She moved to the window, peering out over the balcony and then further, to the lands rolling eastward. Forested land that was supposed to be part of his kingdom, but which felt more like her domain. It didn’t help that she looked as though she might’ve uprooted herself from Lostwood before coming to see him, her hair a nest of vines, her fingers ending in leaves. Her face was as youthful and pristine as the day he’d met her, two decades earlier. The cursed Nightdawn. How had she not aged a day, while he’d become an old, dying man?

“By the Sculptor’s Hand…,” Artemus murmured, wondering how he’d gotten to this place.

Cintra stopped moving suddenly, turning toward him, her colorless eyes boring into him. “The Sculptor? No, that ornery old god has nothing to do with what is happening here. He abandoned these lands more than a thousand years ago, even before the last Blood Tide. The Scribe, the Forger, even the Warrior left. They saw the writing on the wall and fled to save themselves. The old gods are nothing if not survivalists. But Narcissi stayed.”

“Why?” It felt like a strangely simplistic question for him to utter, and yet trying to ascertain the motivations of a goddess was more complicated a thing than ruling a thousand kingdoms.

Cintra smiled, and even if the king had wanted to look away, he didn’t think he’d be able to. “Because She loves this place, these lands, that forest.” She gestured to the endless miles of trees and foliage rolling outwards. Forest that, even from this lofty vantage point, could barely be seen painted on the horizon two years ago. Now it felt like an enemy on his doorstep, the steady march of soldier’s feet moving ever closer. Void, he’d almost prefer an actual army shadowing his capital—at least then he could look his foe in the eye and find them wanting. But how did one combat a forest? With axes and saws, obviously, but he’d already tried that. He had what amounted to a veritable army of woodsmen chopping and hacking and cutting at almost all hours of the day, every day of the year. But when there were hundreds of miles of forest to cover, their progress was, well, rather lacking. Cut back one corner of Lostwood only to find there were ten more corners that had grown outward overnight. And this woman…

“Why is the Goddess of the Wood doing this?” he asked, the question that had been burning on the tip of his tongue ever since she reappeared in his life.

Cintra offered a sad smile that stole his breath from his lungs. “I don’t think She even knows.”

That, more than anything else the odd woman had said thus far, made his chest tighten beneath his silk robes. “How is that possible?”