The Watchtower Read online

  “That patch becomes more unruly every year,” she said, smoothing her hair and straightening her cloak while helping me to my feet. “The mer fey used to believe that pollarding the trees would keep them from breaking free at night, but it only makes them angry and more fractious. Many of the old allées have become impassable at night.”

  I looked back at the dense stand of trees and wondered how we were going to get out of the park, but I didn’t have time to ponder that question because Madame La Pieuvre was purposefully striding across the lawn toward the statue of Diana, which glowed with the same phosphorescent light as Madame La Pieuvre emitted. The open sky above the park, although still veiled by the iridescent fairy shroud, also let in some light—a flickering, multicolored spangle that I guessed came from the Eiffel Tower in the north, and two yellow beacons from the south, like twin cat eyes, which came from the direction of the avenue de l’Observatoire. I was going to ask Madame La Pieuvre about the lights, but when I reached her, I was distracted by the display in front of the statue.

  A dozen candles had been lit at the statue’s base, explaining why it glowed, as well as heaps of flowers, fruit, and small glasses of bitter-smelling, green liquid that cast an emerald glow on base of the statue.

  “Who left these?” I asked.

  “Worshippers of the tree spirits,” she said, kneeling before the statue and lifting a rose to her nose. “There have been cults dedicated to the tree spirits here since before the Romans came. They simply changed their names to Diana and Faunus and Silenus so that the Romans would let them be. When the Christians gained power, they laid their offerings and lit their candles to the Virgin Mary and the saints. During the Terror they hid their relics in the catacombs. In this day and age they call themselves Wiccans and neo-pagans and come to places where the tree spirits still hold rule.”

  Madame La Pieuvre stood and looked around her. Other lights were flickering at the edges of the shrubbery. I stared at one candle shrine before a statue of a dancing faun. The face of the faun in the flickering candlelight seemed to be laughing. As if in response to my thought, I heard a scrap of laughter rise in the air from the trees behind me—Had there been trees there when I walked in the park earlier?—and then an answering peal of hilarity from deep within the gardens near the carousel. Something white flashed in the onyx-green woods and someone—or something—shrieked.

  “So it’s just people,” I said, picturing young girls in the white, embroidered camisoles and slips sold in flea markets and young, goateed boys in skinny jeans and vintage vests—the type of students and tourists that filled the cafés and streets of the Latin Quarter—wandering the dark park in search of an authentic Parisian adventure.

  “People,” Madame La Pieuvre replied. “And those that feed off them. Come…” She wrapped two of her arms around me tightly and pulled me toward the Grand Basin. “Sylvianne holds court at the Medici Fountain. Stay close to me.”

  We skirted the Grand Basin, which lay eerily calm in the center of all the moving foliage, and the Luxembourg Palace—or at least I assumed the palace still stood where I had seen it this morning. Drapes of violet and mauve fog fell over it now.

  “To shield the guards from what’s happening in the park,” Madame La Pieuvre answered my unasked question. We followed a narrow path—narrower than I recalled these paths being—past a statue of Silenus cavorting with a bevy of naked nymphs. More candles, flowers, and glasses of green liquid stood around this statue. The green-tinged candlelight gave the satyr’s face an even more salacious leer than usual.

  “These statues,” I asked as we approached a long, rectangular basin of lily-pad-covered water, “are they here because this is a favorite place of the tree folk—or do the tree folk frequent the park because of the statues?”

  “A little of both,” Madame La Pieuvre replied. “Humans often erect shrines and statues of pagan gods in places where they’ve glimpsed … well, something they didn’t understand. And then the fey are drawn to these places. They like nothing more than to be flattered in marble and bronze.” She gestured toward the group of statues at the end of the long basin. Candles flickering in a shallow grotto illuminated a tarnished bronze giant hovering over twoslim white figures carved from marble.

  “The Cyclops Polyphemus surprising the lovers Galatea and Acis,” Madame La Pieuvre informed in a tour guide’s voice. “Do you know the story?”

