“David,” he whispered. “Beware!”
Roland lifted his right hand, and his index finger pointed at the figure on the altar before it fell away. Then his body sagged on the thorn as the life passed from him at last.
David looked down at the sleeping woman, and her eyes opened. They were not the eyes of David’s mother. Her eyes were green and loving and kind. These eyes were black, devoid of color, like lumps of coal set in snow. The face of the sleeping woman had also changed. She was no longer David’s mother, although he still knew her. Now she was Rose, his father’s lover. Her hair was black, not red, and it pooled like liquid night. Her lips opened, and David saw that her teeth were very white and very sharp, the canines longer than the rest. He took a step back, almost falling from the dais as the woman sat up on her stone bed. She stretched like a cat, her spine curving and her arms tensing. The shawl around her shoulders fell away, exposing an alabaster neck and the tops of her breasts. David saw drops of blood upon them, like a necklace of rubies frozen on her skin. The woman turned on the stone, allowing her gown to drape over the side. Those deep black eyes regarded David, and her pale tongue licked at the points of her teeth.
“Thank you,” she said. Her voice was soft and low, but there was a sibilant undertone to her words, as though a snake had been given the power of speech. “Ssssuch a handsssome boy. Ssssuch a brave boy.”
David retreated, but with each step he took the woman advanced a step to match it, so that the distance between them remained always the same.
“Am I not beautiful?” she asked. Her head tilted slightly, and her face looked troubled. “Am I not pretty enough for you? Come, kisssss me again.”
She was Rose, but Not-Rose. She was night without the promise of dawn, darkness without light. David reached for his sword, then realized that it still lay on the altar. To get to it, he would have to find a way past the woman, and he knew instinctively that if he tried to slip by her, she would kill him.
She seemed to guess what he was thinking, for she glanced back at the sword. “You have no need of it now,” she said. “Never hassss one ssso young come ssso far. Ssssso young, and ssso beautiful.”
One slim finger, its nail etched in blood, touched itself to her lips.
“Here,” she whispered. “Kissss me here.”
David saw his reflection drown in her dark eyes, sinking in the depths of her, and knew what his fate would be. He spun on his heel and jumped the last steps, twisting awkwardly on his right ankle as he landed. The pain was bad, but he was not going to let it hinder him. On the floor ahead of him lay the sword of one of the dead knights. If he could just get to it—
A figure glided over his head, the hem of its gown brushing against his hair, and the woman appeared before him. Her bare feet were not touching the ground. She hung in the air, red and black, blood and night. She was no longer smiling. She opened her lips, exposing her fangs, and suddenly her mouth looked larger than before, with row upon row of sharp teeth like the inside of a shark’s jaws.
Her hands reached for David. “I will have my kisss,” she said, as her nails sank into his shoulders and her head moved toward David’s lips.
David reached into the pocket of his jacket. His right hand sliced through the air, and the claw of the Beast tore a jagged red line across the woman’s face. The wound gaped, but no blood flowed from it, for she had no blood in her veins. She shrieked and pressed her hand to the wound as David struck again, slashing from left to right and blinding her instantly. The woman attacked him with her fingernails, catching his hand and sending the Beast’s claw flying from it. David ran for the doorway to the chamber, with no thought now but to get back to the pitch-black hallway and find his way to the stairs. But the creepers twisted and turned, blocking the way out and trapping him in the room with Not-Rose.
She still hung in the air, her hands now outstretched from her sides, her eyes and face ruined. David moved away from the entrance, trying to get to the fallen sword again. The woman’s sightless eyes followed him.
“I can
sssssmell
you,” she said. “You will pay for what you have done to me.”
She flew toward David, her teeth snapping and her fingers clutching at the air. David darted to his right, then back to his left, in the hope that he could fool her and reach the sword, but she was too clever for him and cut him off. She moved back and forth before him, so quickly that she was little more than a blur in the air, always advancing, sealing off any avenue of escape and forcing him back against the thorns until at last she was only a few feet away from him. David felt sharp pains at his neck and back. He was standing against the tips of the thorns, long and sharp as spears. There was nowhere left for him to go. The woman’s hand snatched at the air, missing his face by an inch.
