The Gates of Night_ The Dreaming Dark - Keith Baker [77]
“Stop!” she cried, lowering the staff. “Stop. Don’t hurt them. Damn you, what do you want from us?”
The Woodsman lowered his axe, his smile cold and triumphant. “What do I want? I want justice, seedling. I want what is mine. I want the Lady Darkheart. For now that means I must have you as well. Fear not, my lady. I will find a way to untangle your roots from this creature. I do not know who worked this foul magic, but once we are bound as one, I will find a way to restore your true beauty. And together we shall take vengeance on those who wronged you so.”
There was curiosity in the staff, but fury was the stronger emotion. “Don’t you see?” Lei said. “You drove her to this. You drove her away.” Her own anger began to grow, as she felt herself warming to the dryad’s tale. Throughout her life, she had let others tell her what to do. House schooling. Service in the war. Betrothal to Hadran. All the way to Lakashtai’s deception. Had she ever been more than a tool? A useful pawn?
“You lie,” the Woodsman said, and a gust of wind forced Lei back a few steps. “Our paths were twined from the moment of creation. Lord and lady, male and female. We were made to rule this moon, to shape this hour of night, and I cannot reach the pinnacle of my power until we are joined. It is destiny.”
“Your destiny. Your desire. Maybe she wanted more.” The staff was singing now, its voice clear and beautiful, a piercing lament echoing Lei’s words.
“More? At my side she would rule over this dominion! What more could she want?”
“Freedom,” Lei said.
“Bah!” the Woodsman roared, raising his axe once more. “You fill her mind with madness, mortal! I had hoped to use you as a bridge, to join with Darkheart through your frail body, but I will not allow you to poison her any further. Cast aside my mate and you will die swiftly. Fight me and I will grow a garden of agonies within your flesh!”
He leapt forward, his axe flashing with the speed of a falling star. Lei brought the staff up, directly into the path of the descending blade, and once again he pulled back. It was a deadly game of cat and mouse, as the Woodsman sought to evade her guard and land a blow on her soft flesh. His speed and strength were astonishing, and he handled his axe as if it were the lightest rapier. Lei staggered backward, seeking respite in retreat, and barely escaped disaster as a tree root grasped at her foot. The living trees massed just beyond the gates. She had to stay within the ring or the battle was over.
Lei redoubled her efforts. She wasn’t even trying to hit the Woodsman anymore. It was all she could do to defend herself. Yet as she fought, she found herself falling into a rhythm. It was Darkheart. The dryad knew the Woodsman, knew how he fought, and she was guiding Lei’s motions. He was still too swift, and even the dryad couldn’t help Lei launch an attack of her own. But with the dryad directing her actions, Lei’s thoughts were free.
How is this possible? she thought. Is it all some power of the staff? Or is there something more? Something in me?
I will find a way to untangle your roots from this creature, the Woodsman had said.
Darkheart’s words in the clear white water: In any other hand, I would be cold wood. But you can reach within.
And one memory rose above all others—the time she had fought Pierce in the sewers beneath Sharn, when she’d seen a vision of his lifeweb and had first thought of him as a brother. She’d seen four patterns, all connected, and now she was sure that one of those was her own.
It made no sense. She was flesh and blood, and a point made all too clear by her scorched skin and aching muscles. Yet in the heat of battle, there was no time to question.
She let go of all thought. Her body was moving under Darkheart’s guidance, but Lei fell within, searching for that thread she’d seen once before.
There. A trace of energy, a beam of light stretching off into darkness. Lei seized it and pulled, and there it was: the web of light and life she knew as Pierce, that pattern she’d adjusted so many times before. In the past, she’d had to touch