The Unready Queen, стр. 16
“I am well aware of the people,” said the queen wearily.
“Why do you hate them so much?”
“I don’t hate them. I just want them to stay on their side.”
“Why do there have to be sides?”
“Because there are.” The queen closed her eyes. “There are sides. You can’t just make the world what you want it to be, Fable.”
“Why not?”
The queen hesitated. It was not the question but the intensity in her daughter’s voice that disarmed her. She squared her jaw. “Because you can’t. Try letting the world make you what you need to be, instead.”
Fable scowled, but did not argue any further.
“Listen, child. I’m glad you had a nice time with your friends,” the queen said. “Really, I am. Of all the people in the whole wide world, you might have found the very best ones. But you went into town without my consent, and that sort of disobedience I cannot abide. This is serious, Fable. Endsborough is off-limits until I say otherwise. Understood?”
Fable rolled her eyes. “Understood.”
“Thank you. Now, go finish your chores. The winds last night tangled up a lot of the southern witching knots, and they’re not going to sort themselves out.”
Fable grudgingly made her way off into the forest to tend to the wards.
The queen leaned against the trunk of a broad elm. The elm leaned in to meet her.
“She will be ready when she needs to be,” the queen said aloud. The leaves rustled above her. “Me? I’m not sure I’ll ever be ready.”
The forest did not respond.
The queen felt an uncomfortable prickle running up her spine. She stiffened. Something was wrong.
The queen listened. All around her the wind whipped through the treetops a little too quickly, and the forest rang with a sudden jarring pain. It rippled through twisted roots and high branches. The queen cringed. Her stomach turned.
Before she knew what she was doing, the queen was running.
Her feet scarcely touched the forest floor. The woods bent around her and rushed past her on either side, drawing her forward. After several minutes, her lungs burned, but she hardly felt them. The ache in her bones was growing stronger as she neared the northwest corner of the woods, and she realized where the forest was pulling her—she was nearing one of the Grandmother Trees.
From the distance came a rhythmic screech of metal teeth on wood and the murmur of men’s voices. The queen’s blood was hot in her veins. No. They would not dare.
She slowed as the foliage around her thinned and the light of the sun cutting between tree trunks made her eyes ache. Palpable waves of distress rolled off the Grandmother Tree. Ahead of the queen lay a broad clearing. The edge of her domain. And the world of men.
“Clear out!” a voice yelled.
The queen lurched to a stop as a spasm shot through her like electricity.
“Here it comes! Warner—back up!”
The great, towering Grandmother Tree had begun to make an unsettling series of pops and groans. The queen was close enough now that she could see the men jogging away up the nearby hills, axes and long, wicked saws still clutched in their hands. She was too late.
Crack!
Numbly, she watched the ancient pillar tip forward.
There were more sickening snaps and pops, the wood shrieked, and then the whole thing came down with a deafening CRUNCH.
It was over.
The queen felt sick.
All around her, she could hear the quiet whimpers of the nymphs and the pixies. Their voices melted into a whispered dirge, and it made the queen’s chest ache.
In the clearing, men began to laugh.
The queen’s jaw shook. Her fists vibrated with fury as, above her, the sky grew cloudy and the wind blew cold.
“Whoo-ee. She nearly took your head off there, Oliver!” somebody shouted. The men were clapping one another on the back.
The queen’s muscles tensed. She’s about to take all of your heads off, she thought. Her pulse pounded in her ears. She could feel the vines beneath the soil waiting for her command. The air crackled with furious anticipation.
“You best be more careful,” shouted another man. “I do not want to be the one to tell that little girl of yours her daddy’s not coming home.”
The queen froze.
“Good job, everyone. Let’s get back to work, now! Stokes, you and Lambert get started on those branches. Be nice to get this thing stripped before those clouds open up.”
The queen turned away. This she could not watch.
The winds died and the forest fell quiet. The queen drew slow, shuddering breaths as she stalked away. With each chuckle and boisterous hoot that followed her, echoing between the trees, she felt a hot ball of wrath rise again in her throat. With great force of will, she swallowed it back down again.
She became aware of many eyes peering at her through the leaves as she walked away. The faces of several grieving nymphs melted into the bark of the nearby trees, and a fluttering pixie light dimmed behind a low fern. A raspy voice drifted down from a mossy branch. “She doesnothing?” it uttered in Spriggan.
“There are times when doing nothing is better than the alternative,” the queen answered. She took great care to keep her voice measured and even. “Violence,” she said, “is not strength.”
The moss above her quivered. “And nothing,” the raspy voice answered, “is notsomething.”
TEN
Salty air rippled across dry grasses as Annie, Cole, and Tinn approached the cliffs that evening. The voyage through the Wild Wood to the goblin horde had once seemed impossible, but the Burtons had now made the trip half a dozen times. It was no more than an hour’s travel if they kept to the secret goblin path, which skirted around the worst of the forest’s obstacles— and the protection the queen had granted them was enough to ward off most of the creatures who might wish them harm.
Chief Nudd met them at the mouth