And suddenly, he found himself wondering, Where am I?
His memory was gone. He stood in the great house of his birth, and it was as foreign to him as a stranger’s abode. The venom in his blood surged with fright. What was he doing in this ghastly place, alone? Then he shook his head, still more confused. Why would he be anything other than alone? He had no one. He was no one.
His hand rested on something that drew his eye.
Felix turned and saw an old painting, its frame gilded but dirty with ash. It was the only piece that remained on the long gallery wall, but in the murk and gloom, he could not make out the images it depicted.
Curious, Felix took it down and carried it to the nearest chamber. This had once been the family sitting room, where Fidel and his children would retire for an hour or two following supper, just the three of them. When Felix stood in the doorway, he had a flash of recall. He saw himself sitting by the fire, playing a game of sticks and pebbles. He saw his sister watching him from a nearby chair, languorous Monster draped purring across her lap. He saw his father, dozing and pretending not to. He saw many a childhood evening all rolled into one.
Then it was gone. The room was stripped of its furnishings, still more stripped of its memories. Felix stood, his shoulders bowed with a heaviness he could not explain. The room seemed grotesque to him, but for no reason he could understand.
The poison ate at his brain. And the faces of his sister and his father melted away.
Remembering why he had come, Felix took the picture to a window. The curtains were drawn, but he pulled them back in a shower of dust and, because this window was crusted with ashes on the outside, he undid the latch and pushed it open. The dull light of the overcast day poured into the room, revealing the picture in his hands.
Though the canvas was small, it contained five separate figures. Three of them stood on the shores of a great black lake; the other two were on an island in the center of that lake. The three on the shore all shared the same beautiful face. But one wore a crown while the other two were bound together in chains. On the island, one of the figures lay sleeping on an altar of gold, his hands crossed over his breast. Beside him stood a woman who covered her face with her hands, weeping.
Felix put his nose closer to the picture, squinting as he studied it. Then he pulled back with a gasp, for though the figures were badly painted and disproportionate, he recognized one of them as vividly as though he stood in life before him. The figure sleeping on the altar, the one whose face was a skull-like mask.
The Dragon.
He almost dropped the picture, but somehow his fingers clung on. Drawing a deep breath, Felix muttered, “It’s only paint.” He forced himself to look again.
And it seemed to him, though he knew it could not be so, that one of the figures moved. The beautiful man wearing a crown turned his head (it must have been a trick of that strange light) and looked at Felix.
Come to me.
“Felix?”
The young prince startled and dropped the picture, which crashed at his feet. He spun about, staring into the shadowed room. Something stood in the doorway. Something . . . rather small.
Then a long-haired orange tomcat, his tail held high, padded into the middle of the room. His face—scarred over where eyes had once been—was unmistakable.
“M-Monster?” Felix said. Then he shook himself. The poison thickened in his veins. The memory of his sister’s cat came and went, leaving behind a black hole of forgetfulness. Felix knelt and put out a hand, something he would never have done a year before for his sister’s cat, whom he loved to hate. “Nice kitty,” he said. “Where did you come from?”
“Nice kitty?” The cat put back his ears, and his pink nose twitched. “Lights Above us, boy, you are in a bad way. You positively reek with poison! It’s a good thing you got here when you did.”
Felix frowned. His brain was on fire, making it difficult to think. He didn’t like cats; he remembered that much at least. And he was almost certain that cats were not supposed to talk, which made this one particularly unappealing. He clenched his teeth and stood up, backing to the window.
“Imraldera sent me,” the cat continued, his ears cupping forward as he followed the sound of the prince’s footsteps. “She said she thought you would come. She hoped so anyway. She wanted me to be here to meet you.” The tip of his tail twitched. “I suppose it’s foolish of me to ask, but did you miss me? Not that I missed you, of course.”
Felix stared, his addled mind trying to form a thought but failing. Part of him wanted very badly to . . . he wasn’t sure. Kick the cat. Smash him. Tear him to pieces.
Burn him.
Come to me.
The voice spoke to his rage. It spoke to his brokenness.
Felix turned and looked out the open window, out into the ruins of the palace gardens. Seven tiers down the hillside, with paths crisscrossing, they boasted now only charred stumps and smoldered statues. And where the gardens ended, Goldstone Wood began.
“Well, I suppose you haven’t missed me, then,” the cat behind him was saying. “Can’t say I’m not a little hurt. After all, one likes to think oneself universally adored, doesn’t one? But come now. Are you ready to return to the Haven with me? Eh, Felix?”
Felix climbed through the window and jumped to the ground below.
The cat, startled, leapt to the windowsill and called down to him. His sharp ears heard the sound of the boy scrabbling in the dirt, and then the pound of his footsteps as he raced across the garden. The cat’s tail lashed again. “This can’t be good,” he said. “Perhaps the poison has gone deeper than we thought.”
Growling, he sprang down into the garden and sped after the long-legged prince.
The garden was both familiar and terribly foreign. Felix felt terror mounting in him as he saw scenes and statues, images that he should know but which, the moment he recognized them, vanished from his memory. He was losing his mind, and there was nothing he could do to catch hold of it again.
