Shadowsong

by S. Jae-Jones

  Think you your beating heart the greatest gift you could give? No, mortal, your heartbeat is but the least and last.

  “Then what . . .” But I could not finish. Then what was my sacrifice for? What was his? What was the price to be paid by my austere young man for letting me walk away?

  “Oh, child,” the rector said with a sigh. “Life is not the body”—he tapped my hand, the one curled around the Goblin King’s ring—“but the soul.”

  “I don’t—I don’t—”

  “You don’t understand?” He shook his head. “The queer, the wild, the strange, the elf-touched—they are said to belong to the Goblin King. Their gifts are fruits of the Underground, their genius, their passion, their obsession, their art. They belong to him, for they are Der Erlkönig’s own.”

  Der Erlkönig’s own. It was what Constanze had always called us, me and Josef, but I had always thought she meant those of us who believed in the Underground.

  “And Magda was taken because of her . . . gifts?”

  The rector’s face was grim. “Magda was taken because she believed. It is madness to bear witness to the Hunt, and she was already mad.”

  A sudden, chilling thought crossed my mind. “What happens to those who do not believe?”

  Through the haze of the flickering lantern light, our gazes met. “I think you know, Fräulein.”

  I did.

  Elf-struck.

  a king stands in a grove, hooded and cloaked, a tall, elegant stranger. His back is turned, his face gazing into the formless mist around him, both defiant and sorrowful, as the sound of thundering hooves and the bell-like bays of hunting hounds fill the air.

  His features are hidden by shadow, but wisps of feathery-white hair peek out from the depths of his hood, a glint of pale eyes mirroring the strange, depthless light around him. In the distance, shapes begin to coalesce, the passing tatters of fog into banners, mist into cresting waves, into horses’ manes, into men. Men with spears, men with shields, and men with swords. An unholy host.

  They are coming, Elisabeth.

  The king throws up his arm in a violent gesture, as though shielding himself from attack. The force of the movement knocks back his hood, revealing a face both terrible and beautiful. His skin is stretched tight across his cheekbones and patterns of darkness swirl about his hairline, ears, jaw, and neck, shadows staining the skin there an inky black. The darkness crawls up his throat and around his chin, and on his head, rams’ horns grow from a ragged nest of silver hair.

  He is both a man and a monster.

  His faded eyes held color once, a mismatched blue and gray-green, but now they are pale, so pale his pupils are but a pinprick in a sea of white. But it is not only the colors of his mismatched gaze that are fading; it is his memories, his manhood, his music. He tries to hold on to them with hands that have changed, hands that were once slender and elegant. A musician’s hands. A violinist’s hands.

  Elisabeth.

  But these memories slip through his fingers, fingers that are now broken, mangled, and strange. His nails are blackened into claws, and there is an extra joint in each finger that had not been there before. He can no longer remember the sound of her voice, the feel of her skin, the scent of her hair, only the smallest snippet of song. A melody, a tune. He hums it to keep sane, to keep human.

  What are monsters but mortals corrupted?

  The clatter of hooves grows louder, along with the clang of steel and the crack of the whip.

  Don’t look, don’t look. Don’t look or you shall go mad.

  The king holds his hands before him and covers his face. The host surrounds him, both there and not there. A dangerous company. A wild hunt.

  Her name, they say, their voice as one.

  The king shakes his head. To give her name to the old laws would be to give up the last of the man he had been, so he swallows it down, feeling it warm the space where his beating heart used to be. He had made her a promise.

  Her name, the host repeats.

  Still he holds it close, refusing to yield. He will pay the price. He will bear the cost.

  The host does not ask a third time. A snap, a lash, and the king throws his head back in a wordless roar of pain. His eyes go pure white, the inky shadows staining his skin, consuming it utterly. The rams’ horns atop his head grow twisted, and his face stretches in an expression of pure, monstrous menace. He climbs atop a stallion, which rears and screams in a hellish cry, its flaming eyes two stars in a night sky. Then he turns and bolts off into the heavens, to claim his own—Der Erlkönig’s own—and bear them back to the Underground and the old laws.

