fifteen

Keelie hurried to her room and changed into hiking boots, then crept along the hall, listening for her grandmother. She needed to get to the forest quickly. If she didn’t do it right this moment, she was afraid she’d never find the courage. Dad would have to forgive her for using dark magic. He would understand her reasons.

As she made her way down the stairs, she heard the front door open.

Dad walked in and Keelie stepped back into the shadows. If he saw her, she’d be in trouble.

His shoulders slumped. Grandmother greeted him at the door. Dad wrapped his arms around her. “Mother you need to sit.”

“How is he? Is there hope?”

“No. He has chosen to fade. He sealed his fate when he tried to kill Einhorn in the Wildewood. Strangely enough, though, Elia said Keelie has something that could cure Elianard.”

It had to be the amulet. That was what would cure Elianard.

“Keelie?” Grandmother inhaled and let loose a plaintive cry. “Poor Elia. She’s desperate. She’ll do or say anything to save her father. What will happen to her?”

“She will stay with her father until he fades. After that, she does not know what she will do.”

Keelie listened, her heart breaking for Elia. Her mother was dead. Now, her father was dying, or fading, as it was for elves. Keelie knew what it was like to lose one parent, but to lose both? At the thought of losing Dad, fear squeezed its cold hand around her heart.

“Mother, I wish to check on Keelie.” Fatigue was in his voice. It had been a long day. “Please go home and get some rest. I’ll be over as soon as I can.”

As Grandmother gathered her shawl and headed for the door, Keelie rushed back to her room, Dad on the stairs right behind her. She barely made it.

Alora, who had been sleeping, lifted her leafy head, “The aunties say the humans are in the forest.”

Dad walked into Keelie’s room. “What are the aunties saying, Alora?” His eyes were bright with concern.

“Humans are in the heart of the forest. Their machines are so loud.”

Dad closed his eyes and Keelie knew he was telepathically contacting the aunties. When he opened them, they were bright green. His face flushed red.

“The Dread has been broken.” Dad clenched his fists. “There are some teenagers with ATVs creating havoc. The trees are frightened. It could be like in the Wildewood— they could become angry and turn against the humans.”

“Dad, can I help?”

“Not now. I want you to watch over your grandmother.”

“Dad, I need to help you. I need to be out there helping you with the trees.”

“Keelie, I know, but I need you to stay with Grandmother.” He clasped her shoulders. “That is how you can help best.”

“Why should I help her? She ordered me to tell you I wanted you to move Mom’s portrait.” Anger filled Keelie.

Dad’s mouth was drawn down in sadness. For a moment he was silent, then he sighed. “Keelie, her health is connected to the Dread. She magically and physically tied herself to this forest. It takes a potent form of magic to renew the Dread, and we don’t have the power to renew the forest without it. The Dread is fading, as is your Grandmother. ‘As the forest goes, so go the elves’ is more than a philosophical statement, my daughter. And if my mother fades, then it will be my turn to tie myself to the forest.

Horrified, Keelie stepped forward. “If something happens to the forest, then the same thing will happen to you?” Images of the High Mountain forest and the Wildewood forest flooded Keelie’s mind. “Dad, why would you tie yourself to a dying forest?”

“I choose to hope, Keelie.” Dad walked to the doorway. “But now, I need to go stop the humans. If the trees panic and humans are harmed, it will bring doom on us. Go to Grandmother’s house and sit with her.”

Dad walked downstairs.

“I told you to talk to the aunties,” Alora whispered softly.

Keelie ignored her and went downstairs, then outside, walking quickly to her grandmother’s house. She found Keliatiel sitting on the couch in the vast great room, where the dismal welcome party had been just a few days ago.

Grandmother looked frail, her eyes closed, her shawl clutched tightly around her shoulders. She opened her eyes when she heard Keelie come in. “I want to go to bed.”

Keelie nodded. This would work out great. She helped the old lady up and followed her toward the stairs. As she passed the library door, she glanced quickly at the low bookcase in the center of the room. But the book was not there anymore.

Grandmother’s bedroom was dominated by a huge, dark-wood bed carved with flowers. As Keelie settled her into the sheets, she brushed her hand over one of the bedposts, then pulled it away quickly, shocked at the bed’s age. It was from a walnut tree, even older than the Sherwood oak that formed the table in the dining room.

Keelie used her already-heightened tree sense to search Grandmother’s room for the book of magic, but it was not here either. Had Keliatiel hidden it? She sat with her grandmother until the old lady’s eyes closed. Outside, the sky had darkened. Grandmother looked pale, almost transparent. For the first time, Keelie wondered if she was going to die, to fade.

She walked through the dim house, trying to sense the forbidden book. She felt a glimmer of its dark magic, and turned to search the dining room with her mind. It was like a game of Marco Polo—she could “feel” she was getting closer to the book as she walked in certain spots. It felt strongest in front of a tall cabinet with locked doors. Keelie turned the key in the lock, but it wouldn’t open.

She heard a moan, and hurried back to her grandmother’s room. Grandmother opened her eyes and blinked several times. Keelie bent down. “Can I get you anything?”

Keliatiel reached out and smoothed back the hair over Keelie’s ears. Over her pointed ear, first, then over her round ear. “Keliel, I’m sorry, child, for speaking so unkindly to you earlier.”

Sympathy and sadness welled up in Keelie. “Dad told me that you aren’t feeling well. I get crabby when I’m sick.”

