White Hart (12 page)

Soft hands pin my arms back down to my sides, and I blink away the blurriness to see a head haloed in sandy blond. “Cas?”

“Who else would you find in the forest?” he says with a chuckle. “Actually, don’t answer that. We’ve had far too many surprises already.”

I try to sit up but he prevents me. “Where’s Anta? Where are we?”

“We’re in a clearing,” he says. “I carried you away from where the birds attacked us. They didn’t come any closer once I got past those trees. It’s weird how this forest works, like there are different sections to control certain creatures.”

“You didn’t answer my first question,” I insist. “Where is Anta?”

Cas’s eyes drop from mine, and a surge of panic rises in my chest like a solid lump.

“He ran away,” Cas says eventually. “I went to you first, and when I turned back, he was gone. But he’ll be all right, Mae. Like you said, he roams these woods on his own.”

I try to swallow that panicked lump back down but it is persistent. I hate to think of him all alone, especially when the Wanderers could be anywhere. I think about that arrow mark in his flesh the night Father died. Could it be that the Wanderers saw a quick opportunity in the middle of their real mission? Or did they also need Anta for whatever they had planned? The thought makes my stomach roil.

“We’ll get him back. But first you need to recuperate, and you need to drink some water.” He lifts the canteen to my lips. I take a tiny sip.

“Anta had most of our things,” I say. “Our camping gear, the majority of our food, some of our water.” I let out a heavy sigh.

“We’ll worry about all that in the morning,” Cas says. “It’s late and dark. You’re cut to shreds... I need to help you wash them.” His cheeks flush pink as he moves flaps of my clothing to reveal the cuts beneath. My muscles clench wherever he touches, and his fingers jerk away. “Sorry.”

I shake my head. “I’m just not used to being touched. When we lived in Halts-Walden, the others thought I was cursed because my mother came from the woods and died birthing me. Even when I was sick, the healers kept a wide berth.” I try to smile to make the situation less uncomfortable.

“Well, I think that is all a load of codswallop. If anyone around here is cursed, it’s probably me,” he says. “I’m the one who needs saving the most often.”

“But you saved me this time,” I point out.

A slow smile of pride moves across his face. “I suppose that’s true. I did save you.”

Cas gently moves his fingers back to the wounds, using a ripped piece of linen to soak up the blood. I wince at the pain, which makes me forget about being embarrassed, and soon I hardly even think of how odd it is for him to touch me. Soon I feel my eyelids getting heavier and heavier until I fall to sleep with Cas’s fingers trailing my cheek with a touch of water.

At first my dreams are peaceful. In them, I sit in a pleasant meadow with Cas next to me. There are no burns on my hands or cuts on my face. Instead, I have my hair tied back in a bow, and a white linen dress that comes to my knees. Cas wears a fine uniform, embroidered with gold thread on the pockets and shoulders. He passes me a grape and smiles at me in the same way he smiled at Ellen back in Halts-Walden.

Then the pastel blue sky becomes muddied with a huge black cloud. Rain falls from the sky—but it isn’t rain, it’s the burning water from the birds, and it melts the skin from Cas’s face, leaving a grotesque skull in its place. I scream so loudly it makes my ears ring.

Cas shakes me awake, and my fingers rush to feel the warmth and smoothness of his skin. He stares at me with his eyebrows creased together. There’s something about his concerned expression that causes my heart to skip a beat.

“Are you all right?” he asks.

I nod sheepishly and drop my hands from his face. “I’m fine.”

I shiver. We are low on blankets, and the night air is freezing cold. I realise that my teeth are chattering, and Cas’s hands are cold against my skin.

His eyes turn to the sky. “The wind has ice on its breath.” He bends down to gather wood.

Cas makes the fire as I shiver beneath our one thin blanket. I watch his fingers move deftly. I never expected the prince to be so capable, but here he is, looking after
me.

In the distance, that terrible noise begins again, and another shiver runs down my spine. It’s the click-clack of our mysterious follower.

“There, can you feel the warmth?” Cas asks.

I nod, but I can’t stop the tremors running up and down my body. Cas frowns at me.

