“Rarely.”
For Mother, the Gate War was a mistake flanked by tragedies. On one side, the Fair Folk senselessly slew her beloved husband mere days before Eala was born; on the other, the Fair Folk stole that treasured daughter away into Tír na nÓg. Between, shehad fought battle after battle against an enemy who could not be beaten.
“She said—” I struggled to remember her words. “At the Battle of the First Gate, when Cathair slew the leipreachán, trees of night sprang up where its heart-blood fell, and beyond them rose the morning sun, if morning were music and the sun were the sound of being alive.”
“That sounds more like a dream than a memory.” Rogan’s words were taut with unease.
I looked down at my hands clutched in my lap. When I spread my fingers, I imagined each one was a comb-toothed leaf, bowing beneath the drizzle.
Dreams didn’t always happen while you slept. And things didn’t have to make sense to be real.
I stood abruptly. “We should move. We don’t want to lose the light.”
The rain stopped after noon, stacking banks of heavy clouds above the rising hills. We passed Finn Coradh, the village closest the fort, and kept riding, despite Rogan begging for a flagon of ale and a roast. At last, we saw it—the unfinished dún hunching dark against an iron sky, towers jutting jagged as broken teeth. Hills dotted in violet and gold tumbled down toward a glassy lough, beyond which a dark line of trees disappeared into the coming dusk.
Rogan reined Finan, who stomped and snorted, his breath a cloud of white.
“Home sweet home, I suppose.” Rogan whistled, rueful. “You’re sure we can’t stay in Finn Coradh? The Muddy Ram is famous, although I can’t remember whether it’s for the wine or for the women.”
“Perhaps we should.” I grinned and tossed my head. “Where there are women, there are always men. Shall we wager which of us can fall into ouronebed with someone faster?”
Rogan frowned, shook his head, and spurred his stallion forward.
The fort’s shadow tasted like winter. The path sloping upward was edged in trees gnarled like broken harp strings. Two tall, pitted standing stones loomed stark as sentinels at the base of the hill, their time-smoothed surfaces sloping like old men’s shoulders. In the fading light, I imagined the patterns of lichen and moss were human features. A giant eye. An open mouth, its ancient words lost on the wind.
It felt like a warning.
I nudged Eimar toward the standing stones. She balked and sallied, forcing me to rein her tight.
“Something has them frightened,” Rogan said, apprehension shadowing his face as he tried to control his own horse.
“I can see that.” I eyed the sky. Red mottled the horizon and stained Dún Darragh’s towers with blood. Night was coming, and the fort was still half a league’s ride. I made my voice soft and murmured to my mare, “Come, girl. There’s nothing fearful here.”
As I guided her between the standing stones, time stopped and the world tilted. I raised my eyes, somehow knowing what I would see before I saw it: two standing stones looming over a path edged in flowers, leading to a castle atop a rise. But the stones were giants with granite faces, and the flowers bloomed with black-and-white petals, and the fort was built of jewels and dreams and strange wishes. The sky sang with light and the earth sang with life. My bones hummed.
Eimar passed beyond the stones. The edges of my vision blurred, as though objects out of sight were twisting into new shapes. The world stretched thin as silk, then righted itself.
I wheeled to look back at Rogan, who was passing through behind me. But his face didn’t change—his eyes didn’t dazzle with impossible visions. He gave me a questioning look.
A flock of ravens burst squawking from a nearby tree, sending rust-colored leaves fluttering to the ground, and filling the sky withblack feathers. Eimar whinnied and reared, nearly crashing into Finan. I struggled to keep my seat, gripping the saddle with my knees and grasping for the reins. My hands found her withers. I buried my fingers in her white mane as she tried to throw me. Panic stomped my heart, and the shadowed forest within me lurched out without my permission.
Greenery burst along Eimar’s neck, leaves rustling toward her ears. Vines twined her head like a second bridle. Instantly, the mare settled, all four hooves dropping to the ground. Her gray hide twitched, and she bowed her head to crop at the grass.
I gripped my hands into fists and swore. Behind me, Rogan inhaled in shock. Regret pulsed through me as I examined the threads of green writhing beneath Eimar’s hide, twisting slowly toward her heart.
“What did you do?” Rogan asked softly. “Your magic—”
“Don’t call it that!” Tears pricked my eyes, and I fought to control my voice. “Please don’t call it that.”
But it didn’t matter what he called it. Mother called it my Greenmark; Cathair called it something uglier. I tried not to name it at all. But it lived within me, like a set of green fingerprints on my heart. Folk magic—wild growth and rot and rebirth. Ihatedit. I hated the way it slid through my veins like dark water and thronged my thoughts with shifting leaves.
I forced myself to look up, to meet Rogan’s eyes. I swallowed my remorse and confirmed what he was already thinking.
“My Greenmark—it’s stronger here. The moment I passed between those stones…” I trailed off. Below me, Eimar cocked an ear and lifted her delicate head. Her eyes had already turned to leaf-glass, glossy as a pond beneath trees. I thought of my beloved Pinecone, crumbling to dirt beneath the hem of my shirt. “My poor girl. I loved her.”
Rogan’s eyes were hard to read in the dimming light. “What will happen to her?”
“By morning, she’ll be another tree in the hungry forest.”
