Mercifully, the twilight of the previous night was returning with the passing of the storm and offered some respite in the darkness, though any attempt to guess which direction we had come from was utterly hopeless. We set off along the path the cyclone had made, hoping it might bring us back to the path, and called Peggy’s name as we went, but there was no answer and not a sound above the drip of water through the branches above.
‘Peggy! Peggy!’ we shouted until our voices were hoarse. We walked and walked until our legs were ready to give way beneath us, but the path remained elusive. Both it and Peggy seemed to have vanished into the night.
Chapter 29
Eliza groaned and slumped against the mossy bough of a beech tree. ‘Midsummer morning is only a few hours away, and we’re utterly lost! Never mind finding the tourney glade, we shall be lucky if we don’t starve to death wandering round this accursed forest!’
I looked about helplessly, trying to avoid Eliza’s gaze, all too aware that our current plight was entirely my fault. Our best chance of finding the path was Peggy; without her our chances were slim at best.
As I deliberated over staying where we were, and hoping Peggy would find us, or searching for her and possibly becoming even more hopelessly lost, a light appeared through the trees a short distance away, followed by another and then another.
‘Look over there,’ said Eliza. ‘Do you see those lights?’
‘Yes, I see them.’
‘What are they? Do you see anyone with them?’
My first thought was the Wild Hunt once again, but it was soon clear that the lights were not lanterns, remaining where they were and never drawing any closer, though we stood and watched them for a long while. In fact, they behaved quite unlike any light I had ever seen before, fading then reappearing one after the other, moving through the trees in a slow gliding motion as though they were guided by an intelligent force.
‘Come, let’s see who or are what they are,’ said Eliza at last. ‘Maybe they can help us find the path.’
‘Wait! They could be dangerous,’ I said.
‘Yes, and they could help us find the path and Peggy,’ Eliza objected. ‘We haven’t much chance of doing either otherwise.’
She strode off towards the lights before I could stop her. They glowed brighter now and had stopped their gliding, remaining fixed in a vaguely oval shape which reached from the ground up to the lower branches of the surrounding trees.
‘Eliza, wait,’ I called as I hurried after her.
‘Oh look, Tom, it’s…’ before Eliza had chance to finish her sentence the lights went out.
‘Eliza! Eliza!’ I cried.
‘Tom! They’ve got me! Help!’ It was certainly Eliza’s voice, but it sounded distant as though it reached me from beneath the ground.
‘Eliza? Where are you?’ I cried, turning all around but too terrified to move from the spot on which I stood and risk becoming even more lost. There was no reply.
As I stood despairing and reproaching myself for letting her follow the lights, they reappeared one by one just ahead of me. In their faint glow, I spotted Eliza slumped on the ground barely three feet away from me.
‘Eliza!’ I cried, dashing towards her.
Her chest rose and fell as she breathed. I shook her and shouted her name, but try as I might she would not wake.
‘Tom, help me!’ Eliza’s voice called again, fainter and more distant this time. ‘They won’t let me go.’
‘Who won’t? Where are you?’ I cried, looking round frantically, but the lights only danced and glowed even brighter in mockery.
‘What have you done to her?’ I shouted in frustration, but they flickered and danced all the more.
I sank back on the saturated ground and stared at Eliza’s sleeping body as the lights whirled overhead, shining down on a ring of toadstools at her feet.
‘Fairies!’ I muttered. I had seen their rings often enough back home in Osmington Mills, and even the most dull-witted knew that to tread into one was simply inviting the tricksters to carry you away into their world. In the darkness of the forest, Eliza must have stepped into the ring without noticing.
I stood up and looked straight at the dancing lights.
‘What will you accept in exchange for Eliza?’ I said.
At once, the lights went out, and I found myself standing in a palace of stone overtaken by creepers and vines, lit with lanterns emitting a strange green light. The boughs of the trees held up a high, vaulted roof, and the dancing lights were now people dressed in long flowing robes with crowns of flowers and leaves upon their heads. At first glance they looked quite human, but there was something a little different about the slant of their eyes and the curve of their mouths. They sat upon fallen logs overgrown with moss before a table laden with every kind of delicious food imaginable. At the head of the table a man and woman were seated upon thrones of richly carved wood.
