by Darius Hinks
Finavar realised that the wardancer was little more than a child and his anger grew. If the boy was too young to perform the Dance of Blades he should have stayed at home with his mother. ‘You should be ashamed,’ he snapped, waving at the five corpses that surrounded them. ‘How could you fall into the hands of such simpletons?’
The youth looked at the bodies. ‘They were part of a much larger group,’ he said, with a note of petulance in his voice. He raised his chin defiantly and adopted a fighting stance. ‘I was allowing them to take me back to their fellows. Then I would have butchered them all.’
Finavar laughed bitterly. ‘You were going to kill them all by yourself?’
The youth kept his chin raised and glared back at Finavar. ‘I was merely waiting for the right time to strike. If you hadn’t blundered in, I would have found where the rest of them are camped out.’ He pointed at the gash along Finavar’s jaw. ‘And I wouldn’t have let them split my head open.’
Despite his rage, Finavar began to find the situation funny. The boy was defiant, foolhardy and more than a little drunk; but he was brave. Finavar lowered his sword. ‘What do you call yourself, young servant of Loec?’
The youth noticed the change in Finavar’s tone and relaxed. ‘It was kind of you to intervene. You weren’t to know my plans.’ He placed a hand across his tattooed chest and gave a slight bow. ‘I’m Sibaris, of the kindred of Fiùrann, from the Glade of Liath.’ The defiance dropped from his face, replaced by a tentative smile.
Finavar could not help warming to the boy. Had they met just a month or two earlier they might have even been friends. He could not bring himself to smile, however; in part because the youth reminded him so much of Jokleel. ‘I know Liath. I travelled through there once as a child, with my brother.’ He hesitated for a moment, then said: ‘I have no kin.’
The boy’s face lit up. ‘Then you must join us. The kindred of Fiùrann, I mean. We have need of friends at the moment, and you clearly have some skill.’
Finavar wondered what he meant by needing friends, but he decided a discussion would only delay him further. ‘We would not see eye to eye,’ he said, turning to leave. ‘Farewell, young Sibaris.’
The youth dashed after him and placed a hand on his shoulder. ‘Wait. If you cannot lend us your help, you must at least join us for the feast.’ He patted Finavar’s hollow cheeks, uninhibited as only a drunk can be. ‘It looks like you could use one.’
Even as he shook his head, Finavar realised how much he craved some companionship and a friendly face. For as long as he could remember, his only conversation had been with a corpse, a lunatic and himself. ‘Feast?’
Sibaris frowned. ‘You really are a stranger. When the bright moon waxes full it will be the time for the Dance of the Whitebeam.’
Finavar shook his head, none the wiser.
‘The Feast of the Two Branches!’ Sibaris laughed at Finavar’s confusion. ‘That settles it. You really must attend. I would be a poor host indeed to let you pass through Liath without witnessing such an important night. I beg you to–’
Finavar’s moment of weakness passed and he held up a hand to silence him. ‘I travel alone.’ He nodded at the corpses. ‘But I will help you deal with this before I leave.’ Finavar was suddenly keen to move on, but he was reluctant to leave without ensuring the bodies were prepared in the correct way.
Sibaris’s expression hardened and he gave Finavar a stiff nod. ‘Very well.’ He grabbed the nearest corpse and began dragging it towards the trees.
Finavar’s worst suspicions were immediately confirmed. The youth was drunk and dangerously unprepared. ‘Wait!’ he growled. ‘Think where we are, boy. This close to the borders we must be sure to leave a clear warning.’
Sibaris blushed again. ‘Of course.’ He drew a knife.
‘I’ll do that. You gather the deadwood.’
Sibaris threw the corpse to the ground and stormed off into the trees, scowling at Finavar as he passed.
Finavar shook his head in disbelief and set to work. He unfastened the breastplate from the large human and laid it on the ground to use as a bowl. Then, as Sibaris grunted and sighed his way through the trees, Finavar dug up some clay from the path and placed it in the piece of armour. Once he had enough, he took his sword and used the tip to open a vein in his arm. As the blood drummed onto the metal, he pounded it with his other hand, making a paste with the clay. As he worked, Finavar sang a low, monotonous dirge.
