At Timothy's feet, the child cowered. Timothy's leg stung bitterly where the toad had slashed it with its claw. The toad again flicked its long black tongue toward the young boy. The tongue was flecked with white foam, and the toad labored to breathe as its fat sides wheezed in and out. Desperate to get the child out of harm's way, Timothy grabbed him by one arm. The boy began to howl.
"I'm not going to hurt you," Timothy cried. With the other hand he kept his sword ready, pointed at the heaving black body of the toad. "You have to get out of here!"
The toad gave a feeble hop, striking out with one leg.
"Run!" Timothy shouted. In frustration, he gave the boy a shove, and that was all it took. The boy ran in the direction of the caravans, crying for his mother.
The long black tongue wound itself around Timothy's ankle, pulling him off balance. He floundered, righted himself, and, reeling with pain, sliced the tongue in two. The toad lurched sideways, the severed tongue still protruding from its fleshy lips, and collapsed in the dirt.
Timothy plunged his sword into the dying toad and withdrew it with shaking hands. He was breathing hard. His pants stuck to his injured leg, and his right arm throbbed. Now, in the thick of the fighting, Julian was nowhere to be seen. Nor was Gwydon. Which side was winning?
A rumbling shook the ground. Oak trees had formed a line, creating an impassable shield. They moved forward as a unit, trampling toads and spiders in their wake. Timothy wanted to cheer, but he was too tired, and his mouth was as dry as old leaves.
Wiping the sweat from his face, he looked for Balor and spotted him many yards away, riding the snake, surrounded by an army of venomous spiders. If there was some way to take down the one-eyed man, the battle might be won! But who could stand up to Balor and his Evil Eye?
Crack! Wood splintered on a nearby caravan. Timothy swiveled. Tristan had recovered from Balor's attack and returned with his pistol. This time his target was Balor. Crouching behind a fallen tree, Tristan aimed at the snake Balor rode. But he wasn't close enough to get a good shot at the moving target.
The faintest whiff of something acrid caught Timothy's attention…smoke! A lazy curl of it rose from the far side of the Market. Then, closer, a gorse bush crackled into flame, followed by a young pear tree. Fire blazed from several locations at once. Balor had found a way to turn back the trees! Fire could change the course of the battle.
Timothy turned and saw Julian once again. He battled a spider yards away, oblivious of a wild boar covered with stiff black fur that was charging straight toward him. It was easily three hundred pounds, and sharp tusks curled from above its mouth. Timothy ran into the boar's path. With no time to draw his aching arm back fully, Timothy's defensive blow was shallow, just piercing the boar's flesh. But it was enough to deflect the creature from impaling him.
A tusk grazed his side. Timothy staggered back, a fiery river of pain flowing down his body. His sword protruded, shallowly, from the boar's side. The animal squealed, twisted, and charged again. Defenseless, Timothy tried to run, but his feet wouldn't obey his brain. He staggered. The boar grunted. Timothy collapsed on the ground, something warm and sticky trickling down under his shirt. He covered his head with his arms and buried his face in the dirt. Timothy waited to be trampled. Nothing happened. He raised his head. Julian was facing off with the boar, driving it back with his sword.
Timothy pushed himself upright. The smoke from the burning trees made him wheeze and choke. He staggered from the boar's path. Without a weapon he was useless. He moved his right arm carefully. When it touched his side, his arm came away sticky with blood.
In the madness of battle, it was easy to forget why he had returned to the Market. Where was Sarah? Had she been swallowed or trampled? How would an ermine survive in the midst of the chaos? Pain made his thoughts fuzzy. His legs felt thick and heavy, too ponderous to move.
