The Iron Tree: Book One of The Crowthistle Chronicles

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  A sense of enchantment hung heavily over the precinct. Suffocatingly it pressed down on the intruder. Runnels of perspiration bound his brow like fine silver chains.

  “This suits me,” Teague A’Connacht muttered to himself. “None to see me, none to call my presence into question.”

  Tethering his horse to a rail, he ascended a broad and shallow stairway. Two wide and lofty doors of brass-studded oak stood open at the top. Keeping his hand on the hilt of Buistéir, he passed between them and into a hall so vast it could have encompassed a thicket of trees. From here a grander staircase led to a second pair of majestic doors, also ajar. Beyond them was a luxurious dining hall or refectory, within which a sumptuous feast on golden dishes was spread out on a long table surrounded by tallbacked, vacant chairs. It seemed as though the diners had begun to feast, then departed only moments ago, for scarcely a morsel was touched and all appeared as fresh as if it had just been set down on the table. A plum or two missing from a pyramid of fruit, a neat bite taken from an apple tart, a spoon coated with cream, a handful of crumbs—these were among the few signs betraying the fact that the feast had begun, yet finished so peremptorily.

  Subversive and beguiling, this fare invited him: the tarts glistening with lacquers of honey, the meats dripping with gravy, the bread cloud-soft and golden brown, the topaz wines, the grapes like orbs of green ice … Teague fancied that he tasted again the salt meat, the hard cheese on which he had broken his fast that day. His tongue had shriveled; his mouth was parched and so tight he could barely swallow. He thirsted and hungered as never before, but the instructions of Aglaval Stormbringer swam in his brain: And neither eat nor drink of anything he finds in those domains …

  With a supreme effort, he took a step past the table only to wheel and turn back. There on the brink of temptation he fought with himself, and ever his eyes strayed to the luscious fruits, the lucent liquors, until between his teeth he forced out the words, “One plum can do no harm—its absence will not even be noted.” Taking up a glossy sphere, plump and tender, ripely hyacinthine and bejeweled with brilliant droplets, he bit into it.

  The juices flowed across his tongue as sweet as music after silence, as soothing as silence after cacophony. When he had swallowed the flesh, he spat the kernel into his palm. It split in half; inside it, a charred worm lay curled up like a fetus.

  The taste of ashes soured his mouth. Black disease engulfed him. In a trance, he sank onto the marble flagstones.

  Some time later, the sorcerer entered the dining hall. He was accompanied by his only human retainer, a fair-haired youth. Seeing Teague A’-Connacht lying prone on the floor, the Lord of Strang pondered awhile, then said to his retainer, “Bury this one beside the other, in the grove of cedars outside my southern borders.”

  The youngest brother, Tierney A’Connacht, rode through the palisade of louring pines and came to the horse yard overleaned by chestnut trees. Many fine horses were gathered there, and a horseherd was pouring oats into their feed troughs. Not far off, a bonfire of green juniper wood crackled and smoked, its clear, cyanic flames giving off a dense fume.

  “Good morrow, my friend,” said Tierney. “Can you tell me where Castle Strang is?”

  “I cannot tell you,” repeated the horseherd, “but go on a little farther and you will come to a cowherd, and he perhaps might tell you.”

  “Gramercie,” said Tierney. As he made ready to ride off, his head snapped around and he stared a second time at the herd, for he had spied amongst them a roan mare that had belonged to his brother Teague.

  “And a good day to you also,” said Tierney as he hacked off the head of the horseherd.

  Opening the yard gate, he freed the mare and turned her head toward Charter Hall. Smacking her across the rump, he said, “Go home!” Teague’s mare needed no further urging but bolted into the hills with all speed.

  Tierney perceived that the horseherd’s bonfire was now extinct.

  Taking no pleasure in the work, the young man questioned all those he encountered before hewing off their heads, including the ancient henwife. At length he reached the top of the ridge. He rode three times widdershins around Castle Strang, entered the doors, led his horse through the gaseous courtyard strewn with the remnants of dead fires, and bypassed the feast in the refectory. His thirst was terrible, his hunger threatened to sever him at the waist, but one bright vision burned before his eyes, and he would allow nothing to hinder him.