Come to me.
The voice rose from the Wood below. Felix chased after it like a lost traveler pursuing the elusive will-o’-the-wisp. He hurtled down the path, through the seven tiers of garden, and stood at last on the edge of the Wood.
In years past, he and Una had run away to play in Goldstone Wood nearly every day. The people of the palace had told many strange and superstitious stories about that forest, and few liked to venture into its depths. None of their servants dared follow them, which had made it all the more attractive to the young brother and sister. Felix’s happiest memories were of the games he and Una had invented during their hours deep within the shadows of those trees, down by the Old Bridge.
“Felix! Wait!” came the voice of the cat, faint now, as though calling from another world.
Everything was gone. The memory of his childhood, the image of his sister’s face. All gone. Everything was taken from Felix, and only the Wood remained. He stood on the edge of those tree-cast shadows, staring into darkness. There were no memories now to comfort him.
There was nothing but the voice within.
Come.
Felix passed into the trees and made his way down the path to the Old Bridge.
“Dragons eat that boy,” the cat snarled, plunging after him.
No one crossed the Old Bridge.
It was one of those unspoken rules that Felix and his sister had always obeyed. Sometimes they’d dared each other to try, to run across and back, bringing some token—a twig, a leaf, a pebble. But though they both declared themselves willing, neither ever did. They would walk halfway and stand as though they’d struck a wall, silently amassing excuses in their heads that neither was willing to speak. Then they would turn around and return to the safe and familiar side farther up the hill.
But when Felix, reaching the end of his headlong flight, stumbled to the edge of the stream and stood upon the first boards of the bridge, he could not remember Una. Nor could he remember any reason he might not
cross this way.
And the voice called him from beyond.
Come to me, child of mortals.
The Wood watched him as he stood there, his hands limp at his sides, his face empty as the memories played through his mind and vanished. There was nothing but trees, cool and peaceful, rustling their leaves above his head in sweet whispers.
Come to me.
Felix gazed across the Old Bridge. He thought he glimpsed something, some large being, a darker shadow beneath the shadows of the trees. Unafraid, he stepped onto the bridge, which clunked hollowly beneath his boots. In four strides he was across. One more step, and he would stand in the leaves on the far side.
“Felix!”
Felix turned, though he recognized neither the voice nor the name. He saw the orange cat, every hair standing on end, empty sockets where eyes should be, standing on the far side of the bridge.
“Felix!” he yeowled. “Don’t cross over!”
Felix bared his teeth. And when he spoke, his voice was scarcely human, and smoke trickled from between his lips. “Don’t tell me what to do.”
“No, wait!”
The next moment, the cat was flying at him, all claws and fur. For an instant, Felix thought he saw a tall man in scarlet with golden hair, hands reaching out to him. But it was only for an instant, for in his surprise, Felix stumbled that final step.
His foot crunched into the leaves of the forest.
Only there was no forest.
No forest, no hill, no cat.
He stood upon a gray plain, one stretching for miles and miles all around him until it met the horizon. Gray that blended into the iron of the sky so exactly that one could scarcely tell up from down but for the cold, pale sun that shone weakly above.
The unicorn appeared at his side.
Come with me, it said.
Felix screamed.
3
In the deep shadows of the Wood Between, the Hunter stalked.
He’d walked these Paths before, ages ago, searching then for what he sought now. Still, he found nothing. But his eyes were bright, shining with light which they took and hoarded so that he could see in the dark with ease—a gift of his ancestry. He sniffed for traces of a leading scent, touched contours of ancient trees with sensitive fingers that ended in claws. His ears strained for the smallest sound.
He’d been called away from his hunt several times, called to serve his master elsewhere. But each time he returned with renewed will. For now he stood to lose much more. Now the prospect of failure was worse than the prospect of death.
Five hundred years he had hunted in the Wood, each moment a century, each century a moment, for Time does not flow a smooth course in that place. The Hunter was tired beyond measure. He was also keen.
A prophecy of blood waited at the end of his journey. His own blood, or that of his prey.
1
Lionheart stood in the sloping gardens of Hill House, breathing deeply of mountain air. Though down in the low country spring had already given way to the sweltering heat and humidity of summer, up here in the mountains, a crisp wind blew constantly. Sometimes it bit so sharp that one would think it could purify all manner of ailments.
It did nothing for Lionheart. His was a sickness of the heart.
He had made the journey to Hill House alone. This would never have been permitted had he made known his intentions, so he had not waited for permission. The moment the Council made its decision and the Eldest named Foxbrush his heir, Lionheart had packed a bundle of necessities and some gold, left a message with his father’s steward, and taken the back way out.
He would not stay behind for the pomp and ceremonies to follow. He would not wait to hear the announcement of Foxbrush and Daylily’s betrothal.
In the barony of Blackrock he had stayed awhile and sent messages ahead to the town of Torfoot, which was not three miles from Hill House’s door. Plenty of folk there were eager for work, and at Lionheart’s request they returned to the old house, opened its doors and windows, lit fires, and prepared for his arrival. Since the coming of the Dragon, Hill House had been abandoned. The people of Torfoot were glad to see it opened up again, smoke curling from its chimneys.
