Britomart did not slow Arthur to a trot until Rivensfeldt had disappeared from view, swallowed by the horizon and the endless plains. They had veered into the open countryside as soon as they were able, leaving behind the road and the pursuers that Britomart was sure would follow. Arthur was flanked with sweat, and Britomart was too. She could feel the hairs that had come loose from her braid sticking to the back of her neck. Of course now her braid would start to come loose, not when she needed it. She would really have to devise a system for getting out of disguise quickly.
Britomart relaxed her grip on the boy in front of her as the horse slowed. He promptly squirmed into a more comfortable position in the saddle, bringing the throwing ax dangerously close to Arthur’s withers as he did so.
Britomart winced and held out a hand for the ax. “You can put that away now. We’ve left the guards behind, and you won't do any good by injuring the horse.”
She quickly withdrew her hand as the boy twisted in the saddle to look at her, inadvertently swiping the ax towards her in doing so. He seemed to have about as much control over it as a newborn colt did over its legs.
The boy looked mournfully up at her. “Can’t I keep it?”
“It’s very natural to want a weapon or two–” Britomart thought of the spear strapped behind her and the sword and dagger at her hip “–or three, but you’re not trained, and you’re not old enough. Besides, I’ll protect you. Now give me that ax before you take my arm off.”
The boy grudgingly handed it over, and Britomart slid it into the carrying loop on the back of the saddle.
“What if you trained me?” asked the boy. “I bet I’d be good at it. Slippery Meg says I’m the best she ever trained with a knife, least when it comes to cutting purses.”
“Cutting purses?”
“Half the people in Rivensfedlt go around with their purses tied to their belts by strings as thin as anything, just waiting to be cut,” the boy said cheerfully.
Phrases like repeat malefactor surfaced in Britomart’s mind. “But you were only doing it because you were hungry,” she said sternly, as much for her own benefit as for the urchin’s.
“Oh, aye. There wasn’t so much as pigs’ scraps to eat after mum died. The Sisters of Frigg tried to get me for their orphanage, but they scrub behind the ears and won’t let you do anything interesting, so I ran away first chance I got.” The boy paused and eyed Britomart curiously. “What is it you want me to steal for you, anyways? I figure it must be something special for you to have gone to so much trouble. Slippery Meg wasn’t too particular, long as she got her share.”
Britomart could feel a headache coming on. She attempted to rub her neck and winced as she scraped herself with her gauntlet. “What I want is for you to stop stealing. You don’t have to steal any more. You don’t have to go back to that–that woman. I’ll give you money. You won't need to worry about food.”
“I couldn’t go back to Slippery Meg if I tried, no more than either of us could go back to Rivensfeldt. They'll be posters up in no time with our faces on them.”
“Yes, of course,” Britomart said hastily, as if she would never have thought of something so absurd as returning the boy to Rivensfeldt once the chase died down. Truth be told, she hadn’t much thought about what she would do with him: He would be rescued, and that would be that. She did some quick recalibrating. “I’m taking you back with me to Boemapolis, and you’ll get a fresh start there. Only, it will be a little while because I’m on a quest at the moment. You’ll have to come along, I suppose. Once we’re back in Boemapolis, I’ll see to it that father pays your apprenticeship fee for a respectable trade. But you must promise never to steal again.”
“I promise,” the boy said solemnly.
“You’re crossing your fingers behind your back. I can see you.”
The boy grinned and shrugged. “Worth a try.”
Britomart raised an eyebrow the way her older sister Goneril used to when she knew Britomart was up to something. “I’m still waiting for your promise. You’re never to steal, and never to break the king’s laws in any way again.” When the boy hesitated, she added, “And if you keep your promise, I’ll teach you to use my throwing ax.”
“I promise,” said the boy.
“Say the words.”
“I promise–”
“You should add your name. It sounds more official that way.” Britomart paused. “What is your name?” She hoped it didn’t involve the word “slippery.”
“Smudge,” declared the boy.
“That’s not a name. That’s what you’ve got on your nose.”
Smudge grinned. “How do you think I got my name?”
