“Abisina?”
She looked up to see her father—who was always a centaur now, except at night around the fire. “I’ve said your name at least three times. Where were you?”
She shrugged, giving him a tight smile.
“When you finish, I’d like you to come with me,” he continued. “I’m going to do some scouting.”
“Do you mind, Elodie?” Abisina asked.
“I’ll walk with Meelah,” Elodie replied. “She said she wanted me to help her make a bow, but I think she just wants to get away from Breide!”
Rueshlan chuckled, and Abisina got to her feet, leaving her breakfast untouched. “I’m not really hungry.”
He nodded. “I didn’t eat mine either.”
They headed south, Abisina riding, as they climbed a ridge that the army had to skirt and then descended to a hidden valley. Farther south, the jagged peaks of the Obruns stood against the sky, lower than their brethren to the west, but still formidably high. To the east, a low ridge of hills marked the horizon.
Since midday, Abisina had seen tension growing in Rueshlan’s face. Now, he sounded weary. “Let’s sleep here tonight,” he said as Abisina slid to the ground.
“Why?” she asked. It was well before sundown.
Rueshlan, transforming into a man, pointed to the low hills in front of them. “Behind those hills, our army will set up camp. There is a plain bordered by streams—a perfect place. In another day we will be at the Motherland, and my attention will be wholly on Charach and the coming battle. For one night, I want to be Rueshlan, your father.”
Abisina nodded, afraid to trust her voice.
They said little all evening. As darkness fell, they sat near the fire, its low hiss mingling with cricket song and the babble of the nearby stream; Abisina heard only the silence between them. When they stretched out on the grass, feet toward the fire, ready to sleep, Rueshlan’s sigh reached Abisina through the darkness.
She sat up and Rueshlan did the same. “I think you’d better tell me,” she said. “Tell me what happened to Vigar. What might happen to you.”
Rueshlan drew a long breath and said, “What we know about Vigar—much of it—we don’t understand. I can’t tell you what it might mean for me. I don’t know if it will help to hear—”
“Vigar died because of Charach. So did my mother. You now go to face him. I need to know it all.”
After a pause, he began the story. “When Vigar arrived at Watersmeet—”
“From where?”
“She and her people came down the Mountains Eternal.”
“Like Vran . . .” Abisina murmured.
“Yes, I noticed that, too. Both Vran and Vigar are responsible for bringing humans back into this land; there had been none, in the south or north, for generations. But Vran and Vigar couldn’t be more different. The Mountains Eternal invite myth-making. In my experience—”
“You’ve been there?”
“Yes, but that story will have to wait”—in the low light, Abisina could hear the laughter in Rueshlan’s voice—“at least, if you want me to tell you about Vigar.”
“I’m sorry. No more interruptions.”
Abisina settled back, her arms around her knees, and Rueshlan continued.
“When Vigar arrived at Watersmeet, it was a frightening place. The folk in the forest surrounding it told stories of malevolent spirits that lived among the Sylvyads. But Vigar saw only shelter. There were terrible beasts around then; Charach was the worst of them. Where he came from is a mystery, but he brought with him creatures who loved evil as much as he did: minotaurs, trolls, hags, überwolves, and other strange beings who embraced darkness. Some folk native to this land joined him, too. The Great Earthquake that destroyed the Obrun City brought ruin for everyone. The fauns and the centaurs who had lived together peacefully now competed for scarce food. And then the dwarves showed up, survivors of the Obrun City—more competition. Some joined Charach because they were drawn to his evil, others because he was strong and they were afraid.”
“But in Vranille, he told the people he would ‘defeat the beasts,’” Abisina said.
“He knew how to manipulate the Vranians. Just as he manipulated those around Watersmeet before Vigar. They had been divided for too long.”
Abisina pulled a goat-hair blanket around her shoulders, suddenly cold.