“Now,” she hissed, “you are mine. I will love you, and you will die loving me in return.”
Her spine stretched, and her mouth opened so wide that her skull split almost in half, the rows of teeth braced to tear David’s throat open. She shot forward, and David threw himself to the floor, waiting until she was almost upon him before he moved. Her dress covered his face, so that he heard but did not see what happened next. There was a sound like a rotten fruit being punctured, and a foot kicked once at his head, but only once.
David rolled out from beneath the folds of red velvet. The thorns had pierced the woman through the heart and the side. Her right hand too had been impaled, but her left hand was free. It trembled against a creeper, the only part of her that moved. David could see her face. She no longer looked like Rose. Her hair had turned to silver, and her skin was old and wrinkled. A dank, musty smell came from the wounds in her body. Her lower jaw hung loosely on her wrinkled chest. Her nostrils quivered as she smelled David, and she tried to speak. At first, her voice was so faint that he could not hear what she said. He leaned in closer, still wary of her even though he knew that she was dying. Her breath stank of putrefaction, but this time he understood her words.
“Thank you,” she whispered, and then her body sagged against the thorns and crumbled to dust before his eyes.
And as she disappeared, the creepers began to wither and die, and the remains of the dead knights fell clattering to the ground. David ran to where Roland lay. His body had been almost drained of blood. David felt like crying for him, but no tears would come. Instead he dragged Roland’s remains up the steps to the stone bed and, with some effort, laid him to rest upon it. He did the same for Raphael, placing his body by Roland’s side. He put their swords upon their chests and folded their hands across the hilts, the way he had seen dead knights laid out in his books. He retrieved his own sword and placed it in its scabbard, then took one of the lamps from its stand and used it to find his way back to the stairs of the tower. The long corridor with its many rooms was now no more, and only dusty stones and crumbling walls remained in its place. When he got outside, he saw that here too, the creepers and thorns had withered away, and all that was left was an old fortress, ruined and decayed. Beyond its gates, Scylla stood waiting for him by the ashes of the fire. She neighed with joy as she saw him approach. David put his hand upon her brow and whispered in her ear, so that she might know what fate had befallen her beloved master. Then, finally, he climbed into the saddle and turned her toward the forest and the road east.
All was quiet as they passed through the trees, for the things that dwelled within them heard David coming and were afraid. Even the Crooked Man, who had returned to his perch among the topmost branches, now looked at the boy in a new way, and tried to work out how he might best use this latest development to his advantage.
DAVID AND SCYLLA followed the road to the east. David’s eyes stared straight ahead, but they noticed little of what was before them. Scylla’s head hung lower than it previously had, as though she too were mourning the passing of her master in her soft, dignified way. Snow sparkled in the eternal dusk, and icicles hung like frozen tears from the bushes and the trees.
Roland was dead. So too was David’s mother. He had been a fool to imagine otherwise. Now, as the horse plodded through this cold, dark world, David admitted to himself, perhaps for the first time, that he had always known his mother was gone. He had just wanted to believe otherwise. It was like the routines that he had employed while she was ill in the hope that they might keep her alive. They were false hopes, dreams without foundation, insubstantial as the voice he had followed to this place. He could not change the world that he had left, and this world, while taunting him with the possibility that things could be different, had ultimately frustrated him. It was time to go home. If the king could not help him, then he might yet be forced to strike a bargain with the Crooked Man. All he had to do was speak Georgie’s name aloud to him.
But hadn’t the Crooked Man told him that everything could be restored to the way it was? That was a lie. His mother was dead, and the world of which she had been a part was gone forever. Even if he went back, it would be to a place in which she was only a memory. Home was now a place shared with Rose and Georgie, and the best would have to be made of that, for his sake as much as theirs. If the Crooked Man’s promise could not be kept, then what others might he break?