Remembering Smudge’s comment about the Sisters of Frigg scrubbing behind one’s ears, Britomart decided to wait to broach the topic of a bath. “Fine. ‘I, Smudge,’” she prompted.
“I, Smudge, promise never to steal, and never to break the king’s laws in any way again. Except for by riding around with a fugitive.”
“Certainly not!”
Smudge looked up at Britomart angelically. “Well, I’m riding around with you, aren’t I?”
“I’m not a fugitive,” Britomart declared. She realized that she was, indeed, a fugitive. “At least, not really. It was a misunderstanding. I’ll have my father write a royal pardon for both of us when we reach Boemapolis.”
“You’re really a princess, then? You don’t look like one.”
Britomart glared at the grubby boy before her. “Just because my hair doesn’t cascade down when it’s supposed to doesn’t mean I’m not a princess. It was pinned up very tightly, alright?”
“It’s more to do with you wearing armor dirtier than a knackerman’s cookpot. And you haven’t got a chest like a princess either.”
“I couldn’t exactly bring a chest with me. I was traveling light. Besides, princesses don’t really carry around chests of gold with them. That’s just a common misconception. Chests of clothes, sometimes, but that’s only because velvet doesn't pack down easily. And the armor is because I’m a knight, dash it. I don’t know why nobody will believe me.”
“I think you might be a princess after all,” Smudge said contemplatively.
“Thank you.”
“You swear like one.” He put on a high-pitched voice: ‘Dash it!’”
“You are being impertinent.”
“Yep, you’re a princess.”
Britomart tried to come up with a retort. But Smudge seemed to believe her now–which was, after all, what she wanted–so she settled on dignified silence. The pair rode in silence for some time after that, and if it was not quite a comfortable silence, it was not an entirely uncomfortable one either.
They stayed off the roads all day and made camp that night in a copse of trees near a stream. Britomart supplemented the hardtack and cheese from the surviving saddlebag with a few mangled fish speared from the stream. Smudge regarded the fish as a personal achievement, having provided Britomart with ample (and often contradictory) advice during her first foray into spearfishing.
After dinner, Britomart pored over the map that she had borrowed from her father’s library. They were farther west than she would have wanted, but their detour would add no more than a day to the journey, even with staying off the Northern Road until they reached the Koleagh Pass. Once through the pass, she could stop in the first northern village they came to and find a family to take in Smudge while she went into the Shadowed Wood. It would be perfect, really. She would use it as an opportunity to question the villagers about where exactly people went when they disappeared into the Shadowed Wood. Surely they must go somewhere? The Shadowed Wood was large, but not so large that a person could not find their way out in two weeks, not unless they were dead, trapped, or going in circles. She refused to believe the first of those options. That left trapped or going in circles. But what–or who–would trap somebody in the Shadowed Wood? A shiver went down her spine. It couldn't be. The old tales were just tales. Goneril had explained that to Britomart in no uncertain terms upon realizing that, at fifteen, Britomart still believed that the tales of Queen Boemia’s exploits were accurate histories.
The question must have lingered in Britomart’s mind, though, for she dreamt of the tale that Willa had been telling her. In her dreams, Britomart saw Queen Boemia strung up by the thorn-wights, bargaining with the Blood Witch. Queen Boemia entrapped, weaving traps of her own.
‘If you will make no deal,’ said the queen, ‘then kill me and be done.’
‘It is not your death I wish,’ said the witch. ‘I wish one year from your life.’
Queen Boemia thought of all the years past, all the years to come. The Blood Witch could choose any year, any year she wished. But what was a year, compared with a life? For the dead could not fight for the kingdom they loved.
‘It is yours,’ said the queen. ‘Let it be done.’
And the thorn-wights released her, and she dropped to the ground.
‘Which year?’ gasped the queen, ‘which year will you claim?’
The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
‘This one,’ said the witch. ‘For this year, you are mine.’
