the circle, and Beatrice said, wonder in her voice, “Hedgehogs.”

They were hedgehogs. Ash could hear their grunts and squeaks. Their spiny humped backs were encrusted with ice beads, glittering and coruscating in the dancing light, as though the winter forest floor wore a crown.

The music began and Beatrice exclaimed over the shifting forms of the Rusalka, but Ash could hardly tear his eyes away from Baba Yaga. She squatted over a human skull, two slender bones in her clawed hands, adding her own drumming to the rhythm, and he stared, fascinated. As the music built, she appeared to grow bored with her contribution and sprang into the dance, screeching and cackling, stamping her feet, clapping, raising her arms and lifting the hem of the tunic to expose sinewy drooping buttocks and a shadow of dark hair at her groin. Ash, repulsed, couldn’t look away, though the dancers swirling around her were unearthly in their combined beauty and power. Human and creature, they circled within the crystal web of the birch wood, held by the central figure of the Sacred Hag, Baba Yaga. He hadn’t imagined such power.

Tearing his eyes away, he sought Izolda. Men and women alike had shed their clothing and boots, and it wasn’t easy to identify a particular form among the constantly shifting and flowing Rusalka, but Izolda was the only one with naked wings.

She danced with quiet intensity, slightly apart from the others, her wings lifting her small, slight body into the air for seconds at a time. As he watched, her body rippled with thick, short fur like brown velvet, and then became pale flesh again with small breasts and a slim waist rounding into hips.

For the most part, the Rusalka did not fully take the shape of either human women or animals, but blended the two aspects as they danced, as though the music called forth everything they were. Ash wondered if they danced in water, if such a thing was possible. If so, did they blend their merfolk bodies into their dance as well?

With a surge of arousal, he imagined what it might be like to mate with such a creature as Izolda.

In silent fascination, he and Beatrice watched as the dance intensified and the dancers, led by Baba Yaga, gave wordless voice in the icy night. Music and snarl, shriek, howl and scream wove seamlessly together as the Rusalka’s shapes flowed from one form to another. To Ash, it was as though the Imbolc night unfolded the entirety of its power, from the diamond-strewn night sky to the musk of rot and root. Baba Yaga and the Maiden stood at the center, both primal, one a dark and hideous shadow and the other beautiful and powerful as an ice storm. Around them whirled the dance of life, male and female, primal and elemental.

Ash became aware the music gradually slowed, the intensity of the dance quieting. He took a deep breath, and it felt like the first he’d remembered to take in a long time. One by one, the instruments’ voices faded away. The man called Marceau had been the first to play. Like the other musicians, he’d joined the dancers in between periods of making music. Now, as the flutes, strings and other drums fell silent, the dance ended with his simple rhythm, like a heartbeat, but Ash could hear a new sound, one not made by an instrument.

With a graceful bound, a four-legged shape leapt over guttering candles and hedgehogs at the circle’s edge. At its sudden appearance, the drumbeat stopped abruptly, though the new sound continued.

“Oh!” said Beatrice, and Ash knew she, too, felt the dance’s power shatter and scatter far and wide among the sentinel birch trees. The low bubble of warmth in which the dance had taken place burst, and Ash could hear the drip, drip, drip of ice on the trees overhanging the clearing as the warm air was released. The hedgehogs edged away, squeaking and grunting among themselves, no longer jewels in a forest crown, but plain, in shades of wood and leaves.

The dancers stood still, arrested, every eye on the creature that had broken the spell. It sat, quite at its ease, a stocky figure in a thick brindled coat with black-tufted ears. Pale gold eyes examined each face.

“It’s a lynx,” breathed Ash.

“No,” said Beatrice. “It’s Cerunmos, reborn. It’s the Horned King, the Sacred Consort.”

MARIA

Dear Gabriel:

I’ve read and re-read your letter. It gave me much to think about, and brought my love for Maria, Rose Red, and so many others to the surface of my mind. Tonight we are at sea with an icy wind in the sails and I find I cannot sleep. I’ve lit a lamp and, wishing I had someone to talk to during this long winter’s night, thought of writing you. Chris is curled up in his hammock, and in any case he doesn’t know anyone at Rowan Tree and thus cannot understand my feelings.

I exchange letters with both Ginger and Rapunzel, who keep me well informed, but they are not men. Their letters are filled with affection and description, but I think they do not always share their deepest fears and feelings to spare me from worry, and you provide a male perspective on happenings and personalities they cannot.

You are wise to play the part of everyone’s favorite old uncle, either prattling and gossiping or dozing by the fire. Being underestimated is a great advantage. I wonder, though, that David and some of the others can be so stupid. Ah, well, all the better, I suppose.

