If it did not … if it failed … then nothing had been solved. She still could not escape. She was still a prisoner.
And now she knew that, no matter what happened, she could never ask Gild to spin straw for her again. By asking Gild to help her, she was helping the Erlking. She’d known this—they’d both known this. But his reasons had seemed … unimportant before. Certainly, whatever he needed the gold for, it was worth saving her own life. She’d told herself that, and been convinced it was true.
But now she knew better.
What would the king do if he captured a god? If he claimed a wish? Would he return Perchta from Verloren?
This possibility was terrible enough. The stories of the Erlking and the wild hunt were wretched—stolen children and a trail of lost spirits. But the stories of Perchta were a thousand times worse, tales she would never tell the children. Whereas the Erlking liked to give chase to his prey and brag of his conquests, Perchta had liked to play. They say that she enjoyed letting her prey think it had escaped, slipped away … only to stumble back into her trap. Over and over again. She liked to wound the beasts of the forests and watch them suffer. She was unsatisfied by a quick death, and no amount of torment seemed to slake her bloodlust.
And those were animals.
The way she toyed with mortals was no better. To the huntress, humans were just as viable prey as stags and boar. Preferred, even, because they had enough sense to know they had no chance against the hunt, but they kept fighting anyway.
She was cruelty incarnate. A monster through and through.
She could not be unleashed on the mortal world again.
But maybe the Erlking’s wish would not be to summon Perchta from the underworld. What else might such a man long for? The destruction of the veil? Freedom to reign over mortals, not only his dark ones? A weapon, or dark magic, or an entire army of the undead to serve him?
Whatever the answer, she didn’t want to find out.
He could not get his wish.
It might be too late. They might have already spun enough for him to hunt and capture a god on the Endless Moon. But she had to hope that wasn’t the case. She had to hope.
She crested a hill and saw the familiar roofs of M?rchenfeld in the distance, tucked into its little valley by the river. Any other day, her heart might have lifted to be so close to home.
But it wasn’t truly a home, not anymore. Not with her father gone.
She glanced toward the sky. There was still a couple of hours until sunset, when Pusch-Grohla had promised to send word and tell Serilda whether or not she would be able to aid her. A couple of hours until she might be given some idea of her fate.
When the mill came into view, Serilda felt no sense of the joy and relief she had when she’d returned after the Hunger Moon.
Except—there was smoke curling up from one of the chimneys.
She paused and at first she thought that someone was in her home. That, maybe, Papa was in her home—!
But then she realized that the smoke was coming from the chimney behind the house, in the gristmill, and that flutter of hope sank back into the pain of loss.
Only Thomas Lindbeck, she thought, working in her father’s absence. As she made her way down the hill, she could see that the Sorge River was higher now than when she’d left, swelling from the melting snow in the mountains. The waterwheel was churning at a good clip. If the mill wasn’t already in demand from their neighbors, it would be soon.
She knew that she should go talk to Thomas. Thank him for keeping everything running while she was gone. Maybe she should even tell him the truth. Not that her father had been taken from the wild hunt and thrown from his horse, but that he had an accident. That he was dead. That he would never be coming back.
But Serilda’s heart was too heavy and she didn’t want to talk to anyone, least of all Thomas Lindbeck.
Pretending that she hadn’t noticed the smoke, she went into her home. Shutting the door behind her, she spent a moment looking around at the barren room. There was a chill in the air and dust on every surface. The spinning wheel, which they hadn’t been able to sell before leaving for Mondbrück, had thin lines of spiderwebbing on the spokes.
Serilda tried to picture a future in which she could stay here. Was there any hope that Pusch-Grohla could help her in a way that she might actually be safe from the Erlking? That she could keep her childhood home?
She doubted it. Probably she would have to run somewhere still. Somewhere very far away.
But this time she would be alone.
If it was possible at all. He was a hunter. He would come for her. He would never stop coming for her.
Who was she to think that would ever change?
With a heavy heart, she sank onto her cot, though there were no longer any blankets. She stared at the ceiling she’d been staring up at her whole life, and waited for the sun to set, and this mysterious messenger to come to her aid.
Or to confirm her fears—that there was no hope at all.
She had been wallowing in these thoughts for some time when she began to notice a strange noise.
Serilda frowned and listened.
Scuffling.
Chewing.
Probably rats had gotten into the walls.
She made a face, wondering if she cared enough to try and set traps for them. Probably not. They would be Thomas’s problem soon enough.
But then she felt guilty. This was her father’s mill, his life’s work. And it was still her home, even if it no longer felt that way. She couldn’t let it fall into disrepair, not so long as she could do something about it.
She grumbled and sat up. She would need to go into town for the traps, and that would have to wait until tomorrow. But for now she could at least try to figure out where they had gotten in.
She shut her eyes and listened some more. At first there was silence, but after a while she heard it again.
Scratching.
Gnawing.
Louder than before.
She shuddered. What if it was an entire family of rats? She knew the millstones and waterwheel could be loud, but still, hadn’t Thomas heard that? Was he already so derelict in the work her father had entrusted to him?
She swung her legs over the cot. Crouching down, she inspected where the walls met the floor, searching for small holes that the vermin might have gotten in. She saw nothing.
“Must be on the mill side,” she muttered. And again, she wanted to ignore it. And again, she chastised herself for those thoughts.
At least, if Thomas was still there, she could chastise him for his negligence. Rodents were drawn to mills—to the scraps of wheat and rye and barley left behind in the process. It was imperative that they were kept clean. She supposed he ought to learn this now if he was going to become the new miller of M?rchenfeld.
With a huff, she rebraided her hair, still filthy from the trek through the underground tunnel and the forest, and headed out, rounding the corner toward the mill.