  And as he rides, his heart still beats her name.

  Elisabeth. Elisabeth. Elisabeth.

  THE USE OF RUNNING

  i had been sent home with a measure of salt, enough to last us through the month, if we didn’t let Constanze get her hands on it. And yet the old rector’s tale of Magda, the old laws, and the unholy host haunted me on my way back to the inn, ghostly hoofbeats thudding in my ears. Snippets of story floated across the surface of my mind, and I tried to gather them into something I could hold. When wisps of clouds blew themselves across the face of the moon, Constanze used to say they were the souls of the departed, joining the eternal hunt in the sky. What became of the stolen? What became of my great aunt? I thought of the circle of alder trees we called the Goblin Grove, the suggestive shapes of the trunks and branches, like limbs frozen in an eternal dance.

  The shivers that wracked my body had nothing to do with the icy wind blowing through my cloak.

  They say the Hunt rides abroad when there is an imbalance between the Underground and the land of the living.

  I had crossed the barrier between worlds, had walked away from the Goblin King and my vows last summer. Had my leaving caused a rip in the fabric of the world, allowing the spirits and ghouls and denizens of the Underground to escape? Was I in danger from the Wild Hunt?

  My hands were full of salt, but I felt the weight of the Goblin King’s ring against my chest, bouncing with every step like the beating of my heart. If I had upset the ancient balance, then what was his promise worth?

  Don’t look back, he had said. And I hadn’t. And I wouldn’t. But now I wasn’t so sure.

  On my way back home, I searched for any sign of new life, faint traces of green among the gray. Nothing yet, for the freeze after nightfall was sure to kill any tender shoot struggling to grow, but the days were growing warmer. Mud squelched beneath my boots as I walked along the path. Surely the seasons still turned as they always had and ever would.

  Yet I could not shake off the sound of hooves.

  Elf-touched. Elf-struck.

  I did not know what to tell Käthe. Or Mother. For all that my sister had crossed the veil dividing the worlds, she was not one of Der Erlkönig’s own. She believed, but her faith was simple and uncomplicated. For her, reality and unreality was as starkly divided as the barrier between the land of the living and the realm of the goblins. There were no maelstroms lurking in my sister. She was all calm waters and smooth sailing. I envied her.

  It was in moments like these I missed my brother most.

  I thought of the cryptic letter we had received. Master Antonius is dead. I am in Vienna. Come quickly. I would have doubted the letter was from Josef at all, if it weren’t for the unmistakable handwriting on the page. The shapes of the words were half-formed, the letters improperly joined up, the hand of a boy who practiced his scales far more than he had his penmanship.

  There were so many things I wanted to say to Josef. So many things I had tried to say in the myriad letters I tried to write and the few I had actually sent. So many drafts, so many sheets of paper consigned to the flames, searching for words, finding them, excising them, losing them, muddling them. So many questions I wanted to ask, wanted to know, wanted to complain, wanted to explain, only to end up with a tower of nonsense.

  In the end, words had been insufficient. Music was the language my brother and
I shared down to our bones. Melodies were our sentences, movements our paragraphs. We spoke best when we let our fingers do the talking—mine over my keyboard, his over the strings. It was in our playing, not my letters, that I could make Sepperl understand.

  How I could make myself understand. The restlessness, the anxiety within me. The feeling of incompleteness and dissatisfaction, my frustration with my inability to execute my ideas on the page, either in words or in song. I could not catch my own mind, my thoughts racing past in a blur, like fingers rushing through sixteenth notes without regard to tempo.

  The hoofbeats grew louder.

  With a start, I realized that the hoofbeats weren’t in my mind, but the sound of an actual horse riding down the road. I glanced over my shoulder and beheld a rider in black, his dark cloak streaming out behind him like wings. Beneath the brim of his hat, his hair was pale, the planes of his face narrow and sharp. His horse was a large black stallion, its eyes wild and teeth bared, a creature running straight from the mouth of hell.

