The night arrived cold and crystal clear. All the residents of Dun-Dealgan were preparing for the revelries and ceremonies of Samhain. When dusk fell, Oonagh explained, everyone would put out their hearthfires; every light would be extinguished. Then they'd all head out of the fort and into the fields beyond, where a huge bonfire would be roaring. They'd dance and tell fortunes and drink and feast and all of it would be in disguise, and then toward the end, they'd take flames from the bonfire to relight their hearthfires with the new year's warmth. Everything began in darkness--the world, the year, the day, life . . . light was the end, but dark was the beginning. Samhain was the celebration of the new year. This was the third and final day of Samhain, the only one the girls wanted to risk venturing out for. If they were to be caught, they wanted it to be for the most exciting of the three nights.

They'd worked hard on disguises, and they'd worked equally hard to keep those disguises hidden from Cathbad. The druid had come by three times to check on Emery, but thankfully, he'd been largely busy with Samhain, so he hadn't been able to linger long with them.

Tess didn't like hiding anything from Cathbad, Emery could tell, and all three girls knew the man would be adamantly opposed to them leaving the fort. "Unless he specifically asks you whether we're trying to sneak out and you tell him no, you aren't lying," Oonagh told her. "You just aren't telling him anything at all. There's no harm in it." That didn't quite soothe Tess, and Emery felt some guilt for that, but when she tried to tell Tess nevermind to it all, she'd stay behind, Tess had been appalled at the thought.

After all was said and done, the three were determined to go out, have a good time, and come home. They would stick together like glue, link arms or hold hands if they had to, and there'd be so many people there that if anyone tried something, the girls would have help.

"What sort of sacrifices has Cathbad been making?" Emery asked, making some last-minute touch-ups on her cloak. Each of them had taken one of the several cloaks that had been in Emery's trunk and layered furs or feathers onto it with rows of stitching. They'd stayed up much of the last two nights to complete the job.

Emery expected Tess to answer her question about Cathbad, but she didn't, so Oonagh jumped in, sure she understood the girl's hesitation. "Our druid is an honorable one. He doesn't believe in the human sacrifices. Some say it weakens us, but Lord Cuchulain's the strongest man alive, and Dun-Dealgan's the safest place outside of Emain Macha, so we're doing just fine, if I might say so."

"I remember him telling me he wouldn't participate in a human sacrifice," Emery said quietly. "I'm glad he doesn't." She glanced at Tess, trying to read her thoughts.

Tess had selected the brightest feathers of the bunch (which were mostly white and speckled chicken feathers) and created a sort of headpiece to cover her short hair and make it look longer. "Cat and I talked about it," she finally commented, distractedly working with a difficult feather that did not want to lie flat. "I don't like that animals have to die. But I understand that this is what they do here, what they believe in. If he didn't make these offerings, people would be confused and afraid. We--I'm fine with it. I understand it."

Emery didn't believe Tess for a minute, but she let it go. It wasn't her relationship.

"In Dun-Cethern, I hear they use the wicker man," Oonagh said darkly, leaning in as if sinister forces might hear them.

"Cethern? Like the Red Branch Knight? Cethern mac Fintan?" Emery remembered that one; he'd terrified her with his toothy grin and always-clenched fists. "What's a wicker man?"

"They build a giant man of wicker, and they stuff it full of humans--criminals, if they can, but if not, anyone will do--and they burn it all up."

"With everyone inside?" Emery was horrified when Oonagh nodded in confirmation. Tess didn't seem particularly surprised, which told Emery Cathbad had probably tried to assuage her dislike of his own sacrifices by telling her about the worse ones performed elsewhere. "Well," Emery added, "I'm thrilled that our druid has a good heart. I can't imagine anyone better than Cat." She caught Tess's demure smile and was satisfied.

Oonagh's cloak was a mixture of fur and feather. She'd created something truly wild, obviously having had years of practice. When she put on her costume, Oonagh transformed into some monstrous specter and yet still managed to look alluring. Emery wasn't sure how she'd done it. And then Tess always looked charming. But her own disguise? Well, it'd disguise her all right, though it wasn't particularly attractive. Since Tess had taken all the lighter feathers, Emery was left with the dark ones, and she'd stitched them in patches all across her cloak (patches because she was too slow to cover the whole thing, even though Oonagh had helped her). So she'd look like a nondescript mottled lump when she wore the cloak, which was fine. More importantly was the mask Oonagh had helped her with. They had to disguise Emery's face. So they'd taken a fox pelt and draped it over her head, the emptied foxface with its withered nose hanging along the bridge of her own. Oonagh had then taken raven feathers and stitched them to suspend from the foxhead over Emery's cheeks, leaving openings for the eyes and stopping above the mouth. With charcoal, Oonagh blackened any bare skin, so that Emery's entire face fell into a shadow when the headpiece and mask were in place.

