I tilted my head. That sounded like rejection. Poor boy.
“How? How have you done it?”
My lips parted, but nothing came out.
“Come with us. You don’t have to live like this,” he insisted. “Like a savage.”
I bared my teeth, tossing him my mostsavagegrin.
His pale skin blanched, but he pressed on, desperation making him taste of fouled things. “Please. We won’t last long out here! If it’s not those two, it will be others. You know it. Tritans aren’t seen on the auction blocks too often, these days. Mostly Elorans, since the Empire took Liyas.” He laughed then, wrapping his palm about a thin sapling, desperate excitement dancing over his skin and mine. “But with your power—Goddess, we couldfightthem! We could start a rebellion! Claim vengeance for the wrong done to our people—”
Entranced, I stepped closer. What would it be like to embrace this fever for war? To bathe in it and finally take what was owed? I took another step, watching the heartbeat flutter at his throat.
“Are you not Tritan, girl? Does the need for justice not sing in your blood?” He made a bitter, humorless sound, the dash of salt adding an intoxicating aroma to his heated, simple ki. “To find a Priestess free of the Empire? Likely the very last of your kind, I might add. You’re a gift of the Goddess, girl. A divine weapon.”
I recoiled.
Always,alwayssent by a dead Goddess to be a weapon for the mundane. To those delusional few who thought they could control the darkness that hungered for their life-blood…
Those who thought it would be satisfied withjustCaledonian blood.
Always, always,always.
Bored, I discarded the man’s cheap vintage, cleansing my palate with the forest’s ambrosia.
Pale eyes gleaming, he seemed not to notice, extending his hand. Thinking my allegiance guaranteed. “Come with us. Fight for us. We need food and water. Please—”
“Food.” I tugged a parcel free of my belt, then stubbed booted toe into the snow. “Water.”
“This won’t last! We can’t survive much longer in this weather without proper clothing. You’d rescue us from slavers just to see us die by the elements?” He laughed again, flinging his hand toward the forest. “You should have left us with them if you won’t help us now. At least then we’d be alive.”
The child whimpered.
I turned to face the father, letting him experience the full-force of my modified canines and savage, filthy visage. “It’s a two-day hike to the coast. Stay on the trail.” I tapped the parcel I’d given him. “One piece each, three times a day. No fires. Look for the lion’s claws,” I said, dragging four nails across tree bark to show them what to look for. “Four claws mark a shelter hidden just off the trail. Eight mark food caches. There’s sympathy for your cause at the coast. It’s all been arranged.”
“And then what? I have nothing. I can’t afford passage—”
The woman tugged on his arm. “Come. She’s done enough, my love. Let’s not linger.” She looked to me. “Thank you, Priestess. Thank you.”
With a single nod, I turned on my heel, reaching for the safety of the trees.
“And what if we don’t make it?” the man called. “What then?”
“You will.”
“You can’t know that!”
Kas howled, impatient and irate, but I turned back to face him, spreading my arms wide. “This is my forest. My home. I’ll know if you need me. And I will come.” With that, I fled, racing along my treetop highway with practiced ease, sprinting toward sanctuary. Their ki lingered on my senses, making my skin crawl with revulsion and hunger—but not so much as the slavers whose toxic presence was still within the borders of my territory.
I sent a pulse toward them, checking their condition and opening the only path that would lead them free of the forest.
I did not want them dead on my land, where their corpses would taint the soil and feed the trees, or…worse.
Besides… if I killed them all, who would perpetrate the danger of entering the Forest of Sorrows and the Menace who lived within?
The Grandmother sang at my approach, for hers was a heart of Glaith. And through her mighty roots, the forest yearned to do my bidding. Growing and withering at my slightest touch. The great-grandmother oak was a fortress none had managed to penetrate.
Save one, thoughhehad only infected my dreams and inspired waking nightmares.