Britomart woke with a start, her heart pounding. She sat up and looked around. All was quiet and still. The sun was rising over the plains, chasing away the gray tones of night, painting the landscape in greens and browns and gold. Britomart checked to make sure that Smudge was sleeping safely and then watched the colors spread as the sun rose. Galbrica–not its cities, but the land itself–lay before her as she had never seen it before. It was beautiful.
She shook herself, then shook Smudge awake too. From the way he talked, she had expected him to wake at the lightest touch, ready to rob the nearest warm-blooded being. Instead, Britomart had to roll him completely off of the bedroll she had lent him before he would do more than mumble and go back to sleep. The fact that she had spent the night sleeping on prickly ground because of giving him her bedroll did not make her any more gentle.
All day, they rode across the open countryside, veering back towards the Northern Road without ever getting too close. Britomart listened for pursuers, but none came.
One day passed without incident, then another. Britomart and Smudge began to fall into a routine. He told her stories about Rivensfeldt, and she told him stories about the court. After her initial shock at the song he was singing while building their cooking fire, she had him teach her the lyrics to all of the Rivensfeldt tavern songs he knew, even if he sometimes had to pause and explain them (“the milkmaid did what?!” “Oh! you mean milking the cow is a metaphor!”). Smudge expanded Britomart’s vocabulary, adding several new words that she was excited to try out on the practice field. Britomart expanded Smudge’s vocabulary, adding fancy new names for things that already had perfectly serviceable names, even if they didn’t sound so pretty. Britomart finally learned what a “velvet” was: a rich person, since nobody else had enough money to wear velvet. Smudge finally learned what a metaphor was: when milking a cow wasn’t really milking a cow.
On the third evening, Britomart started teaching Smudge how to use the throwing ax. She had, after all, promised. On the fourth, she made him memorize a speech to give to her sister Willa if she didn’t make it out of the Shadowed Wood and he had to go to Boemapolis alone.
“Willa will take care of you,” Britomart told him. “She takes care of everybody, whether they want it or not.” At some point, Smudge must have started to believe Britomart about her identity, because he worked hard to get the speech right. Britomart mistook the small furrow on Smudge’s brow for concern about getting to Boemapolis without her. She did not realize it was a furrow of concentration as he tried to work out how to get her to take him with her into the Shadowed Wood. He had never had someone to teach him about throwing axes and metaphors before, and he had no intention of being left behind.
On the fifth evening, they camped within sight of the northern mountains. Trees crept down from the mountains so close to their camp that it filled Britomart with unease, but it was either camping near the woods or camping within sight of the road, and she had no wish to be seen in case there were still guards out looking for them.
Britomart and Smudge kept their fire small even though it served not just for cooking and light now, but for warmth too. Summer was giving a valiant last stand. On the southern plains, the sun had still been hot enough to make riding in armor uncomfortable at midday. This far north, summer was already surrendering to autumn. The night air had a bite to it that made Britomart think wistfully of the bedroll she had given to Smudge. But she had rescued him, and it was traditional to sacrifice your comfort for the person you had rescued. That tradition had probably been intended for situations involving rescuing delicate princesses, not grimy urchins, but it was the principle of the thing.
Britomart lay awake for a long time that night, and not just because of the cold. She watched the stars wink into existence, remembering Goneril teaching her and Willa the constellations when they were young. That had been back when Goneril smiled, back before she walled away some part of herself to become what she was expected to be: the princess whose marriage must secure the future of the kingdom. Goneril’s marriage to the Prince of Osterland meant that their child would unite Galbrica with the neighboring realm, making Galbrica more powerful than it had ever been. Britomart wondered why that felt like a loss.
The next morning, they rejoined the Northern Road and began their ascent of the Koleagh Pass. It was slow going. The road through the pass wound steadily upwards, growing narrower and more rocky as it went. Britomart could feel Arthur tiring as it grew steeper. He wasn’t accustomed to being ridden for days on end, particularly with two riders. Britomart dismounted and walked beside her horse. Smudge stayed in the saddle, proclaiming that he would be the lookout since he was now the tallest in the group. He was as good as his word, swiveling vigilantly as if expecting pursuers to jump out from behind the rocky outcroppings to either side.