  “A little … from art history class. Polyphemus loved Galatea, but Galatea loved Acis, right? It doesn’t look good for poor little Acis.”

  “Polyphemus killed him,” Madame La Pieuvre said, the tour guide’s smooth voice replaced by an anguished rasp. “Tore him limb from limb in front of poor Galatea’s eyes. She poured her tears into his blood and begged the gods to prolong his life in one form or another. You see, she knew she would live forever and she couldn’t bear to live an eternity without him.”

  I glanced at Madame La Pieuvre. Her face glistened with moisture, but whether from tears or the rain she drew to herself, I couldn’t tell.

  “The gods took pity and turned Acis into a river. It flows past Mt. Aetna in Sicily, where Galatea still resides.”

  I wanted to ask which gods these were she spoke of—were they another species of fey or some higher power?—but we were interrupted by a trilling voice that seemed to come from the trees above us.

  “What a lovely story, Octavia. And told with such emotion! To think some say the mer fey are cold-blooded! But then you’re only half fey, aren’t you, ma chère. Your molluscan father must have been quite passionate.”

  I turned to find the source of the voice—and to turn away from Madame La Pieuvre’s inky blush—but nothing was behind us but a stand of slender poplars swaying in the breeze. But one, I noticed, was swaying in a different direction from the others. I stepped closer and stared at the slender, silver-barked form until a silver-skinned face emerged from the bark and slim arms twined out of the branches. The tree woman stepped forward gingerly—I would almost say woodenly if she hadn’t had such an air of refinement about her—on long, bark-sheathed legs. Her feet were covered in roots, and leaves sprouted from her fingertips. Instead of hair, long branches swayed from her scalp, polished green leaves quaking as she laughed at the expression on my face.

  “Have you never seen a dryad, human?” the tree woman asked in a tinkling voice that sounded like wind rustling through leaves.

  “I’ve met a number of fairies, but never one like you,” I admitted. “And one man who’s been turned into a tree.”

  “Ah, you must mean Jean Robin. He’s a different sort of thing altogether. He was once human. I, I assure you, have never been human.” She pronounced the word human with a distinct curl of her full, resin-slick lips, making sure to distinguish herself from a race she clearly thought little of. She needn’t have bothered. Although she shared the same barky skin as Jean Robin, no trace of humanity was in this creature—not in her willowy movements or almond-shaped eyes, which glistened with sap. As she walked past me,he leaves in her hair and on her fingertips trembled like castanets. I smelled the sharp tang of resin and chlorophyll in the air. She seated herself in the grotto on top of the statues of Acis and Galatea, nestling herself snugly into Acis’s lap (and rather smothering Galatea).

  “No one would ever accuse you of that, Sylvianne,” Madame La Pieuvre said smoothly. “Although I see you still keep human companions.”

  Madame La Pieuvre looked pointedly toward the trees. Following her gaze, I realized someone was there. I hadn’t seen him at first because he wore a dark-colored sweatshirt, the hood pulled low over his forehead. His skinny, jean-clad legs were pulled up to his chest. Without looking at the boy, Sylvianne extended her long, silver-barked arm and crooked a leaf-tipped finger. As if pulled by a string, the boy unfolded his long legs, rose unsteadily to his feet, and stumbled jerkily toward the dryad. As he passed by me, I smelled the same bitter smell I’d detected in the glasses of green liquid set before the statues. Absinthe, I
realized. The boy reeked of absinthe. He was so unsteady on his feet that he would have fallen headlong into the fountain if Sylvianne hadn’t grasped him roughly by the arm and pulled him into her lap. He collapsed spinelessly into her embrace and looked up into her face with the devoted eyes of a poodle. I noticed that his sweatshirt had the words BARD COLLEGE written across the front and he had exactly the type of hipster goatee I’d imagined earlier for the pagan worshippers.

  “He’s sweet, isn’t he?” Sylvianne said, stroking the boy’s silky hair. “I found him sketching Polyphemus late one evening and invited him to stay with me for the summer.”

