Grayling's Song(25)

She grabbed Auld Nancy’s hand and stood as if frozen, and her companions lurched into her. Gliding toward them was a horrid creature, all scales and flames and teeth.





XI





huge snake, big enough to swallow a man whole, slithered into the clearing. Its black scaled body, rippling and throbbing, coiled around itself. Its eyes flamed red, and, opening its huge mouth, the snake hissed and howled and breathed fire.

Flames turned trees into torches and sizzled as they met patches of mist and dew. There came a great fluttering in Grayling’s pocket, and Pook burst forth, a raven again. With a harsh cronk, a squawk, and a flapping of wings, he soared into the sky and away. The mule made a sound between a whinny and a grunt and, ears flattened, bolted, saddlebags swinging.

The snake flicked its tail and coiled it around Grayling, pulling her close and squeezing her breathless. A harsh odor burned her throat and stung her eyes. She struggled to breathe. Twisting and wriggling, she fought to free herself, but the snake held her tight. She could do nothing.

Pansy and Desdemona Cork had run away, but Grayling could see Sylvanus, rubbing his beard and mumbling incantations, and Auld Nancy, poking the snake’s middle with her broom and screeching, over and over.

Whether it was due to Sylvanus’s magical intervention or Auld Nancy’s battering, Grayling did not know or care, but the snake opened its mouth, flicked its sharp tongue, and loosed its coils.

Bruised and sore, reeking of the serpent’s stink, trembling with terror, Grayling turned and ran with Sylvanus and Auld Nancy back into the thicket of trees, where they caught up with Pansy and Desdemona Cork.

Together they tore out from the trees onto a path that twisted and turned on its way back to the road. Finally, when they heard nothing behind them but the whooshing sound of fire and the crack of branches snapping from the heat, they stumbled to a stop. Grayling doubled over, trying to catch her breath. Her face smarted and her legs trembled. Auld Nancy dropped to the ground, her head drooping. Pansy pulled at the old woman’s sleeve, bleating, “We must go! Up! Up!”

Although Grayling too was eager to put distance between herself and the monstrous snake, she knew Auld Nancy did not have the strength to rise and run farther. And the day was growing dark. They could not see to flee or to hide. Desdemona Cork helped Grayling gather enough fallen leaves and bracken to make a bed, and hungry and cold and frightened, the five travelers huddled together like kittens.

It was dawn when Grayling woke to Sylvanus saying, “’Tis important to note that the serpent has not followed nor threatened us.”

“Certes, those flames were a threat,” said Desdemona Cork, her face gray beneath her blue markings. She stood, brushing leaves from her veils and shawls and skirts. “’Tis foolish to put ourselves in such danger. I am away.”

Auld Nancy said, “Desdemona Cork! You cannot think to be on the road alone, not with the smoke and shadow on one side and that terrible creature on the other. ’Twould not be safe. We must stay together.”

“And do what?” Desdemona Cork asked. She looked up the road and down. Grayling could see the pulse pounding in the enchantress’s throat. Shaking her hair and her skirts, Desdemona Cork sat down again, and Auld Nancy took her hand.

“Now, Sylvanus,” said Auld Nancy, “what meant you?”

“I mean, I believe the beast is there but to keep us from the grimoires. We will come to no harm unless we try to get closer.”

I was in the snake’s grasp, Grayling thought. Certes, I felt that the creature meant me harm, and I have bruises to prove it. She shivered at the recollection. “We are here because the grimoires may tell us what to do about the evil force,” she said. “And my mother’s grimoire is through those woods. We must get closer.” Her legs ached, and her head hurt, and she wished to be anywhere else. “But how can we ever get past such a creature?”

“Alas, we cannot,” said Sylvanus in a voice hollow and forlorn. “Best we leave it for some master magician to come and—”

“I thought you were a master magician, Sylvanus,” said Auld Nancy. “The others are rooted to the ground. There must be something you can do.”

“Nay,” said Sylvanus, blowing his nose. “Alas, alas, I cannot.”

“My mother and all the others,” said Grayling, “are we just to leave them spellbound? Let them turn completely into trees? What will happen to the world if all the witches and wizards and cunning folk are helpless, and all the power rests in the evil force?” She rubbed her ash-smudged face with her sleeve. “You say you know charms and conjuration. What use is your enchanted scholarship if you can do nothing?”

Said Sylvanus, “Wise men say, ‘when your foe breathes fire, ’tis folly to be brave.’”

A brisk wind set tall trees to groaning, dead leaves swirled around Grayling’s feet, and the cries of foxes and badgers echoed through the woods. Pansy clung to Auld Nancy’s skirts, and no one made a sound but for the thumping of their hearts.

Grayling was afraid. She studied the others. Sylvanus Vetch, teacher of enchanted scholarship at the school in Nether Finchbeck, he, too, was afraid. Auld Nancy with her bluster, skittish Desdemona Cork, fainthearted Pansy, and Grayling herself—all afraid.

Grayling cast about for some way to embolden them. What would Hannah Strong do? “My mother,” Grayling said at last, “has a heartening song, and I believe we are in need of one now.” And she sang loud and sweet and true: