“Where is Armand?” asked la Fontaine.
“D’Anjou took him,” said Rachelle. “I have to stop him.”
“And what are you?”
“I’m a forestborn,” said Rachelle. “What are you?”
“Did I not tell you?” said la Fontaine. “I am an almighty goddess.”
Rachelle stared at the flower she held, and remembered how charms were worked in the south. “You’re . . . a woodwife?”
“Why do you think I filled my Tendre with roses? My mother and I are the only reason this Château wasn’t overrun by woodspawn years ago.”
“The whole Château is surrounded by the Great Forest now,” said Rachelle. “If we get the people inside, can you protect them?”
“A little,” said Fontaine. “I am still not sure if I should kill you first, though.”
“I’ll vouch for her,” said Justine, arriving from behind Rachelle. “And the Bishop will vouch for me.”
“I am not sure I trust your bishop either,” said la Fontaine, but she lowered the plaited roses and Rachelle was able to scramble back to her feet.
Beneath the simple nighttime rustlings, the air shivered with a not-quite-audible breath.
“They’ve started,” said Rachelle. “Where’s Joyeuse?”
“Here,” said the Bishop, also arriving. Behind him, Rachelle could see the courtiers still huddled together behind the line of soldiers, looking unable to believe the danger was over.
The danger was just beginning.
Rachelle turned to the Bishop. “You carry the sword. Justine, come with us to help hold the forestborn back. La Fontaine, get the people into the palace and keep them as safe as you can.”
“Bring my cousin back,” said la Fontaine. “And tell me this tale in my salon.”
“I’ll try,” said Rachelle, though dread curdled in her stomach. She would have to fail at one of those charges.
Then the three of them raced into the dark. Rachelle didn’t worry about finding her way; she simply followed the glowing red trail of the thread that bound her to Erec. As they ran through the trees, the darkness between the trunks thickened and roughened until it was no longer air but dark, damp stone, and they were walking down a tunnel.
At the end of the tunnel was a door made of metal flowers, and it hummed with a power that forbade humans to open it.
Luckily, only one of them was human.
“I’m going inside first,” she said softly. “I’ll leave the door ajar. When I call, charge inside. Or when you hear screams and fighting.” She took a deep breath and realized that despite everything, she was still afraid.
Justine smacked her shoulder lightly. “Be careful.”
“Go with God,” said the Bishop.
Rachelle nodded. “Stand back,” she said, and touched the door.
The petals licked her fingers with soft affection, and the door swung open, and she slipped inside.
Her first thought was to worship.
Not thought. Instinct. And not hers. The pressure crushed her from every side, as if the very air were made of it: this place was sacred to the Devourer. In this place he had been worshipped, loved, feared, and reverenced. Hunger was his glory and destruction his delight. Worship him. Worship. Worship.
She realized that she was standing in a round, domed room hollowed out of black rock, and that the floor was carved with a labyrinth, the lines wide as a hand’s span and just as deep, lined with white marble that glowed in the darkness. Forestborn stood in a ring around the labyrinth. They were singing: a low, whispering chant that had no words Rachelle could recognize. And yet she knew the song; it came from the recesses of her heart. It was the same song that had stirred on the cold, sweet winds of the Great Forest.
Our master, she thought. Our lord. The hunger of hungers, delight of delights, and her body stumbled, swept by another wave of desire to kneel and worship. She was a tiny candle flame, guttering in the wind before it went out.
Hands caught her shoulders, lifted her up. Erec looked into her eyes and said, “Sometimes I wish you weren’t so worthy of me.” His face was fondly affectionate, but his fingers had tightened on her arms as if he wanted to break them.
“I haven’t come to stop the Devourer,” she whispered.
“That’s good. Because I brought a hostage.” He glanced toward the side of the room, and there she saw one of the forestborn sitting with Amélie. Her body was rigid, her eyes wide; when she looked at Rachelle, it seemed to take her a moment to recognize her. Then her lips pressed together and she nodded fiercely.
I’m planning to die as well, Amélie had said to her, and she was brave enough that she had meant it.
Erec was not always so clever as he thought.
“I won’t stop the sacrifice,” said Rachelle. “I promise.”
“Good,” said Erec. “Then come and see.”
He dragged her forward.
While they spoke, the walls of the room had faded away. Though the cold, raw stone was still beneath their feet, now vast, ancient tree trunks reared up around them, taller and thicker than cathedral towers. They were in the Great Forest.
The chanting swelled in her ears, her lungs, her blood. There was almost no difference left, she realized, between the human world and the Great Forest, between simple darkness and eternal night. The only wall that separated them now was the fragile human sitting, head bowed, at the center of the labyrinth.
The chanting ceased. The forestborn lady who had held the knife to Rachelle’s throat said, “Are you ready to accept our lord?”
Armand raised his head. He met Rachelle’s eyes. And then he said, “I will not.”
Erec strode forward, drawing his sword, and pointed it at the base of Armand’s throat. “You have one more chance. Then we use another.”
Rachelle could feel the Devourer—could feel the vast, ancient power rising and waking and turning slowly toward the world again, ever hungry and ever yearning. It was like a rising black tide, and her heart stuttered because surely Armand would be drowned in it. Surely anything human would have to drown.
Armand smiled up at Erec and said, “No.”
“Now!” Rachelle yelled, and then she moved. It seemed to take a very long time: hours to shove a hand against Erec’s arm, jolting his sword point aside. Hours to lunge forward, slide, and crash into Armand. She had meant to shove him out of the center, but he hung on to her and they end up tangled together.