Do you remember playing with her, Robena? Her laughter bubbling up into a delighted shriek as you chased her through the rushes? The gap between her teeth when she grinned, holding up a well-armored gentleman snapping his pincers helplessly at the two of you?

She’s different now. Of course she would be. But you must have stared longer than you meant when you saw her emerge from the mist on the Low. She wore a wreath of large black berries and jaunty river-lilies, and when her boatman pulled the boat ashore she offered him her hand like it was a sacrament.

And now the two of you are here, in Lostwithiel, and she still seems out of place. Or is it Lostwithiel that is out of place? She walks barefoot and her shoulders are straight and proud, and the crowd parts before her instead of causing her to dart here and there. How could the vivacious young girl you remember become something like this, a pillar of the old faith hung in garlands, taciturn and stately?

Then a child darts away from their sibling, clutching a toy, and runs into her. Hard. Constance sways dangerously, like a willow tree, and the toy (a simple doll) goes flying. People nearby gasp, and the mother (who had been haggling too intently to keep track of her child) starts making frantic apologies to the Woman of the Low.

Then Constance squats down, one hand outstretched to keep her balance, and waves the child over. (They are young enough that their gender is entirely “sticky face and grubby hands”.) She pulls a berry free from her wreath and pushes it into the child’s hands, then whispers in their ear.

Awe-struck, the child toddles back to their mother, holding that berry like it’s a precious jewel. And Constance, rising elegantly, smiles. It’s like day breaking on the hills.

Then she looks at you and her smile cools. What have you done wrong?

***

Composed face. Be the one they expect you to be. Everybody’s looking up to you, Constance. A daughter of giants and a wise woman of the woods doesn’t smile like a silly girl at every handsome knight that crosses her path.

When the little darling ran into you, you nearly crumpled into the arms of this burly, grim, intriguing knight. One who definitely is not interested in things like “tea in a sacred garden,” before you get ideas. She’s here as your escort, nothing more. Keep that in your head, daughter of giants!

It is your duty, your obligation to be a stone axle around which the world can turn. You call upon the seasons to remember their ancient oaths, to show their most pleasing faces, and to receive sacrifice. A boon for a boon, a song for a song. (And thank goodness you have not been called upon to beg from them a life.)

You danced the maypole by the shores of the Low, this past season; you buried gifts in the earth and called on it to remember and reciprocate; you fanned the flames and sang the night through to bring Spring to high waxing. And now you are here, confident, focused, not offering your fruits (such as they are) to a strange knight.

A bark; you jump. Just a dog, excited by the attention he’s getting from passers-by, rolling around by a stall. Not dozens of dogs baying and barking and howling, off in the distance at twilight, deep in the Treffwood.

Is it a rumor if you have heard it? Or is it still a rumor if you have not seen it, despite watching the tangled branches carefully, half expecting to see a flash of panthers’ spots, a serpent’s neck?

The Beast of King Pellinore is here. And it will be your responsibility to stand between it and the people of Lostwithiel, if it crosses the threshold, if it bursts forth from the Treffwood to tear up crops and frighten oxen and devil the countryside.

There is nothing like it in the rolls of beasts, and you are not prepared. So all you do is keep your eyes peeled and watch the woods by twilight, listening to that far-off calamity of hounds.