  Through the halls of Strang he strode, still leading his horse. Of the richness and brilliance of his surroundings he took little heed, despite that every chamber seemed to extend the entire length and height of the interior of a hill. The superb fluted pillars supporting the roof were as tall as forest giants. Wrought of gold and silver, they were fretted with wreaths of flowers fashioned from diamonds and precious stones. From the center of each ceiling, where the principal arches met, immense lamps hung from gold chains. Each lamp was made from one hollowed pearl, perfectly transparent, in the midst of which was suspended a large ruby that by the power of gramarye continuously rotated, casting over the interior a clear and mellow light like the setting sun.

  The furniture of Castle Strang was as resplendent as the architecture. At the farthest end of the last hall, beneath a richly ornate canopy, stood a jeweled chair of silk and velvet. Upon it sat Álainna Machnamh, and she was combing her hair.

  When she set eyes on Tierney A’Connacht, she stood up. The silver comb clattered to the floor as she cried out, “May the Fates have mercy on thee in thy folly, Tierney! Why have you come here?”

  “I have come for thee, Álainna. Are you hurt?”

  “He never touched me, for it was not my will. He gave me until this night to change my mind, and if I do not, he says he will weave some enchantment upon me.”

  “For his imprisonment of you, he will be punished, I will make certain.”

  He held out his arms, and she ran to embrace him, but doubt made her falter. Looking askance at the young man, she said, “But perhaps I am mistaken. Are you not some simulacrum?”

  “I am not.”

  “Tell me what you gave me for my sixth birthday.”

  “I gave thee a bunch of violets.”

  The damsel flung her arms around him, saying, “Alas, Tierney, it is thee, but if thou hadst a hundred thousand lives, not one of them could now be saved. Woe that ever I was born, for if the sorcerer should find thee here, thy life will be forfeit and I shall be left desolate. Thy dear brothers, my friends, lie beneath the turf in the cedar grove.”

  “Álainna,” said the young man, “they shall be avenged, and I shall either set thee free or die. Now come with me.”

  “I cannot!” she said. “Some charm or bewitchment will not allow me to pass beyond these walls.”

  “I will break that charm,” said A’Connacht.

  As the last word left his lips, the hall doors burst open with tremendous violence and in came the sorcerer. Enraged, he shouted, “Insolent pup! How dare you trespass in my house! I’ll carve your brains from your skull.”

  “Then strike, son of darkness, if you dare!” exclaimed the undaunted A’Connacht, starting up and drawing the golden sword.

  A savage duel ensued. The wrath of the Lord of Strang was ferocious, but that of the young man was greater. He fought for the sake of his brothers, and for Álainna; he fought with ardent skill, never allowing his passion to mar his judgment. He fought with Fallowblade.

  The sorcerer’s charmed blade had no efficacy against a weapon not forged of iron. Before the relentless onslaught, he fell back. Tierney saw his chance. He lunged forward beneath his opponent’s defenses and struck the sword hand from his right arm. The severed hand fell to the ground, still gripping the sword.

  Roaring like a meteor, the Lord of Strang clutched at the wounded stump of his wrist, but Tierney A’Connacht pressed Fallowblade to his throat.

  “Let us both go free unharmed,” said A’Connacht, “or you will die now.”

&
nbsp; “If you slay me,” groaned the Lord of Strang, “the girl will be a prisoner here forever. Only I can lift the spell that binds her between these walls.”

  A’Connacht swore a violent oath.

  “Upon my honor, I will not take your life if you free her now,” he said, “and if you do not hinder me from escaping from this mausoleum either.”

  “On my word, you may both depart unimpeded,” gasped the sorcerer. To his faithful servant he cried, “Heat the irons in the fire, Ruairc, for this wound must be cauterized ere my life bleeds away.”

  But A’Connacht said, “You are no wight, sorcerer, but a mortal man. Unlike the immortals, you have the ability to tell lies. Therefore I do not trust your word. You shall accompany us out of this castle ere I allow your servant near you or me with his hot irons.”

