The Gates of Night

CHAPTER 22

The songs of the darkwood staff had no words, only the music of an inhuman voice. It did not speak, but Lei could feel the emotions of the spirit trapped within the staff as if they were echoes of her own thoughts. She could sense Darkheart reaching through her to touch the forest, to shield Lei and her companions from the eyes of the enemy. When the storm rose around them, Lei didn’t need the staff to tell her what was going on. She knew the Woodsman had found them. She could sense his presence, fearsome and terribly familiar, as if this man had haunted her dreams all her life.

At first the staff gave her courage. Darkheart had no fear of the thorns, and as these soldiers of the forest moved around them, this confidence had helped Lei keep her silence and hold her position. The Woodsman had sensed their presence and dispatched these minions, but that was to be expected. Lei and her companions were entering the very heart of his dominion. They simply needed to wait out the storm, until the Woodsman’s attention moved elsewhere.

Then lightning struck. The flare wiped away the night, and a giant’s hand slammed into her. Lei kept her hands locked around the shaft of the staff even as the shockwave threw her to the ground. Somehow she maintained her grip through the pain and through the fall. Her body ached, but something was wrong on a deeper, more fundamental level. The song had stopped, and so had the stream of emotions flowing from the staff. She felt strangely empty. The only sound was the wind and tiny feet moving through the forest.

Thorns!

A little man emerged from behind the nearest tree, a long thorn-blade in its hand. There was no time for pain, no time to worry about her wounds. Lei could move, and she could fight. The darkwood staff flashed in the night, and the thorn staggered backward. Lei lunged, driving the end of the staff into her tiny foe. She was fighting on pure instinct, spinning, thrusting, turning to face new enemies. And through it all, Lei felt numb, almost detached. It was like another dream, watching another Lei do battle.

Am I?

Lei had received combat training in preparation for her military duties, but she’d never been expected to fight on the front lines. Her task was to repair the injured warforged, not to join them on the battlefield. Despite this simple training, she’d accomplished remarkable things. Less than a year ago, she’d fought a minotaur with her bare hands. She’d battled monsters in the Mournland and horrors beneath the streets of Sharn. Lei had never questioned her abilities before. She’d been taught the basic principles of battle, and usually she was caught up in the moment, letting anger carry her through combat. Surely anyone else would do as well in her place.

Or would they?

The thorns focused on her companions. Three tried to encircle Daine, and Lei brought one down with a perfect blow to the back of the knees. How did I know where to strike? she thought. Was it training? Common sense?

Or had the knowledge been placed within her?

Pain. Triumph. They were Darkheart’s emotions, faint but growing stronger with each passing second. She could see the path to their destination.

“We’re almost there!” Lei cried. “Follow me!”

The forest fought her. Briars tore at her skin, while vines and roots sought to trip and entangle. She could feel the malevolent attention of the Woodsman, a presence watching from every tree. She kept moving, forcing her way free of branches and brambles. With every step, she found a new strength flowing into her.

Darkheart.

Once she had shared this forest with the Woodsman, and her power grew as they moved toward the center. Lei could feel the anger within the staff. Exile, imprisonment, and a deep hatred for the fey prince who had driven her to it; these joined to form a wave of fury that drove back treacherous vegetation and pursuing thorns. Lei let the rage carry her through the woods, driving her forward.

And then they reached the clearing. Nine towering arches formed of stone and wood, earth and water. The Gates of Night. Eight spread in a ring around the largest of the gates, an arch of black briars. Looking at them, Lei knew this was the very center of the realm, the heart of the Deepwood Moon … and the seat of the Woodsman.

“What do we do?” Pierce said.

The staff sang once more. Emotion raged within it, fear mingled with fury. Its anger still burned, but its song was faint and unsteady; it had used much of its energy in the passage through he forest.

“I’m working on it!” Lei said. What do I do? Her vision had said Darkheart is the key, and the dryad had led them to the gates. What happens now?

“Work fast,” Daine said, emerging from the treeline with Xu’sasar at his heels. Blood and sap covered his armor.

