Don't go into the Gravenwold Woods, they say in my village. Or if you do, then don't expect to return.

The woods are old and hungry, and no man ventures into the heart of the forest for fear they'll never return. Something lurks deep in the core, and you can hear strange noises if you venture too close to it. It's difficult enough to enter the edges, which are overgrown and wild, though you can make a living if you're bold.

The men of Densby earn their living from the lumber, and if they're not quite content to live within the shadow of Gravenwold, then they make good use of it.

My father wasn't a lumberjack like the rest of them. He spent his days hunting beneath the heavy boughs, selling furs in the nearby town of Marietta. He taught his craft to me, along with the Old Ways he claimed kept him safe from the dangers to be found in the forest.

But with danger came opportunity.

And sometimes, the need was great enough to counter the risk.

Ten days after Frost Night, I clutched my bow and swung my quiver over my shoulder, trying not to think of how empty the larder was. Winter this year brought with it a killing chill, and we'd lost three calves to something that came out of the woods.

The choices were growing narrower by the day. Densby wasn't the sort of village you could expect to find charity within, especially when your last name was Bane. Everyone here in the Borderlands scraped by, and the only items of value my two sisters and I had were things I didn't wish to trade. Just the other day I'd seen Master Vasham eyeing my sister, Eloya, like a prize mare the widower was considering. He had three children who needed a mother, but the very thought set my teeth on edge, for Eloya was only six years older than his eldest.

We needed food.

And I would prefer to risk the woods, than to pay any other sort of price.

"Be careful, Neva," Eloya told me, handing me a small wrapped package; bread and cheese wrapped carefully in waxed paper. "Goodwife Amiss told me the woods took another huntsman the other day. It's hungry too."

My youngest sister's skin was slightly darker than mine, though she shared the same brown eyes. Hers were kinder though, and there was a softness about her face that hadn't been sloughed off in the past three years, when father began to take ill.

"I heard that as well," I muttered, taking the bread and cheese, and secreting them in the pouch around my waist. "Though there's equal chance Bennett Hapslow simply drank himself stupid, then fell into a river and drowned."

It wouldn't surprise me. Hapslow was renowned for liking a good drink. Or ten.

Eloya bit her lip as I fetched my fur cloak. "Equal chance," she conceded, "but it doesn't set my mind at ease one whit. They say you can hear the wolves howling in there."

"If there are wolves in Gravenwold, then there are deer or smaller prey." I headed for the door. "And I'll bring something back, I promise. Besides... father made a deal with the woods. No Bane can fall to their touch, as long as we keep to the pact."

Father's cough barked through the house. We both looked up. The sound of that cough was like an arrow straight to the heart. He wasn't getting any better.

"I'll keep an eye on him." Eloya squeezed my hand, clearly recognizing the worry on my face. "Don't be too late."

"I'll be back before dark."

To stray outside any longer was too dangerous.

My other sister, Averill, was nailing boards to the back of the chicken coop as I left our small homestead. I nodded toward her, but we were both caught up in our own worlds; trying to put one foot in front of the other every moment, every day, in this quest for survival.

We needed meat. Blowing steaming air into my gloved hands, I headed for the frozen woods, sinking up to the ankles in soft snow. Another snowfall last night had turned the world into a fairyland, if one didn't look too closely. I could remember better years, when Eloya, Averill and I squealed with laughter and chased each other around the garden in snow like this. My mother would yell at us for getting wet and cold, but she couldn't quite hide her smile as she watched us.

A long time ago now. My mother died when I was thirteen, her warm southern blood finely succumbing to the northern chill. I never did find out what drove her so far north.

I slipped past the hill of sawn-off tree trunks that ringed the forest, where once mighty timbers had stood. A certain sort of silence lingered; almost like the forest itself mourned the loss of those trees, and the fog didn't touch the ruined stumps, as if even it dared not cross the boundaries of the woods.

