“The man on the horse,” Katya said, “was the Duke.”
“I got that,” Todd said.
“He lived a long time ago. I’m not sure of exactly when. When you’re a little child you don’t listen to those kind of details. It’s the story you remember. And the story was this:”
“One day in autumn the Duke went out hunting, which he did all the time — it was his favorite thing to do — and he saw what he thought was a goat, trapped in a briar-thicket. So he got off his horse, telling his men that he wanted to kill this animal himself. He hated goats, having been attacked by one and badly hurt as a baby He still had scars on his face from that attack, and they ached in the cold weather, all of which served to keep his hatred of goats alive. Perhaps it was a petty thing, this hatred; but sometimes little things can be the unmaking of us. There’s no doubt that Goga would not have pursued his goat as far as he did had he not been injured as a child. And then — to make matters worse — as he approached the animal history virtually repeated itself. The animal reared up, striking the Duke with its blackhoof and cracking his nose. The goat then ran off.”
“Goga was furious, beside himself with fury! To have been mistreated by a goat twice! He got straight back on his horse, blood pouring from his broken nose, and went after the animal, riding hard through the forest to catch up with it. His entourage went with him, because they were bound to follow the Duke wherever he went. But they were beginning to suspect that there was something strange about where they were headed and that it would be better for them all if they just turned round and rode back to the Fortress.”
“But Goga wouldn’t do that?”
“Of course not. He was determined to chase down the animal that had struck him. He wanted revenge on the thing. He wanted to stick his sword through it, and cut out its heart and eat it raw. That was the kind of rage he was in.
“So he kept riding. And his men, out of loyalty, kept following, further and further from the Fortress and the paths they knew, into the depths of the forest. Steadily even the Duke began to realize that what his men were whispering was right: there were creatures here, lurking about, the likes of which God had not made. He could see things between the trees that didn’t belong in any of the bestiaries he had in the Fortress. Strange, ungodly creatures.”
As Katya told her story, Todd glanced at the dark mass of trees into which Goga and his men had just ridden. Was that the Deep Wood she had just described? Surely it was. The same horsemen. The same trees. In other words, he was standing in the middle of Katya’s story.
“So … the Duke kept riding, and riding, driving his poor horse as he followed the leaping goat deeper and deeper into the forest, until they were in a place where there were certain no human being had ever ventured before. By now, all the men, even the most loyal, the bravest of them, were begging the Duke to let them turn back. The air was bitter and sulfurous, and in the ground beneath the horses’ hooves the men could hear the sound of people sobbing, as though living souls had been buried alive in the black, smoking dirt.
“But the Duke would not be moved from his ambition. ‘What kind of hunters do you call yourselves?’ he said to his men, ‘If you won’t go after a goat? Where’s your faith in God? There’s no danger to us here, if our hearts are pure.'”
“So on they went, the men quietly offering up prayers for the safety of their souls as they rode.
“And eventually, after a long chase, their quarry came in sight again. The goat was standing in a grove of trees so old they had been planted before the Flood, in the tangled roots of which grew mushrooms that gave off the smell of dead flesh. The Duke got off his horse, drew his sword and approached the goat.