“Give him back!” I snarled.
The limb dropped onto the ground with a dull thud, and warm liquid spilled from the branch, filling my nose with the stench of rotting meat. Some of it splattered on my skirt, making me jump back.
Rosalind shrieked and flew out of sight, but Cathbad pulled his sack away from the spray and continued rifling through his bag.
Drayce’s shadow shoved the flailing branch away and wrapped around another, then another and another until he rendered the tree immobile. The massive trunk rumbled, and the ground shook beneath our feet.
“Stand back,” he said. “These branches are about to fly through the air.”
I stepped back several paces, my pulse pounding through my ears. Aengus was the son of a demigod. Did that mean he couldn’t die? I glanced at Rosalind, who offered me a hand. I shook my head, and she flew back. Would the trunk eject Aengus if Drayce pulled off the branches with his shadows?
Cathbad finally rose, holding a smaller sack in one hand and in the other, a handful of engraved stones. “Allow me, Your Majesty.”
The druid tilted his head up toward the bound branches, nodded to himself, and walked to the base of the tree. Every few paces, he dropped a stone and sprinkled the white contents of his sack at its roots. I held my breath, hoping it was salt. Salt was one of the few substances faeries couldn’t abide. On the day that I opened a rift into the human world to help Father escape the palace, the salty wind had stung like a squeezed lemon over a cut.
A gurgling sound rattled my eardrums, followed by retching. The trunk split, and wooden teeth splintered out from its maw. With a gut-churning groan, the tree hurled Aengus out into the road. He rolled several times before stopping at our feet.
I dropped to my knees and turned him onto his back.
Rosalind rushed to our side. “Is he alive?”
Aengus coughed out a mouthful of foul liquid. “That was…” He turned his head and spluttered. “A Fomorian must have found a way to mate with a tree.”
My gaze rose to the giant plant, which still struggled within Drayce’s shadows. “We’ve got to kill it.”
Drayce patted me on the arm. “Erin has stopped pulling on my shadow.”
I stared up into his stern features. “What does that mean?”
“She has reached her destination.” Drayce pulled me up and placed an arm around my middle. “Let’s move before Melusina and the Fear Dorcha send reinforcements.”
As Cathbad and Rosalind set Aengus to his feet, I placed a hand on his arm and frowned. “Can you continue?”
He gave me a sharp nod. “It will take more than a carnivorous tree to get between me and my revenge.”
A relieved breath escaped my nostrils, and I turned to Cathbad with a smile. “Thank you. Where did you get the salt?”
The druid pulled back his shoulders and preened. “Osmos kindly lent me a capall to venture into the human territory, and I brought back enough salt to last me a year.”
Aengus stumbled onto his hands and knees, his eyes drooping shut. “I feel—”
He collapsed to the ground and snored.
My eyes bulged. “What’s happening, now?”
Cathbad reached into his pocket and pulled out his pinched fingers. I inhaled a sharp breath. Salt. This reminded me of how I once brought Shona, the daughter of Mayor Mulloy, out of the gancanagh’s lust-induced trance. Cathbad placed the salt between Aengus’ lips, making the larger male jerk and spit.
“You’d better wipe that sap off your clothes before it affects you,” Drayce muttered.
“Good idea.” I pulled a handkerchief from my pocket and ran it over my leather armor.
Some of the sap had drenched into my hair, and I let the cloth soak in the foul liquid. By the time I finished, the handkerchief doubled in weight. Resisting the urge to toss it aside, I slipped it into my leather pocket.
The last time I came across a poison, it had saved me from a group of soldiers planning on sacrificing my body to Melusina.
Drayce led us off the winding road and through a forest of more dead trees. Our glowing lights cast flickering shadows over trunks that seemed to stretch to the sky. Dried leaves and twigs crunched underfoot, but the sound barely registered in the still, silent air.
We passed a herd of sleeping deer, their antlers tangled and overgrown. Squirrels still clung to their branches in slumber, and a giant serpent who dangled from a branch with unmoving red eyes.
Nobody stopped, spoke, nobody dared to slow. We stole through the forest, following the shadow Drayce had wrapped around Erin’s hoof.
The shadow led to a wall of vines as thick as tree trunks that twisted toward the sky. I leaned back and tilted my head up, but all I could see were more vines.
“Rosalind, could you fly up with a torch?” I asked.
She launched herself in the sky, illuminating thorns as long and as thick as my fingers. “There’s a building here,” she said. “It’s about the size of the Summer Court Palace.”
I turned to ask Aengus if he had visited the Summer Court, but he wasn’t there and neither was Cathbad. A palpitation of fear squeezed my heart. I turned to Drayce. “Where are the others?”
He cocked his head to the side and frowned. “What are you talking about? We came here alone.”
I tilted my head up, looking for Rosalind, but she and her glowing torch were also gone. “We didn’t.” My voice shook. “Something’s happening.”
Drayce’s large hand ran down my back. “Whatever it is, remain calm.”
My mouth fell open. “How can you not remember everyone?”
Warm, damp air fanned against the left side of my face, accompanied by rasping panting and the ghost of fur brushing against my cheek. Without meaning to, I turned and met glowing eyes the size of dinner plates and a set of teeth as long as my forearm.
“Drayce?” The word came out a panicked gasp.
He didn’t reply.
I swung
