Destroyer Rising (32 page)

I took three deep breaths and wiped the sweat from my
forehead. Bubbles snored, her bulk half-crushing my feet. Shiawase
was out like a light. It was one of the few times I’d actually seen
the ghost sleep. I rubbed my face and gently slid my numb feet out
from under Bubbles.

Water. I needed water. I pulled the Book that Bleeds
out of my backpack and placed it inside the hidden chest before
wobbling around the cu sith on half-numb legs. I glanced back at
the motley crew sleeping in my reading nook. I hoped they would get
more rest than I had.

I found a Frappuccino in the small fridge in the back
room instead. There was no way in hell I was going to try to sleep
again after that. The grandfather clock ticked nearby. I’d never
see Cara here again, and the recurring thought made the tock sound
like thunder. I had to get away.

Aideen glanced up from her perch on the register when
I walked into the front room. “There is a green man at Rivercene
who wishes to speak with the Dead God.”

“The what?” I asked, wondering if maybe I was still
asleep and my nightmare was taking a new turn.

“You,” she said. “The green men hold on to old
traditions and, to them, necromancers are Dead Gods.”

My groggy brain slowly pieced things together. “A
woodsman? From Kansas City?”

“I don’t know if he’s from the city, but yes, he is a
woodsman. I considered waking you earlier, but the innkeeper
offered to entertain the green man for a while. We all needed the
rest.”

“Is Foster awake?” I asked. “Do you think he’d want
to go?”

“It might be easier to walk the Abyss with Gaia,”
Aideen said. “I’m not sure if the woodsman will wait until
daylight. Foster is sleeping.”

I nodded. “How is he?”

Aideen tilted her head to the side. “Better than I
expected, but he is trying hard to hide his pain. I fear what he
may do out of vengeance.”

“Think he’ll go after Glenn?” I asked as I opened my
backpack.

“I hope not.”

“If he does, he won’t go alone. We have Nixie’s
people, and the wolves.”

“We can talk more, later,” Aideen said. She gave me a
pained smile.

“Of course,” I said. “I’m sorry to bring it up
now.”

I held Gaia’s hand. Before I stepped into the Abyss,
I said, “Take care of him.”

“Take care of your own, Damian. We need you.”

The world turned black.

“Where can I take you?” Gaia asked.

“Rivercene,” I said.

Gaia looked at me as the path materialized beneath
our feet. “You wish to accept my offer?”

“No,” I said. “I need to speak with the innkeeper.
I’m guessing you can get me past the Guardian there?”

“As I am the Guardian? Yes.”

We walked in silence for a time, passing nightmares
and starry vistas along the way.

“I don’t see as many of the Old Gods as we used to,”
I said, staring out into the darkness.

“Many have left the Abyss,” Gaia said. “Though you
repaired the Seal from the Burning Lands, many creatures escaped
into other planes.”

I remembered some of the tree-like tentacles and
mountainous creatures we’d passed. The thought of encountering any
of them outside the Abyss—while they weren’t slowed—was
terrifying.

Gaia slowed. “We are here.”

I took a deep breath. “Ready.”

She said no more. The stars collapsed in on
themselves as I was torn from the Abyss. I landed on the front
steps of Rivercene, facing the distant river as I slammed into the
wood ass-first.

“Ow,” I said, grabbing my ass. “Ow ow ow.” The voices
were a cacophony inside my head. Whatever was here, they didn’t
like it.

“Damian?”

I looked up and found the innkeeper staring at me as
I slowly stopped rubbing my ass.

“Oh, don’t stop on my account,” the innkeeper said,
squinting at me under the porch light. “I’m surprised you survived
the Burning Lands. Thought for sure that fire demon would get you
killed. Must be slipping in my old age.”

“It’s good to see you too,” I said as I adjusted my
backpack and leaned forward, resting my arms on my knees. The
transition out of the Abyss hadn’t been smooth, and the world still
spun a bit.

I blew out a breath and looked past the innkeeper.
The skies weren’t as clear here as they had been at the cabin, but
the night sky was still stunning compared to the city. Some vague
movement flickered through my peripheral vision, and then it was
gone. I didn’t remember the tree line being so close to Rivercene.
One of the shadows moved in the darkness.

