Wildwood Dancing (3 page)

“Thank you,” I said as the gargoyle made a flying leap from my shoulder, then scampered off into the undergrowth.

“Delighted to be of service, Mistress Jenica. I’ll expect you to return the favor, mind.”

“You shall have the first dance, of course, Master Anatolie,” I told him.

The dwarf grinned, revealing a set of jeweled studs in his front teeth. “I’ll match you step for step, young lady. You’ll find me a more satisfactory partner than that slippery green friend of yours. He’s shaking like a jelly—wouldn’t know a jig if it jumped up and bit him.”

Gogu stopped shivering instantly. I could feel bunched-up irritation in every part of him.

“You’ve upset him,” I said. “Frogs have feelings, too, you know.”

The dwarf bowed again. “No offense,” he said, his eyes on Gogu. “It should be an interesting night. We’ve got visitors. Night People from the forests of the east.”

A bolt of horror shot through me and I stopped walking. Ahead of us, my sisters and their assorted escorts were disappearing along the broad, leaf-carpeted track that led away under tall trees, following the sweet call of a flute. The branches were festooned with colored lights shaped like birds and beetles and flowers. “Night People?” I echoed, and heard the tremor in my voice. Fragments of dark stories crept into my mind: tales of blood and violence, of evil deeds and terrible retribution.

“Nothing to worry about,” said Anatolie offhand.

“Yes, it is!” I protested. “Florica, who works for us, says they come at night and bite people in their beds. She says the only thing they drink is human blood.” My sisters were too far ahead to be called back.

“This would be the same Florica who said all dwarves were liars and thieves?” Anatolie asked, feet planted apart and hands on hips. His cloak was ankle length and lined with what appeared to be bear skin.

“Well, yes,” I said.

“The same Florica who told you not to go too close to the Deadwash or you’d be scooped up in the magic fishing net of Drǎguţa, the witch of the wood?”

“Yes, but … but Night People, everyone says—” I stopped myself. Anatolie was right. If I had never met one, it was unfair to judge on the basis of stories.

“You and your sisters are quite safe here,” the dwarf said as we started walking again. “Hasn’t the forest queen herself allowed you to visit her revels these nine years of Full Moons? Believe me, if her protection did not stretch out over the five of you, you would not be here now.”

“I don’t like the sound of that at all,” I said, wondering whether he meant we would have met the same fate as the foolish folk in the stories: dead, mad, or vanished.

“The Night People will not touch you while Ileana is queen of the wildwood,” Anatolie said. “You have my word.”

“Thank you,” I said, but I was full of doubt. I could not remember hearing a single good thing about the Night People, and I had no wish to meet even one of them. They’d never been
to Dancing Glade before; at least, not when we were there. I thought about garlic, and silver crosses, and everything else folk used to keep such dangerous forces at bay. I hadn’t brought a thing to protect myself or my sisters.

When we reached the glade, the festivities were in full swing. A circle of autumn-clad trees sheltered the grassy sward, their branches hung with still more lanterns. These cast a warm light over the brightly clad revelers, whose gowns and masks, robes and jewels filled the open space with a swirling mass of color. Above them, creatures performed aerial dances of their own, some borne on delicate, diaphanous wings, some on leathery, creaking membranes. Some of the guests were tall enough to bump their heads on the lanterns; some were so tiny, one had to take care not to step on them. I saw my gargoyle perched on the branch of a holly bush, waving its paws in time with the music and beaming beatifically.

The musicians sat on a raised platform at the far end, under the biggest oak. The instruments were the same as the ones in the village band—flute, drum, goat-pipes, fiddle—and yet they were not quite the same. Each possessed a strangeness that set it apart. What ordinary drum cries out poetry when beaten? What flute plays three tunes at once, each blending perfectly with the others? As for the goat-pipes, they had something of the voice of the creature whose skin had provided their air bag, plaintive and piercing. The fiddle soared like a lark.

The sound of this band was intoxicating to the ears, the kind of felicitous blend a village musician aspires to and may achieve once in a lifetime. It made feet move faster, pulses race,
faces flush. It set hearts thumping and coaxed smiles from the most somber mouths. It was a music we would keep on hearing in our dreams, days after Full Moon was over and we were gone from the Other Kingdom.