  “And then you’ll let him go?” Madame La Pieuvre asked. “He must have a family—”

  “I’ll give him back when I’m done with him!” Sylvianne roared, the leaves in her hair thrashing. “You are not one to speak, Octavia. You have kept your own human pet for over fifty years.”

  “She’s not a pet and she’s not bewitched like this boy is,” Madame La Pieuvre spat back, her own appendages bristling. Her skin appeared mottled and darker than before.

  “Far worse for her then! When I am done with this boy, he will go back to his pathetic little life with only the vaguest memories of a misspent adventure abroad. Your concubine must spend every moment of her life knowing that you will survive her by thousands of years … and thousands of lovers.”

  “Not everyone is so voracious in her appetites,” Madame La Pieuvre hissed. Her face was puffed up. Recalling what I’d learned about octopus behavior from a NOVA television special, I decided I’d better step in before someone got inked.

  “Ladies,” I said loudly enough to be heard over the swish of leaves and tentacles in the air, “I’m sure we’ve all made some choices in our lives that we regret. I, for one, got myself involved with a vampire last year.”

  The fect of my announcement on Sylvianne was instantaneous. She stood up so quickly that Bard Boy nearly rolled into the fountain. He managed to catch himself into a ball at Sylvianne’s feet with reflexes that made me suspect he wasn’t as out of it as he appeared. Every leaf on her head bristled and her silver skin turned ashen.

  “Which vampire?” she spat.

  I wiped a sticky drop of resin from my face. Too late I recalled Madame La Pieuvre’s warning. Well, too bad. If this creature could poach college boys from my country, I could give her a little competition.

  “Will Hughes,” I said with more confidence than I felt. “He’s the reason I’m here. He sent me a message to join him on the path to the Summer Country.”

  “Then why aren’t you on it?” Sylvianne replied, folding her arms across her chest. “Didn’t he leave you a clear sign? Maybe he changed his mind. As I recall, he was quite fickle as a young man—although also quite delightful.” She reached down and distractedly stroked Bard Boy’s hair.

  I shrugged. “Maybe he did, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to give up. He took something of mine and I want it back.”

  “Oooh.” Sylvianne pursed her lips and made a sound like doves cooing. “A woman scorned, is it? He took something from me, too!” She unfolded her arms and beckoned with a leafy finger, just as she’d summoned the boy before. I looked at Madame La Pieuvre for guidance, but she was still puffed up with anger, inky blotches staining her face. Maybe she was angry with me for not taking her advice about not mentioning Will’s name. Well, at least I’d gotten the dryad’s attention.

  I walked toward the grotto, carefully stepping over Bard Boy’s legs—and over the other figures that had quietly crept around the fountain’s base while we talked. Looking down I spied humans and others—a satyr with cloven hooves, a girl with a long tail, a deer with wide, sentient eyes—but I didn’t see the man in the long coat and wide-brimmed hat. Where did he fit into all this? I wondered. When I was a few feet away, Sylvianne beckoned me to come closer and then wrapped a leafy arm around me and pulled me into her lap, just as she’d held Bard Boy a moment ago. For a moment I worried I could become her next pet, but then all worries passed away. I was sitting on a branch in a tree listening to the wind in the boughs, nestled in the crook of two branches as securely as a baby bird in a nest. The bark felt warm with the day’s sun. Resting my head against it, I could hear sap flowing, strong as the pulse of the earth. I wanted to do nothing more but close my eyes and nap for a hundred years. This must have been how Rip Van Winkle felt when he rested his head against an old oak for a little after-lunch nap. Or how Jean Robin felt just before he metamorphosed into a tree.

  Then I heard her voice inside my head.

  I loved him, too, for a little while, and I thought he loved me. He told me he wanted to go to the Summer Country to become immortal so we could be together for all time. I gave him a branch from my hair to give him entrance to the Summer Country. But it wasn’t for me, it was for Marguerite! He betrayed me. Me! bece, Queen of the Forest.

  He betrayed me, too, as a matter of fact, I told her without moving my lips.

  Is that why you want to go to the Summer Country? To make him apologize?

