"Don't bother. I'll lose everything down to the roots if I wait to hear the excuse. Just get back to work."

Father stalked into the hut, and Edward didn't see him until he went inside to cook the evening meal. Even then, Father didn't look up. He held his half of the tally sticks from Dobelis, recording the trade with similar notches on a special plank. Edward simmered barley and rye in a pot, adding goat's milk for flavor. The fire warmed the front of his legs and arms, but his face felt hotter.

Finally, Father broke the silence. "I should never have let your grandfather tell you that nonsense."

"Why would he lie to me? He gained nothing from the tale."

"By the time you were old enough to listen to his fancies, he was too old to remember anything clearly. He never visited Thorn Castle before the Sleep, and he certainly never met a woman there."

"If the roses are in bloom," Edward said, "they'll part for the right man."

Behind him, Father said, "Don't be ridiculous, Edward." Edward heard the scrape of pottery as Father got out the bowls for supper. "The court will return soon. When the King hears the news, he'll send the Prince. His seers have always said the boy was born to save Beauty-let him be the fool who tests Thorn Castle."

With shaking hands, Edward ladled the thick mixture into Father's bowl, then his own. "Why must you be a prince to face a rosebush? A gardener will do better, especially if he has a link to the people inside."

"We've got a garden to save and no time for folly. A prince can do what he wishes. A gardener must work."

Edward sat down at the small table, smelling the lingering scent of primrose. He looked across at Father. "I used to play with him in the courtyard, remember? When I wasn't bent down beside you, weeding and digging and hardening my hands. All the Prince has ever had are soft palms and servants. What makes him better than me? What does he know of thorns?"

Father slammed his hand down flat on the table.

"Not another word, Edward. Mention it again, and you'll be out in the fields, not under my roof."

They passed the rest of the meal in silence. Edward cleared the bowls and boiled the water for tea. As Father added new straw to the bed, Edward mixed a special brew. Wild hyssop rootstock, steeped in among the tea leaves, its flavor masked by still other cuttings.

Edward lay awake in the bed, waiting until he could hear the slow, even breaths of Father's hyssop-deepened sleep. When he was sure of Father's state, Edward crept out of bed and packed a leather satchel with barley and turnips. Grabbing the bronze shears, a hatchet, and gloves, he slipped out of the hut and over the garden wall.

As dawn began to heat the baked earth again, Edward found himself staring from his hiding place at the peasants carrying water into the fields, their feet kicking up clouds of dust. Leaning over to pour water onto the browning crops, they looked like stalks themselves, bending in a chaotic wind.

The sun had reached its peak before Edward spotted Olaus, his ruddy face framed by a dented helmet, a notched sword resting on his shoulder. As Olaus crossed the fields and joined the road, Edward saw that even the chain-mail vest he wore was rusty, with a wide gash run-fling along the left side. Once Olaus had entered the forest, Edward stepped out from hiding.

"How can you stand the sun in that armor?" Edward asked.

"It may be hot to you, but it's cooler than the smithy," Olaus said, smiling. He stepped off the road into the trees.

"Thank you, Olaus," Edward said. For the first time since the drought came, he felt unburdened. "Thank you for coming."

"Well, I know you can't do it alone," Olaus said. "Who'll defend you from the bandits that lurk along these roads?"

"The only bandits will be rivals for Beauty. If we meet someone, it'll likely be the Prince catching up with us."

"You'll need my help then, too." Olaus paused. "What will you say to Cleome?"

"I'm not sure."

"She's more beautiful than Beauty herself, right, Edward?" Olaus asked. "Hair like the dawn, and eyes like the deep sea?"

"Grandfather said no such thing. Cleome wasn't a noble. She served in the hall."

Olaus smiled. "And Beauty?"

"Grandfather didn't know. He never saw her."

"She can look like a horse, for all I care. Just as long as I'm not at the bellows, so long as the smith can't hammer on me."

Curiosity overcame Edward. "Did you see my father?"

Olaus shook his head, a solemn look taking hold in his face. "I won't speak of it, Edward. From this point on, we can have nothing behind us-only the thorns before."

Edward agreed, and no more words of home passed their lips.

The days passed by in a slow, sweaty blur. Edward grew used to the soft crunch of dry grass beneath his feet. He watched his pants grow brown and stiff with dirt, the cuffs becoming worn, then stringy, then ragged. As they got closer to Thorn Castle, they ran out of food; the sun had dried up everything Edward could forage. Soon all he heard was the growl of his stomach and the pounding of his head with every listless step.

Finally, Edward spotted a village, wattle huts with fallen thatch. Trellises and vines covered the walls. Flowers filled doorways and stretched upward to form roofs. Every path was planted, flowers and herbs all green and healthy. Edward stepped between bright yellow rows of trumpeting daffodils, threading through the colorful labyrinth and looking for the most edible plant. He heard Olaus's footsteps follow behind him.

"Who's there?" an old, old voice said, cracking and hissing like a fire built with wet pine. Edward could not see its origin; it seemed to flow from the very plants themselves. He looked at Olaus, who shrugged his shoulders.