Painfully, he inched his way to the large alder where he had stashed the Uilleann pipes. The tree lay fallen outside the ring of battle. He curled between the branches, pressing his back against the trunk, hoping the leaves and branches would protect him from view. If he could just rest for a moment, he would fight again. His thoughts whirled. The fire would have to be stopped before it decimated the trees. But how? There was a word for putting out fires, but he was too tired to think. As his eyes closed, the word danced just beyond reach. As usual, when searching for just the right word, he pictured Scrabble tiles, the smooth wood and black letters. Quench, Timothy thought, twenty points. He must find a way to quench the flames. He could do that without a sword. He would move in just a minute, but in the branches of the alder, the world began to swirl. How much blood had he lost? Not enough to feel this bad, Timothy thought. His thoughts were confused; they flickered like an old black-and-white movie and then went out.
6 THE HEALER
IN HER SLEEP, curled in the roots of the oak tree, Sarah smelled the acrid scent of smoke and heard the sound of thunder. It woke her, nose twitching, and filled her with an overpowering need to flee. The thunder wasn't coming from the sky; it shook the forest floor. As she wormed her way out of her dry den, her tree began to sway. With a tremendous groan, the oak pulled its roots from deep in the earth and took a mighty step forward. Sarah scampered out of its way while sniffing the air. Which way should she run?
Two squirrels scampered past, chittering in high voices. Keeping low to the ground, she ran after them. Noise and smoke billowed from every direction. Trees and bushes were awake and moving. A lone deer fled past in the opposite direction. Sarah hesitated, caught in confusion.
She began to run faster now but blindly, a flash of white among the browns and greens of the forest. Her heart beat fast with fear. Bushes burst into flame as she passed, nearly singeing her coat.
Dusk was falling, but that would be no help to a small white ermine. Even in the darkness she was an easy target.
Jessica longed to be part of the battle. She caught brief glimpses of Timothy or Gwydon, and once she saw Nom riding in the branches of a giant oak. What good was the ruby necklace or its magical powers, she wondered bitterly, if she didn't know what they were?
She grabbed a large flat stone and searched for a target. It took all her might to throw the stone, but it found its mark. A large spider flew backward, flattened by the blow. Heartened, Jessica looked around for another weapon and saw instead a gaggle of white waddling into the midst of the battle. It was the geese, honking and hissing, pinching and pulling. The goose woman trudged behind, clucking like one of her own geese and brandishing her herding stick. There was a peculiar gleam in her eye and a quiver of arrows on her back.
"Ah, just who I was looking for. We'd better get busy." The goose woman hummed as she pulled out an arrow and fitted it to the bow at her side. Jessica's heart surged. She was ready to fight, and here was Cerridwyn to show her how.
"You'll need that necklace now." Cerridwyn nodded toward the filigreed chain with the single red stone that Jessica wore.
Jessica eagerly eyed the arrow in Cerridwyn's hands. She remembered how Cerridwyn had taught Sarah to shoot an arrow into the midst of battle. Jessica was ready to learn.
"The necklace is the sign of a Healer, and the Healer's job isn't to fight," Cerridwyn said. "Only a Healer can truly own the necklace. That's why it never would have done Tristan any good at all. But when a Healer wears it…ah, well, that's a different matter. It helps the process."
"But I thought I was supposed to learn from you! And you have a bow and arrows!" Jessica exclaimed, looking longingly at the bow. "I thought I inherited your power and skill!"
The goose woman, who was looking more like Cerridwyn with every passing minute, replied, "You have inherited power and skill, but it will not look the same in you as it does in me. The Light only makes you more of who you truly are. You have your own gifts. We're both working toward the same ends, in our own ways."
"What do you mean?" Jessica gazed out longingly over the battlefield, thinking that fighting looked glorious and that healing was always left to the girls.
"If you are going to do useful work, you have to recognize your own gifts," Cerridwyn insisted. "We don't choose gifts, Jessica. They are given. Healing can be the most difficult work of all."
"But I don't know how to heal!" Jessica cried, the knot of disappointment nearly choking her.
The transformation was complete now. Where the goose woman had been, Cerridwyn now stood tall with flaming hair framing a stern face. "Give me your hands."
Reluctantly, Jessica stretched out her cold hands. Cerridwyn clasped them in her large palms. A warm current flowed from them.