Iulia was already out there, dark hair flying, her face wreathed in smiles. Tati danced more sedately, her hand in that of tall Grigori, an imposing figure with long, twisted dark hair. It was said he was a kinsman of Drǎguţa, the witch of the wood.

Paula was not dancing, but had gone straight to her usual group of friends, a clutch of witches, astronomers, and soothsayers clad in long, raggedy robes and swathing, vaporous cloaks. All wore hats—I saw tall pointed structures decorated with stars, and scholarly felt caps, and here and there a mysterious shadowy hood. They were gathered around a table under the trees, deep in debate as always, their arguments fueled by a continuous supply of ţuicǎ. Paula was seated among them, waving her hands about as she expounded some theory.

Stela was with the smallest folk, down near the musicians. There was a double ring of them, weaving in and out and around about in a dance of their own. Some had wings, some horns, some feathers, and some shining, jewel-bright scales. They were chattering like a mob of little birds as they pranced to and fro, and still managing to get every step perfect. We’d all started here; as we grew older, we had been welcomed by different folk, collected by different ferrymen, and permitted to mix more widely. Dancing Glade had its own set of rules.

“Hello, Jena!” my little sister called, waving wildly. Then she plunged back into the circle.

The pattern of the night was always the same. The revels
would begin with chain dances, circle dances, devised so everyone could join in, the big and small, the clumsy and dainty, side by side. We sisters had been part of this since the first time we came across to the Other Kingdom, when kindly folk of all shapes used to take our small hands and guide us through the steps. We needed no guidance now, for we were skilled in all the dances. The first was always done with our boatmen by our sides—it was their privilege to lead us onto the sward. At some point in the evening the queen of the forest would hold formal court; this was the opportunity for newcomers to be greeted, petitions made, questions asked. Later on, the music would change, and with it the mood of the crowd. That was the time for couples to dance slow measures in each other’s arms, floating in their own small worlds. By then my youngest sisters would be getting tired, and we would all sit under the trees and watch until it was time for the last dance—a grand gathering of the entire crowd, in celebration of Full Moon. Then we would pass across the Bright Between once more, and go home to another month of hard work and dreaming.

The music was making my feet move even before I trod on the sward. I took the dwarf’s hand and we threw ourselves into a jig. The drumbeat made my heart race; the goat-pipes seemed to speak to something deep inside me, saying,
Faster, faster! You’re alive!
Anatolie gripped my hand tightly as we ran and jumped, as we turned, and swayed, and pointed our toes. Gogu had retreated to the pocket, where he was safe from falling and being trampled by the multitude of stamping, hopping, kicking feet. When the dance was over, I fished him out and set him on my shoulder once more.

“All right?” I whispered.

If you could call being shaken about like a feather duster “all right,” I suppose so
.

I was looking around the glade as my heartbeat slowly returned to normal. “Where are the Night People?” I asked Anatolie.

“They will come. Wait until the moon moves higher; wait until you see her between the branches of the tallest oaks. Then you’ll catch a glimpse of them, around the edges.”

“Don’t they dance?”

Anatolie grinned. “I’ll bet you a silver piece to a lump of coal that you can’t get one of them to step up and partner you,” he said. “They stick to their own kind, those black-cloaked streaks of melancholy. They don’t come to enjoy themselves, but to observe—to take stock.”

Out of long habit, because I was the sensible sister, I checked on the others, one by one, to make sure they were safe. Over at the far side of the sward I saw Stela, now playing a chasing game with her bevy of small companions. Those that could fly had a distinct advantage. Iulia was with a circle of young forest men and women. When I had first seen such folk, I had thought of them as fairies—though they were far taller and more elegant than the tiny figures of my childhood imagination—with their garments constructed of leaves and cobwebs, vines, bark, and feathers, and their features unsettlingly not quite human. There was no sign of Paula, but she would still be at the scholars’ table.

There was a ripple of movement. A fanfare rang out and the crowd parted before an imposing figure clad in a gown that
seemed fashioned of iridescent gossamer. It was Ileana, the hostess of these celebrations and queen of the forest people, sweeping across Dancing Glade. Folk said every bird of the wildwood had given one feather to make up her crown, which rose from her head in an exuberant crest. Her golden-haired consort, Marin, was a step behind her. This grand entrance was a feature of every Full Moon’s revels. Walking behind the queen and her partner tonight was a group of folk I had never seen before.