‘You would have enjoyed the feast,’ muttered Sibaris, returning briefly to drop some branches on the path.
Finavar gave no answer, so Sibaris headed back into the trees. ‘Even with all our troubles, we will make sure it’s a night to remember.’ He grinned. ‘Liathian wine is without equal.’
Still ignoring him, Finavar traced his finger around one of his tattoos. It was the rune of Loec, his patron god. He prayed for the protection of his lord as he stemmed the blood flowing from his arm. Then he tied the wound with a tourniquet of leaves.
‘It’s the night on which the Lord of the Greenwood moves amongst us,’ said Sibaris, ‘to keep us safe.’ He frowned at Finavar. ‘Surely you have a similar festival in your own realm? We mark the fact that autumn is turning to winter, on the night when the dead are closer to us than at any other time. They come with the Lord of the Greenwood to reward the bravest of the Fiùrann for their courage. Many of us have needed bravery recently, so he should be very pleased.’
Finavar nodded vaguely and turned his attention to the corpses. He removed their clothes and armour, and piled them in the centre of the path. Then, once they were all naked, he took the crimson paste he had made and began to paint runes over their skin, still singing his mournful dirge.
Once they were all covered with intricate, spiralling designs, he put the paste down and drew his knife again.
‘That will suffice,’ he said as Sibaris returned with another bundle of sticks. Then he plunged his knife into the chest of the corpse he was cradling. Still-warm blood rushed over his arms and pooled on the ground.
Sibaris nodded, drew his sword and began working at another one of the corpses.
They sliced with quiet efficiency, peeling the dead in one piece, as if they were preparing fruit. Once they had done they spread the painted skins across the ground. Then they scooped up the bloody mess that remained and piled it on top of the clothes and armour.
Finavar grabbed a handful of the sticks Sibaris had gathered and wedged them inside one of the skins, wiggling and adjusting them until he had made a bloody, drooping mannequin with empty sockets for eyes. He took his gruesome creation and walked over to the trees, seeking a suitably prominent place to position his warning. Then he looked back at Sibaris with a frown. ‘What did you say?’
Sibaris was on the ground, jamming sticks inside another one of the skins. He looked up in surprise. ‘I didn’t say anything.’
‘Earlier, I mean. What did you say earlier?’
Sibaris shook his head. ‘I said you would have enjoyed the feast.’ He tried a tentative smile. ‘Are you thinking you might attend the rites?’
‘After that,’ snapped Finavar. ‘You said someone would reward you.’
‘Yes,’ Sibaris grinned. ‘The Lord of the Greenwood!’ The youth’s eyes were bright with religious ecstasy. ‘The Divine Consort. He comes every autumn to mark the passing of the season. He leaves the Wild Hunt and comes to solemnise the Dance of the Whitebeam. It is a site that many travel to see. Surely you have heard of it?’
Finavar dropped his bloody doll to the ground and his voice became a hesitant whisper. ‘The Lord of the Greenwood will be here?’
‘Exactly. Mälloch the Elder conducts the ceremony.’ Sibaris smirked as he mentioned Mälloch’s name. ‘He admits only the very bravest, but you have proved yourself worthy.’ Sibaris waved at the sacks of skin they had made. ‘You have helped me, stranger
, so I will happily vouch for you.’ He grinned. ‘Mälloch’s soul is more ancient than any in the forest, even Naieth herself is young in comparison. He has little time for common folk but,’ Sibaris’s smirk became a grin, ‘he is my great-grandfather. I’m sure he will listen. Besides, there will be many other strangers at the ceremony.’
‘The Divine Consort?’ Finavar could hardly believe what he had heard. He had never expected to find the king so soon. He looked down at his skeletal limbs. He had struggled to overcome even a small group of outsiders, how would he find the strength to avenge his brother? ‘Am I ready?’ he wondered aloud. Then he shook his head. ‘Only fate could have brought me here.’
Sibaris frowned, unsure of his meaning.
‘I will come,’ said Finavar.
Sibaris looked stunned and delighted at the same time, but before he could ask for an explanation. Finavar nodded at the abattoir they had created. ‘Once we’ve finished with your “victims”.’