Then the woods were there, standing thick and solemn before me like sentinels.

"Vashta watch over me," I whispered, reaching for the rabbit I'd killed earlier. I laid its cold carcass on the flat stone my father had shown me when I was ten, and followed him on the hunt, desperately wanting to learn the skills he taught. I'd wrung its neck earlier, and it was short work to slice it open, letting the congealed blood inside it ooze onto the stone. Dipping a finger in the blood, I painted it across my forehead in a symbol of the Trident.

To enter Gravenwold, you have to gift it with a life to safeguard your own. The rabbit would have served as half a meal for our little family, but despite my earlier bravado I didn't dare forgo the sacrifice. My father believed in the Old Ways, and so did I, even as the Bennett Hapslow's of the world laughed at us.

But Bennett Hapslow didn't come back.

Sticky rings of sap congealed on the nearby trunk of an alder, felled before its time, almost like blood had flown here recently. The lumberjacks were creeping closer to Gravenwold, and they'd crossed the forest boundaries. It made me shiver. Was that why the forest was beginning to creep over its own boundaries? Something had stolen our calves, leaving a bloodied trail in the early winter snows. And something killed all of Widow Hashell's chickens a month ago.

If it were a fox, it would have at least eaten one of them.

"Forest, welcome me," I whispered. There was no point in lingering any longer.

The strangest thing occurred when I slipped beneath the boughs of Gravenwold. My lungs opened up as if I could breathe again and I felt the forest in my blood, running hot in my veins.

No one else from Densby could move like I did beneath the forest's shadow. Only my father could, but he was getting worse by the day, his lungs thick with some malevolence he couldn't shake.

I started running, feet tramping the trail buried beneath the fresh litter of snow.

I ran to escape the world behind me, with its empty belly, and the coughing bark of sickness. I ran to fill my lungs with the burning air, knowing instinctively where to put my feet to avoid a hidden pit beneath the snow. Hunger couldn't wear me down. Not here. Nor could it slow me. The forest fed my soul, and I could feel my cheeks stinging with the cold as I raced along old trails I knew like the back of my hand.

They say my father was born beneath the shadow of Gravenwold, and now, with blood surging through my veins, I believed it. How else could his daughter find such enlightenment, when her very soul was heavy? How else could I find the energy to slip over the snow like a wraith, when last night's meal had been more broth than soup?

It had been weeks since I dared venture out, but I knew the regular routes the deer favored. With the last blizzard of the season abating, they wouldn't be moving far, trying to conserve energy during the blistering chill. Pockets of cedar and thickets where they could hide from the winds would show signs of them.

But the trails I found were old, and all that remained of their presence was the stripped bark on several birch trees. Casting around for signs of smaller game, I laid several snares in likely places before moving on.

A rabbit would be nice, but it wouldn't feed three growing girls for too long. And my father needed meat to give him energy, and help him fight his illness.

Moving slower now, I saw the quick patter of tracks that indicated a fox. A recent passing, for the snow hadn't settled until last night. There was no wind this deep in the woods, and everything lay oddly silent; it looked like a glittering cathedral, where the rasp of my breath sounded oddly sacrilegious. Snowflakes danced through the air, barely enough to be called a snowfall.

And there...

A trail that clearly belonged to the deer I needed to bring down.

A fresh trail.

Darting through the snowdrift like alone wolf, I kept my eyes and ears open. The forest flashed past me, and every time I thought I'd almost lost the trail it would appear again. Taunting me. Drawing me further into the forest.

It wasn't until I ran out of breath that I stopped and bent over, fighting the stitch in my side. Trinity's bells, how far had I run? I didn't recognize—

A pair of bushes rustled.

Even as I drew one of my goose-tipped arrows from its quiver and set it to my lax bow, I noted the thicker brambles in the undergrowth, and the heavy, watchful boughs of conifers. Every other tree stood straight and stark, but the brambles were the first sign of the border between the outskirts of the forest, and the mysterious Heart nobody dared enter. They called the brambles Widow's Thorns, after some long ago Queen who'd poisoned her husband with a tea brewed from them—and inch-by-inch they were slowly choking the forest.