Grandmother lifted her head, then lowered it as if even that small movement had taxed all her energy. “As a baby, you would scream very loudly when you were upset. Zeke said you reminded him of me when circumstances didn’t go as I planned.”

“You mean you get mad when you don’t get your way.”

Grandmother nodded. “Despite my differences with Katharine, she was a good mother. I tried to understand why she took you away, but anger and bitterness clouded my judgment. It still does. I could have taught you so many things.”

“I’m here. You can still teach me.”

Grandmother closed her eyes. “We’ll see. I don’t remember ever feeling this tired. We’ll talk later.”

Keelie knelt on the floor and leaned her head against the bed, the edge of the mattress pressing into her forehead. She closed her eyes. She felt so helpless—she needed to do something. Getting up, she returned to the cabinet in the dining room, frustrated by the lock. Was there a charm on it? A curse? She didn’t know enough about magic to tell the difference. She needed a better key.

She froze. A key. And she knew just where to find one.

Keelie ran back to her house to wrestle Alora down the stairs and over to her grandmother’s.

“Where are we going, Keelie?”

“To open a cabinet.”

“Is that fun? You don’t sound like you’re having fun.”

Keelie plunked the heavy planter down in front of her sleeping grandmother. Watch over her. You’re going to contact me if she wakes up.

Alora scowled. I’m not the one who’s supposed to be watching. If you’d listened to me, then you wouldn’t have to sneak out to talk to the aunties.

An image of the sprite popped into Keelie’s mind.

What? You’re not going to the aunties? What are you going to do, Keliel Tree Talker?

I’m going to see the sprite. I’ll be back. If I hurry, then I can be back before Dad returns.

I don’t like this. You need to go to the aunties. They can advise you. They know everything that goes on in this forest.

No, Dad is with them. He has enough to do to stop those kids with the ATVs. I’ll be back.

This was becoming a pattern. If someone had told her a year ago that she’d be hiking in the woods day and night, she’d have laughed at them.

The moon was bright in the dusky sky as Keelie ran back to Dad’s house and grabbed a flashlight from the Swiss Miss Chalet. Playing the beam over the path, she could see numerous tire tracks in the dirt. It angered her to think about a bunch of idiots on ATVs wheeling through the forest. There had to be a way to restore the Dread. If not, more and more humans would come into the forest.

Hearing the creek, Keelie called out for the sprite. “Are you there?”

The little sprite rose up from the water. “Here I am.”

Keelie knelt down. “I need the amulet.”

The little sprite tilted her head. “Are you sure?”

“I’m sure. I need it now.”

The sprite shook her head disapprovingly. She disappeared underwater with a silent splash, and returned with the mud-encrusted amulet. As she lifted it up in her hands, the mud washed away and its silver thorns glinted in the moonlight as if winking at Keelie.

Keelie reached out for it. Her fingers touched the sprite s wet, clammy skin. Clasping the amulet, Keelie felt cold, as if she had plunged her hands into a bucket of ice water and the chill had permanently settled in her bones.

“Thank you.”

The sprite smiled, wide and lipless, then sank back out of sight.

As Keelie made her way back through the woods, her heart raced with anticipation. She had the amulet—she should be able to unlock the cabinet.

The wind blew through the trees, leaves rustling against one another. She caught whispered tree conversations. What is the Tree Shepherdess doing? Where is she going? She hoped Dad wasn’t listening to the trees tonight.

Some form of healing magic had to be in the book. She wasn’t sure how to use it, but Einhorn had given her the amulet for a reason. He knew Keelie was the one who could resist dark magic. After all, she’d defeated the Red Cap when she barely even knew how to use her tree magic.

She reached out to the trees on the edge of the forest. Where is my father?

He is with the queens, the ones the little princess calls the aunties. Do you wish to speak to him?

No. Fear rushed through Keelie. If they contacted Dad, he would come back.

As you wish, Tree Shepherdess.

Keelie crept into her grandmother’s house.

She held the amulet to the locked cabinet door. She didn’t know how she knew what to do—it was as if she were being guided by the amulet itself. The spiral on it began to glow, starting on the outside ring, then circling deeper and deeper until it reached the center. From inside the cabinet, a bright gold light shone, matching the light coming from the amulet. The lock on the cabinet clicked, and the door swung open.

The book floated out. Keelie reached for it with an outstretched hand, holding the amulet with the other.

The concentric spirals on the book started to rotate, and then the book fell open. Alora’s voice was loud in her head. What are you doing?

Keelie barely heard her. She was lost in a trance. The pages of the book flipped open. Keelie looked down and there it was—a spell to heal blindness. She read it, wondering why the strange script made sense to her.

She remembered the dream and Knot’s warning not to use dark magic, even for a good cause. But she must heal Ariel. She could control the magic. The wind was blowing and she heard the trees. No! Tree Shepherd, hurry.

Keelie ran outside to the mews, the book tight to her chest and the amulet thrust forward in her hand. She shouted the words of the spell. Dark storm clouds formed, blotting out the moon. The wind increased, and a cold eeriness wrapped around her as a golden undulating light flowed from the amulet and snaked its way to Ariel, enveloping the hawk in bands of light.

Gold light shone from the hawk’s eyes. Ariel flapped her wings, her beak open, but made no sound.

Keelie held the book close. The magic was now reaching into her, the end of that serpentine light now entering her wrist and moving up her arm.

A dark fog surrounded her. The book was knocked out of her hand.

Keelie looked up into Jake’s pale, horrified face. “What have you done?”