The World Above Page 7

  “I’m sorry,” she said. “Perhaps I should not have shown you.”

  “No,” I said at once. I shook my head and felt the tears fly. “I’m glad you did. But I think you’re right. This would have been too much for Jack, at least right off. One glimpse of this, and he’d have set off to avenge our father.”

  Except for the color of his eyes, Jack was the image of Duke Roland.

  The shape of their faces was precisely the same. In the curve of Duke Roland’s lips, I saw the curve of Jack’s mouth when he smiled. Jack had our father’s wide, sweeping cheekbones, the almond shape of his eyes. But while Jack’s eyes were blue like our mother’s, Duke Roland’s were as gray as storm clouds.

  “This must be hard for you, too,” Shannon said softly. “You look so much like her.”

  My head turned toward her as if pulled by a string.

  “What?”

  “Surely you can see the resemblance,” she said. She moved to stand beside me. “You look as much like her as Jack looks like your father.” She cocked her head to one side. “Though, if it’s not presumptuous of me to say so, I think I can see your father in you as well. Something about the determined set of the chin, I think.”

  “I wish I’d known him,” I said softly. “And I wish I’d taken time to know my mother.”

  “At least you can do something about the second,” Shannon said. I felt a sudden burst of affection sweep over me for this girl I barely knew. Not only had it been the right thing to say, it had been the right way to say it, simple and straightforward. Practical, just as I was myself.

  She is right, I thought. I could still get to know my mother better. And hadn’t Mama said I had my father’s nature? My ability to plan, my single-mindedness when it came to getting a job done. I was Duke Roland’s child. I was his heir, his firstborn. Who knew what I might discover if I stopped comparing myself to Jack and simply tried to know my own self better?

  Jack, I thought.

  “We have to find our brothers first,” I said.

  “Thank you,” Shannon said quietly.

  I turned back toward her in surprise. “For what?”

  “For not saying ‘save,’” she said. “Even though it’s what we’re both thinking.”

  “What I’m thinking is that we’ll do whatever it takes,” I said.

  With gentle fingers, I reached to cover my parents’ portrait.

  TWELVE

  “I’ve been thinking it over, and I’ve decided we should take the shortcut,” Shannon announced early the next morning.

  We had talked far into the night, trying to determine the best way to locate our brothers. We would head for Guy de Trabant’s fortress, of course. But unlike Jack and Sean, we would go on horseback, though even that would take time. Shannon estimated five full days. What if Jack and Sean needed help now?

  Perhaps it had been seeing the portrait of my parents, or seeing how much Jack looked like our father, but a sense of urgency now seized me and would not let go. I had tossed and turned as I slept, anxious and edgy. My skin crawled with impatience. I had already waited nearly four whole weeks before following Jack to the World Above. Traveling another five days before I could learn about my brother’s fate seemed . . . wrong. Even worse, it seemed dangerous.

  Too long. The thought pounded in my head to the rhythm of my heart. Too long. Too long.

  “What’s the shortcut?” I inquired.

  We were in the stables, readying the castle’s one remaining horse. Even in my haste to be gone, I eyed him dubiously. He was ancient and swaybacked. Surely there was no way he could carry us both. But Shannon had assured me that, like the rest of my father’s subjects, the old horse would prove steadfast and loyal. His name, as a matter of fact, was Verité. Truth. Appropriate, there was no denying it. Shannon tossed a blanket across Verité’s broad back, then added our saddlebags before she replied.

  “Through the Greenwood Forest.”

  I caught my breath. “But I thought you said . . .” My voice trailed off.

  “I did,” Shannon answered. “I know. But I still think it’s the right choice.”

  The Greenwood lay like a great green divide between de Trabant’s lands and ours. The boundary that marked the place where our lands had once ended and Duke Guy’s began was somewhere deep inside the Greenwood itself, Shannon said, though she had never seen it. The place was marked by an ancient oak. My mother had grown up not far from the Greenwood. Rowan, her nurse, had built her house along its outskirts, though she, and it, had vanished long ago.