“Thanks for the advice,” Lei said. She walked toward the arch of thorns.

She felt the surge around her. Roots rose from the ground, branches lashed out like striking serpents, and a wall of wood rose around the clearing. She turned toward Daine, intending to rush to his aid.

No!

It wasn’t a word. It was a burst of pure emotion, an order so strong that it stopped Lei in her tracks. Even as her fury grew, Lei saw that it was too late. Pierce and Daine were helpless in wooden bonds, while Xu’sasar had vanished; if she’d fallen into the sea of writhing trees, there was no telling what might have become of her. Lei couldn’t fight that force. If she moved in, she’d simply be trapped herself. She took a step back toward the arch and waited.

Lei felt a surge of recognition as the Woodsman strode out of the forest-recognition and anger. He smiled when he saw her, and shifted the long axe that lay across his shoulder.

“So, beloved,” the Woodsman said. “You have returned to me at last.”

“Beloved?” Daine said. “Lei, wha-”

His words cut off as a branch wrapped around his head, gagging him.

“I knew you would return some day, my Lady Darkheart.” The Woodsman’s voice was deep and soft, wind rustling through a field of pine, and his smiling lips did not move as he spoke. “I thought you would travel in better company.”

“And I owe my friends an apology,” Lei said. “I told them you weren’t an idiot with an axe.”

“My axe is for flesh and blood. For your kind, vessel.”

“Show me.”

Lei lunged, remembering how deadly her staff had been in her battle with the Huntsman. In her mind, this fight was already over. She could hear the Woodsman scream as the staff pierced his body, see his mask falling to the ground.

Wood struck wood, the powerful blow shattering her dream. The Woodsman parried her thrust with his axe. His strength was incredible; the force of his stroke almost knocked her to the ground. Lightning flashed in the sky above, and the laughter of the Woodsman echoed in the thunder. “You threaten me, creature of flesh? Do you even know whom you address?”

“Torenas,” Lei said, speaking with all the confidence she could muster. “Youngest of the Nine Brothers of Night. An overweening youth, a preening pine-lord held in contempt by the true powers of this plane.”

Thunder rolled again, but the Woodsman wasn’t laughing. Lei saw his sculpted smile waver, and in that moment she lunged. The darkwood staff howled, and the Woodsman leapt away from her, barely avoiding the blow. He brought his axe down in an arc of silver and polished wood, and Lei raised the staff to block the stroke-but he checked the blow. He doesn’t want to hit the staff, Lei realized.

“Halt!” the Woodsman said, and Lei was gratified to hear a little concern in his voice. “I have no wish to hurt you, vessel, nor to harm my beloved Darkheart. Your companions are another matter.”

Daine’s mouth was gagged, but Lei heard the muffled cry of pain as the tree limbs twisted flesh and bone. While Pierce made no sound, Lei could see his wooden bonds flexing, and she recognize the terrible stress this was putting on his joints.

“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 Pierce to bring up his lifeweb. Now she could feel it her mind. But could she affect it? Drawing on her talents as an artificer, she tried to pull at the threads, to weave a new, temporary pattern into the web.

And it responded. Though Pierce was across the clearing, held high in the air, she could feel the changes taking place. Strength. Take strength from me, my brother.

The images dissolved in a burst of pain. She was staggering across the clearing, and fell just before she reached a writhing mass of foliage. Wet numbness spread across her right leg, and fierce pain told her that the handle of the Woodsman’s axe had cracked a rib. She tried to collect her thoughts, but the pain was too great. The Woodsman came forward, his bloody axe held high.

Pierce crashed into him, leaving a trail of torn vines and scraps of roots in his path. Grabbing the Woodsman’s wrists, Pierce forced the masked man away from Lei. Though the Woodsman had the strength of an ogre, Pierce was stronger still, and he forced the Woodsman to his knees.

The Woodsman screamed.