"The work will not be easy. It may even exhaust you. Each time you heal, you will lose a little of your own strength. But you will never be emptied." Then Cerridwyn bent down and kissed the top of Jessica's head. "Try it now, child."
Jessica bent over a broken birch sapling that lay a few feet away. Her hands closed hesitantly around the smooth white bark. Although her hands felt warm against the cool bark, nothing happened. She looked up at Cerridwyn, but the woman's eyes were on the birch tree. With a shiver, the broken trunk straightened. A chill ran down Jessica's arms as if all the warmth had left her body through her hands. Her breath caught. She looked at her hands, opening and closing them. They looked no different than they ever had.
The geese had stopped their clamoring and waddled in a white gaggle into the dusk. Cerridwyn spoke as she raised her bow. "You have found one of your gifts, and that's no small thing." She frowned across the battlefield as if searching for the best target. "But even healing and arrows are of little use against fire. If something isn't done soon, the battle will be lost. What we really need now is a storm."
With that, Cerridwyn let fly an arrow into the sky. A small puff of wind lifted the hair off Jessica's neck.
Sarah was surrounded by fire. No matter which way she ran, she faced a wall of flames. Instinctively, she began to dig with sharp claws, making a burrow in the soil to protect herself from the encroaching heat. Not all of the forest was aflame yet, but it wouldn't be long before the fire spread.
The hole was almost deep enough. She would be able to hide in the cool soil while the fire passed over. Hunger was again stabbing at her belly, but there was no time for food, only for digging and finding shelter.
When the burrow was deep enough, she curled into a tight white ball. The tip of her tail stood out like a small black eye. Then another noise penetrated her burrow: not the dreadful noise of the trees marching into battle, but something that resembled human singing. It came closer and paused nearby. Stiff fingers pried into the soft dirt. It didn't take long for the fingers to find her. She drew her head back and bit as hard as she could. Her teeth cut into stiff bark fingers. The fingers scooped her wriggling body up and dropped her into a dark hole.
The hole was a dry space, lined with leaves. It smelled of the forest, not the dangerous scent of humans. And then her new hiding hole began to rock with a steady rhythm. Her exhausted body quieted. She felt safe, and that was enough for now.
7 THE BIRDS
DARKNESS ARRIVED WITH the eagles, as if they pulled night in with a flap of their great wings. Below them, flames were bright exclamation points in that darkness, and behind them was the rain.
Fat drops sputtered from the sky. When the first drop landed on her forehead, Jessica glanced up from tending a deer that had been wounded by an enemy's claw. Humans, animals, and trees, injured and dead, surrounded her on every side. Despite the carnage, Jessica wanted to cheer. The rain had come and would extinguish the fire.
"It's raining!" she called out to Cerridwyn, who only nodded and smiled once in response before again taking aim, this time at a target in the battlefield.
Soon the raindrops were falling faster, splattering on the ground and sizzling in the flames. And amid the sound of the rain was another noise: Jessica looked up at the beating of hundreds-no, thousands-of wings.
Birdcall pierced the night. Andor and Arkell were in the front line of the advancing birds, followed by others of their kind: bald eagles from the north, golden eagles from the west. Hawks, kestrels, owls, and sweet-tongued blackbirds flew in a great, sweeping band just behind. Unruly crows and magpies were the rear guard, while sparrows and other small birds darted in and out of the ranks. Only the yellow-eyed starlings had refused to come.
The birds swooped down in formation, pecking and clawing at snakes, toads, and boars. Darkness hid their descent, and as the rain fell harder, its patter covered the noise of their wings.
But Andor and Arkell had another mission in mind now that they had left the ferret-boy behind in the nest guarded by crows. They searched for the one-eyed man who rode the serpent, and for any sign of the boy wearing the crown, the boy they had watched for so long.
The man on the crested snake was not difficult to spot. With his long-handled axe, he hacked wildly at a great stand of oaks. Andor dropped swiftly, as if he were targeting a fish in a river, but the one-eyed man was fast with the axe. It was arcing toward the eagle before the mighty bird could reach the man's face. Arkell saw his chance and followed quickly, talons extended. He managed to grab the axe with one talon, but the man held on with two hands, and, try as he might, Arkell could not part the axe from the one-eyed man's grip.
