An Enchantment of Ravens(31)
He paused. I clenched my fists against the unhappiness stealing across his expression. I didn’t want him to feel bad and apologize, I wanted him to understand.
“We do not speak of such things,” he said finally. “At all. Because we cannot. We cannot think of such things. Even this conversation puts you and me in grave danger.”
Like bile, the forbidden words crept up the back of my throat. Shuddering, I swallowed them down.
Rook wasn’t responsible for the fairy beasts. And while he was, to be fair, entirely at fault for dragging me into the forest in the first place, he had nearly died last night protecting me. This I couldn’t deny. He drooped in his ragged clothes, and the crown shook between his fingers. He labored for breath. Arguing had obviously taxed him.
“I’m sorry,” we both said at the same time, in identically grudging voices.
A startled smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. It was my turn to avoid his eyes. I took a deep breath, determined to address one more thing before we went on.
“We need to talk about what you said last night.”
“I hate it when people tell me that,” he replied. “It’s never good.”
“Rook. You aren’t still taking me to trial, are you? You’ve changed your mind.”
I’m not sure what reaction I anticipated. Perhaps for him to draw himself up and say, You claim to know the mind of a prince? Anything but the way he looked aside and uneasily toyed with his raven pin.
“I realize now that I—made a mistake,” he confessed. “You did not intentionally sabotage me. What you did with your Craft was . . .” He struggled to find words, incapable of describing that which he didn’t understand. “When I came to fetch you,” he went on instead, “I told no one of my plans. We won’t be missed in the autumn court. Once I have healed, I promise to return you to Whimsy.”
The strength went out of my knees, and I steadied myself on a tree trunk. I was going home. Home! To Emma and the twins, my safe warm house filled with the smell of linseed oil, the work I already missed so much. And yet—back to the endless summer, and the way things were before—a life that crept along to the endless buzzing of grasshoppers in the wheat. I’d leave the autumnlands’ wonders behind forever. My heart soared and plummeted by turns like a bird buffeted by a storm. If I felt like this too long, I’d tear myself apart. But what could I do? How could I stop?
And what exactly had finally gotten the truth through to Rook?
I studied him. His expression was impassive. But the way he ran his fingers over the raven pin, his eyes getting duller and duller, worsened the turbulence battering my spirits.
“What of you?” I asked. “Your reputation? What will you do next?”
He mustered himself and replied, “I will think of some—” Just like that he stopped. His jaw worked. “Let us not speak of it,” he finished oddly. “Do you see that hill ahead? Once we reach the top we’ll be back in the autumnlands.”
I squinted. The hill looked no different to me than the forest behind us. While I puzzled over this, I realized why Rook hadn’t been able to finish his sentence.
It had been a lie.
Nine
AS SOON as we crested the hill, it was autumn again. I turned a full circle. Gently swaying birches stretched into the distance across a forest painted in dreamy tones of white and gold. I took a step back, and another, but the summerlands didn’t reappear.
“This doesn’t make any sense,” I said.
Rook didn’t hear me. He’d leaned against the first autumn tree we’d come to and stood propped up like a scarecrow in his torn coat. His eyes were closed, and the relief on his face was profound. I was glad to see it, because after our last conversation his fever had seemed to sap his strength. He’d barely made it up the hill.
I waited for at least an hour for him to recover. I sat down, and tried lying down, but the leaves tickled my neck and I couldn’t relax in such a vulnerable position. My fears and worries and longings and questions jangled around in my head, and the weight of my dirty, scratchy clothes and my own smell were apt to drive me mad now that I didn’t have anything to distract me. Every time I glanced at Rook, he hadn’t moved.
Finally I approached him.
“I hear running water nearby,” I said. “I’m going to go find it. I’m thirsty, and I need to wash up.”
I didn’t expect him to respond, but his eyes opened halfway, and he regarded me as though in a trance. I fought back a shudder. It wasn’t like being looked at by a person. His gaze lacked sentience, as though the forest, not him, stared through his eyes. Then he blinked and the impression went away.
“Follow me. It’s safer here than in the summerlands, but you shouldn’t wander around by yourself.” He scrutinized me. “You are quite filthy,” he added, as if only just now noticing it.
“Thank you. I’m in good company.”
His indignation didn’t stop him from replying inevitably, “You’re welcome.” After he’d bit out the reluctant words he swanned the rest of the way down to the brook and knelt on its mossy bank, reviewing his own reflection. I spied a patch of honeysuckles I could use for privacy—I wanted to rinse my clothes and let them dry a bit before I put them back on. A scrubbing would accomplish little in the way of comfort if my dress remained stiff as treated canvas with mud and horse sweat.