girls from Piscul Dracului but the most formidable of her own folk, such as the tall Grigori or the most powerful of the soothsayers. I saw the black-booted stranger lift Tati’s hand and kiss it in a cool gesture of greeting. Then the Night People seemed to drift away into the shadows under the trees.

Ileana and Marin were not the real power in the Other Kingdom. They presided over the revels and sorted out minor disputes between the forest folk. They made sure the daily life of the wildwood went on in its usual pattern. The folk of the Other Kingdom were often less than forthcoming when questioned about their realm and its rules, but Paula had picked up a great deal at the scholars’ table. We knew that the one who was the heart of it all—the one who held the ancient secrets and wove the powerful magic—was Dr˘agu¸ta, the witch of the wood. Dr˘agu¸ta had been in the forest since before the castle of Piscul Dracului sprang to life in the imagination of the eccentric voivode who built it. She had dwelt in the depths of the woods since these great oaks were mere sprouting acorns. Dr˘agu¸ta did not come to Full Moon dancing. She stayed in her lair, somewhere out in the wildest and least accessible part of the woods.

If folk needed to ask her something, they had to go and find her, for she wouldn’t come to them.

Once, I had questioned whether Dr˘agu¸ta really existed at all. Only once. A chorus of horrified gasps and hisses had greeted my doubt— “Don’t say that!” “Shh!”— as if the witch were everywhere, watching and listening. Dr˘agu¸ta was real, all right, and folk’s fear of her was real fear.