The Tower: Part 4: Yule
Post #34: In which threat, obstacle, and opening ...
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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.”
“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.