Rueshlan went on. “I can imagine a young faun or an old centaur, driven in to Watersmeet, desperate to escape the gnashing teeth of an überwolf or the horns of a minotaur. But instead of death among the trees, Vigar was there. As the stories got out, folk began to say that Vigar was a powerful new sorceress or the priestess of a new god, and that she would defeat Charach. She always insisted she was simply a woman, but who’s to say?” Rueshlan shrugged. “Maybe it doesn’t matter.”
He was no longer talking to Abisina, but to himself. “For the coming battle—do I carry some strength that will rise when I need it, or is there something out there that will come to our aid? I know what is said about me—that I am some kind of demigod because I have lived long, because I am both man and centaur. But is any of this power real or does it just flow from their belief?”
After a moment, Rueshlan looked at his daughter.
“What was I saying?”
“You were talking about the stories of Vigar,” Abisina replied, glad to have him back again.
“Yes, that’s right. Vigar’s followers grew, and Charach worried. This new community had to be destroyed. But it was impossible to attack Watersmeet. He tried to lay siege, but there are so many places to climb or paddle ashore for supplies. At last, he found a weakness: the Sylvyads’ great thirst. Dam the rivers and destroy Vigar’s stronghold.
“His armies were given a new task: felling tree after tree. It took months and thousands of trees, but eventually he dammed all three rivers flowing into Watersmeet. With Charach’s followers busy hauling logs and pulling down forests, it was easy enough to slip to the shore for food, but now they needed water, too. And their beloved Sylvyads began to show the strain. Leaves fell in showers, and in a high wind the groans were deafening. Finally, the oldest and largest tree, at the very center of the community, died. And when it died, Vigar knew something had to be done. Do you remember Sahnda’s song?”
“I remember rushing water,” Abisina said slowly, “and something about figures—is that right? Figures in the water?”
“Yes, and along the shore—naiads and hamadryads—the spirits that live in the rivers and the trees.”
“We saw them—Haret and I!” Abisina cried. “South of the Obruns, we watched fauns dance, and the trees seemed to dance with them!”
“The fauns can call them up sometimes. But in those days, the tree and water spirits didn’t just look alive. They
were
alive—provoked, I suppose, by Charach, his arrogance that he could control the river and do it with the corpses of trees. One morning, Vigar took a stand in the muddy riverbed. She offered to spare Charach a great vengeance if he would leave the land immediately. He laughed. What great vengeance could this tiny woman bring? But he was also enraged at her boldness, and he gathered his army to capture Vigar. The stories say that his followers were afraid to stand below the swollen dams. Transforming into the White Worm, Charach compelled them.
“The second his claw touched Vigar’s neck, the waters rose up with a great roar, alive with the figures of naiads, mouths open in screams, hands raised in fists. The wall of water towered high above the dam. And then it burst forth, deluging the army and Charach and Vigar, racing toward Watersmeet in a roiling, raging flood filled with trees and their spirits, naiads, minotaurs, überwolves, and—bodies. In Watersmeet, there was no time to react, nowhere to flee. Most simply sat transfixed as the flood raced toward them. A young faun, Glynholly’s ancestor, who had crawled onto a root far upstream, survived to tell the story of Vigar’s sacrifice. One of the naiads carried Vigar high above the crest of the waves. As the water was about to reach the faun’s perch, Vigar cried out to the naiad who held her, ‘Leave me! Destroy Charach!’ The wave struck, and Watersmeet sustained great damage. The impact took out many of the already weak Sylvyads, and many creatures did not survive. But it also swept away Charach and his army.”
“The River Deliverance,” Abisina said, understanding the name for the first time. “But what about Vigar? What happened to her?”
“This is where I come into the story. I was far downstream, having just come into this land.”
“From where?”
“I was a wanderer then, Abisina. . . . I have seen many lands, been part of many histories, never staying anywhere for long—until I met Vigar.”
“But—why?” Abisina sought her father’s eyes in the low light of the fire.