‘Tom!’ cried Eliza. Her voice was right beside me now, but her sleeping body lay unconscious just as it had on the forest floor.
‘What will you accept in exchange for Eliza?’ I said again, looking directly at the man and woman upon their thrones.
The fairies laughed and whispered to one another. ‘Won’t you stay and feast with us?’ asked the man with a voice like silk. He gestured to an empty seat beside him. My eyes settled upon the table, and my stomach growled with hunger.
‘Don’t take anything from them!’ Eliza’s voice implored me. ‘They’ll trap you and keep you here forever!’
I swallowed hard and cleared my throat. ‘No thank you,’ I said to the man. ‘Eliza and I are in a hurry. What will you accept in exchange for her freedom?’
‘What can you give?’ asked the man.
‘I have nothing of any value, no silver or gold,’ I replied.
‘What is the most precious thing you possess?’ asked the woman, her voice just as enchanting as the man’s.
I hesitated. I knew what it was, but it was more precious to me than a mountain of gold or silver. I opened my mouth to offer it, but the words caught in my throat. I swallowed hard and forced my voice to work. ‘The memory of the faces of my family,’ I said at last.
‘No, Tom, you can’t!’ Eliza cried.
‘We will take it,’ said the woman.
‘Tom, no!’
In an instant, the palace, the table and food, the logs and thrones all vanished, leaving behind the lights which flickered for a moment then went out and did not return.
Eliza stirred and sat up. ‘Tom!’ she cried, jumping to her feet and embracing me. ‘Please say you didn’t give them your memories! Tell me you still remember your mother and father and Lizzie?’
I thought back to the last time I had seen them, the day before I met Emerson in the lane outside the cottage on that fateful day in September. I recalled the cottage, the kitchen table, the rickety little bed Lizzie slept in, and my pile of blankets on the floor, but the faces of my mother, father and Lizzie were vague as though they were shrouded in mist, and try as I might I could not recollect a single feature.
‘I don’t remember,’ I said. ‘I had no choice. You are more important than a memory.’
‘You know that’s not true,’ said Eliza.
I shrugged. ‘I got us into this mess, now I must get us out. We need to find Peggy and the path if we’ve any hope of reaching the tourney glade before Emerson and Mabson.’
‘But which way do we go?’ asked Eliza.
I peered into the gloom ahead, but the trees grew so close in every direction that it was impossible to see very far. I was about to concede defeat and suggest we stay put until dawn when a figure emerged from out of the trees a little way ahead.
‘Look there!’ whispered Eliza.
‘Quick, behind this tree,’ I hissed, dragging Eliza out of sight. My thoughts turned at once to Mabson, but as I peeped out from behind the bough I wasn’t so sure it was him. The figure was rather short and fat and appeared to be carrying a heavy burden on his back. As
he drew nearer, I realised it was a rush-bottomed chair, and across his shoulder a sack was slung. He wore a long, rather bulky coat and a wide-brimmed hat which was drawn low over his head. Whoever it was was quite bent from the weight of his burden, yet surprisingly nimble nonetheless. Beside him, a wiry-haired dog trotted along.
‘Peggy!’ I cried, for a moment forgetting the danger in my excitement at seeing her.
At once, Peggy came bounding into my arms, her tail wagging. The figure stopped and laughed a deep, joyful laugh.
‘Ho ho, so you have found each other at last. Paimpont Forest is not the place to be separated from companions. I have spent years wandering its paths and still not found my way out.’
He unstrapped the chair from his back and seated himself upon it as he rummaged through his sack. It contained an array of buttons, spools of thread, ribbons, spoons, pins and thimbles, along with larger items like kettles, pots and pans. The man was a pedlar.
From out of the jumble of oddments he pulled a bright brass bell hanging from a leather thong and fitted it loosely round Peggy’s neck.
‘There,’ he said. ‘She’ll not be so easy to lose again.’
‘Thank you,’ I replied, a little taken aback.
‘Well now, where might you three be going anyway?’ he asked.