“You’re still cold, and so am I.” He stares at me thoughtfully. “There’s one thing that would warm us both up, but you’re not going to like it.”

He bends his knees and drops to the floor. Before I can protest, he gets underneath the blanket and wraps his arms around me.

“Wh-what are you doing?” I say.

“I’m warming us both up,” he replies. “Don’t be a prude! I’m not going to touch you or anything.”

“You’ve got your arm around me!”

“Well, you know what I mean. Now, relax and go to sleep,” he says.

My body is stiff with the shock of such contact. I’ve never been someone who hugs often, and no one but Father has ever hugged me. As the grotesque clicking continues, I actually find Cas’s warm arms and body a comfort. Before long, my mind begins to jumble up in that way it always does before sleep comes. For the first time, I think of my old home. My gut aches when I think that I will never be hugged by my father again. Somehow, Cas’s arms around me help to ease that ache.

C
as is gone when I wake. I bolt upright, eyes roaming the surrounding forest in search for him but he is nowhere to be seen. My fingers plunge into the fire embers to find them cold and dead. Up above, the sun is high in the sky. I’ve sleep for too long. What were we thinking? Sleeping without either of us keeping a lookout? I let my guard down last night, and now the prince has disappeared. My stomach sinks.

“Oh, you’re awake!”

I whip my head around to the sound of the voice. Cas strides towards me, carrying fresh berries, with a freshly killed rabbit over his shoulder.

“I’ve brought breakfast,” he says cheerily. “You look better, well rested.”

“I slept for too long. Why didn’t you wake me?” I say. “We have Anta to find and Wanderers to hunt. They could be days ahead of us by now.”

“Then an hour is not going to make much difference, and Anta knows the forest.” He places a hand on my shoulder and squeezes it. There is strength in his touch. “Here, eat these.”

I examine the berries first. They look juicy and inviting, but I’m suspicious of everything and anything in the Waerg Woods. I place one on my lips and let the juice lie there for a few moments.

“We should check they aren’t poisonous,” I say. “We should wait awhile, see if our skin itches or swells.”

He nods as he sits and begins to skin the rabbit. I find myself looking away, my stomach roiling. “That’s sensible. How did you become so sensible so young?” He grins at me as his knife slides between flesh and meat, teasing me with mischievous eyes.

“I had to. It was just me and Father. When he hurt his leg, I had to look after him.” I shrug. I rub another berry on my forearm. “We didn’t have money or things..”

“You could have sold the stag for a fortune. If you really wanted to survive, why didn’t you do that?”

“The thought of selling Anta is a terrible one. My first memory is looking out of the window and seeing him as a calf. Father said he saw the stag calf when I was born, and Anta never went away. When I was old enough, I started to climb on him, and he’s protected me all these years. He’s my friend, my one friend in the world.” I stop talking, realising that I’ve let my mouth get away with me. I scowl and turn away from him, with tears threatening, building at the surface of my eyelids. No, I must brick them down again.

“We’ll find Anta.” Casimir reaches across and puts his hand on my arm. “I promise you Mae, we’ll find him.”

*

P
eople shouldn’t make promises they can’t keep. Someone needs to make it a law of the realm. Anything to prevent hearing those words:
I promise
.

We wander aimlessly through the forest calling for Anta and searching for his tracks. But he is nowhere to be seen and I worry that our shouts will attract the attention of whatever unsavoury beings are hiding in the depths of the forest. The only good thing is that we find another source for water to refill our canteens.

For a while I ride pillion with Cas. You would think that the night spent under the blanket would make me more comfortable with him, but it just makes it worse—as though the intimacy has broken down something inside me and now I am too aware of everything: aware of his firm body, the warm tones in his voice, his expressive eyes, and the way he smells of berries. For the first time ever, I worry about what I say, whether it is stupid or petulant or my voice cracks. Our conversations from the morning repeat in my mind, looking for faults. I lost control of myself when I talked about Anta.

I let my guard down. And now he can stamp all over my heart whenever he feels like it.

I’m a fool who forgets her priorities. Anta is my priority, not some stupid prince.