Too close to the edges of where I dared stray. The forest guardians wouldn't protect me here. Stay? Or go?

A whisper of sound caught my ear again, just as I turned to go.

Movement shifted out of the corner of my eye.

Gleaming like polished alabaster beneath the sun, the White Hart grazed before me, separated from me only by a thicket of brambles. It hadn't seen me. My breath caught in my chest. I hadn't seen the clearing earlier, but a single ray of sunlight pierced the clouds above and lit upon the stag,

The White Hart was pure legend.

Capture the stag and it could grant you a wish. Kill it and you would live on forever, in the stories of men. Nobody had seen it in over a century.

Its meat would feed my family for a month, if we rationed the supply.

Barely daring to move, I drew the bow slowly to my cheek, my gaze narrowing into a tunnel along the arrow, locking onto the pulsing beat of the hart's chest.

Think of what the villagers would say. The White Hart! Brought down by my arrow alone. I could almost imagine the smoky laughter in the village inn cutting off abruptly as I staggered inside with the deer slung over my shoulders, and the startled looks on the men's faces turning to rapture—

I shook my head, dislodging snowflakes from my thick lashes. I'd never craved glory, and the men in my village were louts.

—the deer's head mounted on the wall, a glossy trophy one could forever claim—

I couldn't do it.

The tip of the arrow lowered, and my breath burst out of me. These thoughts weren't my own.

A flock of ravens suddenly screamed and burst into a noisy flutter of shadows through the trees. The moment was lost. The hart's glorious head jerked up, its brown eyes searching the forest, and locking upon me. Muscle rippled through its haunches as it crouched, and then it was gone in a bound, moving as swiftly and silently as a wind through the woods, just as ethereal.

Something shook inside me. You fool. I had two sisters to feed, and my father... Sweet Vashta, but they said there was magic within the hart's flesh. Perhaps enough to restore his slowly withering body.

But it was long gone now, and so was any chance at the hart. I would have to make do with some lesser animal.

It felt as though magic sloughed off me, as if I'd broken some sort of spell. The silence of the forest began to intrude, along with the dense, oppressive weight of the trees themselves. This was not a part of the wood I knew.

What was I doing?

Where was I?

Coming awake, I began to turn in slow circles, aware of a faint whisper through the trees, almost as if they were speaking. A face loomed out of the warped wood of an old gnarled oak, and a little pinpricks of icy feet marched down my spine.

I was in the Heart of the Forest.

And I was not alone. I could feel it, even if I couldn't see anything.

"Show yourself," I called, whispers of dread creeping through my veins. Another face sat in the mossy bark of a second oak, like the melted wax face of something you saw when you stared into the candle too long, only to blink and realize there was nothing there.

"There you are," called a woman's voice behind me, rich with some long-born satisfaction, "I've been waiting many years for you, child."

* * *

I had the arrow nocked and ready to loose as I turned, heart hammering in my chest.

Snow whispered under the long red velvet cloak of the creature, as she walked in a steady circle around me. She looked like an old woman with silver hair that hung in knotted snarls down to her waist, and eyes the color of topaz.

But humans didn't live in the Heart of Gravenwold.

Monsters did.

"Are you going to shoot me instead?" she asked, an eyebrow arching. "There's a poor feast on these old bones, girl."

I slowly lowered the tip of the arrow a second time, easing the tension of the bow a fraction, but not entirely releasing it. "The only creatures in the center of the woods are those said to tear the heart from a man's chest. There are monsters here."

She smiled. "But you're not a man."

"Semantics," I muttered.

"Fear not, child," the old woman whispered. "You passed the test. Only two more tests to see if you're truly worthy. And the trees recognize your blood. Have you not felt them calling to you?"

