Page 59 of Strange Grace
Nona turns an angry glance at the other women, then says to Rhun, “I hoped a valley like this would never teach you such a lesson.”
“It was either this lesson, or death.”
His mother’s face slackens in shock, and Rhun feels only a small moment of shame.
“We’re never promised innocence in this valley,” Hetty Pugh says.
“Such a bargain would require an even steeper price,” Aderyn agrees quietly, studying Rhun with a level, heavy regard. “Where is my daughter?”
“With Haf Lewis,” he says, uninterested in revealing they lost Baeddan and split up to find him.
“Is she so changed as you?”
Rhun stares; he’s not sure. The forest was always in Mairwen, he knows, but the night intensified her, purified her somehow. She is more herself than he thought was possible.
He says, “Mairwen is her truest self now. Maybe we all are.”
•••
THE EDGE OF THE DEVIL’SForest swells with shadows, and Mairwen holds tighter to Haf Lewis’s hand, stepping fully inside. Haf gasps but joins her, squeezing so tight their bones crunch together.
It feels right to enter the forest again. The air cools and ahead all is quiet. She remembers something warm and peaceful in the center. The altar.
rough gray stone is warm under her fingers. She avoids the dark streaks staining it, maybe from rain or old dead vines, maybe blood. Mairwen imagines laying herself down upon it and falling into a long, relaxing sleep. She’s so tired, and this bed would welcome her bones. Her heart. It doesn’t frighten her, though perhaps it should. A breeze rattles the thorns and dry leaves tossed over the surface of the altar. Dawn arrives soon. An hour or less. Beyond the altar, the Bone Tree is beautiful: white as the moon, layered with armor of bones. Half alive. She could make it fully alive.
“Mairwen Grace.”
She lifts her head.
“I never thought to stand here,” Haf whispers.
Mair transfers her grip to Haf’s shoulder, hugging her friend. “There is an altar at the base of the Bone Tree just like the hearth at my mother’s house, and if you touch it, it’s warm, despite being hard granite. The warmth is the heart of the forest, and magic pulses out through the root system and canopy, the way our blood is in our fingers and toes.”
“You make it sound like it’s magic from a fairy tale.”
“Oh, Haf.” Mair looks into the forest, at the tall black trees and popping green undergrowth, the scatter of tiny white flowers, and every layer of shadows back and back and back. “This is all a fairy tale.”
Haf wraps her arm around Mairwen’s waist. “It’s too real for that.”
“We tell it as a story, the three Grace sisters and the devil. It’s about falling in love with monsters and giving your heart up for your home. We tell it to the boys so they’ll have it like a shield. We tell it to the entire town so none of us question the details of the bargain.”
Wind blows the canopy overhead, littering them with tiny oval leaves, dry and brown and pale yellow, and Haf shudders, making an involuntary move to run back out into the sun.
Just then, the bruising ache along Mairwen’s collarbones pulses, and she thinks she hears the creaking sound of branches growing and leaning in a harsh wind. Mair closes her eyes, focuses on the pain until it dissipates. What is she becoming?
beneath her sheer veil, the girl puts a finger to her lips for quiet
Mairwen closes her eyes, reaching out with her hand as if she can grasp the memory.
A tiny voice calls out “Mairwen Grace!” from deeper in the forest.
Haf startles, tugging away. “What was that? Who is in there?”
Mair walks forward, crunching over a bed of fallen leaves. It was not Baeddan, but a high, lovely voice, like a bird. She smiles. “Some bird women, I think, tiny creatures with sharp teeth. Be careful.”
“Oh,” murmurs Haf in awe.
“Mairwen Grace!”
