If not for Aislinne Kray, he could be truly content. But after tracking her to the deep woods he had lost her, and that was troubling. It was impossible that such a thing could happen once he had gotten the smell of his quarry, but in this case it had. It bothered him even now, hours later, after he had returned empty-handed. Still, it was not important in the larger scheme of things, he reasoned. She was nothing to him but an irritant, and she played no role in his plans for the bearer of the staff and the staff’s magic. He would have both, and he would have them soon.
“We must trust in the promise that the place we seek awaits us and the Hawk will lead us there. I have seen him. I have spoken with him. He will take us one village at a
time to where no dangers will ever reach us again. He begins with us, with this village, with the people of Glensk Wood, because we stand nearest the danger and require the quickest response. Others will see him, as well, when he returns for them, but we are the first.”
He paused meaningfully. “But only if you believe! Only if you act on your faith! Only if you are true to your commitment to his teachings and to your sect and to your Seraphic!”
He had made himself larger and more dramatic in appearance than the real Seraphic had looked when he was alive. He had changed his features and his voice, and the overall impression he had created was one of power and majesty. Those assembled saw him as enhanced by the power invested in him as their spiritual leader; they had witnessed firsthand how easily he could dispose of those who challenged his authority.
Though the body had been removed during the night, no one had forgotten the fate of Pogue Kray. Such power commanded respect and discouraged doubts. It was so now as the Seraphic revealed what was required of them.
“Do you believe?” Skeal Eile demanded suddenly, his voice booming out across the square and down the paths and roads that were crammed with the people of the village.
“Do you believe enough to come with me? Do you believe enough to do whatever is needed to find your way? Do you commit to what your faith asks of you? Will you put aside your doubts and fears and march boldly out of this valley to your new home? Who among you is with me?”
The roar of commitment was vast and deafening. Voices rose as a single bellow of affirmation and trust.
“Let me hear you!” the demon shouted over the roar. “Let the whole world hear your song of faith!”
The crowd had gone wild, arms raised and fists clenched in gestures that matched the cacophony of their voices. They were his now, committed to his cause—a cause as thin and transparent as the air they breathed and every bit as necessary to their desperation.
They would go with him, and they would find what he had promised.
But they would not find it in the way they believed. They would find that even a new world was full of surprises.
“Gather your children and old people together! Take up your weapons and collect food and water! We leave at once!”
He watched them scatter to their homes to do as he had commanded of them, and he felt a great sense of satisfaction. His power over them was complete, the dark magic he wielded irresistible. With no one to stand against him, with no voice to be raised in protest, there was nothing to sway them from the course he had set. They gave no thought to what would be demanded of them. They would follow him to wherever he led them, no matter the destination, no matter the cost.
They would follow him, and they would pay the price for doing so.
IT WAS NEARING MIDDAY when Prue Liss reached the slopes of the valley leading down into Glensk Wood. She had been following the scarlet dove all night and throughout the morning without stopping for more than a few minutes at a time to rest, calling on reserves of strength she hadn’t known she possessed. She was driven in large part by her need to find Pan, to reach his side before anything worse could happen. She had no idea if this was possible. Even now, the path she followed was seemingly taking her back to the village of Glensk Wood where she was certain he would not go. She struggled with her doubts as she traveled, more than once thinking to turn aside in favor of a more likely destination. Yet the dove drew her now as it had when it had brought her to Pan the first time, and she could not make herself forsake it.
But with the sunrise her strength had begun to fail, and now she wondered if she would be worth anything even when she found him.
Ahead stood the ruins of a house sitting silent and deserted amid fields freshly plowed and awaiting spring plantings. The dove had flown toward it and now sat upon its blackened eaves, awaiting her. She trudged ahead to catch up, the muscles of her legs operating on memory and not much else. She had to sleep soon, she knew. Even if the dove went on, she could not. She was too tired to keep going. She had to rest.
She had almost reached the ruins when she heard a stirring inside the broken walls and saw a shadow of movement pass across the timbers of the far wall.
“Hello?” she called out.
When Aislinne Kray—dirty and bedraggled and grim—came around the corner of the doorway with a steel-tipped arrow and unstrung longbow gripped in one hand, she was shocked into complete silence.
“Prue?” the other asked in disbelief. “Is it you?”