Britomart did not truly expect pursuers to have followed them this far North, but that didn’t stop her from feeling nervous about how easily trapped they would be this close to the pass, hemmed in by rocks and trees with nowhere to go but onwards along the road.
The road began to level out as they approached the top of the pass. Along the mountain slope that cut steeply downwards towards their left, Britomart could see the beginning of the thick fringe of trees that marked the edge of the Shadowed Wood. She stared so fixedly at it that she forgot to walk. Was that a slicker of movement she had seen in the trees? Just for a moment, she could have sworn she saw a flash of white. Alfrick? Perhaps there was some magical force binding him there, doomed to forever look out at the world to which he could never return. She was being foolish, she knew. If there ever had been magic in the Shadowed Wood, it had died with the Blood Witch. And yet, wasn’t magic what she was half-expecting to find there?
Britomart shook off her reverie and hurried to catch up with Arthur and his small, disreputable rider.
Five minutes later, Britomart clucked her tongue to bring Arthur to a halt. She lifted Smudge down to stretch his legs. They stood in the mountainous saddle between two peaks, hemmed in by outcroppings of rock. They had made it to the top of the Koleagh Pass. The fingers of the Shadowed Wood reached down over the mountains to one side of them as if grasping towards the plains of Galbrica. On the other side of the pass, the wood grew vast and dark to the left of the road as far as the eye could see. The road skirted the Shadowed Wood, always staying a wary furlong from its edge. The quickest route from the Koleagh Pass to Svernhold would have been to cut a road through the wood itself. Nobody had been foolish enough to suggest that.
“That’s it, then?” Smudge asked, his voice unusually somber. “The Shadowed Wood?”
“That’s it, scamp.”
Britomart turned for one last glimpse of the way they had come. The way back to the Galbrican plains with their warmth and wheat. The way back to the royal city that she knew so well. The road up from the southern side of the Koleagh Pass unfolded below them, curving in and out of view. Her breath caught in her throat. Partway up, three men rode: knights, judging by the glint of their armor. They were still far below, but not as far below as Britomart would have liked. She could only hope that the winding of the road between rocky outcrops had shielded her and Smudge from the mens’ notice.
Arthur caught Britomart’s sudden tension and whickered softly. Britomart sprung into action. “We need to go,” she told Smudge, her voice low and urgent.“There are men coming, partway down the pass.” She set the boy unceremoniously on the horse as he tried to twist around to look at the men below them. Then she swung herself into the saddle behind him, and they were moving again, heading down the northern side of the pass with all the speed they could manage. Which was not very much.
The road down from the Koleagh Pass was not as steep on this side, nor was the distance as long, for the wooded valley that it opened onto towards the north was higher than the plains on its southern side. But it was not an easy ride either. The terrain remained uneven and rocky. She could not risk pushing Arthur any faster than a walk lest his hooves lose purchase and send them all tumbling down the mountainside.
Once they reached the valley below, they could gallop. Maybe, just maybe, they would have enough of a head start for Britomart to get Smudge to a village before their pursuers caught up. Then, she could slip into the Shadowed Wood. Then, but not before then. She could not take a child into the Shadowed Wood, not even a child like Smudge. It was too dangerous.
Even with a head start, though, she knew that Arthur was tired from a fortnight of cross-country riding, and there was only so much she could ask of her horse. Outrunning three knights on horseback might be too much.
Knights rather than city guards meant something different than pursuers from Rivensfeldt. Had King Gundred granted Willa’s request and sent a band of knights to track down Alfrick? Or had he sent the knights to bring Britomart back? Could they have caught up with her already? Of course they could, Britomart thought with chagrin. She had lost a day in her flight away from the Northern Road with Smudge. Even if her father had waited to search the city for her before sending out a rescue party (as if I need rescuing!), she would not have been able to outrun them for much longer.
A shout sounded from above.
“I think they saw us,” said Smudge. “Does that mean we get to gallop?” he added hopefully.
Britomart grimaced. “Not yet. Almost.” Almost there. Almost to the bottom of the pass.
