He forced himself to think about the witch of the Deep Fell for a time. He had not let himself do so earlier; it was easier not to. He knew he had to go to her. It did not help matters to think about how dangerous that might be. Nightshade frightened the others badly, and nothing besides the Mark had done that. He might be biting off more than he could chew once again; he might be putting them all in a worse predicament than the one they had experienced in the camp of the Crag Trolls. He chewed his lower lip thoughtfully. He could not afford to do that. There might be no one to rescue them this time. He would have to be more careful. He would have to take steps to protect them.
Especially Willow, he thought. He glanced over to where she lay in the dark, trying to follow the line of her sleeping form. She had not transformed herself into and taken root as a tree this night. Evidently, she did so only periodically. He found that he was less repelled by the idea than he had previously been. Perhaps it was only the strangeness of the change that had bothered him so at first, and now he was used to the idea. Sometimes familiarity bred acceptance, not contempt.
He shook his head admonishingly. What you really mean, Holiday, is that she saved your skin, so now you can accept her. Bully for you.
His breathing evened out and his eyes closed. He wished she hadn’t given up so much to follow him. He wished that she had been a little less impulsive. It made him feel responsible for her, and he didn’t want that. She wanted it, of course. She saw things the way some child would see them, their fate told in the winding of vines on a bridal bed, their lives joined by a chance meeting at some midnight swim. She expected things from him that he wasn’t prepared to give to anyone.
His thoughts wandered, and his obstinacy slowly diffused. Perhaps the problem was not with her at all; perhaps it was with him. Maybe the real problem was that he simply didn’t have the things to give her that she was asking for. Perhaps he had lost everything good about himself when Annie had died. He didn’t want to think that, but perhaps it was so.
He was surprised to find tears in his eyes. He brushed them silently away, grateful that no one could see.
He let his thoughts slip away then, and he drifted down into himself. His dreams overtook him, and he slept.
He was awake early, the daylight still a faint blush against the eastern horizon where the mist rolled across the hills. The others of the little company were awake as well, stretching muscles cramped from sleeping in the damp and chill, yawning against the too quick passing of the night. The rain had died away to a spattering of drops from the leaves of the trees. Ben stepped from the pavilion tent into the halflight and walked to where a trickle of water spilled down out of the rocks through a gathering of heavy brush. He was bending down to catch a drink in his cupped hands when a pair of ferretlike faces poked out suddenly from the brush.
He jumped backward, water flying up into his face, a startled oath on his lips.
“Great High Lord,” a voice greeted quickly.
“Mighty High Lord,” a second voice echoed.
Fillip and Sot. Ben recovered his composure, forced himself with considerable effort to discard his impulse to throttle them both, and waited patiently as they worked their way free of their concealment. The G’Home Gnomes were a bedraggled pair, their clothing ripped and their fur matted with the rain. They appeared even dirtier than usual, if that was possible.
They waddled forward, eyes peering up at him in the near dark.
“We experienced some difficulty eluding the Crag Trolls, High Lord,” Fillip explained.
“We were hunted until dark, and then we could not determine where you had gone,” Sot added.
“We were frightened that you had been taken again,” Fillip said.