  Was it? I wondered. Was that why I was so determined to follow Will Hughes—to hear him say he was sorry that he’d left me behind in New York? Well, maybe that was part of the reason. Enough so that it wouldn’t be a complete lie to agree with Sylvianne.

  “Yes,” I said, “and when I find him, I’ll make him apologize to you, too. After all, we girls have to stick together.”

  Sylvianne leaned back and held me at arm’s length to look at my face. This close I could see that her skin was paper-thin and peeling, her lips flaking and chapped. Resin pooled in her eyes, and when she spoke, her voice was as dry as bare twigs scraping against one another.

  “That would be … nice. All I’ve ever wanted was an apology.”

  “Then you’ll get one,” I promised.

  Then she whispered in my ear what I needed to do to find the path to the Summer Country.

  12

  Atomsight

  Back in their room, back in their bed, Marguerite turned toward Will, took his face in her cupped hands, and told him the truth about herself. She told him even as the last flashes of lightning from a now diminishing storm illumined her face and its uncanny, ethereal beauty.

  Marguerite told Will that she was of the fey and immortal, and that was why she’d been able to shrug off the lightning bolt as if it were a moonbeam. She could be physically killed, nowhere near as easily as a mortal but in a few specific ways, but not by lightning because it came from the light as she did. The bolt’s effect on her had been that of pouring a few drops of water into a half-full glass. None. They were of the same element. He had been accurate in his observation.

  “The fey,” Will reflected wonderingly, even as he thought to ask if the poet had known this. But Marguerite was so exhausted now that the instant they fell into each other’s arms in a relieved embrace, she fell into the deepest sleep.

  Will was fatigued as well, but he lingered awake a few minutes experiencing the most unbounded sort of joy any lover could experience. His beloved, the most precious person in the world to him, could live forever! As long as she took precautions against the small list of dangers she’d alluded to. Her own flesh and blood would not betray her with age as his would, with this symptom and then that, and then some crushing new weakness or annihilatory event, the sad way of mortal flesh.

  No greater revelation than this was possible for a lover!

  Will joined Marguerite in her deep, tender sleep, the rest of the blessed: a serene glow seeping into the cells of his brain and blood, the atoms of his flesh, even into his poetic and mathematical soul.

  Second to sleep, he was first to awake, before the sun had poked above the horizon. Though nothing regarding immortality had changed overnight, or could have, Will awoke with a vague dread suffusing his mind and blood, the same mind and blood so gifted with serenity in sleep. Unable to remain still, he got up quietly so as not to wake Marguerite and went out into the still morning. He walked in the directi
on of the pond where they’d been the previous day, as if the black and white swans they’d seen there made it a reassuring place, despite her dismayed reaction to the story of betrayal and wounding with an arrow.

  The storm had passed, leaving a rose and gold dawn promising a beautiful clear day. Why, then, did he feel this apprehension? After a few inchoate moments, he identified the source of his dark sensation. If Marguerite was going to live forever and he was going to die, he could never be to her what she was to him.…

  Yes, as mortals they might be separated by death but not for long, and each could still be the central love of the other’s life. But with Marguerite immortal, no matter how much she loved him or came to love him, time would fade all their memories for her, stretching them out like ocean crests vanishing at the horizon, and she would always find another “great love of her life.” That was natural, not immoral. She’d always be young. He could ask her to wait for him while he was in prison, or away in war, or while captaining a ship, but not forever. No lover could ask another to wait forever. That was a true life sentence for the heart.

  Will saw himself, grimly, as one love of multitudes stretching out toward infinity, eventually a pathetic point coming when Marguerite could not recall him or his name. The image cut him searingly, to the bone, in a way no other thought in his life ever had. This was jealousy akin to terror!

  Will could not help but cry out, as if echoing the wailing creature the night before, and as he did, he saw where those cries had come from. There at the shore of the pond lay the black swan they’d seen earlier—dead, its beautiful long neck lying limp in the tall reeds. Will let out a moan, only this one was answered by a soft hand on his arm and an even softer voice speaking close to his ear.