With both hands occupied, the one-eyed man was unable to protect his face. Andor swooped in, raking with his talons.
Boars, spiders, and toads that battled for the Dark retreated to the forest with the onslaught of the birds. They fled in confusion, looking for places to hide. Some burrowed into the ground; others dispersed into the wilds of the forest. The fires were smoldering now, thanks to the rain. Jessica hurried among the wounded. She was bitterly cold, and weariness hung on her like a heavy cloak.
As she stumbled over bodies-animal, tree, and human-there was one Jessica recognized: a woman with fair hair and a ragged scar on her neck.
It was Peter's mother, Fiona, the baker. Her breathing was labored, and her leg was twisted at a strange angle, but at least she was able to speak.
"Have you seen my son?" she whispered frantically. "Do you know if Peter's alive?"
Motioning her to be calm, Jessica carefully placed her hands on the twisted leg and felt an icy numbness travel up her arm. She kept her hands wrapped around Fiona's leg as she considered how to answer.
"The last time I saw him, he was alive," she said finally. "I think he's escaped the worst of the battle." She thought it better not to mention that the last time she had seen him, he was also in the form of a ferret-and a prisoner of Balor.
The answer and her touch served its purpose. Fiona smiled and stretched the twisted leg. With Jessica's help she was soon able to stand and even walk, though with a limp. "To die in the service of the Light is not a bad thing," she said, "but I'd rather have my boy back."
Jessica dragged herself onward. Now birdcall eclipsed the sound of sluicing rain. Their noise was deafening, and she flinched when a hawk dove too close to her head. The rain had long since soaked through her thin cotton clothing. The number of wounded seemed endless. Many were beyond Jessica's ability to help. She mourned for a large alder, fallen on the edge of the battle. It had been a magnificent tree, tall and broad. Now its leafy branches lay splayed on the ground, blocking her path. A rustling in the leaves caught her eye, but it was only a small rabbit startled by her presence. She stepped carefully among the branches. Her foot thumped against something solid. It was the body of a boy curled in the vee of two limbs, his face hidden in his arms. Jessica bent over to feel for a pulse. A gleam of gold was caught in his curly hair. Her fingers rested on his pale neck. She bent closer. What was that…a crown?
"Timothy!" Jessica cried out.
The tousled head barely moved. The boy gave a soft groan.
Quickly she ran her hands over his body. Something sticky coated his right side. Blood. The blood wasn't fresh; the wound had closed, and the blood had stopped flowing. He was breathing deep, regular breaths, like someone asleep. Again she called his name, but this time he made no response. The sticky puddle by his side was large.
Jessica bit her lip, praying he hadn't lost too much blood. She called to Cerridwyn, who was tending to the wounded just a few yards away. "I found Timothy, and he's hurt!" Then, very gently, she began to press her hands over his wounded side. Cerridwyn picked her way over severed tree limbs and toppled trunks.
"The wound's closed." Jessica sat back on her heels, hugging herself for warmth. "But he won't wake up!"
Cerridwyn bent her head low and sniffed Timothy's breath. "The animal that attacked him carries a poison of the spirit," she said finally, straightening. "It works as a depressant. While the body may recover, often the spirit remains wounded." Her expression was serious, and Jessica felt her throat tighten.
"But he has to recover!"
"Timothy is sleeping safely for the time being, and there is little else we can do for him now except keep him warm." Cerridwyn removed her shawl and wrapped it around him. "Meanwhile, there are others who still need our help."
"We can't just leave him!" Jessica glared at Cerridwyn. Anger and fear warred within her. She was exhausted, and she had expected more than this from the older woman.
Cerridwyn laid her hand on Jessica's neck. Warmth spread across her back and into her clenched shoulders, and when Cerriwyn spoke, her voice was gentler. "Sometimes waiting is all we can do. It can be harder than doing battle. Timothy's spirit is strong, and there are others who need me." And with those words Cerridwyn turned and walked away.