It occurred to me that I might be seeing things,
considering the screaming voices in my head, but the harder I
looked, the more I could make out.

A creature stepped into the light, and I had no doubt
it was the woodsman. It was taller than Foster, nine feet, maybe
more, depending on how its leafy branches and constantly shifting
vines bristled. It stepped onto one of the flagstones with a thud,
and the rock cracked.

“Dammit, you overgrown bush!” The innkeeper snapped.
“I told you I didn’t mind if you waited here, so long as you didn’t
break anything.”

“The stone is now two,” the woodsman said. “It is not
broken. It is of the earth, and the earth cannot be broken.”

The innkeeper squeezed her forehead. “Gods but I hate
these things sometimes.” She turned to me. “Damian, this is—” Her
words cut off into a brief clicking that sounded like wooden sticks
banging together.

“What?” I whispered.

“That’s his name,” the innkeeper said with a sigh.
“Call him green man, or woodsman. They all answer to those
names.”

The woodsman bent down onto his knee so his emerald
eyes were just above my own. The tightly wrapped vines that formed
his face stilled as though they had decided on their form.

“Hmm,” the woodsman said as he looked me over. “You
are the Lord of the Dead Gods. I did not realize that.”

“He means the mantle,” the innkeeper said.
“Melodramatic lot, they are. Tell him what you saw so we can all
get some sleep. Tell him what you told Camazotz.”

“Very well,” the woodsman said. He settled onto the
ground at the bottom of the short stairs leading to the front
door.

“Is Camazotz still here?”

The innkeeper shook her head. “He went on to Kansas
City, after he heard this tale.”

I stopped asking questions and instead focused on the
woodsman.

“We have long been friends with the witches by the
river. They respect the land and the trees and find peace in the
waters.”

“The coven?” I asked, unsure if he meant the undines
or the green witches.

“Yes. They were an ancient group. I have known them
in one form or another for thousands of your years. The old Fae,
before they were driven into hiding in the wars, were one with
us.”

I wasn’t sure if the woodsman meant they were one
with nature, or if the old Fae were actually green men.

“But the old stories are not why I have come to find
you. It is the old enemies that have led me to walk in the
light.”

“He means show himself,” the innkeeper said. “Just
talk like a normal person, yes?”

The woodsman turned his head to the innkeeper and
then returned his focus to me. I didn’t think he gave half a damn
what the innkeeper thought. I kind of admired him for that.

“What are the old enemies?” I asked.

“Ancient creatures, monsters some would say. Flying
heads, baykok, mishupishu, skinwalkers, and the water witches. We
have heard stories of Sharp Elbows, a two-faced nightmare once
thought no more than story.”

“All at the coven?” I whispered.

“No,” the woodsman said. “But they have been seen by
the eyes of the green men and, by their gaze, I know these things
to be true.”

“You should have told Camazotz,” the innkeeper said.
“You only told him of the dark-touched.

The woodsman’s eyes flashed to the innkeeper. “He did
not ask after the old enemies.”

“Never mind,” the innkeeper said, pinching the bridge
of her nose. “I’ll get a message to him.”

“What destroyed the coven?” I asked. “How did the
survivors escape?”

“The coven fell at the attack of the dark-touched,
the night dwellers, and the sea witches.” The woodsman’s hands
curled into fists and his voice angered. “They killed that which
was under the protection of the green men. It will not be
forgotten.”

“How did they escape?”

The woodsman’s fingers cracked and he slowly uncurled
his fist. A slow-moving sap oozed down his knuckles. “They did
not.” He drew the sap up into a small spike on the back of his
hand. “The dark-touched allowed them to flee at the request of a
flame-haired undine.”

“A redheaded water witch?” I asked.

“Yes.” The woodsman cracked his hand again and spread
more sap across his knuckles.

“I would have expected him to say her head had been
on fire,” the innkeeper said. “Thank you for speaking plainly,
woodsman. I know this must pain you.”

I swallowed a laugh. I was pretty sure the innkeeper
was being a total smartass, and wondered how the woodsman would
respond.