But the sight was not as welcoming as Lionheart had hoped. Not even Hill House, where he had known two summers as a boy and of which he treasured many fond memories, could comfort him now. His humiliation was too great.
He had avoided people as much as possible on his journey, and even now at his journey’s end he scarcely spoke to the folk of the house. The night of his arrival, he had nodded to the cook, the housekeeper, the maid, and the footman, said nothing, and gone to his room, shutting the door firmly behind himself. The maid left a plate of food outside in the hall. He rose at dawn, opened his door, and stepped right on it, cracking the plate. The maid found it an hour later, along with the empty bedroom. But there was no sign of the disinherited prince.
“Royalty always has their own ways,” said Redbird, the cook, when the maid came back and reported his disappearance.
“But does he really count as royalty now?” asked the maid. “I mean, now that he ain’t the crown prince no more?”
“Once a royal, always a royal,” said Redbird.
But the maid wasn’t sure she believed her.
Lionheart had gone out to the gardens when the sun was just rising. Before leaving the Eldest’s House, he had shaved off his beard, leaving his face cold now in the morning. He tramped through the familiar but overgrown grounds, recalling boyhood days many years ago when he had been sent to visit his cousin for the summer and spent hours entertaining himself in these gardens.
Back before he climbed farther up the mountain and met the lonely girl who changed his life.
Lionheart had been to Hill House months ago, when he first returned to Southlands after his exile and came searching for Rose Red. It was then that he had knocked out the front boards of the old shed’s door in order to reach inside. No one had repaired those boards since, so when Lionheart came to the old shed, he knew what he would find just within its dark doorway.
He put his hand into the mustiness, brushing away spider webs and crawlies, and took hold of the fell sword, Bloodbiter’s Wrath. Which looked startlingly like a beanpole. Perhaps because it was one.
Lionheart pulled the beanpole out of the shed and held it in both hands. It was decorated up and down with messy little carvings, including its name somewhere near where the “hilt” should be. It had been his weapon of choice as a boy and had seen many an epic battle up in the mountain forest where he and Rose Red had played their games. He lifted it up, his knuckles whitening as he squeezed it. With very little effort, he could break it in two. . . .
“There are some things that cannot be repaired once broken.”
Lionheart startled at the voice and whirled about, brandishing the beanpole. He had thought himself quite alone in the morning stillness. Even now, as his eyes scanned the lawns and overgrown hedgerows, he saw no one.
“It smells to me,” the voice spoke again, surprisingly close but from a different direction, “as though you don’t know what it is you hold there. Sad, that. How limited mortal perceptions are.”
Spinning in place, Lionheart scanned the whole of the yard. Still he saw no one. “Where are you?” he demanded, his voice firm, though his heart raced. “Who are you?”
“Oh, come now, I’m hurt.” The voice was masculine, a smooth tenor. Yet there was a slight huskiness to it as well, and an unnatural timbre. “I thought you would remember me. Not that we spent a great deal of time in each other’s company, but I like to think I make a lasting impression.”
“Where did we meet?”
“Oriana.”
At that name, Lionheart’s face broke into a sweat despite the chill morning. His brows lowered and he adjusted his grip on the beanpole. “Come out,” he said. “Come out where I can see you.”
“Really, my lad, you’re blinder than I am.”
The next mo
ment, a large orange tomcat appeared at Lionheart’s feet. It boasted a thick ruff and a plume of a tail, the tip of which twitched continually as it tilted up its whiskered nose. It was a handsome animal, large for a house cat, glossy and healthy looking.
But it had no eyes.
This strange lack made its face altogether too smug as it smiled up at Lionheart. It was a face that would be hard to forget. It was not a face one would expect to speak.
Lionheart gaped. Then he said, “Monster?”
“Ah! You do remember me, then,” said the cat with a trill. “Only, I’d rather you did not refer to me by that name. I allow only friends to address me thus, and you, my lad, are far from being my friend.” The voice was bright and cheerful, but there was an edge to it that made Lionheart step back. “You may call me Sir. Or Your Grace. Even Your Eminence. I’m not especially picky.”
During the course of Lionheart’s travels, he had encountered dragons, emperors, sylphs, oracles, priests, dukes—any number of fantastic peoples, mortal and immortal alike. The memory of Rose Red’s goat transforming into a tall woman and shaking him within an inch of his life was burned into his memory. But he had never before heard human speech cross the lips of a house cat.
A house cat who had more than one reason to dislike Lionheart.
“You belonged to Una,” Lionheart said.
“Well, belonged might be stretching the point,” said the cat. “Rather, I was her guardian. And a noble occupation it was while it lasted. But my sweet young mistress has since married and gone to live in her husband’s kingdom, far, far away.”
Lionheart said nothing for a long moment. Una, married? To whom? It did not take long for his imagination to fill in that missing piece. Who else but the Prince of Farthestshore? It must be he. The Dragon truly was dead, then, and his nightmare of several months back was reality.