"Are you a witch?" I demanded, instead of answering.

She laughed. "These names you call me… Monster. Witch. Should I take affront at such? And, as for you, I’m the least of your concerns. Perhaps you should ask yourself why the forest goes to such lengths to keep people out of its core. Did you hear anything whispering to you? Suggesting you walk further? Demanding you enter?"

"No. Nothing whispered, nothing—" Those odd thoughts snagged mine again. The hart’s head mounted on my wall. The sudden urge to go after it was overwhelming, but I shook it away again.

"Go on," she breathed. "Tell me what you’re remembering."

"Something wanted me to kill the hart," I said slowly. "I… I felt like it would be an honor to kill it. That my entire village would cheer, and people would celebrate my skills."

"Stronger men have fallen to a weaker enticement than that." Her eyes narrowed. "What stopped you?"

"I only hunt for food or furs to sell," I replied bluntly. "My father is ill and my sisters hungry." And the villagers of Densby whispered about my fey gifts, and Eloya’s healing gifts and Averill's knowing. I’d long grown weary of their censure, or even needed their approval. "I knew the thoughts weren’t my own."

The woman’s mouth twisted. "That old chestnut. You’re lucky your will is strong, and pride not your natural inclination, or it would have had you."

"Had me? What is it?" It had been in my mind.

"An ancient foe," she warned, and gave another strange look. "One not easily vanquished. You are a child of mystery, it seems. And I do not like riddles I cannot answer."

I stepped back abruptly as she glided toward me. She looked human. Perhaps that was the problem. Don’t trust anything you meet inside Gravenwold, my father’s voice whispered in my memories. "What did you mean when you said you've been waiting many years for me?"

"I’ll answer that question the next time we meet. You’re not ready for it yet. Destiny sits upon your shoulders, but I don't want to scare you away before you hear its whisper."

A shiver ran down my spine. I was fairly certain I never wanted to be ready for the answer.

"What's your name, child?"

The word tripped to my lips, but I caught it before I could let it fly. Neva. Neva Bane. My head was swimming again, and I could hear my name echoing in my ears as if it wanted to escape. "The Old Ways say giving a name is dangerous," I ground out. "Unless you earn it."

"And how do I earn it?" She was all teeth.

"See me safely from this forest, and I'll grant you my name."

She cocked her head. "How old are you?"

"How old are you?"

"As old as the mountains, and as young as the sun."

"That's not an answer."

"And neither is yours."

I took a step back from her. "I'm tired. And I'm hungry. I don't have time for riddles."

"Oh, child." Her vicious smile dawned again. "One day will come a time when all you have is riddles."

"Will you let me leave?" I asked, trying not to look around. More trees bore those candle-wax faces, and the light was beginning to dull. How long had I been here? Had she been distracting me?

Did time run differently here, in the Heart?

"I will let you leave," the old woman said softly. "Though I'm not done with you yet. But I will expect a name. We have a deal, after all. Whisper it to the trees before you leave their embrace. If you don't, then I'll follow you home and take it from your lips instead."

The blood drained from my face. "I should go."

And never return.

"Yes. You should not linger here, child." Her smile slowly vanished, leaving her face stern and serious, as if she’d made some sort of decision. "The forest has granted you a stay of execution. A life for a life—"

"I took no life."

"Precisely." She seemed to grow taller, circling into the shadows of the trees. "Your heart follows the Old Ways, child. Mind you keep to them, less my mercy be not so benevolent next time. And be ready. You have two more tests to pass yet."

And then she was gone.

"For what?" I demanded. I couldn't even make out a single footprint in the snow where she'd been standing.

In the tree behind me, a crow cawed. The only other sound was the echo my voice. And the feeling something was watching me again.

Witch or not, monster or not, it was more than time to get out of here.

"And then I'm never coming back," I muttered, feeling the eerie weight of her words upon me. Destiny could take its sweet self elsewhere.

I wasn't interested.