“Nothing can pain me so much as the betrayal of the
Fae,” the woodsman said. “A betrayal that cut out the heart of my
brethren and left their friends dead and drawn across the
earth.”

The innkeeper sat down on the stairs beside me. “Let
him talk for a while,” she whispered.

The woodsman launched into a five-minute tirade about
the injustices of the Fae and the impotence of their king. I raised
an eyebrow when the woodsman grew quiet, and spoke of things I’d
never expected to hear from a green man, a people known for their
calm and peace.

“We will not stand idly by while the False King
sentences our allies to death. He will answer for allowing the
return of the dark-touched and I will smite him for the injustice
he inflicts in the name of peace. When the veil falls, we march to
war, and Hern dies with him.”

The innkeeper made a series of clicking sounds. “The
world’s gone mad when the woodsmen promise war.” She clicked out
another pattern with her tongue that I recognized as the green
man’s name.

The woodsman raised his emerald eyes to her and spoke
quietly. “Prophecy is destiny, and destiny does not barter.”

The innkeeper tilted her head to one side. “I’d
forgotten that. I apologize. I meant no disrespect.”

“None was found.”

“What now?” the innkeeper asked.

“I will return to my city, but my brothers remain to
stand watch, as they have since our mother was buried beneath this
place.” The woodsman returned his gaze to me, emerald eyes catching
the moonlight in a series of flashes. “It has been most good to
meet you, Lord of the Dead Gods. I hope to meet you again on better
terms, for it is the dead that feed the new growth, and the new
growth that feeds the living.”

“What should I call you?” I asked. “I won’t remember
your real name.”

The woodsman looked at the nearby tree stump where
we’d once hung a man as bait. “Call me … Stump. It is a good and
sturdy name.”

I bit my lips and slammed my brain on the emergency
stop button for my sarcasm. It was a close thing. “Stump. It was an
honor to meet you.”

“And you,” the green man said as a pale light swelled
in the grasses around his feet. He sank into the earth without
another word, and then he was gone. The nearby tree line shifted
closer to the river. I couldn’t be sure how many woodsmen
surrounded Rivercene, but it was significant.

“Why didn’t they help when Ezekiel was here?” I
asked.

“Not their fight. Now, if one of you idiots had gone
into the cellar. Well, let’s just say it would have become their
fight.”

A breeze rolled across the fields around us, setting
the trees to swaying. I knew the woodsmen, the green men, were not
a common sight, but I might never look at a tree the same way
again.

“Come in for tea,” the innkeeper said, regaining her
feet. She looked up at the sky. “Perhaps coffee. The sun will be
rising soon. There is something I would discuss with you in
private.”

I nodded in agreement. The thought of being alone
with the innkeeper sent a frisson of excitement down my spine. She
was a mystery in many ways, and maybe I could learn something more
of her.

The screen door squealed when she opened it, and I
reached out to hold it for her. The innkeeper put an old key in the
front door and twisted. The lock clicked and she twisted again.
This time it kachunked in the frame and the innkeeper pushed her
way inside.

“Come in.”

I followed her through the doorway. Every voice,
every sound inside my head cut off. I could hear my own heartbeat,
and I didn’t move for almost a minute, basking in that glorious
silence.

Nothing had changed since I’d been there before. The
grand old wooden stairs still flowed up the right side of the hall,
flanked by a wide, sweeping bannister. I took a deep breath and
smiled, looking across the hardwood floors at the aged portraits on
the wall and the beige Victorian chairs below them.

I studied the piano in the living room off to the
left. Mike had forged a wardstone for it, setting a protection on
the home unlike anything I’d experienced elsewhere. Ghosts were
hidden from me here, hidden from all who might harm them. I’d been
told it was for their own safety, but I wondered.

The innkeeper’s footsteps grew distant. I took one
last look at the marble fireplace on the far wall, one of many
inside Rivercene, and turned back to the hallway. I couldn’t see
the innkeeper, but I figured she’d gone to the kitchen. I made my
way past the upright piano tucked beneath the staircase and the
curio filled with old photographs and antiques.

The kitchen was just as crazy as I remembered, with
an enormous fireplace in the wall. The dark hardwood floor extended
into the mouth of the fireplace now, and I frowned.