  As Rowan herself had predicted, it hadn’t taken Guy de Trabant long to figure out where my mother had gone. But by the time his soldiers reached the wise old woman’s cottage, neither Rowan nor my mother were anywhere to be found. When word of my mother’s escape reached Guy de Trabant, he’d flown into a rage and ordered Rowan’s house burned to the ground. No one had seen her since.

  With Rowan’s departure, a change had come over the Greenwood, or so the local inhabitants told. Where once it had been safe for travelers to pass, outlaws now made the forest their home. One was of particular note: Robert de Trabant, Guy de Trabant’s only son.

  “Going through the Greenwood could save us as many as three days,” Shannon continued. “I know it’s risky, but I think it’s a chance worth taking. Surely not every tree harbors a ruffian. They say the duke’s son and his band stay mostly near the border with the kingdom of Larienne.”

  I had never heard of Larienne before, and said so. “I have never seen it myself,” Shannon told me. “But it’s rumored to be so wealthy that the merchants line their bathtubs with gold tiles.”

  I gestured at our country garments. “We’re not wealthy, that much is obvious.”

  “Precisely,” Shannon said with a nod. “So there’s no real reason for Robert de Trabant and his band to take an interest in us, even if we encounter them. With any luck, though, we’ll slip through quietly with no one the wiser.”

  I hesitated for a moment, my fingers fiddling with Verité’s long mane. “I hate to say this,” I finally said. “But I don’t think relying on luck is a very good plan.”

  Shannon gave a short bark of unamused laughter. “Don’t I know it? But our only other choice is to follow Sean and Jack’s example and bypass the forest entirely. I just don’t want to take that much time to go around it.”

  “Nor do I.”

  “We’re agreed then?” Shannon asked. “We go through the Greenwood, even if it is the more dangerous choice.”

  “We go through the Greenwood.” I nodded. “Though I reserve the same right Jack always did.”

  “What’s that?”

  “The right to say ‘I told you so’ if anything goes wrong.”

  We rode all that day at a steady, even pace that took us through the countryside once governed by my father and mother. Everyone recognized Shannon, and it was clear that the people adored her. In every village or hamlet, the men and women stopped their work and came to greet us. Shannon introduced me simply as her friend Gen. Neither of us offered any additional information.

  The women bobbed quick, shy curtsies, their glances fluttering up like butterflies to rest on my face, then back down to rest on the ground. The men doffed their caps, then stood turning them in their hands.

  Hope. There is still so much hope here, I thought.

  “Do you think they know who I am?” I asked, as we left the farms behind. We were in open country now. Dead ahead, stretching along the horizon in either direction as far as I could see, lay the dark green smudge of the Greenwood.

  “Do you suppose Sean and Jack attracted as much attention as we did?”

  Did Jack come to feel as I do now? I wondered. Had the people of this place found a way inside his heart? Without knowing a single one of their names, did he feel responsible for them?

  “The answer to the second question is most certainly yes,” Shannon replied. “Everyone loves Sean. Even the children stop their games when he comes along. As for k
nowing who you are . . . The older ones must suspect, I think; the resemblance to your parents is so strong. But you have to remember that no one here really knows what happened to Duke Roland’s young wife. They don’t know you and Jack were ever born.”

  We rode in silence for several moments, the wind shushing through the tall grass and the thunk of Verité’s hooves against the earth the only sounds.

  “It’s not what I expected,” I finally said. “This country is poor. That much is obvious. But the people seem—” I broke off, frustrated by my inability to explain my impressions. “They don’t seem unhappy. They don’t seem desperate or ready to fight with one another at a moment’s notice.

  “When Jack first returned from the World Above—when he brought back the sickly goose and a nearly empty sack that should have been overflowing with gold—my mother was beside herself. She said it was a sign that the people were not being governed wisely or well. That they were suffering.”