Once they were dressed, it was time to overcome the first challenge of the night: fooling the guard stationed outside Cullen's roundhouse, whom Cathbad had also tasked with making sure Emery didn't leave that night. He was a particularly young guard, which would make things a little easier. Oonagh distracted him by showing off her costume, and though he didn't seem much to care, her prancing about turned his head long enough for Emery to slip out and cross the path to hide behind a chicken coop. Then Tess joined Oonagh, who said to the guard, "The Lady isn't feeling well, so she's gone to bed. I'm going to put out the hearthfire, but not to worry--I've piled the blankets on her. Then Tess and I will be off. So kind is the Lady; she didn't want us to miss the fun."

Then Oonagh did as she'd said, the guard asking few questions, and they joined Emery and headed toward the gates. The costumed crowds were gathering, everyone putting out fires as they left their homes, which greatly aided Emery's ability to hide. The guards had opened the gates to let the villagers out but seemed to be looking keenly at the many faces that passed through. Oonagh and Tess purposefully kept near the guards, even greeted them, so they'd be seen without Emery, who'd pushed her way somewhere into the middle and managed to scoot out unnoticed by bending down low when the watchmen looked her way. In all the dimness and commotion, it was quite easy for the three of them to exit Dun-Dealgan, and the moment the gates were a distance behind them, they joined together again, exuberantly took one another's hands, and hurried toward the bonfire raging in the distance.

It was an absolutely beautiful night, cool and crisp, the smell of burning wood permeating the air, the glow of the flames lighting a massive circle in the surrounding fields. A menagerie of fantastical figures danced and sang to the various instruments played by skilled and unskilled musicians alike--bone flutes, lyres, and goat skin drums among other things Emery couldn't identify. As the girls made their way nearer to the fire, wending through people bedecked in antlers and wizened sows' heads and wooly coats and bird beaks or feet and bones and branches and straw and fallen leaves, all artfully crafted into disguises even the gods couldn't have seen through, they became more aware of the rows of people pulling items and animals up toward the flames. The villagers waited their turn to throw in their sacrifices for the autumn's harvest: some threw in apples or bushels of wheat; some tossed in a portion of vegetables from their own gardens; many dragged a chicken or a piglet or a lamb or, for the wealthier, even a calf toward the fire. What each could afford, each must offer. Oonagh's family had brought along a chicken and two rabbits.

Emery was mesmerized by the spectacle of it, and as they approached, she saw Cathbad standing before the inferno, dressed in a snow-white cloak, hooded and belted with a thick cord. She'd never seen him in such a clean-looking outfit, nor had she seen him so commanding. He stood and looked over each sacrificial offer, accepted most, turned some away (to the shame of whatever villager had tried to offer less than his share), and then bid the offerer to toss the food or animal over the edge of the pit from whence the fire bloomed and add to its fuel.

Tess couldn't watch. She turned away as Emery and Oonagh stared in both amazement and some amount of fear. But after several moments of observing from a distance, unable to approach Cathbad for a number of reasons and concerned that Tess might faint, they moved away from the bonfire and out into the crowds.

There, they danced, and they found cups and drank the bottle of wine Oonagh had saved from the night of King Conchobar's feast and hidden in her cloak to bring out into the fields, and they flirted with costumed strangers. Drunken figures spun in rings and elders yelled warnings of the aos sí wandering amongst them and the spirit world's portals opening. Young people coupled up and drew close and children ran wild throughout the crowds. But everyone stayed within the light of the bonfire; nobody dared venture into the darkness beyond.

At one point, Oonagh found a woman purporting to tell fortunes, and she brought Tess and Emery to her. A small crowd gathered round them as she took first Tess's hand. "My mother was a druidess," the woman claimed, she herself as aged and wizened as an old walnut. "I have some of the skill, lass, though I warn you, what I say may not always be sweet to the ear."

Tess looked to Emery as if unsure whether to go on, but Emery only laughed in reply, and Tess nodded to the old woman.

The crone took hold of Tess's other hand as well, squeezed both as she closed her eyes. Rocking back and forth a little, the woman's features twitched, as if she were a rabbit sniffing for danger. Then, after a mere moment, she spoke. "Ah . . . more to you there is, than you wish to be said," she began. "A child . . . a child of yours will cause great harm. And . . . you--" the crone opened her eyes, stared pointedly at Tess, "--you, my dearest, must needs harden, must needs embrace the courage within you."

