The Iron Tree: Book One of The Crowthistle Chronicles

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  “’Tuz true,” said Fridleif Squüdfitcher bitterly. “End hed he been et Fountain Square, I’d stull hev my good gray gildung.”

  “Landlord? Do these men speak truth?” the sergeant demanded. The landlord, apprehensively standing by, was a plump man in a reddish tunic. His gray stocking cap was slipping off his balding pate. He humbly dipped his head and the cap fell off into his hand. “That they do, sir. I’ll avow.”

  “Release him!” The two guardsmen stepped away from Eoin, who rubbed his arms where their gloved hands had gripped him. “Hear ye,” said the sergeant loudly, beaming his stern gaze around the tavern room like a lighthouse. “King Maolmórdha Ó Maoldúin himself, may Ádh shower fortune upon him, wishes to interview a man who might well be able to furnish important knowledge. There is a reward for information leading to his discovery. Be assured, this man is accused of no ill deed, and if he willingly presents himself at the palace, he himself will receive the reward. He is as I have described.” One of his men murmured in the sergeant’s ear. “And possibly speaks with an Ashqalêthan accent,” added the sergeant. Without another word, he pushed through the press of his men and ducked out the doorway into the rain.

  Eoin watched the last of the guards follow their superior officer. A hard light smouldered in his eyes.

  High in the peaks of the city, the noon bell struck. Its mellow tones winged their way across the roofscape of one of the poorer parts of town, where Jarred was wearily seeking somewhere to rest for a while. He sat down on the threshold of a doorway giving onto the street, beneath a crumbling arched portico. Leaning his head against the cold stonework, he let his thoughts drift back to the recent past, back to the marsh.

  He recalled taking his leave of Lilith as the convoy made ready to depart for the Fair. She had seemed permeated with a serenity he had not seen in her before. He marveled. No longer did she jump in fright at the slightest unexpected sound.

  At their parting she had said, “I have come to terms with this curse, a stór. If it destroys me, it will not matter. Nay, do not look at me in alarm. You must understand, it has been worth triggering my bane. It has been worth all. Had I not married you and borne Jewel, I would be curse free, perhaps. Perhaps not. But had I lived free of the risk, never having been your wife, never having known my child—that would have been more severe than anything Jaravhor could have called down on me.

  “It would have been like slaying my own child, only worse, because she never would have lived, never known the world. We would never have seen her face or heard her voice. So believe me when I say to you, ’twas all worth it. We have had thirteen years of joy together, you and I. Should our lives be snuffed out tomorrow, none can ever take those years from us. If madness withers my mind, even if it kills me, it cannot erase the fact we’ve enjoyed our happiness, we’ve welcomed our child. So you see, I have come to terms with the curse.”

  “I am glad for you,” said Jarred, kissing her, “but as for myself, I will fight the scourge to the very end.”

  Beneath the crumbling arched portico in Cathair Rua, as the final notes of the noon bell waned, Jarred sifted through these memories. He closed his eyes just for a moment.

  An hour and a half later, the rattling iron wheelrims of a passing street vendor’s cart roused him. Reflexively, his hand flew to his chest. The vitreous lump that was the sorcerer’s jewel remained safe beneath his tunic. His pulse slowed; the treasure had not been thieved from him as he slept.

  “You are very trusting, young man,” said a voice from the shadows. “Trusting, or unwise, or both, to fall asleep alone in the streets of Cathair Rua. You may not believe me, but I guarded you as you slept.”

  The speaker was a bearded man with unkempt hair, brown streaked with silver gray. He looked to be about fifty winters old, although some observers might have found his age difficult to estimate; the man’s skin was unlined, as clear and fine pored as the skin of a youth, neither leathered nor spotted by sun or wind, as if he had spent his life indoors. There was, however, enough looseness of the flesh beneath the eyes, enough furrowing across the forehead, to proclaim he had reached the middle years. He was strong and stalwart, dark eyed.