"Two traveling gardeners in search of food," Edward said.

"For a square of cloth, I'll give you what you need," the voice replied.

"That trade sounds fair to me," Olaus said, tightening his grip on his imperfect sword.

Edward shook his head. "Let us see you so we may seal this bargain."

The old man emerged from a gap between the pink sword lilies and a hibiscus shrub. His cloak was made of a patchwork of scraps, some faded, some bright, some covered by dirt. Edward had never seen so many colors. In the bits and rags, he recognized bright dahlia oranges, zinnia yellows, and iris blue-violets and still more exotic, foreign dyes.

Olaus gasped. "How did you get so wretched, old man?"

"Olaus," Edward warned. He had not noticed the old man's face, a pair of faded blue eyes and more wrinkles than there are veins in a leaf. His white hair hung down in long, dirty knots, obscuring a pair of cankered lips. Edward could not tell where the mud ended and the face began.

"Do not ask about my age. Pay me my price."

As Edward clipped off a square from the edge of his shirt, the old man produced handfuls of beans and pea pods from his cloak.

"Are you here for the thorns?" the old man asked.

"Yes, for Beauty and for another," Olaus answered, straightening his shoulders. "One of his relatives sleeps inside the castle."

"Oh, really?" The old man smiled.

"Not a relative," Edward explained, as he handed over his square of cloth. "My grandfather visited the castle before the Sleep, before the thorns, to trade bulbs with the gardener there. He met a woman in the feasting hail. While he was at home, getting the King's permission to marry her, the Sleep overtook the kingdom. The thorns grew up and he married another. Toward the end of his days, his thoughts turned back to her. He was very old when he told me this."

"That doesn't mean you'll cross through. Dirt-diggers won't penetrate the thorns."

"I know the ways of roses. I handle thorns without getting pricked. I weed nettles without getting stung."

"You're not the breed that will survive. The roses will not part for a common weed. Turn back and return to your garden."

"Who are you to command us?" Olaus shouted.

The old man grabbed hold of his cloak, running the back of his fingers over the multicolored patches. "For every square, there was once a man who came to prove his bravery. Peasants, soldiers, even knights, now only the cloth is left."

Edward looked at the patches, hundreds of irregular squares, wondering if the old man's story was true. He tried to picture a face, a man for every patch in the harlequin cape, an army of hundreds swallowed up and gone.

When he crested the hill, Edward got his first glimpse of the roses, a fierce red as if the sunset had nestled in a circle around the castle. As he neared, it grew larger and larger, swallowing up his view until there was nothing before him but roses, tall as a full-grown oak. He felt dwarfed by the wall of flowers, like an ant before an apple.

"It's like a barley field set on its side, with a rose for every seed," Edward whispered.

"No, it's like a fire," Olaus said. "A wall of fire like the summer burns that eat whole forests."

Edward nodded. Here was a fire of roses, its flames the waves and ripples created by the wind, flowers bobbing, swaying, dipping with each gust. The closer Edward and Olaus got, the more the wall seemed to move. Edward thought he could watch it forever.

He brushed his hand against the leaves, a soft, gentle feeling like the touch of velvet. He closed his eyes and stepped forward, feeling the peculiar embrace of pliant flowers and stubborn thorns. Two steps in and he could go no farther. The wall resisted him, and he felt the prickles dig into his body like the tines of forks. He gasped and stepped back.

"It didn't part," Edward said, a coldness spreading through his limbs. He looked at Olaus, whose face had turned pale.

"Try again," Olaus said. "I'll try with you."

Edward walked into the red again, and again made no progress. The thorns stung like bee stings, and he withdrew faster this time. He looked to his left; Olaus had failed, too.

"It won't accept us," Edward said. A yawning pit grew inside him. All his plans suddenly destroyed. Grandfather had been so sure. He had been so sure.

"I don't recognize these roses, Olaus."

"They look like the ones you place on the King's table."

"No flowers of this sort have ever grown in a garden," Edward said. "Maybe we should turn back."

"I'm not leaving. I won't give up yet," Olaus said. Edward watched as he drew his sword and struck the wall. The blow chopped off the heads of a score of flowers in one sweep. The petals scattered on the grass, a spill of red on green.

"You see them fall," he shouted. "It's only a matter of how many blows."

"They were supposed to part." Edward looked at his arms and legs, watching his scratches swell with blood.

"They'll part-by sword or hatchet, they'll make way for us." Olaus kicked the cut flowers. "I won't go back."

Edward felt the beating of his heart, the panicked breathing of his lungs. The roses might still make way, he thought. Bending down on one knee, he peered through the hole, gingerly touching the sap on the exposed red-thorned canes. Where there weren't thorns, there were bristles, red and fine as hair, like spider legs dyed with blood. He could not see through to the other side.

"There's nothing to return to, Edward," Olaus said. He sounded nervous, his words quivering like the roses in the breeze. "The sun has turned your garden to desert by now. The King has made us outlaws by now. Neither the smith nor your father could take us back. We can't change that, but we can make the roses part."