  Through the silent, splendid halls of Castle Strang they went, those four, with Álainna holding the reins of Tierney’s steed. When they reached the outer doors, the sorcerer said a Word, and with his remaining hand sketched a sign in the air, and Álainna found she was able to pass through into the courtyard. A’Connacht grasped the Lord of Strang by the hair, the edge of the golden sword pressed between his shoulder blades. They made their exit through the gates, and when they had walked fifty paces, Tierney released his foe. He and Álainna leapt upon the horse and galloped out of sight.

  Hugging his mutilated arm to his body, the sorcerer screamed a curse after them. “Álainna, if ever you wed this base miscreant, death and madness shall fall on you both, and shall follow any offspring of your union to the end of days. Hear me! Madness for yourself and death for your lover! You may fly from me, but you cannot avoid my malediction.”

  He tottered and fell down on his doorstep in a pool of his own blood, but his faithful lad brought the red-hot irons and cauterized the wound in a burst of steam and bloody smoke, then bore his master into the castle on a litter and tended him until he was hale once more.

  The story ended.

  In the chimney corner, the drudge stirred in her sleep and sighed. Beside her, the lad Fionnbar was slumped in a snoring heap. The room was cold as an ice cave.

  The pile of rags spoke again. “I was that servant,” concluded Ruairc MacGabhann unnecessarily. “His only living servant. All the rest were naught but thin moonshine and fumes clothed in a semblance of reality. Only I live to tell the full story of Tierney A’Connacht and Álainna Machnamh.”

  “Did they wed?” Jarred asked softly, foreseeing the answer. “Tierney and Álainna?”

  “Of course they did,” affirmed the old eyesore. “How could they do otherwise? Love blinds us to peril. They were married, and a son was born to them. Perhaps they might have known happiness in those days, but always they were intent on eluding the Lord of Strang, so they departed from Slievmordhu and were seen no more, as far I know.”

  Jarred retreated as far as possible from the filthy bed of rags and the near-blind narrator, who peered at him in a distasteful way. “At the time,” said the old man, “the power of the Lord of Strang was great, but not as great as it was to become later. The couple fled from his wrath, fled into hiding. But they and their descendants could not escape such a curse.”

  “Perchance,” said Jarred stiffly, “Castle Strang harbors the secret of how to rid that family of this malison.”

  “I doubt it,” cackled the skinny rooster. “Since the demise of the Lord, the Dome is closely guarded by the soldiers of King Maolmórdha, so that the king’s enemies cannot be getting near enough to find out many amazing secrets.” He smacked his lips again. “But Maolmórdha cannot get in either. About the curse, nothing can be done,” he said with finality—and, Jarred suspected, a note of spiteful glee.

  All at once the southerner wished again, more ardently, to be far away from that unsavory dive. Without further ado, he tossed the purse of coins on the bed, threw open the door, and took his leave.

  The lonely plaint of homecoming plovers sawed at the violin strings of the evening breeze. Like a garden of red glass flowers, cookfires sprang up over the length and breadth of the Fairfield as the stallholders settled down for the third night. Fewer were there than on the previous evening; already some had packed up and departed for their distant homes, among them the weathermasters and other Narngalishmen. Away in the reeds of the Rushy Water, bitterns boomed.

  Lilith and Earnán were sitting by their fire, awaiting Jarred’s return. Chains of silence bound them together, simultaneously insulating them in private worlds of reverie. Earnán was lost in recollections of Liadán: the sound of her voice, the times they had spent together. Lilith’s thoughts strayed, again, to the family life she and Jarred might have enjoyed. The longing that was on her was like a sickness. In her mind she sang to her unborn child; she talked to her unborn child and asked forgiveness for never being able to open the door to Life. The torment weighed on her and ate at her like acid.

  Jarred walked into the firelight. As soon as he set eyes on Lilith, he removed the amulet from his neck and placed it around hers.

  “You are secure again,” he said steadfastly.

  “And you have returned!” she answered fervently. Her melancholy evaporated, and she moved to embrace him, but, recalling her prohibition on touching, drew back at the last instant.