  “Why should I believe you?” Jarred asked, springing to his feet. “I am not as gullible as you seem to think. Maybe I can fall asleep unworried because I have nothing of value to steal.”

  “There are thieves around here,” said the stranger, “who, unaware of your poverty, would just as soon give you a blow on the head and rifle through your pockets to see what they could find. It is surprising what items of value apparent paupers may carry with them.”

  Jarred bristled.

  The stranger, however, made no threatening gestures. Furthermore, he stood aloof and was not bearing any noticeable weapons. He appeared to be of a similar height to Jarred. His clothes were made of good-quality fabric but travel stained and well worn; they were a mishmash of styles, dyed with shades from many different lands. The man had an air of one who had traveled far, and his eyes had the burned-out look of one who has seen much.

  “Why should you guard me anyway?” Jarred asked.

  “I ask myself the same question. Perhaps it was your very vulnerability. I have always been one to protect the defenseless. Or perhaps it is because you remind me of myself.”

  The younger man eyed him warily and made no reply.

  “I was hoping you might take that as a compliment,” said the stranger, “but perhaps not. You take care of yourself, now, and do not be so unwary.”

  He turned to go, but something in the way he moved struck Jarred, and he said quickly, “Wait.” The stranger turned back and Jarred said, “I do take that as a compliment. I daresay you are a man who has seen much of the world and learned about many of its marvels.” In his heart, uncertainty raged against hope and disbelief, warring with self-loathing for even daring to hope and thus setting himself up for yet another disappointment.

  “Even so,” said the man, nodding curtly. “Many marvels have I seen and many more will see, perhaps. A traveler unrolls a long road when he attempts to find out what he is seeking. You might say I speak in riddles, and perhaps I do, but to me they make sense.”

  “Maybe what he is seeking is something he left behind,” Jarred hazarded.

  “A traveler may leave behind many things when he is forever roaming. It might be the very first thing he left behind that keeps him on the move. I have never stayed for long in one place.” Nearby the street vendor rummaged in his cart, rattling some pans. The stranger glanced at the source of the irritating noise. “I bide too long here. Evening draws nigh.” He made to depart, but hesitated. Fastening his attention on Jarred’s face, he studied him quizzically for a moment. In that moment, Jarred thought he saw a flash of something that might have been recognition, or disbelief, or sudden regret, as swiftly quenched as it had appeared.

  They held each other’s gaze. Then the stranger said earnestly, almost apologetically, “In this world there are many questions humankind cannot answer.”

  The words Jarred would have liked to speak seemed stuck in his throat. He felt paralyzed, caught between two forces, one impelling him toward this enigmatic person, the other wrenching him away.

  “You are a fine man,” said the stranger musingly. “Farewell.”

  And he was off, before Jarred was able to force the sounds from his mouth or even to move. After the man had vanished into the tangle of side streets and shadows, moving silently and swiftly, Jarred croaked, “What is your name?” but there was no one to reply.

  A thin, pearly light suffused the city streets, sieving down through silver-gray cloud cover like wadded thistledown. There was no time to dwell on the chance encounter; with fierce resolve, Jarred compelled himself to dismiss it from his thoughts, intending to puzzle over it later, at leisure. He purchased a meat pie from the street vendor. After one bite of rancid gravy and gristle, he threw the repulsive viand to a stray dog. Having judged by the sun’s angle that it was time for the
pudding-faced sentry’s watch to finish, he struck out once more for the sanctorum.

  He was passing the mouth of a dank alleyway when an unkempt, barefoot woman darted from a clot of grisaille shadow and plucked urgently at his cloak. “Jarred!” she hissed fiercely.

  He halted, astounded. “Who are you?”

  “Alas, have you forgotten me? I am Fionnuala, the half sister of Fionnbar. Great peril snaps at your heels. On your life, come with me.”