‘We’re trying to find our way back to the path,’ replied Eliza. ‘We had to leave it to escape the Wild Hunt, and then we were swept away by a cyclone of leaves, and then I accidentally stepped into a fairy ring and poor Tom here had to exchange his memory of his family for my freedom, or they’d never have let me go!’
‘Ah yes, so you have discovered the perils of Paimpont eh? ’Tis foolhardy to leave the forest path by night,’ said the pedlar. ‘But, come. I will lead you back and set you on your way.’
He rose and strapped his chair to his back once more then set off in roughly the direction he had appeared from. Eliza and I looked at one another, but we both seemed to agree that he was our only hope of finding our way back.
We followed him through the trees for a short while until we were stopped suddenly by a herd of what I thought at first were deer crossing our path in silence, but as I looked closer I realised they were unlike any creature I had ever seen before. They stopped when they saw the pedlar and stared at us.
They looked like a strange hybrid of a tiny horse and a deer, with a small, slender body, no higher than my waist, and short antlers. Their eyes were deep and sorrowful, and they had a tail and mane of silvery grey, but perhaps the most astonishing aspect of their appearance was their hide, which was translucent like gossamer, and through it I could see their skeleton and the network of veins running through their bodies like a river and its tributaries.
Eliza gasped, but the pedlar reached out his hand and caressed the head of one of the smallest beasts.
‘Well now, little wanderers, ‘tis not a night to be walking the forest. Off you go and find yourselves a bed for the night.’
At once, the creatures continued on their way, disappearing into the darkness with barely a rustle.
‘What were they?’ asked Eliza in amazement.
‘They are the Sylphen,’ said the pedlar. ‘The saddest of all creatures on the earth. They had strong magic within them in ages past, but it was taken from them during the Banishment. What you see now is all that is left of them, poor things.’
‘How awful,’ said Eliza. ‘I had no idea.’
‘Paimpont’s secrets are many and great. But now, what reason might you have for journeying through its depths?’ asked the pedlar as we walked. ‘Few folk will risk passing beyond its borders, except perhaps one brave young man once every generation or so who comes looking for the silver bees. They never find them, though. Seems to me that they never reveal themselves to those who go looking for them but prefer to appear unexpectedly. They’re not a treasure to be sought and claimed. Anyhow, are you one of those bee hunters?’
‘No, sir,’ I replied. ‘We’re looking for the tourney glade. We’re hoping to find our friends there.’
‘The tourney glade, eh? You must be friends of the wizards. I have seen them about their magic, though I’m wise enough to know to keep my distance and not concern myself with things beyond my understanding. Still, Blanche would be glad to see her legacy being maintained even after three hundred years.’
‘Pardon me, sir, but who is Blanche?’ asked Eliza.
‘Blanche of Burgundy,’ the pedlar replied. ‘Queen of France and Navarre after whom Chateau Blanche, which overlooks the tourney glade, is named. Have your friends told you her story?’
‘No, sir,’ Eliza replied.
‘In that case, allow me to.’Tis a sad story, but not without a happy ending. Blanche was the first wife of King Charles IV of France. She was the daughter of the Count of Burgundy and the Countess of Artois, who engineered her marriage to the future king when she was just eleven years old. There is not much to tell of the early years of her marriage, but in 1313, when Blanche was seventeen, her sister in law, Queen Isabella of England, paid a visit to the French royal court. She presented Blanche and her two other sisters in law with embroidered coin purses as gifts. Now, Queen Isabella was known as the she-wolf of France for good reason. Taking offence at some imaginary slight by one or all of her brothers’ wives, she concocted a scandal to rid the court of them. She told her father, King Philip, that the purses she had given to Blanche and her other sister in law, Margaret, were now in the possession of the knights Gautier and Philippe d’Aunay. From that, she concluded that Blanche and Margaret must have been conducting secret love affairs with the brothers in the Paris guard tower, the Tour de Nesle.
‘King Philip had the knights executed and Blanche and Margaret imprisoned. Joan, Blanche’s sister and wife of King Philip’s other son, Count Philip of Poitiers, was accused of hiding the affair. She and her husband both pleaded her innocence, and she was eventually exonerated, but Blanche and Margaret were not so lucky. They were tried for adultery, found guilty and imprisoned in the underground dungeon of Chateau Gaillard.
