Laurell Hamilton - Never After

“Useful,” Sally said, after a moment’s thought. “Useful to myself and others. That’s a powerful thing.”

“More than people realize,” said the gardener.

“Everyone has got something different to offer. Just a matter of finding out what that is.”

She sipped her drink. “I was the youngest of seven children. A good, hardy farming family, but there wasn’t enough for all of us to eat. So I left. Took to the road one day and had my adventures. Until I came to this place. They needed a person with a talent for growing things, and that I had aplenty. I was useful. So I stayed.

“I’m a princess. I have duties.”

“That you do,” said the old woman. “But following the duty to yourself, and the duty to others, doesn’t have to be separate.”

Sally narrowed her eyes. “You know something.”

The gardener smiled to herself, but it was sad, and vaguely uneasy. “I dreamed of the queen and her crown of horns, sleeping in the forest by the silver lake. Guarded by ravens, who keep her dreams at bay.”

She spoke the words almost as though she were singing them, and Sally found herself light-headed, leaning hard against the oak, which seemed to vibrate beneath her back. “But that’s just a dream.”

“No,” whispered the gardener, fixing her with a look. “Those of us who ever lived in the shadow of the Tangleroot know of odd truths, and odder dreams that are truth, echoes of a past that slumbers; and of things that walk amongst us, fully awake. Stories that others have forgotten, because they are too strange.”

Sally rubbed her arms, chilled. “The Tangleroot is only a forest.”

“Is that why no one enters it?” The old woman’s smile deepened, but with a particular glint in her eyes. “Or why no one cuts its trees, or stands long in its shadow? You know that much is true.”

Sally did know. The Tangleroot was an ancient forest, rumored to have once been the site of a powerful kingdom. But a curse had fallen, and great battles had raged, and what was mighty had decayed; until the forest took root, with trees rising from the bodies of the dead. To cut a tree from the Tangleroot, some said, was to cut a soul—and bring down a curse upon your head.

Whether mere fancy or not, Sally had never met a man or woman who did not take heed of the old warnings. And it was true, too, that strange things seemed to happen around that forest. Lights, dancing in the shadows, and unearthly voices singing. Wolves who were said to walk as men, and men small as thimbles. Those who entered did not often come out; and the lucky few who walked free were always changed: insane or wild, or aged in unnatural ways.

Sally began to suddenly suffer the same uneasiness that had filled her just before the old king had announced his plan to marry her off. “Why are you telling me this?”

“Because there are answers in the Tangleroot, for those who have the courage to find them. Answers and questions, and possibilities.”

“And dreams?” Sally asked.

“Dreams that walk,” whispered the old woman, staring down into her tankard. “Your mother would have understood. She had been inside the forest. I could see it in her eyes.”

Sally went still at the mention of her mother, and then placed her hand over her chest, feeling through her dress the pendant, warm against her skin; the wooden heart, especially. “If I go there, will I find something that can help me? And my father?”

“You’ll find something,” she replied ominously, and pointed at Sally. “The Tangleroot calls to some, and to others it merely answers the desire that it senses. You want that forest, and it’ll bring you in, one way or another. It is a dangerous place, created by a dangerous woman who lived long ago. But there’s danger in staying here, too. You can’t stop a plant that wants to grow. You’ll only crush it if you try.”

Sally had felt crushed from the moment her father had mentioned marriage, but now a terrible restlessness rose within her, crazy anticipation feeding a burst of wildness. Her entire body twitched, as though it wanted to start walking, and for a moment she felt a strange energy between herself and the oak. Like something was waking.

Fool’s errand, she told herself. Magic, if it exists, won’t save you.

But she found herself saying, “And all I would do is enter the Tangleroot? There must be more than that. I wouldn’t know what to look for, or how to start.”

“Start by not making excuses. Go or stay.” The gardener stood on unsteady legs, and handed Sally her tankard. “Princess or not, duty or no, you were born with a heart and head. Which, in my experience, is enough to make your own choices about how to live your life.”

The old woman touched Sally’s brow, and her fingertips were light and cool. “You have a week before the envoy arrives.”

“That’s not much,” Sally said.

“It’s a lifetime,” she replied. “Depending on how you use it.”

Sally used it that night, when she slipped out of the castle and ran away.

She did not take much with her. Bread, cheese, dried salted beef; a sharp knife; and warm clothing that consisted of a down vest, a woolen cloak, and cashmere knitted leggings worn beneath her work dress, which still smelled faintly of manure. She took gold coins, and left behind her horse. If she was going to venture inside the Tangleroot—and that remained to be seen—she did not want to worry about leaving the animal behind. That, and it was harder to hide with a horse when one traveled the road.

The borders of the Tangleroot were everywhere, scattered and connected, twisting through the countryside across numerous kingdoms. The closest edge of the ancient forest was more than a day’s walk to the south, a little farther if Sally stayed off the main road and traveled one of the lesser-used trails. Which she did, guided by the light of the moon, and the stars glimpsed through the leaves of the trees.

She moved quickly, almost running at times, afraid that she would hear the silver bells attached to her father’s saddle; or the familiar call of his deep voice. Part of her wished that she would hear those things; not entirely certain that she would keep on running.

She was terrified. This was a fool’s journey. No direction, save faith in the unknowable, and the possibility of something miraculous.

But she did not stop. Not once. Afraid that if she did, even for a moment, she would turn around and return home. Like a coward, without even trying to fight for her freedom. The gardener was right: Sally had a week. One week to find an alternative, be it magic or simply inspiration—neither of which she was going to discover back home.

Near dawn, she found a small clearing behind a thicket of blackberry bushes that had lost their flowers. It was a cool night, and she curled deep inside her cloak to eat bread and cheese. Forest sounds filled the air: the hiss of the wind, and the crunch of a hoof in the leaves. Owls hooted. Sally was not frightened of the night, but sitting still made her think again of what she was doing, and that was far more terrifying. She shut her eyes and tried to sleep.

And dreamed of a queen.

Dawn, and though it is spring, there is ice on the lake, a sheen of frozen pearls smashed to dust, compacted into a shield against the undercurrent, dark water. A sleeping time: the fog has not yet burned away, and everywhere a glow, an otherworldly gleam.

It is not safe to walk on the ice. Ice belongs to the sleeping queen, the horned woman of the southern shore, who wears a crown to keep her dreams inside her head. Such dangerous things, her dreams. Like her voice, which makes thunder, raining words that drown.