  “What news?” asked Earnán.

  Jarred related the entire tale as it had been told to him by Ruairc MacGabhann, and when he had finished the three of them sat together in despondent silence, mulling over the implications of all they had heard.

  Said Lilith presently, “It seems nothing can be done.”

  “I will journey to this Dome—” began Jarred.

  “You will not!” flared Lilith. “Will you deprive us of your life? Hear me out. In this kingdom the legends of Castle Strang are well known to everybody, although most folk consider them of no greater moment than children’s nursery tales. The place’s actual existence, however, is now far from the daily thoughts of the populace. Who would waste their time pondering about an uninhabited fortress that has remained unassailable for decades, unaltered except for a slow deterioration of its outer surfaces? Everyone knows that it remains heavily guarded. King Maolmórdha, with all his druids, cannot find a way to gain entry, and in his jealousy he will not allow the weathermasters to try, but he has ensured that none of his rivals may broach the fortress either. It is said that there are indeed wondrous treasures and secrets of gramarye to be found within the Dome. That may be true or not, but this is a fact: the Royal Sentinels offer no mercy to trespassers. Whoever is cunning enough to slip past their watch is no better off. If he should endeavor to break through the gates or climb the walls, or gain access to the Dome in any way whatsoever, he will be slain instantly, burned to a charred remnant by some kind of enchanted flame that is a property woven into the premises themselves.”

  Jarred remained silent, pondering on this news. “Well,” he said at length, “it seems there would be no profit in seeking answers at this sorcerous castle. Yet my heart is heavy, for I would fain act in some way, yet I cannot see any road before me.”

  The fourth and last day of the Fair proved a long and miserable one. That evening, the marshfolk dismantled their stalls in preparation for an early start in the morning.

  “I beg you to leave this place with us,” Lilith pleaded with Jarred. “There is no profit in remaining. You have discovered all the answers to be found.”

  Reluctantly he agreed, although every nerve of his body was racked with the agony of yearning for what could never be, and he could not bear to envisage the future as it must now unfold.

  All hope was terminated. Only despair remained to fill up the rest of eternity. The curse was irrevocable—madness would afflict Lilith if she were to marry. There was no knowing whether it might smite her even if she remained single.

  Since he could not marry Lilith, Jarred debated leaving the marsh. For a long time he had been beset with self-reproach in regard to his mother; he would think fondly of her and w
onder how she fared, and try to contrive some way of sending her a message, or even to make the long journey back to R’shael to visit her.

  Yet if he should depart, Lilith’s bewitching face must surely haunt him, her voice must come to him in dreams; he would be forced to remain ignorant of her condition—whether she were happy, whether she were in good health; he must exist deprived of her conversation, her companionship, her pure, unselfish love. Should he stay, however, he must endure each moment in a ferment of stymied desire and thwarted passion, accepting her daily presence without the fulfilment of her embrace, constantly being reminded of the joy that eluded them both.

  Lilith’s pain equaled her lover’s. Contemplating life without him threatened to drive her to distraction. Her gaze constantly lingered on him: the sculptured line of his jaw, the high-molded cheekbones, the thick hair pouring down his back as rich and glossy as gravy. In his hazel eyes she saw her unborn children, and she wept for what had been lost. She supposed he might leave the marsh. Should she beg him to stay? What if he would not? Or, if he desired to stay, should she leave, in case her doom infected him? By irresolution she was torn, by sorrow she was pierced, and she could no longer find happiness in anything.

  She and her loved ones went home dispiritedly from the Autumn Fair.

  V

  The Jewel

  It seemed, the next year, that Summer was loath to depart. A mellow wind blew in from the south, carrying on its back a fragrance of roses. The migratory birds were in no hurry to leave the long rays of sunlight that lay like ripe corn across the marshlands. They sang and twittered from every tree and reed bed, their colors flashing in the foliage of islets, flaming in reflections from tranquil meres.

  This idyll was in stark contrast to the mood of Lilith and Jarred. For them, the months passed in dejection. They tried to keep up their spirits, but, torn between parting from one another and staying together in chaste friendship, they found it impossible.