The woman released Tess's hands, and Tess, looking none the worse for the reading, shrugged and waved Emery over.

"Oh . . . I'm fine," Emery said. "I think I've had enough mysticism to last me a lifetime."

"Go on, then," Oonagh encouraged, and the small crowd that had gathered joined in.

What could she do? Emery reluctantly stepped forward and held out her hands to the woman, who took hold and again closed her eyes, made the same sort of rocking movements and facial contortions as she'd done for Tess. Emery figured this was all in good fun; she'd told Tess something about a future child, right? Who could even think that far ahead? So she waited for the harmless fortune to come.

"Ach, my lass," the old woman croaked at length. "There are veils behind veils, for you . . . I have difficulty seeing what lies ahead . . . save for a--a choice." Without warning, the woman suddenly yanked Emery's hand's toward her and snapped her lids apart, her black eyes beady and frightening, nothing like the ones she'd turned on Tess. "Your choice will damn us all!" she cried, her voice scratching the air, harsh in Emery's ears. "The chaos is forming, the Dark is rising, and ancient ones move in the deep--it is your consent that will doom us!" Emery struggled to pull away from the woman, whose iron grip was crushing her fingers. The crowd had closed in, begun to ask her name, and the hag's mouth gaped wide as she shrieked in a stench of must and age, "He asks! You must answer!"

Panicked, Emery at last managed to tear her hands from the old woman's. Spinning, she saw only unknown faces, birds and wild animals, phantasms of the forest and the night, and they caved in on her, prodding, demanding, so that Emery could only cry out frantically and push through the wall of faces, shove out of the crowd and run, until, after gaining some distance, she realized to her immense relief that . . . all was well. The bonfire was still roaring happily. The villagers were everywhere but paid her no heed; they danced and sang and drank as merrily as before.

What just happened? she asked herself. Had it been a hallucination? Oonagh did say that strange things happened on Samhain, that the world of the fae, the aos sí, intermingled with humans and played tricks, sometimes could be dangerous. Perhaps, too, it could've been the wine and the heat from the flames. Whatever the case, she was calmer, now, and though the woman's words had terrified her, she could talk it over with Tess and Oonagh . . . if only she could find them.

The party was still raging. They'd been out for hours, but none of the people seemed ready to wind down. It began to annoy Emery, now, as she moved through the crowds. Nobody was recognizable, and she certainly couldn't reveal herself to ask for help. She momentarily thought of going to Cathbad, but he'd surely grow angry and maybe even have to leave the important business he was tending to if he knew she was outside the gates. There were so many similar costumes, though, that finding Tess and Oonagh seemed almost impossible. Nevertheless, Emery wove in and out of revelers guffawing and smashing cups of beer together, tired children passed out in various places, groups of mummers dancing and contorting in weird ways, chanting and singing. Ten or fifteen minutes had passed before Emery just wanted to scream at everyone, and she might have, if something hadn't caught her attention.

Hair. It was hair. Curly, golden hair.

She knew only one person with such boyish blond curls, yet . . . that couldn't be him. But she had to know. He was yards from her, on the fringes of the crowd, half in shadow, half in light, and though his hair was free to catch the illumination of the bonfire, his face was masked with some sort of dark fabric across most of it, only his eyes and a part of one cheek visible. He'd had his attention elsewhere, but as Emery drew near, the person met her gaze, and she was sure--sure it was him.

When Emery was within feet of the figure, when ten steps would have brought her to him, he lifted a hand to the fabric draped across his face. Everyone around him seemed to dampen, to dull, to slow, and when the person's features were suddenly revealed, Emery was sure her heart slowed as well.

"Charlie!"

But the word, rather than cause him to run to her, led him to turn and slip out of the firelight. Emery wasted no time and took off running headlong after him, shedding her heavy cloak as she went, able to see his small moonlit figure (how had he gotten so far, in such a short amount of time?) darting across the fields and toward the forest. She called to him several times, and once he paused to look back, but then he was off again, and Emery was sure he meant her to follow.

She had to go--this might be the only chance she'd get! It was Charlie!

"Emery!"

The girl stopped and turned at the sound of her own name. A distance away, nearer the bonfire, was the figure of a man--Cullen? How?

But she couldn't wait for him. Charlie had already disappeared into the fringe of trees. So she raced on and crossed over into darkness.