Behind her, she heard the clatter of hooves on rocks. The knights were not being as careful as she had been of Arthur. They were either desperate or stupid. She was fervently hoping for the latter.
Gradually, so gradually that Britomart felt like she might implode with impatience, Arthur’s stride became more regular, and the ground grew flat beneath them. They had reached the bottom of the pass.
“Now,” Britomart said, “we gallop.”
They galloped.
Soon they heard the knights behind them galloping too. Let there be a village soon, Britomart prayed, any village, anywhere that I can leave Smudge in safety and go into the Shadowed Wood. There must be villages too small to have been marked on father’s map. Just one village. Let there be a village. But no villages came, and a quick glance back told her that the knights were gaining on them.
They would simply have to keep running.
She leaned in closer to Smudge to catch his words as the air racing past snatched them away. “I said,” he yelled, “Are we going into the woods, or are you going to wait till they catch us?”
“We can’t! It’s not safe for you,” she yelled back.
“Neither is whoever is back there!”
That, Britomart had to admit, was true. A rescue party of knights might not take kindly to a dirt-caked boy with a thief's “T” branded on the back of his hand. She hesitated for a moment, but the hoofbeats behind them were growing louder. She dared one more glance back. The knights were close enough now that she could recognize the blazons on their surcoats. That couldn’t be–Sir Danquil? She was damned if she would be rescued by Danquil.
“If you get eaten by wolves, it is not my fault!” she yelled to Smudge.
She reined Arthur off the road and towards the Shadowed Wood.
Smudge whooped as Arthur’s long strides ate up the space between the road and the trees. Then they were among the trees, huge trunks whipping past them. Britomart eased Arthur to a canter, then to a trot. She listened for the sound of hoofbeats behind them. None came. Bit by bit, her heartbeat grew steadier. She slowed Arthur to a walk, then dismounted to walk alongside him and give him a rest.
She began to ask Smudge if he wanted to come down too, but the words caught in her throat when she saw his expression. His face was blank with awe.
For the first time, Britomart truly looked around her. Huge trunks rose up to every side, their leaves forming a thick, green dome overhead that let in only the dimmest of light. Occasional motes of light glowed in the perpetual green twilight and then were gone. It reminded Britomart of being underwater, surrounded by some foreign element. Thick undergrowth grew up among the trees. The ground was spongy and emerald green with moss beneath her feet. Splashes of color caught her eye amidst the foliage: clumps of tiny white flowers half hidden by leaf shadows; a red toadstool nestled against the gnarled roots of a tree; a stirring of iridescent blue that might have been an insect’s wings.
“It's beautiful,” Britomart whispered. She spared no glance behind her as her feet carried her forward. Neither she nor Smudge noticed the trees closing in behind them, erasing any trace of their path.
***
Out on the road, Sir Danquil reined his horse to a halt. His two companions halted next to him. “Well, that’s torn it,” he said in a querulous voice. “Dashed if she hasn’t gone and disappeared. Probably gone into that dashed wood of hers.”
The knight beside him, whose sparse attempt at facial hair proclaimed him to be no older than Danquil, fidgeted nervously. “I suppose we’d better go in after her.”
Danquil cleared his throat. “Well, yes, technically we ought to, I suppose, but you see, I only got roped into this because the king found out I’d given her my hat, given it to her, as if I had a choice; you try telling her it’s your hat and not to go using it in on of her disguises…” Danquil’s words sputtered out as he saw the confused looks on both of the other knights’ faces. “What I mean to say is that we ought to have a local guide. Someone from one of the villages hereabouts. They’ll know the Shadowed Wood like the back of their hand, I dare say. No use us going in without a guide.”
“Don’t see any villages around here,” said the third knight dourly.
“We had better ride on then,” Sir Danquil declared. “We’ll just keep riding on, and I’m sure we’ll come to one. True, it might be a bit far from the Shadowed Wood, but the king can’t blame us for geography, can he?”
The other two knights readily assented.
They rode on towards Svernhold, hoping that the next village would be very far from the Shadowed Wood indeed.