‘Margaret died the following year, shortly after her husband, Louis, became king following the death of his father, though he too died less than two years later. The crown then passed to Louis’ younger brother, Philip of Poitiers, making Blanche’s sister, Joan, queen. But if Blanche had hoped that her sister’s ascension to the throne might bring an end to her imprisonment, she was disappointed. Poor Blanche remained confined to the lightless dungeon for eight years until her husband inherited the crown upon the death of King Philip, but still Blanche was not released. That was, until Charles decided he wanted to remarry.
‘Blanche, now queen of France, was finally released from the dungeon and sent to a nunnery, and her husband petitioned her to agree to an annulment of their marriage. Despite her utter ruin, Blanche would not agree. Eight years beneath the ground had taken their toll upon the new queen. Embittered by her treatment, she remained resolute in her decision. Then one day she was visited by a stranger calling himself ‘Pierre’. He wore a cloak and deep hood and a leather mask across his eyes and nose, leaving only his mouth visible.
‘Pierre offered Blanche the chance to live out the rest of her life in peace and comfort, away from the harsh confines of the nunnery and the scandal of the crimes she had been accused of. In return, he asked just one favour.
‘“What can you possibly ask of me? Don’t you see how wretched I am? I am queen in name alone.” Blanche replied.
‘Pierre said that the favour he sought was not very great and and asked only that Blanche agree to her husband’s demand for an annulment of their marriage in exchange for a decaying and abandoned castle deep in the forest of Paimpont. It had once been used as a base for hunting by the royal court, but since Paimpont had gained a reputation as a haunted and dangerous place, the court no longer hunted there.
‘“What reason have you for wanting me to ask this of the King?” Blanche asked Pierre.
‘Pierre expla
ined that he belonged to a secret guild of magicians. “We are called Le Masque, the masked ones, for we must conceal our identities and activities or risk imprisonment or even execution for witchcraft,” he said.
‘“Let me think on your offer,” said Blanche. “Come back in three days and you will have your answer.”
‘Blanche was understandably wary of falling in with a rogue, having been the victim of her sister in law’s schemes, but life in the nunnery was harsh, even compared to the dungeons she had endured for almost a decade. Moreover, she was curious about the secret guild which Pierre claimed to be a part of. She had seen the jugglers and travelling conjurors of the royal court but nothing like Pierre and the group he claimed to be part of. The House of Lusignan was said to be descended from the fairy Melusine, who had a tail like a fish in the place of her legs, but beyond its rather dull descendants Blanche had never come across anything close to real magic.
‘Concluding that a fraudster would probably have demanded more of the King than a worthless ruined castle, and desiring peace away from the nunnery and the scandal of her past, Blanche decided to accept Pierre’s offer. Three days later she sent a message to the King agreeing to an annulment on the condition that he grant her the disused castle in the Forest of Paimpont and peace to live out her days in seclusion there. The King agreed without question, and Blanche left for Paimpont with Pierre and the rest of Le Masque.
‘The castle was renamed Chateau Blanche in her honour, and she lived freely and in peace as Pierre had promised her, almost entirely forgotten by the outside world. She learned a great many things from Le Masque and became a skilled magician in her own right. She took a particular interest in curses and hexes and cursed her husband’s dynasty, the powerful House of Capet, to die out in revenge for his treatment of her. So it was that King Charles IV was the last of the Capetian line, dying just six years later without an heir.
‘Time passed, and events in the world outside ceased to trouble Blanche, but she came to learn that magicians are not a harmonious breed. She knew well that Le Masque was just one of several magic guilds across France and Europe, each jealous of the others’ powers, some openly hostile to one another. Blanche foresaw that this hostility could destroy magic altogether as the guilds turned on one another. Rejected and scorned by the world outside, she was desperate not to lose what she and her new friends had built, and so she proposed a radical idea to protect magic and all of its practitioners and heal the rifts between the guilds: a tournament open to every magician in Europe to be held in Paimpont every four years where rivals could gather and practise their craft openly and without fear of discovery.’
The Puppeteer: Book II of The Guild of Gatekeepers Page 14