I, too, am interested in the new arrivals, and the coincidence of their appearance in Rowan Tree in the same few days. Is it a coincidence, I wonder? They certainly sound as though they possess nothing in common, other than both being strangers seeking a place to spend the winter, but coincidence is so often not chance at all, merely a deliberate part of a pattern we don’t yet perceive.

Chattan sounds a good fellow, and I trust your instinct and Kunik’s that he means no harm. Kunik is no fool, so if the man is off in any way, he’ll pick up on it, especially as he’s taken him in. The fact that Artemis trusts him and has traveled with him also speaks volumes.

I don’t feel nearly so sanguine about Mingan, and I share your concern about his persistent attentions to Rose Red, his friendliness with David and his cronies, and his suspiciously helpful presence among Gwelda’s friends. In fairness, he may simply be unusually tactful and trying to get along with all factions at Rowan Tree, but you don’t describe a tactful man; you describe a twister. I’m sorry you’re saddled with him in your home, but I appreciate the wisdom in keeping him under your eye.

My heart breaks for Gwelda. She and Jan were such a joy to be around and work with, and so deeply in love with one another. It’s hard to believe anyone would kill such a man, but many a good man has been senselessly killed.

I have heard vague stories of the bodarks, but thought them only sinister tales. It disturbs me that Artemis has some experience of them and they are in fact more than evil rumor. Yet I know well from my time on the sea that Webbd is full of dark magic and malignant forces, as well as holy power and great good. I suppose everywhere it must be the same -- an uneasy balance.

My heart is heavy for Rose Red and Maria. Maria has fought so hard to reclaim herself from her earlier life and the murder of her children. When she naturally fell into a leadership role at Rowan Tree, I rejoiced in her healing self-hatred and the appreciation of others for her experience and wisdom. Naturally, a weak, vain man like David finds her a threat. She’s ten times more powerful than he is. His manipulation during the meeting about Gwelda is typical of such a character, as well as his lack of compassion and eagerness to seize any advantage in power.

As for Rose Red, I know her sensitivity. It sounds as though she’s lost her lover, Rowan. If I know her, she’s hiding her grief and feeling ashamed. She’ll also be agonizing over her oak’s failing health and feeling intuitively the larger disturbance and trouble in Webbd’s forests and trees. I’m glad Gwelda sought her out, as that will give her someone to care for and talk to, and I’m even more glad Artemis is with her.

We all loved the White Stag, and his loss is a blow none of us will forget soon, but Artemis and Rose Red must be particularly bereft.

To have Mingan sniffing around in addition to everything else is intolerable and makes me burn with rage. What does the man want from her?

I wonder if all these events and disturbances have to do with the Yrtym. I feel a growing and pervasive sense of wrongness now everywhere I look. The night sky is changing, as are the sea and trees. The sea withdraws from the land -- how can such a thing be? Bodarks murder the innocent. The Sacred Consort sacrifices himself, and once harmonious communities divide and struggle for power. The midnight wind whispers of fear and despair.

It heartens me to know you and Kunik are there at Rowan Tree, along with Artemis and Heks. I do not know her well, but she holds some kind of power; she reminds me a bit of Baba Yaga, and I mean that as a compliment, believe it or not! I have faith in Ginger, Maria and Rose Red. None of them know how strong they are. Whatever comes, I know you will all stand shoulder to shoulder and face it. I wish I could stand with you, too, but I know in my heart I belong here, at sea. If I can play any part in this, it will be from here.

I’ve long believed wherever we find ourselves is the place we’re most needed, whether we understand why or not.

Watch over them, Gabriel, Rose Red and Maria, Ginger, Gwelda, and the rest. My love to everyone; you’re in my thoughts. Send me news when you have it, and watch your back, my friend.

Radulf

Maria finished the letter, folded it, and returned it to Gabriel. “What a good man he is,” she said. “Thank you for letting me read it. He’s right. Ginger and I do try to spare him our deepest doubts and fears. There’s nothing he can do, after all.”

Gabriel cradled his pipe in his palm. “Isn’t there? Do you feel unsupported and misunderstood by him?”

Maria laughed. “No, of course not. He’s a good friend. When he tells me he believes in me, it helps me believe in myself. I wonder if that’s true -- that Ginger, Rose Red and I don’t know how strong we are.”

“Sometimes our loved ones see us more clearly than we do ourselves,” said Gabriel. “Radulf neither needs nor wants protection. He knows who he is and he knows where he needs to be. If he’s right, and he has some role to play in this, the more information he has, the better, don’t you think?”