The evening began strange and grew stranger. The Fiùrann were a fiery collection of young wardancers and, as they sang slurred drunken elegies from a moonlit hilltop, Finavar tried to be carried along by the wildness of their tales. A moment of escape would have been a blessing, but it was not to be. He soon noticed an odd stiffness to their songs – a forced jollity that never quite rang true. The journey had taken a night and day, and Sibaris had talked the whole time, boasting of the delights that lay ahead – of the wild debauchery of his clan, but as soon as Finavar emerged from the trees and entered the crowd, he knew that something was wrong.
Most of the shadow-dancers barely acknowledged his presence as they leapt and twirled across the grass. The rite had drawn poets and songsmiths from throughout the region. There were even travellers from other realms of the forest, so Finavar hid himself in the crowd, just another pair of ears for their songs and jokes.
As he moved through the strangers his sense of unease grew. The celebrants eyed each other warily as they met and some of them wore masks. To hide one’s face in battle was normal, but in a gathering such as this it seemed odd. Finavar noticed that some of the masked figures also wore pouches of dried flowers around their necks, soaked with lavender oil, and after giving him the briefest of greetings they would press the pouches to their noses and take a deep, nervous breath.
Intrigued, Finavar made his way through the dancers to the top of the hill, where he found the lord of the Fiùrann – a tall, hawk-nosed noble named Mälloch the Elder. As his kindreds reeled around him, Mälloch remained sprawled languorously across the grass, his long limbs enveloped by an enormous bearskin. As the others recited poems and acted out battles he lay quietly in the dark, watching the proceedings with a troubled, distant expression.
Despite the cold, most of the wardancers wore little more than Finavar – loincloths and the odd animal skin – but beneath his bearskin, Mälloch wore a soft leather tunic, embroidered with an intricate, spiralling design, and where the others carried short, leaf-bladed swords, he carried a long, curved blade, with a swan’s neck handle made of carved ivory. It was clearly of foreign manufacture and a thing of great beauty. Even after all he had been through, Finavar found himself eying the exotic weapon jealously as he approached. He noticed that the noble wore two scabbards, both of the same curved shape, but one of them was empty. He wondered what had happened to the blade’s twin.
Mälloch looked as youthful and handsome as any other asrai noble, but when Finavar reached him he saw that Sibaris had not exaggerated – Mälloch’s great age was unmistakable. His skin shone with antiquity. As he moved he shimmered, like gossamer caught in the moonlight. The same light was visible in the surrounding trees – fine strands of silver that flashed and tinkled in the breeze.
Finavar briefly met Mälloch’s eye as he passed him. The noble studied him closely and Finavar felt his confidence wavering. He turned away and accepted the wine that was offered to him, seeking courage for what lay ahead. He quickly found that his emaciated body was no match for the heady drink. His head began to spin and, as the night wore on, he found it harder to follow the words of the songs. He decided that the Liathian food might be a safer option and began to wolf down every leaf-full of nourishment he could grasp. As the food hit his stomach a wonderful sense of wellbeing flooded his body. He realised he could not remember the last time he had eaten anything that could accurately be described as a meal.
As midnight approached, the mood of the gathering grew even tenser. There was a single dead tree at the summit of the hill. Its bark was the colour of the moon and it had only two branches – a pair of thick, gnarled limbs that reached out like arms from either side of the trunk. As the wardancers recounted tales of glory and heroism, they circled the rotten husk, addressing prayers to its leafless crown. As they whirled back and forth, Mälloch finally began to pay attention, leaning forwards and staring intently at the display. As he did so, the light of the moon began to blaze brighter, breaking through a gap in the clouds and surrounding the tree in a column of silver.
Finavar could not tell if it was the wine or Mälloch’s sorcery, but the light seemed unnaturally bright. The crowd gathered on the hilltop vanished into shadow until all that was left was the illuminated tree, the endless, circular dance, and Mälloch’s eyes, blazing in the twilight.
There was a lone drummer sat beside Mälloch, and as the moon grew brighter she played harder, driving the dancers into a frenzy of flailing limbs and howled verses. Periodically, Mälloch would raise his sword in a lacklustre gesture, waving it vaguely in the direction of one of the dancers. The dancer would then step away from the tree, shaking their head in disappointment as the darkness enveloped them.