Perhaps make way meant that they could be cut through, Edward thought. A barren garden and his life stood behind him, but only the thorns lay ahead.

"We'll not hack our way through, Olaus," Edward said, taking the leather gloves off his belt, "but you'll have to do some cutting."

Edward constructed a narrow tunnel through the thorns, pruning dead cane when possible, propping healthy cane to the side with branches when it wasn't. The air stank of roses.

"This is taking too long," Olaus said, setting down freshly cut saplings before him.

But Edward wasn't listening. "These must be wild roses. Dog roses. They grow along the hedgerows when the weather is fair. Never this color of red, but the shape of the petals is right."

Olaus answered with a bitter laugh. "Weeds among weeds, are we? No wonder I feel so much at home."

"So much deadwood," Edward whispered. "Black spot, canker, mildew-it's a wonder they've gotten so large."

"What did you say?"

"Nothing." He wiped his forehead with the back of his arm. "Keep the branches coming."

"The tunnel isn't even straight."

"Better crooked than cut, Olaus," Edward said, and turned back to his work.

As the hours passed, his arms ached with the effort of twisting the cane. Behind every obstruction lay another. The aches spread up his arm into his shoulder and back. The light waned, and the cane grew tougher, thicker than his wrist and more like trees than vines. Here the roses were choked with deadwood, a lifeless snarled knot in the heart of the thorns. Edward switched to his axe, squinting before each blow, trying to aim for a particular cane, but often surprised when he hit something closer than his target. As the sweat trickled down his face, Edward thought he tasted the roses.

"Let me take over," Olaus asked.

Edward handed him the axe. "Only trim the deadwood. Nothing alive. Make the cuts at an angle."

"Right," Olaus said.

Edward dragged the cuttings out to the clear space beyond the flowers. The thorns began to pierce through the gloves, and each armload felt like a mass of iron burrs. Each time he returned for a load, Olaus was panting worse, face flushed redder than his sunburn.

When they were forty feet in, and the pile outside was higher than Edward, he heard a ripping, cracking sound above him, like breaking sticks or the felling of a tree. The cane above them sagged and collapsed. Edward shouted as he saw the vines engulf Olaus, as if a great mouth were swallowing his friend whole. Olaus cried out, but the cry was cut short.

Edward ran forward. He heard a brittle snapping that became a roar. Before he made three steps, the cane crashed down on him, a crushing, bristling weight that embraced him like an iron maiden.

A wind blew through the bush, carrying the scent of rotting flesh and roses, sweet scent and sweet decay, brushing the rose hips against Edward's face. Their spiny hairs tickled his jaw, then his chin, then his lips, like a spider crawling across his skin. His stomach protested, but Edward turned away, feeling the thorns dig into his skull, clamping down on his head like a beast with misshapen fangs. He turned to the left, grinding his teeth against the piercing of his scalp, and the rose hips scuttled across his ear, pressing so close he heard them scratch against his skin. Edward twisted again with a groan, pushing back the cane behind, flexing his arms against his bonds. His head burned as his scabs reopened and new wounds were made. But he had made a tiny space, a bit of safety.

The wind picked up again, and Edward's nose filled with the stench of Olaus's corpse. He could see the body, a few feet away through the fog of leaves and red thorns, with its purpled skin and crusted, blackened blood, surrounded by cane that had grown quickly into his skull. Blossoms snaked in and out of the eyes and mouth, shifting in the breeze like flames consuming a log. The thorns made a scratching noise as they brushed against the chain shirt.

Olaus, what have we done? Why did we think we could outwit this place?

A half dozen roses hung just above his head, their wilting red petals covered with a film of dew. Edward's parched throat cried out for moisture, and he tilted forward, licking the drops off the sagging petals. Then he bit the flower off at the stem, trying to sate his hunger with the damp, chewy petals. His stomach protested even more. He surveyed the thorns around him to distract himself.

The edges looked even farther out of reach than yesterday, obscured by a tightening curtain of cane and thorn and blossom, swaying under the force of the wind. He caught a glimpse of the safe, open space beyond the blooms. Farther in, there was still darkness, although he could pick out bones and skulls, wedged in between the cane or pierced right through. Above, Edward saw tiny patches of blue and white. Clouds, he thought dully. Finally some clouds in the sky.

His belly twisted beneath his skin. He could take the ache in his stomach no longer. He closed his mouth over the rose hips, running his tongue over the slender, waxy surface of the bulbous tubes. Biting them off at the sepal, he savored the sharp tartness as he chewed the fibrous fruit. When he swallowed, the wind blew through the thorns like a sigh.

The hermit was right, Olaus. Weeds don't part for other weeds.

The aches in his body became less insistent. His eyelids felt heavy, and his head drooped forward from fatigue. He looked at the bloodred thorns poking into his chest and legs. Cane that gripped and twisted around him like jagged-edged ropes. Soft green shoots brushed at his fingertips, edged down the collar of his shirt. I could tear them off, he thought, or bite at the buds, but what would be the point? They would only grow back. The space around him felt snug, conforming to his body, comforting him, as if the cane was weaving him a womb of leaves and thorns.