“That’s them,” Anatolie hissed. “Sour-faced individuals, aren’t they?”

I did not think the Night People were sour-faced, just rather sad-looking. They were extremely pale, their skin almost waxen in appearance, their eyes deep set, dark, and intense. All were clad in jet-black. The pair who led them was especially striking. The woman’s lips were narrow and bright crimson in color, whether by nature or artifice I could not tell. Her fingernails had been dyed to match. Both she and the man had bony, aristocratic features: well-defined cheeks and jaws; jutting, arrogant noses; and dark, winged brows. They made a handsome couple—he in billowing shirt, tight trousers, and high boots, she in a formfitting gown whose plunging neckline left little to the imagination.

I spotted Tati, standing in the crowd close by Ileana, her dark hair shining under the colored lights of the glade. The forest queen beckoned; my sister stepped forward and dropped into a low, graceful curtsy. A moment later Tati was being introduced to the new arrivals. I felt a sudden chill. If Ileana singled out anyone for this kind of attention, it was not the little human
girls from Piscul Dracului but the most formidable of her own folk, such as the tall Grigori or the most powerful of the soothsayers. I saw the black-booted stranger lift Tati’s hand and kiss it in a cool gesture of greeting. Then the Night People seemed to drift away into the shadows under the trees.

Ileana and Marin were not the real power in the Other Kingdom. They presided over the revels and sorted out minor disputes between the forest folk. They made sure the daily life of the wildwood went on in its usual pattern. The folk of the Other Kingdom were often less than forthcoming when questioned about their realm and its rules, but Paula had picked up a great deal at the scholars’ table. We knew that the one who was the heart of it all—the one who held the ancient secrets and wove the powerful magic—was Drǎguţa, the witch of the wood. Drǎguţa had been in the forest since before the castle of Piscul Dracului sprang to life in the imagination of the eccentric
voivode
who built it. She had dwelt in the depths of the woods since these great oaks were mere sprouting acorns. Drǎguţa did not come to Full Moon dancing. She stayed in her lair, somewhere out in the wildest and least accessible part of the woods. If folk needed to ask her something, they had to go and find her, for she wouldn’t come to them.

Once, I had questioned whether Drǎguţa really existed at all. Only once. A chorus of horrified gasps and hisses had greeted my doubt—
“Don’t say that!” “Shh.”
—as if the witch were everywhere, watching and listening. Drǎguţa was real, all right, and folk’s fear of her was real fear. In our world, Florica spoke her name in a trembling whisper, and Petru crossed himself
every time he heard it. For every boy or girl from our valley who had perished in the forest or drowned in the lake, there was a story about Drǎguţa and her minions, about hands coming up out of the water to drag the hapless under. For every crucifix the villagers had erected on the outskirts of the Piscul Dracului forest to keep evil spirits at bay, there was a tale about someone who had ventured too far and walked into the witch’s net. Perhaps it was not surprising that our castle had stood empty for so long.

The forest queen had finished introducing folk to her black-clad guests. Calling for the music to start up again, she moved out onto the sward with her hand in Marin’s. I danced with Grigori, whose alarming appearance tended to mask the fact that he was a model of courtesy. I danced with a forest man who had ivy twists for hair, and another clad all in cobwebs. The music wove its way into my blood and made my feet agile and my limbs supple. My head was full of colors and lights: I smiled at nothing in particular and felt that I was beautiful. Only when the earlier dances came to an end and folk stood about the edges of the sward while the band had a rest did I remember that Father was leaving in the morning. Once my mind escaped the lure of the dancing, once my body stopped bending and turning and swaying to the music’s enchantment, I found that I was thinking only of the long winter ahead, and how we would cope without him.

Something of my worry must have shown on my face. Grigori came over to ask what was troubling me. Anatolie offered the opinion that I must be unwell. Gogu showed his own
awareness of my unease, snuggling up to my neck, under my hair.
It’s all right, Jena. I’m here
. It helped that he was close, for I felt suddenly cold and, surrounded as I was by folk making merry, curiously alone.