Wildwood Dancing

thinking.

Florica had heard about the rumors in the village. She did not actually ask us whether our sister may have been bewitched by forces from the Other Kingdom, but she climbed the steep stairs to our bedchamber and festooned the place with plaits of garlic, enough to keep out anything that might conspire to snatch Tati away from us. She put a hand to Tati’s brow and looked closely at her neck—something I had not been brave enough to do myself— and then she went back downstairs. Her expression troubled me: it combined grief and acceptance.

“What will you do when Full Moon comes?” Paula asked me as we sat by Tati’s bedside one evening, listening to the labored sound of her breathing.

“What will I do?”

“It’s not an unreasonable question. You usually do make the decisions, Jena. Do you think Sorrow will come? If he does, how can she go across? She’s barely conscious. She won’t be able to walk.”

“I know that.”

“So what if he does come, and there’s some way he can take her? Will you let her go?”

I gazed down at Tati. “It’s not my choice,” I said, realizing that I had learned that much from all this. “It’s Tati’s and Sorrow’s. I don’t know what we’ll do.” I knew whose advice I wanted. I knew whose support I needed. But I wouldn’t go to Varful cu Negur?a. I couldn’t ask him. There was too much 362

between us: too much love, too much hurt, too much misunderstanding. We’d made a gap too wide to bridge.

“Is Tati going to die?”

I had not heard Stela come in. She stood at the foot of the bed, her eyes on our sister’s fragile form—the tight-stretched skin, the shadowed lids.

“I hope not.” I wasn’t prepared to lie to her.

“Doesn’t she believe in true love anymore?” Stela asked.

The moon grew from new to half to almost full again, and the first lambs were born. Men came up from the village to help Petru, willing and able now I could pay them a fair wage. Tati was sinking steadily. I knew she could not last many days more unless we could get her to eat something—a little soup, a sliver of cheese. But she refused everything.

Not knowing what else to do, we told stories of true love in an effort to coax hope back to Tati’s heart. It was often hard to tell whether she could hear them, for she lay mostly limp and unresponsive. Late one afternoon, when Stela was down in the kitchen, Paula told a striking tale she had heard among the scholars of the Other Kingdom. The sun had almost set beyond the green window; the light in our chamber was mellow. Green as grass, I thought, green as pondweed, green as home. Maybe I was the one who needed to believe in true love.

Paula’s was a dark tale, in which a father desired his daughter. She fled to conceal herself in the kitchens of a great house, ash smeared on her face, her body hidden by a coat of many small skins—rabbit, fox, stoat, mole, badger. She fell in love 363

with the young master of the house, and drew his attention with a series of gifts.

“So she dropped her gold ring in the bowl of broth, and gave it to the kitchen maid to place before the young lord at table. And this time, he demanded to know who had served the soup, and where he might find her. . . .”

When Paula reached the end of the story, Tati’s eyes were open. It was the first time in days she had shown any awareness of her surroundings. I took her hand and felt her fingers squeeze mine weakly. They were deathly cold. It came to me that if I said the wrong thing, she would shut her eyes again and sink away beyond reach. Paula’s story had sown a seed in my imagination.

“Iulia,” I ventured, “you remember when Costi first changed back into a man, and you said if it were a story I’d have to grovel to get him back? Was that what you meant—ash and rags and mysterious gifts?”

“I suppose it might work,” Iulia said doubtfully. “Are you saying you’re actually prepared to try now?”

I took a deep breath. “I might be,” I said. “If I can work out the best way to do it. Costi’s not the sort to respond to a gold ring. And you know I’m not the groveling type. But there must be a way to show him that—that —”

“That you love him?” Tati whispered.

I felt my cheeks flush red. “Well, yes,” I admitted. “I’m terrified of going to see him. Why hasn’t he invited us to Varful cu Negur?a? If he’s forgiven me, why hasn’t he come to see me?”

“He loves you, Jena.” Tati was too weak to lift her head, but she turned her eyes to meet mine. “You must know that in your heart.”

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“He needs to know he can trust you,” Iulia said. “That if something bad happens in the future, you won’t let go again.”

“I’ve already broken two promises,” I said. “I told him I’d never leave him behind, and then I did. First to find Tati, then all by himself in the forest, with no voice. If I promise again, why should he believe me?”

Paula was thinking, her chin in her hand. “He shouldn’t be so hard on you,” she said. “When you wouldn’t accept that he was Costi, you were just being careful. That was reasonable enough, considering all the things that had happened. Surely he hasn’t forgotten that you protected him and loved him and put him first for nine whole years. That can’t be wiped out in a single day.”

“But it was,” I said.

“Remind him.” Tati’s voice was like a leaf stirred in the wind. “Remind him how things were.”

“And show him they haven’t really changed,” said Iulia.

“Do it while you’ve got the courage,” Paula added. “Go tomorrow. One of you has to take the first step.”

“It’s too soon. I’m not ready.” My heart was pounding; it was as if I’d been asked to fight a dragon single-