It was as Roland had warned:
“He will say less than he means and conceal more than he reveals.”
Any deal made with the Crooked Man would be filled with potential traps and perils. David would just have to hope that the king was able and willing to help him, allowing him to avoid any further contact with the trickster. But what he had heard so far about the king had caused him doubt. Roland had clearly thought little of him, and even the Woodsman had admitted that the king’s hold on his kingdom was not what it once was. Now, faced with the threat of Leroi and his wolf army, perhaps the king would be tested beyond endurance. His kingdom would be taken from him by force, and he would die in Leroi’s jaws. With the burden of that knowledge on his shoulders, would he even have time for the problems of a boy lost in the world?
And what of the book itself, the Book of Lost Things? What could be contained in its pages that would help David to return home: a map to another hollow tree, perhaps, or a spell capable of magicking him back? But if the book had magical properties, then why couldn’t the king use it to protect his kingdom? David hoped that the king wasn’t like the Great Oz, all smoke and mirrors and good intentions, but without any real power to back him up.
So lost was David in his own thoughts, and so used was he to an empty road, that he failed to see the men until they were almost upon him. There were two of them, dressed mostly in rags, with scarves covering their faces so that only their eyes were visible. One carried a short sword, the other a bow with an arrow notched upon its string, ready to fire. They dashed from the undergrowth, casting aside the white furs with which they had camouflaged themselves, and stood in front of David, their weapons raised.
“Halt!” cried the man with the sword, and David stopped Scylla just a few feet from where they stood.
The one with the bow squinted down the length of his arrow, then eased the pressure on the string as he lowered the weapon.
“Why, it’s just a boy,” he said. His voice was hoarse and rumbled with menace. He lowered the scarf from his face, revealing a mouth distorted by a vertical scar that cut across his lips. His companion threw back the hood from his head. Most of his nose had been cut off. All that was left was a mess of scarred cartilage with two holes in the center.
“Boy or not, that’s a fine horse he’s riding,” he said. “He has no business with such an animal. He probably stole it himself, so there’s no sin in relieving him of what wasn’t his to begin with.”
He reached for Scylla’s reins, but David pulled the horse back a step.
“I didn’t steal her,” he said softly.
“What?” said the thief. “What did you say, boy? We’ll have none of your lip, or you won’t live long enough to regret the day you met us.”
He brandished his sword at David. It was primitive and crudely made, and David could see the marks of the whetstone upon its blade. Scylla neighed and stepped farther away from the threat.
“I said,” David repeated, “that I didn’t steal her, and she’s not going anywhere with you. Now get away from us.”
“Why, you little—”
The swordsman snatched at Scylla’s reins once again, but this time David raised her up on her hind legs, then urged her onward and down. One of her hooves struck the swordsman on the forehead, and there was a hollow, cracking sound as the man fell dead to the ground. His fellow bandit was so shocked that he failed to respond quickly enough. He was still trying to lift his bow when David spurred Scylla, his own sword now drawn and extended. He slashed at the archer, and the very tip of his sword caught the man’s throat, slicing through the rags to the flesh beneath. The bandit stumbled, and his bow fell. He raised his hand to his neck and tried to speak, but only a wet, gurgling sound emerged. Blood fountained through his fingers and scattered itself upon the snow. The front of his clothing was already drenched with red as he dropped to his knees beside his dead companion, the flow starting to ease as his heart began to fail.
David turned Scylla so that she was facing the dying man.
“I warned you!” shouted David. He was crying now, crying for Roland and his mother and his father, crying even for Georgie and Rose, for all of the things that he had lost, both those that could be named and those that could only be felt. “I asked you to leave us alone, but you wouldn’t. Now look at what it’s brought you. You idiots! You stupid, stupid men!”
The bowman’s mouth opened and closed, and his lips formed words, but no sounds came out. His eyes were fixed on the boy. David saw them narrow, as if the bowman could not quite understand what was being said or what was happening to him as he knelt in the snow, his blood pooling around him.