  My heart stopped. It couldn’t be—could it?

  As the horseman drew nearer, I saw that his eyes were a simple twig brown, not a mismatched green and gray. The white hair was nothing but a wig between the tricorn hat. And still my excitable heart leaped and trembled like a skittish thing, searching for the familiar in every unknown, every unfamiliar thing.

  It was not the Goblin King.

  Of course it wasn’t the Goblin King.

  The rider rushed past, and I jumped out of the way to avoid being splattered. I watched the horseman and his steed disappear around a bend in the road, feeling a strange combination of relief and disappointment. I had not been sleeping well, of course my mind would conjure specters where there were none. And yet the expectation—the hope—that I might see my Goblin King again was the dagger with which I stabbed myself. It couldn’t be. It cannot be. I must move on.

  Then, to my astonishment, the horse and its rider came galloping back.

  I paused by the side of the road, waiting for the horseman to pass again, but instead he slowed at the sight of me, bringing his steed from a gallop to a trot, a walk, a stop.

  “Fräulein Vogler?” the rider asked.

  I was stunned. “Y-yes?” I managed. “I am she. How can I help you?”

  The rider did not answer, but reached into the satchel at his side. A courier, I realized. A postman. Then my heart lifted. Josef!

  He pulled out a small leather pouch, leaning down to hand it to me. The pouch was rather heavy for its size, and clinked musically as I accepted it. Mystified, I was about to open the pouch to examine its contents when the courier handed me a letter.

  All else was forgotten as I snatched the letter from his hands, not caring whether or not I bent or battered the edges. I had been waiting for word—for an explanation—from Josef for so long that I was past caring about such trivial matters as polite manners or social niceties.

  The weight of the paper was heavy and expensive, faintly perfumed with a sweet scent that lingered despite the many miles it had traveled. The letter bore an official-looking wax seal, a crest with the image of a flower pressed into it. A rose, or a poppy perhaps? It did not seem like something my brother would send—the paper, the ink, the scent were all wrong—yet I clung to hope, because I wanted to believe my brother would send for me. Would write—really write— to me, instead of leaving me behind.

  “Who sent this?” I asked.

  But the postman, having delivered his message, merely tipped his hat to me and rode off. I watched him disappear down the road, then returned to the letter in my hand and turned it over. My heart stuttered, tripping over its excitement and dread. There, written in an unfamiliar, elegant, educated hand, was an address:

  To the composer of Der Erlkönig.

  * * *

  “Is everything all right?” Käthe asked once I got home. A pile of chopped root vegetables and salt pork lay on the sideboard, while a pot of water bubbled away above the stove. “You look as though you’ve seen a ghost!” She laughed, but sobered at my expression. “Liesl?”

  With trembling hands, I handed the small leather pouch out for my sister to hold.

  “Is that the salt?” she asked with a frown.

  “No.” I set the salt down on the table, then set the leather pouch down beside it. It clinked musically. “But it might just be our miracle.”

  Käthe sucked in a sharp breath. “What is it? Who’s it for? And who’s it from?”

  “I think”—I swallowed—“I think it’s for me.”

  I held up the letter, with the words To the composer of Der Erlkönig clearly visible in stark, black ink. Its faintly sweet, cloying scent perfumed the air, clashing horribly with the onions and herbs my sister was prepping for supper.

  “But it must be from a very important person,” Käthe observed. “Look at the paper! And”—she squinted—“is that a crest?”

  “Yes.” Upon closer examination, I thought the seal might be a poppy, not a rose. A strange choice.

  “Well, are you going to read it?” My sister went on with making supper. “Let’s see what this mysterious nobleman wants with the composer of Der Erlkönig, eh?”

  I broke the wax sealing the letter and unfolded the page. “Dear Mademoiselle Vogler,” I read aloud. “Forgive me for this most unconventional and improper method of correspondence. You and I are strangers to each other, but pray do not be alarmed when I write that I feel as though we have already been acquainted.”

  “Ooh, a secret admirer?” Käthe teased. “Liesl, you sly thing!”