Jessica crouched by Timothy's side a few moments longer. He looked peaceful. She thought about the time he had taken her place when she was the prey of the Wild Hunt. She could still hear the hounds' excited cries, their snapping jaws, feel their warm breath. And Timothy had let the hounds hunt him instead. Now it was her turn to help him, and she didn't know how.
When she had imagined adventures, she hadn't foreseen all this sadness. Adventures were supposed to be about intrigue and mystery, excitement and danger. Now, as she removed Timothy's glasses and tried to clean them on her crumpled skirt, what she wanted most in the world was to see them all safely home! She gently replaced Timothy's glasses and swiped at her own eyes.
As she stood, she felt as if eyes bore between her shoulder blades. Jessica rotated slowly, and only then did she see the girl just a few yards away, watching her. "Star Girl!" Jessica called out. The girl didn't move, but her eyes locked with Jessica's. Before Jessica could go to her, she heard a groan. Just a few feet away, a merchant lay wounded in the mud. Jessica bent to tend to him.
Arkell and Andor would not give up easily. They had come to turn the battle, to lead the charge of the birds. Arkell had managed a few ragged scores on Balor's hideous face, but no more than that. After one last failed attempt to gouge Balor's Evil Eye, without becoming a victim of its deadly glance himself, he changed tactics. He dove at the head of the crested snake that Balor rode. This time his talons drove home, blinding the creature in one eye.
Andor, too, was having a difficult time finding a target while avoiding the Evil Eye. A poisoned arrow, shot by forces of the Dark, whistled by, and Andor swept sideways as it grazed the edge of his feathers. Again and again he flew at the one-eyed man but could do no real damage.
As animals of the Dark retreated, and the birds continued their attack, no one noticed a small ferret who dodged the smoldering fires and ran toward the great serpent that carried Balor. Peter reached the snake as a group of crows circled in to attack. They dove like arrows aimed at a single target. Sitting on the back of the great crested snake, Balor twisted this way and that but still managed to cling to the serpent's back.
Peter leapt onto the snake's tail and ran along the crest of the twisting body, digging his claws into its flesh to keep from falling off. The crows were relentless. Balor's cloak hung inches above the reptile's back. The ferret leapt and dug its claws into the fabric. In seconds Peter had scrambled to Balor's shoulder. As Balor swiveled his head to see what clung there, the ferret bit into his neck and hung on. Balor roared with pain. The axe fell from his grasp as he slipped, arms flailing, from the snake's back. He fell in a heap, the ferret still attached to his neck. The flap of skin covering his solitary eye folded back in fury, and the eye's light struck Andor in mid-flight as he wheeled to dive.
The eagle fell to the ground with a heavy thud, his great wings still outstretched. From behind, Arkell swooped down. Balor rolled to his side, protecting his face with his arms. With all his strength, Arkell struck Balor squarely at the base of his skull, opening a deep gouge where neck and skull joined. A long and harsh cry reverberated into the night, and the earth trembled. The ferret let go and ran.
The serpent slunk away to the open fissure. It disappeared into the ground like a long green tongue drawn in by lips of earth. Only the end of its tail protruded and twitched across the packed earth until it bumped against Balor's body. Wrapping itself tightly around Balor's waist, it dragged him down into the ground.
The many-clawed toad leapt into the fissure. The crack closed over the group, mending like a ragged scar, sealing away snake, toad, and man.
As suddenly as it had come, the rain stopped. But the birds still wheeled, cawing and calling.
Except for Andor, who lay motionless on the ground, Arkell by his side.
It was the mournful cawing of the birds that startled Sarah awake.
8 PETER'S RETURN
IN THE SANCTUARY of the tree, voices pulled Sarah from her sleep. They were not the voices of humans, which made little sense to her now, but the speech of birds that brought images into her mind-images of battle, of attack and victory. She also sensed the wind blowing, for her hiding place rocked as if a storm had begun.