Every turn brings a fresh hope, and every time, it disappoints. I see no white flashes through the trees, no glimpses of his great antlers. Beneath my legs, Gwen’s chestnut flank seems strange. She moves too smoothly and with too much grace. Everything feels wrong.

We break for food, but I can’t rest even then. My eyes search the trees around us.

“We’ll find him,” Cas insists. This time his voice is smaller. He’s beginning to lose his own hope.

I punch the soil. “Where? How? We’re lost!”

Today the forest is cold and green. There is no warm sun filtering down. These trees have a green trim of leaves, but the branches are twisted and quite bare. Generous bushes and thorny plants twist around the path edges.

Cas remains silent. The day continues until the cold sun fades, and we find a place to set up camp. It’s a second day without finding the Wanderers’ tracks, and one whole day without Anta. This feels as low as when the birds were attacking me.

Cas chats away about everything and nothing. I don’t hear most of it. Instead I wrap my arms around my knees and stare out into the shadows around us. When the clicking comes back, Cas talks louder, trying to drown out the sound.

He sleeps close to me again, to keep away the freezing chill. This time I dream of both Father and Anta. In my dreams, they are both dead, and I am alone in the world. My worst fears come true. When I wake, I feel as though I dreamt the truth, and Anta really is lying stiff beneath the fallen leaves. My throat tightens as I think about it.

The early morning brings frost. There’s a stiff, sharp citrus scent to the frozen air. My boots slip on the icy leaves as we pack our meagre belongings and head out onto the path.

Here the forest climbs up a steep incline, and Gwen treads carefully as we follow it to the top. The higher we go, the colder it gets, and soon enough we are trudging through inches of snow. The horse does her best, but her hooves slip on the icy ground, and more than once she almost falls.

I shake my head and dismount. “This is no good. We have to turn back. We’ll have to head through the forest and away from the path. It’s the only way to avoid the slope.”

Cas swings his leg over Gwen’s back and lands on the snow with a soft thud. “You’re right.” He pulls the reins over her head and turns the horse around. She shivers with the cold, so I pull a blanket from our pack and lay it over her back before continuing the treacherous journey back down the incline.

“It’s more like a mountain here,” Cas observes. “Look at the rocks peeking out of the snow, and the icicles hanging from the trees. I can imagine we’re in the Benothan ranges of the north.” He blows onto his hands for warmth.

“Have you ever travelled that far?” I ask, my interest piqued.

“No, Father would never allow it. But I would love to follow the river Sverne all the way to the ranges, and then travel back down to Jakani near the Anadi Sands. They say the people wear silk from head to toe.”

“My ancestors are from the Haedalands,” I muse. “Father says it is a place of bright colours and spice.”

“Would you like to go there?”

“Oh yes,” I say. “But...”

“But what?”

“No, it’s stupid.” I fold my arms so that my cold hands are tucked beneath my armpits.

“Tell me,” he insists.

“I don’t speak the language. My skin is lighter. I don’t know their customs. I would feel like an outsider.”

Cas lets out a low laugh. “That’s not stupid at all. I would feel exactly the same.”

When I try to picture Cas in the Haedalands with his princely demeanour, my lips twitch. He catches my eye and must notice the glint in it, because he begins to chuckle.

“Hey,” he says. “I can fit in with locals.”

We carry on, feeling lighter than before. He’s right that the terrain is completely different here, as though we’ve passed over the northern border. I know we haven’t, but the effect is extraordinary.

Cas shakes his head. “These woods, they are unlike anything I’ve ever seen. The creatures, the unknown trees, the plants that grow here and nowhere else... The strange changes in climate... Surely all of this means there is still magic here. Why can’t Father use this magic for the Red Palace? Why is it that only the craft-born can tap into the magic that is so obviously here?”

“I don’t know,” I mutter. It has reached the point where I no longer like having to keep a secret from Cas. We have shared moments and conversations that could turn us into friends. I don’t know much about having friends, but keeping such a huge secret from the other person feels wrong.

“I suppose just because the land is magic, it doesn’t mean we can harvest it,” he muses. “Not unless we have the ability deep within. I can’t wait to find Ellen and see what she’s capable of. This forest has shown me so many things.”

I raise an eyebrow incredulously.

“I know, not all of them have been good.”