Crown of Shadows - C. S. Friedman [162]
Remembering the Patriarch’s rejection of her pleas, she shook her head sadly. Is there so little to fear in this world that you have to make enemies out of your neighbors? Does your God have nothing better to do than pass judgment on the innocent? But deep within her heart, where it hurt to look, she did indeed understand him. And she knew that in a way he was right. She had seen the Forest and she knew its power, and nothing short of the One God Himself was going to bring it down.
Quietly she slipped out of the rain cape and let it fall to the ground behind her. There was no need for it now that the rain had stopped, and its bulk might slow her down. A faint mist clung to the ground, but despite its clammy touch she was grateful for it, for it made the earth damp enough to hold the mark of footprints. If she could find the place where Andrys and his fellows had entered the Forest, she could surely follow their trail. It was too bad that her improvised plan hadn’t allowed her to bring her horse along; it would have made the journey easier. But if she had tried to bring it along with her the guards would surely have noticed, and therefore she must do without it.
As she traveled, searching the ground by lamplight for a promising sign, the Forest changed about her. Not in a neat progression, as one might expect, but in fits and starts. In one place the smell of rotting meat was so strong that it nearly choked her, and she held a damp cloth over her mouth in the desperate hope that it would keep out the worst of the stink. Ten steps later, that smell was gone. Unwholesome growths clung to the tree trunks in one place, but left neighboring acres undisturbed. Wormlike creatures writhed at the foot of the great trees as tribes of smaller parasites slowly chewed their way through their skins, but twenty steps away no sign of worm or parasite was visible. She didn’t remember the Hunter’s realm being like that before. She couldn’t imagine that the man who had shown her the glories of the night—fearsome and violent, yes, but ordered as the finest music is ordered, and pristine as the moonlight itself—would have condoned such a state of affairs.
And then she found it. She thought it was a riverbed at first, a trough scoured into the mud by some flash flood that had swept down from the mountains. But holding her lantern close, she saw the footprints that marked its bottom. They were horses’ prints, the triune markings of an eastern breed. She had found the Church’s trail at last.
A sense of relief so intense that it was almost painful welled up inside her. Not until this moment had she been willing to admit to her greatest fear, which was that the Hunter’s realm might swallow all signs of Andrys’ passage, so that no one could follow him. But these tracks were so clearly marked, so utterly mundane in form, that she felt a sudden rush of confidence, and even the sour stink of the Forest seemed to fade for a moment, as if to acknowledge, This is it. This is right. Follow him.
Turning up her lantern wick, she followed the soldiers’ trail deep into the Forest. The lumps of horse droppings scattered here and there were still damp and pungent, which seemed to imply that they weren’t far ahead of her. Thank the gods! She tried not to think about what her reception would be when she finally caught up with them. The Church soldiers would be furious, but Andrys ... she could feel his need now, as though there were a cord connecting them. Andrys was all that mattered.