“I do.” Maria sighed. “What are we going to do about Rowan Tree, Gabriel? What’s the right thing for everyone? If I’m not the best leader, I’ll gladly step aside, but I can’t believe David will be better than me.”

“David would be a disastrous leader, except it wouldn’t be just David, you know. It would be David and his cronies. They would grab power, pit people against each other, encourage competition, greed and toadying, and disempower you women as fast as they could.”

“I think so too. So how do we protect the community without looking as though we’re the ones who are being self-serving?”

“You won’t like my advice.”

Maria raised a dark eyebrow. “Tell me anyway.”

“I think we should wait. It’s Yule, remember, when Yr returns. No one knows what happens when Cerunmos dies, but it would be fitting for him to be reborn in this season. When Artemis returned from her little field trip with Chattan, she seemed unconcerned about the new Sacred Consort. Perhaps she knows something we don’t. In any case, I think we should give it some time and see what happens.”

“That makes sense, but even if Cerunmos returns, how will it help Rowan Tree?”

“I don’t know. This is connected in ways we can’t understand. Cerunmos seems like a big piece of the puzzle. I’ve also been talking to Heks, Ash and Bea.” Gabriel paused and chuckled, shaking his head. “That Ash is a character.”

Maria smiled. “He is.”

“You know they brought news that young Seren, who fancies himself king of storytellers and music, is on the way to fix Rowan Gate?”

“I heard. And probably Clarissa will be right behind him.”

“Won’t that be interesting?”

“Interesting isn’t the word I’d use. It seems like more complication. I’d like everyone to go away and leave us alone so we can go back to the way we were. Visitors appear to be stirring up David’s obnoxious behavior.”

“And that’s interesting, too. Who do you think encouraged him, Chattan or Mingan?”

“Who knows? Who cares? Maybe just having two new men did it.”

“It matters, Maria. When a new person arrives in a group or a community and the dynamics deteriorate, it’s wise to identify the problem’s source.”

Both Mingan and Chattan seem pleasant.”

“Do they?”

Maria thought for a moment. “Well, no. I like Chattan and I don’t like Mingan, but he’s been helpful and kind to Gwelda …”

“Has he? Have you ever seen him spend time talking to Gwelda, trying to get to know her?”

“Well … no. But he helped build her house.”

“Yes, and he takes every chance he gets to bother Rosie, who feels as you do. She doesn’t like him and she feels bad about it. Then, after a hard day’s work “helping” Gwelda, he goes to David’s house and drinks rubble and talks to the men’s club. He usually doesn’t come in until I’ve gone to bed.”

“You make him sound like a spy.”

“In Radulf’s words, I think he’s a twister. Dishonest, selfish, manipulative, and invested in his own agenda.”

“What does he want?”

“I’m not sure. He wants power over Rose Red, but I’m not sure what else. The point is David’s a perfect tool. He’s too stupid and self-important to see through Mingan’s machinations. He’s stirring David up because he likes causing trouble and it distracts from whatever his real intention is.”

“Everything you’re saying makes me feel more determined to figure out a plan immediately. Why wait for it to get worse?”

“I think it’s more effective to let things unfold as they will. This situation is uncomfortable, and, as you point out, it’s about to get more complicated. For example, where will Seren stay?”

“I hadn’t thought about that. The most logical place is with David. He has a spare room in that ridiculous house of his.”

“And what will the arrival of Seren, who sounds like a vain, selfish youth, add to the mix of David, his cronies, Mingan, and the rest? Will he be able to fix Rowan Gate, and if not, what will happen? Vanity doesn’t take kindly to humiliation.”

Maria sat with downcast eyes, swirling the dregs of her tea.

At last she looked up. “You’re right. I don’t like it, but there’s no doubt things are changing and moving in unexpected ways. I hate this bickering and tension. Rowan Tree has been such a peaceful place. Do you think Rose Red or Gwelda are in any immediate danger?”

“I don’t. Rose Red is surrounded by friends. My eye is on Mingan. Artemis and Heks are here. Gwelda is sheltered and safe for now in her birch forest. Rowan Gate and the other portals on Webbd will do what they do. Most people still look to you to lead the community. It’s never been formal, and I see no reason to change that now. Let David do his worst. Let’s see what happens.”

“We have created a remarkable news network,” said Maria. “Ash and Bea are invaluable. Radulf is in touch. If Clarissa does come, she’ll know something about what’s happening with the merfolk. Rapunzel is gathering information from her lighthouse.”

“Watchful waiting,” said Gabriel, his eyes half closed as he sucked on his pipe.

Maria laughed. “’Everyone’s favorite old uncle’?” she quoted.

Gabriel grinned.

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