At their head rode a great king Gaborn recognized only from his device, for on his golden shield he bore the ancient emblem of the green knight.

It was Erden Geboren.

Tens and tens of thousands of other lords and ladies and peasants rode with him or followed after, a great horde that covered the hills and downs.

The ghost king raised a great hunting horn to his lips with both hands, and blew.

Its deep call echoed over the hills, silencing everyone who still spoke throughout all the mortal camp. He blew it plaintively twice more, in short riffs.

It was the call that King Sylvarresta had blown last year at the beginning of his hunt, an invitation for all riders to mount their horses.

At Gaborn’s side, a cold wind stirred, a chill that smote him to the bone, so powerful and frightening was it.

Fear gripped him, made him terrified to blink or twitch. To do so would surely kill him, Gaborn felt. So he stood, frozen, until he recalled his father’s words. “No prince of Mystarria need fear the spirits of the Dunnwood.”

He looked from the corner of his eye to see the ghost of King Sylvarresta rise from the corpse there on its pallet. Sylvarresta bent at the waist, sitting up, and gazed longingly across the field, to the men of the great hunt.

Then he reached over and shook King Orden’s shoulders, rousing him as if from a deep slumber, so that he, too, awoke.

The kings rose together and seemed to call across the valley. Though their lips moved, they spoke no words that Gaborn could hear, yet a strange moaning issued over the downs.

Across the far valley came a quick response. Two ladies rode out of that distant crowd, emerging fifty yards from the edge of the wood, each of them leading a saddled horse.

Gaborn recognized them. One woman was the Queen Venetta Sylvarresta, and the other was Gaborn’s own mother.

They smiled radiantly, and seemed to be talking as if neither had a care in the world. Grand. Happy.

King Sylvarresta and King Orden took each other’s hands and walked casually down the field as they used to when they were but young men. Sylvarresta seemed to be telling a long joke, and Orden laughed at him heartily, shaking his head. Their voices carried on the wind as an odd twitter, the words escaping Gaborn.

They moved with deceptive swiftness, these ghosts, like deer leaping through the grass. In but a handful of steps, King Orden and King Sylvarresta both met their wives, and kissed them in greeting, then mounted their own steeds.

All across the fields, other knights rose to join the hunt. Men from the fallen castle. Chemoise’s father appeared at the base of the oak, hurried across the fields to the great throng.