  “The first part is certainly true,” Shannon answered. “As to the second . . .”

  She thought a moment before going on. “I think the people miss having a leader,” she finally continued. “Someone to look up to, whose protection we can invoke, even if it’s only when we tuck our children into bed at night. It’s good to be able to put your trust in something greater than yourself. It makes the world less frightening.

  “Some nights, many nights, we may worry about the future. We lie in our beds and listen to the wind howl. But when we finally do fall asleep, our dreams are not disturbed by the fear that those we trust will suddenly decide to turn on us. Call it Guy de Trabant’s legacy, though I doubt it’s one he intended to bestow. The people of this land work together; we look out for one another. We have learned that our survival depends on it.”

  “We,” I said. “You are one of them, not an outsider.”

  “Of course I’m one of them,” Shannon answered simply. “Sean and I haven’t been outsiders from the moment the people first realized they could trust Papa, that he meant to aid them, not bring more harm. Belonging is more than just an accident of birth.”

  “True enough,” I replied.

  We rode on. I watched the Greenwood looming ever closer.

  “Tell me more about Guy de Trabant’s son,” I said.

  “I don’t know all that much,” Shannon admitted with a shrug. “His mother died when he was a small child. After that, they say his father tried to keep him close, that having inflicted harm on others, Guy de Trabant was desperate to keep his son from harm at any cost. But Robert de Trabant could not be contained. He was wild. He didn’t want to stay inside his father’s fortress. He wanted to see the world.”

  “To have adventures,” I murmured.

  “Perhaps,” Shannon replied. “Whatever his motivation, he was forever slipping away. It didn’t matter how many guards his father posted. He mingled with the common people and won their hearts. But when murmurings began that Robert would make a better ruler than his father, Guy de Trabant decided things had gone on long enough.

  “He sent his soldiers into the city. They took people from their homes. The women and children were thrown into prison. Able-bodied men and boys were sent to the north, to work in the mines. Duke Guy issued a proclamation. The raids would continue, every week, for as long as his son defied him. When the defiance ceased, so would the people’s punishment. But Robert de Trabant would not be cowed. He escaped for good that very night.”

  “And his father’s people?” I asked.

  “Safe,” Shannon replied. “Or as safe as they can be, considering who sits on their country’s throne. Robert de Trabant knew his father better than his father knew himself, or so it seems. Robert called his father’s bluff. The persecutions ceased, but Robert de Trabant still has not come home. He’s lived in the forest for nearly a year now.”

  “Where he preys on others by stealing from them,” I pointed out. “How does that make him better than his father?”

  “They say he steals only from those who would make his father and his nobles rich,” Shannon answered. “Even richer than they already are. Robert’s a thief, true enough, but what he steals he gives to those who need it most. We’ve even seen a sack or two of gold or goods appear on the edge of the Greenwood from time to time. Robert de Trabant is like his father in one way, at least. He does not venture far into the territory that once belonged to Duke Roland.”

  “Let us hope we do not meet him,” I said.

  Shannon nodded. “Either way, we’ll find out soon enough.”

  She brought Verité to a halt. Our conversation had carried us across the breadth of the meadow to the edge of Greenwood Forest.

  We entered it just as the long shadows of late afternoon began to fall.

  THIRTEEN

  The setting of the sun made the Greenwood a beautiful, but eerie, place. A strange green and golden light shone around us. The forest itself was silent. The voices of the day birds had ceased; night birds had not yet commenced their calls. The floor of the forest was a thick carpet of pine needles and dead leaves. Verité’s big hooves made hardly any sound as he plodded along.

  This place feels old, I thought. Much older than the forest that covered the hills near our farm in the World Below. The trees through which Shannon and I now traveled had enormous trunks, many too large to see around. Their boughs were as curved as Verité’s back, as if they’d grown tired of holding themselves upright. Even the pine needles extended downward, brushing against the tops of our heads from time to time as we passed beneath them.

