Chapter 14

CHAPTER 14

G WYDION HAD SEEN his fair share of feasts, but even he was unprepared.

There must have been at least two hundred people in the camp. They were all dressed in finery—the human nobles wore wool and fur, while the otherfolk wore garments of silk and oak leaves, cloaks of spun lichen, feathers, and scales. He saw a man wearing a necklace of branches, his fingers tipped with elegant claws, chatting with a woman in a wool gown, a cup of wine in her hand. Dancers whirled and spun. Music slithered through the trees, but Gwydion could not pinpoint its source. He understood little, save for a wordless wail. The smell of roasted lamb made Gwydion’s stomach lurch. He had eaten naught but dried meat and bread since leaving Branwen’s house.

Palug sniffed the air. He had been sitting atop Branwen’s shoulder, but at the sound of the loud music, he flattened his ears and leapt down. He trotted in the direction of the food, his tail curled. Gwydion shook his head, amused. Hopefully the cat wouldn’t steal the ham off some noble’s plate.

Branwen was watching the dancers, a line between her brows. Her gaze seemed to flick through the crowd as though she could not settle on a single person.

“Tell me,” he said, “what do you see?”

When she glanced at Gwydion, her pale eyes caught the firelight. “What?” she said loudly, over the music.

Gwydion huffed out a laugh. He leaned down to her ear. “What do you see?”

“Magic,” she replied, turning her mouth toward his ear. “Everywhere. The Otherking… it’s like looking at lightning.” She touched a finger to the place between her brows. “I can’t look for too long. It hurts.”

“We’ll find something to eat,” he said, taking her elbow. He walked through the revel, the music throbbing through him. Others had lost themselves to it; they danced with sinuous grace and little regard for the eyes upon them. He and Branwen hurried past the dancers toward tables brimming with finely prepared fare.

Gwydion gazed at the assortment of food and drink. A tray of goblets had been laid out, and the thick, syrupy cordial smelled of blackberries and honey. He reached for one.

Branwen knocked his hand away. It hurt—the blow rattled through his right hand. His injured knuckles flared in protest. “Ow,” he said, teeth gritted.

Understanding and regret flashed across Branwen’s face. “Sorry,” she said. “It’s enchanted. You’d have slept for a week… or longer.”

“Oh,” he said, surprised. “Thank you.”

Gwydion had never lacked for magic. As a diviner, magic was his in a way it was to few others. Only his sister, brother, and uncle could rival him for knowledge of it. Branwen had no magic of her own, but she moved through camp with an awareness no other mortal possessed. She would never be tricked by magic.

He would have to rely on her, he realized, in a way that he had not relied on another in years. The thought was not a pleasant one. Trust did not come easily to him.

“Is it an old injury?” Branwen asked, with a look at his hand.

He nodded. “I don’t heal as well as I should. And while the bones did eventually knit back together, sinew and tendons are far more fragile.”

She winced in sympathy. “I’ll carry our food, then. Can you grab that bottle? That one there? It’s safe.”

He picked up the bottle while she took a plate and piled it high with food. There was a shoulder of mutton stuffed with oysters, onion cakes, chicken in brandy broth, salt duck in onion sauce, and boiled ham. Branwen picked over an assortment of savory pies: marrow, cockles, chicken and leek, and lamb with carrots and mint. Once she carried enough food for three, they retreated from the tables.

They found a bench near the edges of the revel, where they were half-hidden by trees. Bonfire sparks swirled into the air, smoke twining toward the open sky. They shared the bottle of cider and the plate of food.

Branwen gazed at the celebration with mingled wonder and irritation. “This feast could feed my village for a month. Is this how nobles prepare themselves for a hunt? Wear fine clothes, souse themselves silly, and go out looking for deer and rabbits with throbbing heads and dry tongues?”

Gwydion laughed. “In my experience, yes. These hunts… they’re as much an excuse for excess as they are a competition.”

“It’s the same in your home, then?”

“Of course.” Gwydion caught a glimpse of a woman holding fire in her hands. She exhaled upon the flames, and the sparks flew apart and reformed as tiny birds that flew into the darkness. “Only… ours don’t have as much magic.”