“There are many Charachs in the world,” Rueshlan said heavily. “They may not all resemble him, but they are out there. I’m sure some Charach drove the humans out of this land so long ago. And Vigar and her people were fleeing their own when they came down the Mountains Eternal. I did what I could to help destroy these monsters. At the time Vigar confronted Charach, I felt called to this land. I found Vigar. She had been carried far down the river, through the Obruns where her broken body washed against a boulder. I thought she was dead, but she still carried a whisper of life. As I lifted her carefully from the splinters of trees, she said: ‘You heard my call! Now listen: Charach will return. Finish my work. Watersmeet.’ Every word cost her what little energy she had left. ‘Take my necklace,’ she told me. ‘They will know I sent you.’ The necklace seemed to catch fire, almost blinding me. When I opened my eyes again, her spirit had left her body.
“The necklace led me through the mountains where I built the garden and her grave. And then it led me to Watersmeet. I found the folk distraught, needing a leader—and when they saw the necklace around my throat, they accepted that it—or Vigar—had chosen me. As you’ve discovered, the necklace has a . . . a power. I don’t know its origin. Vigar may have, though she told nobody. She brought it with her from over the Mountains Eternal. Perhaps its power enabled her and her people to survive a journey very few have ever made.
“The necklace represents rivers coming together—and it’s made of Obrium. Did her people belong to this land, to Watersmeet itself, long ago? Was she leading them home?” Rueshlan stopped speaking, his questions hanging in the air.
Abisina held the pendant and studied the flawless metal. She had seen its power on her own journey. What else could it do?
Rueshlan got up and stirred the fire, throwing on more logs, while Abisina sat thinking of all that he had told her: his life as a wanderer, the treachery of Charach, the naiads and hamadryads rising up. But she always came back to Vigar’s sacrifice. In the end, the necklace could not save her.
“How did Charach survive?” Abisina asked when
Rueshlan returned to sit near her.
“Beings like Charach are hard to destroy. Only Vigar came close—it’s been more than three hundred years since she died.”
“But her sacrifice was for nothing!” Abisina said. “This time, instead of trolls, he’s got Vranians. And instead of Vigar, there’s you. Now you’re going to die to save us!”
“Abisina, I have to fight him—we all do. We have no choice.”
“But why does it have to be you?”
“I am Keeper of Watersmeet. I swore an oath to defend it.”
“He is not threatening Watersmeet! We don’t even know if he’ll come through the Col.” It was Glynholly’s argument, the one Findlay had rejected so completely, but she couldn’t help herself. “Why do you have to go looking for him?”
“He will come for Watersmeet,” Rueshlan said firmly. “He will not rest until he has reversed his defeat. If we let the fairies fight, they will be destroyed. Perhaps not at first. But eventually, he will destroy them. And then we will not be strong enough to defeat him. We have to meet him together.”
“But what if he kills you?” Abisina whispered.
“I won’t let—” Rueshlan began but stopped himself. “Vigar made a choice that I will not make. She was not a mother when she sacrificed herself. Knowing what might be asked of me, I chose not to be a father. But now I am a father. I must fight Charach, but I will fight to survive.” Rueshlan’s black eyes glinted in the firelight. “I cannot promise you how it will end. But I promise that I will fight.”
Abisina woke in the chill before dawn and found Rueshlan crouched by the coals of the fire. As she joined him, he offered her a few pieces of dried meat, but she shook her head. “I don’t think I could swallow it.”
He put the meat back into his bag.
It took only a moment to stamp out the fire and pack the gear. They galloped through the dusky wood and into the hills that he had pointed to the night before, coming down the far slope to the edge of a stream as the sun rose.
Rueshlan slowed. “We should meet a sentry here somewhere. The camp will be just—”
“Halt!”
He stopped short, and Abisina’s heart pounded against her ribs.
A figure stepped from between two trees across the stream—a faun with an arrow pointed right at Rueshlan’s chest. “Halt and answer to Rueshlan!”
This brought a loud laugh from her father. “I must always answer to Rueshlan!”
The faun peered toward his prey, his mouth a stern line. He wore a quiver full of arrows slung across his back, a sword and axe tucked into his belt, and a small dagger strapped around his upper arm. But in less time than it took Abisina to assess his weaponry, he dropped his arrow.