  I shot her a stern look. “Do you want me to read this or not?”

  “Sorry, sorry,” she said. “Do go on.”

  “Last month, I happened upon the performance of an unusual piece of music, played on the violin by an unusual young man. I cannot adequately express the extent to which the music moved me, a profound and deep resonance, as though the notes touched upon a nerve of fire in my very soul.”

  I caught my breath. An unusual piece of music, played on the violin by an unusual young man.

  Josef.

  When my sister harrumphed impatiently, I coughed, willing myself to continue for her benefit.

  “I confess I was possessed of an obsession with your work. Not a single person in Vienna could tell me the name of the composer, only that the piece had been published in an obscure collection of curated works by Giovanni Antonius Rossi before his death. I knew the old man well, and do not hear much, if anything, of his voice in the piece.”

  Josef must have taken my strange little bagatelle and had it published under Master Antonius’s name. In fairness, the decision made sense, for the old virtuoso was a known musician with an established output. Yet as grateful as I was to have found an audience for my work, the knowledge that Der Erlkönig was not published under my own name niggled at me, a worm of discontent burrowing its way through my heart.

  “The young violinist has been as mysterious as you, my dear genius,” I went on. “After the old virtuoso’s passing, he and his companion vanished entirely. Unfortunately, I am afraid I was forced to take matters into my own hands.”

  The feeling of vague disquiet sharpened into one of foreboding. The creeping sensation of trespass, of violation, of having my privacy invaded rose up like vines from the author’s words, threatening to strangle me with dismay. I read on in silence.

  After Master Antonius’s death your correspondence was discovered among the old virtuoso’s effects. I saw that the letters were addressed to a Franz Josef Vogler and I managed to preserve them before they were discarded, unread. The letters were dated these several months past, with a most curious signature in each one: Composer of Der Erlkönig.

  I went utterly still. I thought of Josef’s anguished summons, the plea for me to join him in Vienna. Guilt twisted my heart into knots. I should have answered him sooner. I should have found a way to get to him. I should have tried harder to get in touch, I should have, I should have, I sh
ould have—

  “What, Liesl?” Käthe said. “What is it? Don’t leave me hanging.”

  Shaking, I cleared my throat and continued reading aloud.

  “I—I do not take pride in my next actions, but I simply had to . . . had to know the identity of the composer of the work. I . . . I . . .” But my voice failed me, trailing into nothing.

  I read one of the missives, the letter went on. Forgive me, mademoiselle, for this gross trespass upon your privacy, but I discerned immediately the nature of your relationship with Herr Vogler—namely, that you are his sister and his muse.

  My hands were trembling so badly I could barely make out the words on the page.

  Fearing that they were friendless and alone in this world, I went through great pains to discover the whereabouts of your brother and his companion. Never fear, mademoiselle, for they are safe and well provided for by yours truly, a most devoted patron and sponsor of their careers. Now if you could find it in your heart to forgive an overeager enthusiast of your music for this breach in confidence, I write you now to urge you to join us in Vienna. A talent such as yours must not be wasted in a backwater Bavarian town and should be celebrated to great acclaim. Funds, influence, power: I lay all that I possess before you as your kindly benefactor. I will take no offense should you decline my offer, but can only urge you to accept, as I look forward to hearing more from the remarkable mind behind such otherworldly music.

  As a token of good faith, I present to you a payment of fifty florins, to be spent at your discretion. Spend them as foolishly or as wisely as you choose, for they are my gift to you in thanks for the gift of your music. However, should you choose to spend them by purchasing coach fare to Vienna for yourself and your family, give my name to the factor in your town and he will advance whatever additional funds you need to make a new life here.

  Yours faithfully,

  Graf Procházka von und zu Snovin

  “Liesl?” Käthe prompted. “Liesl!”

  The letter slipped from my numb fingers, fluttering to the floor. Dropping her knife with an exasperated sigh, Käthe snatched it up before it touched the ground and read the words of our unknown benefactor for herself.