Branwen looked down at herself. “Are the clothes as restrictive as these?” She was dressed in a gown of green and gold, embroidered elegantly and fitted tightly through the waist. It made her look like some forest queen. She seemed to belong to the wilds, to the untamed places of the world. He had the unwise impulse to use his magic to conjure a crown of autumn flowers. But someone might notice that.

“You look beautiful,” he said, and meant it.

Branwen rolled her shoulders, as if testing the strength of the fabric. “Beautiful, yes. Practical, no.” She twisted around, looking at the bodice. “Just how much did this cost?”

He shrugged.

“Nobles,” she said. “Never having to ask for the price of things. Sometimes I don’t think you understand the power you wield.”

The words struck unnervingly close to home. He recalled his own harsh words to Arianrhod: Spoken as one who has never been powerless. It was true that Gwydion had never possessed the power or respect of his siblings; it was also true that he was still the nephew of a king. Gold had little meaning to him; he’d never needed it. It was why he traded in intelligence and secrets.

Two of the folk approached their bench. There was a boy, perhaps a year or two younger than Gwydion, with striking red hair and sharp teeth. The other was a girl with a gown of moss and wispy lichen.

“Well, look who it is,” the folk boy said to the girl. “Thieves are not welcome to the Hunt.”

Gwydion drew in an involuntary breath. They must have recognized him. How? His mind raced to come up with a lie, an excuse. He felt like he had when Amaethon had held flame in his hand, staring up at the oak tree that Gwydion had taken refuge within. Trapped, cornered, helpless.

He had to talk his way out of this. He had to—

But before he could say a word, the girl knocked the bottle from Branwen’s hand. It broke upon the ground, and the sparks of the bonfires glimmered on the shattered glass.

“That’s not for you, crow,” said the folk girl. “You stole Cydifor’s magic.”

“And my knife,” said the boy.

It wasn’t him, Gwydion realized. They had not recognized him. They were after Branwen.

His fear sharpened into anger. He stepped between the folk and Branwen, his words commanding and edged with an unspoken threat. “Touch her again and—”

The boy seized Gwydion’s right hand. That grip was inhumanly strong, and pain flared down Gwydion’s right arm. He twisted, trying to break free of the sudden agony that consumed him, but the folk boy flung him to the ground. Gwydion stumbled, falling to one knee. “I would really appreciate,” he said, through clenched teeth, “if people would stop grabbing that hand.”

“Humans,” said the girl, making no attempt to hide her disdain. “You’re weak, fragile, and so very greedy.”

An old fury simmered to the surface. Gwydion had spent most of his life being called weak . Weak for a diviner, weak for a brother, weak for a royal. Part of him yearned to reach into his pocket, to take the blackberry seeds he kept hidden and unleash his power upon them. He imagined these two folk hunters wrapped in briars, powerless for the first time in their lives.

But the moment he used his magic, he would be unmasked. There was only one plant diviner in the isles—and he was the trickster of Gwynedd.

“Bold words,” said Branwen. She reached into one sleeve of her gown and withdrew that wickedly curved knife. “For one who lost a fight to a mortal child. You never did return for this. Too frightened?”

The boy snarled. “No one frightens us, least of all a mortal. Give me my knife.”

Branwen bared her teeth at him. “No. It does well chopping firewood.”

Fury glittered in the boy’s eyes. He lunged, and Branwen darted aside.

The gown was her undoing. Her beautiful, cursedly long gown. The boy stamped one foot upon the hem, and she fell. She rolled, trying to rise, but the boy’s foot came down on her back, pinning her in place.

She clawed at the boy’s ankle, trying to free herself. But he was as immovable as a mountain.

“We will have that eye,” said the girl. She had a knife of her own.

Gwydion’s mouth went dry. He had to stop this. He had to—

But he couldn’t stop this, part of him whispered. The moment Gwydion used his magic, his plans would come undone. He had come too far, risked too much. He liked Branwen well enough, but if it came down to a choice of her or the Hunt, he knew which one he had to pick.

There had to be some words to disarm the situation, some way he could stop this without unraveling everything.

“We are here for the Hunt, as are the rest of you,” he said desperately. “We are not here for trouble.”

“Then give us her eye,” snarled the girl, and drove the knife down.