  This is a place with secrets, I thought. It keeps them well.

  The light was fading quickly now. Then, as if a candle had been snuffed out, the sun slipped from sight. The forest was plunged into gloom. A quick chill ran down my spine.

  We are going to have to spend the night in this place, I thought, and wondered why I had not considered this before.

  “I think we should get down and lead the horse,” Shannon said. “We don’t want to risk one of us falling off.”

  “Whatever you say,” I agreed.

  Shannon swung one leg over Verité’s head, and then dropped lightly to the ground. I had my leg halfway across his broad rump when a sound broke the forest’s silence.

  “What do you suppose we have here, my friends?” asked a playful voice.

  Startled, I twisted in the direction of the sound, lost my grip on the horse, and tumbled to the ground.

  “Not graceful young noblewomen. You can be sure of that,” a second replied.

  “Of course we’re not noble born,” Shannon’s sharp tone cut across the laughter that seemed to erupt from all around us.

  It’s coming from above! I realized. They are in the trees!

  Shannon helped me to my feet. “Follow my lead,” she whispered urgently. I gave a quick nod.

  “You can tell we’re not noble just by looking at us,” she continued in a loud. voice. “Or don’t you care to use your eyes?”

  “Oh, we care to use them all right, damsel,” the first voice spoke once more.

  Not five paces ahead a branch dipped down, and suddenly a young man not much older than Shannon and me was standing on the path in front of us. He was dressed in a strange patchwork of myriad shades of green, the perfect camouflage for the forest. Legs apart, hands on hips, precisely like an adventurer out of one of my mother’s bedtime stories. Jack had spent much of his childhood trying to perfect that very stance.

  “And we like to use our heads, as well.”

  “I should certainly hope so,” I spoke up firmly despite the way my heart had begun to pound. Shannon had showed no fear. I needed to match her example. “Considering there’s likely a price on every single one of them.”

  “The lass talks sense,” the second voice sounded. There was another flurry of branches, and another figure dropped to the ground. “Even if she can’t ride a horse.”

  In the fading light, I could see that this man was older than his companion. If not f
or the fact that I suspected the younger must be Robert de Trabant, the two might have been father and son.

  “Now, Steel,” the young man said, his tone mock severe. “That’s unfair, and you know it. She was riding just fine. It was getting off the horse that posed the problem.”

  Again, a burst of low laughter sounded from the trees. The young man made a gesture, and at this signal, the rest of his companions began dropping to the ground all around us. Almost before I realized what was happening, Shannon and I were standing in the center of a circle of green-and-brown-clad figures, each no more than an arm’s reach from his neighbor. The young man who had appeared first stood facing us. His older companion was at our backs. We were completely surrounded.

  “Ladies,” the younger man said. He bent low in a bow. “Welcome to Greenwood Forest. What business brings you beneath its boughs?”

  Shannon stuck out her chin. “What right do you have to ask us that?” she demanded. “No one owns the forest, as far as I know.”

  “True enough,” the young man acknowledged, but though his words were cordial, his voice was sharp as the edge of a knife. He broke the circle to take several steps toward us, as if to get a better look at who was brave enough to deal with him so boldly.

  His hair was a burnished brown, like the skin of a hazelnut, and his eyes were chestnut dark. There was something about them that made me want to gaze right back and look away at the same time. I felt a different sort of shiver move down my spine.

  “Most who meet us, however,” he continued, his tone conversational, as if discussing the weather, “discover they prefer to share a little something. If not your business, make another choice. But make no mistake: You will choose something.”

  It is you who are making the mistake, I thought. We may be two girls alone, but we are not so easily browbeaten.

  “We have food and blankets, which we will gladly share with anyone who needs them,” I answered, careful to keep my own tone pleasant and mild. “Whatever is in our saddlebags is at your disposal. But if you were hoping for gold or jewels, you’re in for a disappointment.”