My son. My son.
“Let us play a game,” she whispered in his perfect little ear. “It will be our special secret that I am your mother. I will call you Donal, and you must call me Lady Eden except when we are alone together. Can you do that for me?”
He pulled back and frowned at her. “Lady Eden,” he repeated. “I know about secrets.”
She hugged him again, astonished at his maturity and understanding. Was this miraculous being her child, indeed? Could such happiness be born of fear and sorrow?
“Oh, Donal,” she whispered. “I will make you happy.”
But as she looked over his thin shoulders, she saw two faces, one elegant and refined, one weathered and wise. In Aunt Claudia’s eyes was grave concern, and in Mrs. Byrne’s an understanding that Eden knew she would keep to herself.
And so the secret would survive a little longer.
In the very center of the ancient wood, where sunlight almost never reached the ground and Grandfather Oak stood watch, the fox ended his flight.
He stopped at the tangle of gnarled roots thrusting up from the ground and sniffed the loam. Nothing changed here. All was as it had been for a thousand years, the last enchanted place in the land of the Britons.
And the one who slept within was just as changeless.
The fox shook his bright coat and turned about three times. Red pelt became red hair, and fur turned to skin and rough-woven cloth.
Tod wriggled his bare toes into the earth and prepared to face his master.
“My lord,” he whispered.
No answer. Of course, no answer; Lord Hern had slept for nearly five human years. The blink of an eye in the time of the Fane, but his sleep was no less profound for all that.
Tod placed his hand against the warm bark, feeling the heart that beat within. He slapped the bark three times, chanting as he did so.
“My lord, awake! She has returned!”
Silence. Then, after a thousand heartbeats, a stirring. Grandfather Oak groaned at being disturbed in his winter slumber, and his guardian shared the sentiment.
But he did not refuse the summoning. Tod snapped back his hand as the bark began to ripple and grow transparent. A figure became visible within, still at one with the ancient tree. Then, with movements stiff and slow, Lord Hern stepped free of his waiting place.
A thousand times had Tod seen the Forest Lord, but still he felt his power. He was tall, so tall, crowned with his rack of antlers, green-eyed, awesome in his strength and dignity. Lord Hern was the last of the High Fane remaining in this part of man’s earth, perhaps the last anywhere. Tod didn’t know; he was bound to the lord as he was to this dale, unable to leave it except by Lord Hern’s command.
“My lord,” he said, and bowed. But he could not hold such solemnity for long. He laughed and did a somersault, bounding this way and that. “Oh, Tod has such things to tell you!”
Lord Hern looked down upon him with eyes still glazed by sleep. “Tod. Why did you wake me?”
“Because she has come back!” With an effort, he held himself still. “She, the mortal who betrayed you.”
All at once Lord Hern’s eyes flashed like emerald fire. He stepped away from the tree, and the branches of Grandfather Oak shuddered and sighed.
Tod knew better than to tease, though the temptation was great. He had been alone so long, with only the beasts for company. Of those few that remained since Lord Hern had taken his grace from the land, most were sluggish or hibernating for the winter.
But now the lord was back.
“When?” Hern demanded. “When did she come?”
“Today, today! Tod saw her. And Tod saw—”
Tod almost remembered too late. He had sworn to himself that he would not speak of the other. Tod feared little, but Lord Hern’s wrath was not something he wished to see again, not until another thousand of man’s years had passed. The lord would know the truth soon enough without his help.
It was the lady who most needed the warning.