The combination of light, noise and alcohol left Finavar feeling quite bewildered. ‘What’s happening?’ he asked, turning to Sibaris who was sitting beside him on the grass. ‘When does the Lord of the Greenwood appear?’
The youth’s face gleamed like ivory as he turned to Finavar. Unlike the others, he was grinning with genuine excitement. ‘Mälloch is choosing. He must decide which of the supplicants will be offered to the Dàrragh.’
Finavar shook his head, feeling as though he were speaking to Sibaris through a thick fog. ‘The Dàrragh?’
‘The tree!’ Sibaris waved at the dead whitebeam, silhouetted in the shaft of moonlight. ‘My great-grandfather must choose an offering for the Divine Consort. Two will be bound to the tree but only one will become the Child of the Whitebeam.’
‘And the other one?’
‘The other one will receive a lesser reward. He will travel with Mälloch to the Rites of Spring. He will enter the court of the Mage Queen and join the ranks of the highborn. He will become a great lord of the forest, like Mälloch himself.’
Finavar looked back at the dancers. Their bodies were painted red with vermillion and they wore circlets of dried roses. He nodded. The details of the rite were strange, but the ritual was essentially familiar. One of the dancers would be sacrificed to feed the soul of the tree, killed for no reason in the name of Orion and the Wild Hunt. The thought sickened him. It was another example of all that was wrong with their sovereign.
He took a deep breath and tried to steady his breathing. The drumming was building to a crescendo and he guessed that Orion would soon appear.
Mälloch finally rose to his feet, threw back his bearskin and sauntered into the column of light. He waved his sword again, leaving just two of the crimson dancers to circle the tree. Then he lifted his other hand and muttered a charm.
There was a chorus of gasps as the surrounding forest lit up. Hundreds of silver flames pierced the darkness, shimmering and sparkling with the same light that shone through Mälloch’s skin. As they drifted through the darkness, washing up the sides of the hill, they lit up the faces of the assembled asrai, and painted them all as ghosts. As the flames approached, Finavar saw that they contained faces – glimpses of fallen warriors.
Mälloch was half hidden in shadow but as Finavar heard him mutter another command, he saw that the noble still looked distracted and distant, as though his thoughts were far from the hilltop ritual.
The ghosts entered the column of moonlight and began to spiral around the two remaining dancers, trailing from their limbs like pennants as they rolled and tumbled across the grass.
‘He will be here soon,’ whispered Sibaris, leaning close to Finavar.
Finavar felt a rush of panic. What did he hope to achieve? He recalled the ferocity of the king’s hunt and realised it was absurd to think he could avenge his brother in his current state. He was still far too weak to consider such a thing. He shuffled back into the crowd and took another drink of wine. Tonight was not the time to strike. Orion would butcher him. He would just become another sacrifice. He must be patient.
As the spirits surrounded the two dancers, they began fastening them to the limbs of the tree, binding them with strands of creeper and moss. The eyes of the dancers were rolling drunkenly and Finavar doubted they understood what was happening.
Finavar found himself gripped by a potent mixture of tiredness, alcohol and grief. His face twisted into a sneer. The sight of such pathetic devotion made his stomach turn. He thought of how passionately Ordaana had spoken and he suddenly wished she were with him. All his life he considered her insane, but now he saw where the real madness lay.
He rose to leave, but Sibaris hissed in alarm and dragged him to the ground. Finavar felt too exhausted to resist, so he took another slug of wine and tried to relax, waiting for the inevitable bloodshed.
Mälloch remained silent for a long time, studying the two figures bound to the tree. Then he began to address the crowd in rich, rolling tones. ‘Summer must pass, but life remains. In the earth and in the sky, the gods will linger, through the frost and snow, waiting to be born again. Even in times of great trial…’ His voice faltered, and he looked down for a second, seeming to lose his way. When he spoke again his words were quieter and less sure. ‘Even in these dark times, we must remember that we are one with nature. What befalls the forest, befalls the children of the forest. We cannot forsake our duty, however onerous it may seem. If we are to overcome this evil we must bind ourselves closer than ever before to the heart of the Eternal Realms.’