Two and Twenty Dark Tales by Georgia McBride Page B

soul.”
    “Perhaps to the left of your soul?”
    He knew from her tone she was smirking beneath that helm of hers.
    “Try your heart,” she said.
    He turned away from her. But she had made him think. And see things differently. He whipped back toward her. “What if it’s part of your heart? What if you know some of these words better than I?”
    “If we’re speaking of love, I am mute,” she assured him.
    He groaned, stretched as much as the ropes allowed, and faced forward once more.
    “There is a reason you must connect the Pieces of Eight. Otherwise, anyone might do it. But a boy born when you were… in the region you were… this must come from you .”
    The boat slowed and men shouted as an island came into view. On that island, a huge tree sat atop a strangely bulbous hill.
    Cyrelle motioned with her snout. “The time has come, Garendell.”
    “Marnum,” he corrected. “I never knew myself as Garendell. I’m just Marnum, a simple man.”
    He had two couplets—four lines, but a song needed a rhythm and tune. He thought of the rhythms he’d encountered on his journey, the beat of the horse’s hooves as he had clung to the belly of the wagon, the spurt of the beast’s blood as it had died, the pace of his own feet on the road. His fingers tapped against his thigh, and he began to hum.
    Cyrelle looked away, torn.
    The crew was divided, some lighting two cannons chained to the deck and aiming for the tree, some scurrying into the shallow water to attack the huge and twisted thing on foot.
    If it was what the legends claimed—the source of both dream and nightmare—destroying it completely would cause irrevocable harm. But if Marnum could shake it, free it of the poison… He sifted words and tunes and rhythms in his head, testing each on his tongue. He thought of love and he thought of the people he’d met along his way. “Bridge the distance and heed her call, magic once more will beckon all.”
    Cyrelle looked at him, and the Wolf’s head bobbed up and down in a nod. “Keep going. You’re onto something. I can feel it.”
    When the sailors began to scream, Marnum focused on the giant tree once more. Broad branches as nimble as arms swept out, stretching and lengthening impossibly, a hundred twiggy fingers grabbing men and hurling them against the shore or into the depths of the lake to drown.
    On the hill a fire was lit, flames licking at the tree’s thick trunk.
    The tree reached down and smothered the blaze with its leafy branches, and the hill at its base writhed, beasts bursting from between its roots and wanting nothing more than to rend and destroy the river rats, to protect the poisoned tree that wished murder and mayhem beneath a stoically peaceful sky.
    “Hurry,” Cyrelle urged. “You need another couplet.” She called to the few remaining men on board. “Set us free—arm us! We will fight beside you!”
    She earned only a quick glance before a branch swept out and tossed a man overboard. She tried once more. “Set us loose on it!”
    And Marnum found his missing lines at her side.
    “A nightmare inside of a dream, Wicked and lovely, though, it seems.”
    “String it together,” Cyrelle urged.
    “Infinite ways to test your fate,
    O’er the mountains and hills, she waits.
    Wise is he, so clever and strong,
    He fell from grace, all for a song.
    Bridge the distance and heed her call,
    Magic once more, will beckon all.
    A nightmare inside of a dream,
    Wicked and lovely, though, it seems.”
    The tree shivered, recognizing the song’s strain, but in a moment, recovered, and struck out even more cruelly.
    “Set us free to fight—there is no honor dying like a pig trussed for dinner!” Cyrelle shouted.
    A man raced forward, his cheeks red with exertion, and he looked at them both between frightened glances over his shoulder. “You,” he said of Cyrelle. “I will set you free to fight—you look able to brandish a weapon.” He slid a doubtful glance at Marnum as he cut