The cry came as a surprise to Lei; Pierce was fighting with magically enhanced strength, but he had no weapon, and was doing little more than holding the Woodsman at bay. Then she saw a flash of white bone, as Xu’sasar’s throwing wheel spun back across the clearing. The drow girl stood next to an arch of dark stone, and she caught the boomerang and prepared for another throw.

“No!” Lei said, hobbling across the clearing. “No. Don’t kill him.”

“Unhand me!” the Woodsman roared, still struggling in Pierce’s grip. “You will pay for this indignity! I will see you buried in the earth and devoured by insects, alive and aware until your bones are shards in the-”

His words dissolved into a howl of agony as Lei pressed the end of the staff into the wound on his back, where blood and sap were flowing freely. The staff shivered in Lei’s hands as power flowed through the shaft. The Woodsman stiffened and screamed again as his body stretched upward. Pierce let go before he was lifted into the sky, and they watched in wonder as the being that had once been the Woodsman completed his transformation. He towered over them, forty feet tall, his limbs stretching out across the ring of gates.

He had become a tree.

His bark was as pale as the skin of his arms, his leaves dark as the clothes he’d worn, and Lei thought she could see a face faintly traced into his trunk, the vague image of the mask he had worn. But the storm winds were gone, and his limbs did not move.

“Can someone help me down?” The trees around the clearing had fallen still, but Daine was still hanging in the air, branches wrapped around his torso.

As Xu’sasar and Pierce ran to assist Daine, Lei turned to the great gate at the center of the clearing. She could still feel the power churning within the staff. There was a sense of satisfaction, but the sorrow remained.

“What happens to you?” Lei whispered.

In answer, Darkheart reached into Lei. Her power and presence were stronger than ever, and Lei moved without a thought. She struggled with the force controlling her body, but Darkheart was too powerful. Against her will, Lei stepped forward … and drove the staff into the ground before the briar gate.

Thunder shook the world. Lei’s hands locked around the staff, and she could feel the power the staff had drawn from the Woodsman fading away, being forced down into the earth itself. And the gate before her changed. Threads of gold ran up from the ground, twining along the black briars. And then she saw the light. Sunlight, faint but clear, the first pure light she’d seen since she’d entered Karul’tash so long ago. The dark forest was all around her, but through the arch she could see the setting sun of dusk.

Free me.

The thought was clear and vivid, the voice of the woman Lei had seen in her coma. And then it was gone. Lei swayed, and almost fell. She felt as if every ounce of energy had been drained from her bones. The staff was utterly silent, physically and emotionally.

“Lei!”

Daine ran to her, Xu’sasar and Pierce behind him. She turned toward him, but before she could speak she felt a sharp pain in her shoulder, pain followed by a chilling numbness. It was an arrow, a thin arrow made from a long, sharp thorn, with leaves in place of feathers.

“Lei!” Daine cried. He caught her as she pitched forward, catching her before she hit the ground. A volley of arrows came flying out from the dark trees. Pierce dove forward, shielding Lei with his body.

“Gate …” she whispered to Daine. “Dusk …”

“Get to the gate!” Daine cried.

And the thorns charged.

The creatures came at them from all from all sides, and Lei couldn’t begin to count them. The night was full of thornblades and beady eyes, and the sound of tiny feet against the grass. Lei’s head span as Daine swept her off her feet, holding her in both arms. Xu’sasar scattered their enemies with a long chain formed from links of razor-sharp bone, carving a sap-drenched path to the central arch.

“Go!” Xu’sasar said as they approached the gate. There was an arrow in the girl’s thigh, dark blood almost invisible against her skin. She whirled her chain, ripping the links across a thorn and pulling the creature to the ground. Daine hesitated, and then he ran through the arch …

And into the light.

In the distance, the setting sun made a silhouette of a range of mountains, but after the long night, the fading sun was the most beautiful thing Lei had seen. The sounds of battle were gone; all she heard were crickets and songbirds, and Daine’s labored breathing.

“Welcome to Dusk,” a voice said. Male, young. “It certainly took you long enough.”