The ermine poked her head out of the hole in the tree, where the hard fingers had placed her, and sniffed. The scent of fire, animals, man, and, above all, danger still hung heavy in the air. But there was no storm. Night was approaching. The world was darkening.
One voice stood out among the cacophony:
"Andor, watchman and noble friend of the Light, I send your spirit skyward, beyond the mountains of the north, beyond the sun and moon."
An eagle lay prostrate on the ground, and beside it mourned another of the giant birds. The words and image rumbled like a dirge through Sarah's mind. She crept farther out from her hiding place until only her back legs and tail remained in the hole in the tree. The tree swayed.
And again the tree began to walk.
Sarah dug her claws into the rough bark as the tree moved across the battlefield.
The Greenman strode on in the dusk through what was left of the Travelers' Market. What had been a busy, colorful pageant of people and goods was now a ruined battlefield. The snake and toad had fled back into the depths of the earth, Balor the One-Eyed with them. They were not destroyed, he knew, but they would be held back for a time. Now he must find Timothy.
When he came to the fallen alder, he stopped. Curled in the middle of its branches, like a large and sloppy bird, Timothy slept, covered by a shawl. He looked peaceful in his sleep, but the Greenman sensed that poison had worked its way deep into his system. It would require something more than ordinary medicine to rouse the boy, something more than Jessica's or even Cerridwyn's healing touch. Not far off, Star Girl watched as Timothy slept.
The small ermine still clung to the Greenman's side, half in and half out of the knothole. Her curious nose twitched, and her bright eyes shone. Stiffly and slowly, the Greenman bent his twiggy arms. His fingers, now thick and knobby, had difficulty gripping small things. He closed them as carefully as he could around the lithe body of the ermine. She immediately tensed, and he could feel the rapid heartbeat, the taut muscles. Gently he lifted the ermine between his rough fingers and placed her in a crook of his own branches that formed a vee. She clung there, trembling.
Then the Greenman reached up through twigs and leaves until his fingers closed around one of the slender branches above his head. It was, like all his branches, full of new growth and sap. His strong fingers circled, then snapped the limb. A hot flame of pain sent a shudder through his trunk to his roots. Sticky amber sap welled up at the rough wound and then dripped slowly onto the fur of the white ermine.
Sarah found herself sitting in the veed branches of a tree. She had no idea why she was there, or how she had gotten there. Dusk had turned to night. And something had dropped into her hair. Her fingers explored the thick, sticky substance on the crown of her head. Why couldn't she figure out where she was? Her memory was confused, as if she were waking from a sound sleep, while fleeting images of dreams still clung to her. The last thing she remembered clearly was being with the Animal Tamer and a crow held by a chain.
She looked down. The ground wasn't so very far away. Before she could jump, however, a familiar, raspy voice stopped her.
"Child"-the voice was deep and unmistakable once you'd heard it before-"your brother needs something only you can give him."
"Greenman!" Sarah cried, looking around in the darkness. "Where are you?" And then she looked up at the tree in which she sat and began to laugh.
Her laughter was joined by a deep, rolling laugh from the tree. Sarah wrapped her arms around the scratchy trunk. Only then did she think about the Greenman's words.
"I don't know where Timothy is," she exclaimed. "And my mother's very sick, and-"
"Peace, child. Your mother is well, and your brother is at your feet."
Sarah climbed down. The moonlight revealed Timothy curled at her feet, and Sarah dropped to her knees. He was breathing regularly, his lips slightly parted; a golden crown perched askew in his curly hair. He clutched a sword in one hand. By his side, pipes protruded from a canvas bag.
Gently she shook her brother's shoulder. "Timothy, it's me…wake up!"
But Timothy slept on. She shook him more roughly now. "Timothy! Get up!" When he still didn't stir, she looked up into the face of the Greenman, her heart beating faster. "What's wrong with him?"
"He was injured in battle. The wound is healed, but his spirit is weakened."
Sarah pressed her hand against Timothy's cheek. His flesh was cool to her touch.
"Do you have the gift I gave you?"
