Moonblood (Tales of Goldstone Wood Book #3)
Read Moonblood (Tales of Goldstone Wood Book #3) Online
Authors: Anne Elisabeth Stengl
Tags: #FIC026000, #FIC042000, #FIC042080
© 2012 by Anne Elisabeth Stengl
Published by Bethany House Publishers
11400 Hampshire Avenue South
Bloomington, Minnesota 55438
Bethany House Publishers is a division of
Baker Publishing Group, Grand Rapids, Michigan
Ebook edition created 2012
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—for example, electronic, photocopy, recording—without the prior written permission of the publisher. The only exception is brief quotations in printed reviews.
ISBN 978-1-4412-1472-0
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is on file at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, incidents, and dialogues are products of the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Book design by Paul Higdon
Cover illustration by William Graf
To my Erin . . .
and sweet Annie!
Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Prologue
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
1
2
3
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
1
2
3
Epilogue
About the Author
Tales of Goldstone Wood
Back Ads
Back Cover
Prologue
T
HE UNICORN
STOOD
before the gates of Palace Var. It guarded the paths to and from Arpiar, watching them with eyes that burned through all tricks and disguises. The roses climbing the stone walls of Var cast their moonlit shadows upon the unicorn’s back in dappled patterns. If a wind swelled, those patterns shifted, but the unicorn never moved.
The Queen of Arpiar could see the unicorn through a window in her chambers, where she lay upon her pillows. She turned her gaze away, closing her eyes.
“My queen,” said her headwoman. “The child lives. You have a daughter.”
Across the darkened chamber, a newborn made no sound as gentle hands wrapped it in red and gold. When the babe had not cried at its birth, the queen had thought perhaps it was dead.
“A daughter,” she whispered. Tears slipped down her cheek. “No.”
Before she could dash traces of weeping from her face, her husband entered. Without a glance for his queen, he went to the cradle and looked inside. He smiled, and though his face was more beautiful than tongue could tell, the queen shuddered at the sight.
“A daughter!” Triumph filled the king’s voice. He turned to the queen and laughed in her face. “A pretty daughter, my pretty bride. With blood as red as the red, red rose. Her name will be Varvare.”
“Please,” his wife spoke in a small voice. “Please, my lord.”
“Please what, sweet Anahid?” The king laughed again and moved to the queen’s bedside. He took her hand and, though she struggled against him, would not release his hold. “You’d think I was disappointed in you. On the contrary, beloved, I could not be better satisfied! You have proven more useful than I dared hope.”
He dropped her hand and addressed himself to her headwoman and the other attendants present. “See to it you care well for my darling Varvare. My perfect rose.”
With those words he vanished from the chamber, though the shadow of his presence lingered long afterward.
Nevertheless, the moment he was out of sight, Queen Anahid rallied herself. She pushed upright on her cushions, turning once more to that sight out her window. The unicorn stood at its post in the shadow of the roses, and it was hateful to her.
“Bring me clothes and a cloak of midnight.” She turned to her attendants, who stared at her. “At once.”
They exchanged glances, but no one moved. In all the realm of Arpiar, not a soul could be found who loved the king. But neither was there a heart that did not sink with fear at the mention of his name. Thus the queen’s servants remained frozen in place when she spoke. The queen stared at them with her great silver eyes, and they would not meet her gaze.
“Will no one serve her queen?” she asked.
They made no answer.
Straining so that a vein stood out on her forehead, Anahid flung back the soiled blankets of her labor and rose from her bed. Her headwoman gasped, “My queen!”
In that moment, the princess, who had made no more than a whimper since the time of her birth, gave a cry from her cradle. The piteous sound worked a magic of its own on the assembled servants. One leapt to the cradle and gently lifted the child. Another ran to the queen’s side, and a third did as the queen had asked and brought her clean garments and a cloak as black as the night.
The queen was weak from her labor, but her strength returned in the face of need. She let her servants clothe her, then took and wrapped the deep cloak about her shoulders. “Give her to me,” she said, turning to the youngest of her maids, who stood trembling near to hand, shushing the babe.
“My queen,” her headwoman spoke, “are you certain—”
“Do you doubt me?” The queen’s eyes flashed. She took the baby, adjusting the scarlet and gold cloth that bound the tiny limbs tight. She tucked the warm bundle inside her cloak, close to her heart.
“Tell no one I have gone,” she said, striding to the door. “Any of you who follows me does so at your peril.”
The blackness of her cloak shielded Queen Anahid and the princess as she made her way through the corridors of Palace Var, unseen save by the roses, which turned their faces away and said not a word. She slid from shadow to shadow. Woven enchantments whirled in endless, grasping fingers everywhere she turned, but these Anahid had long ago learned to see and to elude.
But all Paths from Arpiar led past the unicorn.
The queen stood in the darkness of the courtyard, breathing in the perfume of roses, gazing at the silvery gate that stood between her and the empty landscape. She felt the tiny beating heart pressed against her own and gnashed her teeth. “Would that he had been devoured on the shores of the Dark Water!” Then, closing her eyes and bowing her head, she cried out in the voice of her heart, a voice unheard in that world but which carried to worlds beyond.
“I swore I would never call upon you again.”
An answer came across distances unimaginable and sang close to her ear in a voice of birdsong.
Yet I am always waiting for you, child.
“I ask nothing for myself, only for my daughter. She does not deserve the fate the king has purposed for her.”
What would you have me do?
“Show me where I can take her. Show me where she may be safe.”
Walk my Path,
sang the silver voice.
There in the darkness of Arpiar, a way opened at the queen’s feet. The one Path that the unicorn could not follow. Anahid stepped into it, full of both gratitude and shame, for she had vowed never to walk this way again. But she had no other choice. She followed the Path to the gate, pushed the bars aside, and stepped onto the plains beyond.
The unicorn did not see her. She passed beneath its gaze, her heart beating like a war drum against the bundle on her breast. The unicorn was blind to her passage.
Queen Anahid strode from Palace Var without a backward glance, her daughter held tight in her arms. As she went, the silver voice sang in her ear, and she almost found herself responding to the familiar, half-forgotten words:
Beyond the Final Water falling,
The Songs of Spheres recalling.
Won’t you return to me?
She followed the song across the hinterlands of Arpiar, speeding along the Path so quickly that she must have covered leagues in a stride. She came to a footbridge, just a few planks spanning from nowhere to nowhere. But when she crossed it, she stepped over the boundaries from her world into the Wood Between.
The unicorn felt the breach on the borders of Arpiar. It raised its head, and the bugle call of its warning shattered the stillness of the night. Anahid, even as she stood beneath the leafy canopy of the Wood, heard that sound across the worlds. She moaned with fear.
Do not be afraid. Follow me.
“It will find me!”
I will guide you. Follow me.
“Only for my daughter!” the queen cried. “Only for my daughter.”
Her feet, in dainty slippers, sped along the Path as it wound through the Wood. She could feel the unicorn pursuing, though it could not see her. But the nearness of its presence filled Anahid with such dread, she nearly dropped her burden and fled. But no! Though she had come so far, she was still too close to Arpiar.
“Please,” she whispered. The silence of the Wood oppressed her. “Please, show me somewhere safe.”
Follow,
sang the silver voice, and she raced after that sound. Her feet burned with each step. How long had it been since she’d followed this Path? Not since she was merely Maid Anahid, a lowly creature unworthy of a king’s notice. She had not known then and did not know now where it would lead. She only knew the unicorn could not catch her.