  He recognized, then, the girl who had once been rawboned but comely. Comely she was no longer. Years of subsistence in the city streets had sapped the last vestiges of her beauty. Hollow were her cheeks, gaunt and spare her figure. Her eyes were sunken into their sockets, as if retreating in horror from the sights they had beheld. Her timidity had vanished also, to be replaced with an unyielding quality, a ruthlessness that Jarred knew belonged to folk subjected to gruelling poverty.

  “This is some trick,” he said.

  “No trick!” Her face, upturned to Jarred’s, appeared earnest, open, sincere. She might have been lying, but he knew she was not. He imagined he glimpsed tears behind her eyes. “Word is going around that you are hunted by the king’s men. You took the Star, did you not? We all saw that it was gone, but only Finn and I guessed who had taken it. At all events, we must not stand here prating. Hasten! Follow me and I’ll take you to a hiding place. Then I shall tell you more.”

  Jarred hesitated, but only for a heartbeat. Reaching a decision, he nodded curtly and strode after the woman as she glided quietly down the deserted alleyway.

  The paths by which she led him began to look familiar, and it was not long before he found himself approaching, for the third time in his life, the grimy door of the hovel of Ruiarc MacGabhann.

  “I’ll not enter here!” he said, resisting as she tried to pull him forward. “I’ll not confront that old rogue again.”

  “He’s dead,” she said brusquely. “We buried him years ago. ’Tis only me and Finn now, and Finn is from home. Come! Quickly, before someone sees you!”

  Reluctantly, Jarred allowed her to lead him through the low doorway.

  Within the windowless chamber, all was much the same as it had been fourteen years ago, except cleaner and lacking the heap of rags that had once been the couch of MacGabhann.

  Embers glowed in the fireplace. On the mantelpiece stood the same two battered cups and jug. The wall shelf held the identical chipped dishes, but fewer. The furniture still consisted of a table, a bench seat, a chest, and a three-legged stool, with the addition of a bale of straw. Fionnuala bade Jarred seat himself on the bale. She picked up the poker and nudged some life into the fire while she finished her tale, as promised.

  “Word is about,” she said, “that the king seeks a man whose description fits you perfectly. This man is wanted for the purpose of asking him for information, so the official explanation claims, but we city folk are not fools. The Star disappears, next day the king’s men are scouring the city for a brown-haired man wearing a green neckerchief—take it off!” she interrupted herself, as though seeing the scarf for the first time. Dubiously, Jarred untied the knot. She continued, “This can only mean that you were seen removing the Star. Prithee, do not look at me askance, sir! You are the only one able to do that deed. Of course I know it was you.”

  “Are you saying the king wants the jewel from me?”

  “I am not. I am saying he wants a descendant of the Lord of Strang, for only such a one can crack open the Dome he so longs to penetrate. There is a bounty set on you, but you must be taken alive. Or you can turn yourself in and receive the reward, but you’d never be free to enjoy it, not once they had you in their clutches. The Druid Imperius would be hardly likely to set free the scion of a powerful sorcerer to walk abroad beyond his control. Neither the palace nor the sanctorum can be trusted. They’d wall you up somewhere, for sure, after you’d opened the Dome of Strang for them.”

  “Open the Dome!” exclaimed Jarred with abhorrence. “I’ll have naught to do with Strang or any other thing wrought by my father’s father. Only ill could come of reopening any edifice built by such a rogue. My heart tells me something evil lies hidden within that wretched fortress. If I had my way, the Dome would remain locked until the end of time.”

  “Nevertheless, the hunt for you is on. News spreads fast, especially when a reward is offered. If you were to dare the streets again now, you’d soon be recognized, or at least suspected. You must stay here until nightfall.”

  “And then?”

  “Under cover of darkness I shall help you escape the city. ’Tis unlikely the king knows from whence you hail. Once you are gone from here, he will not know where to look for you in the Four Kingdoms. Especially if you do not wear this!” she said, snatching up Jarred’s green neckerchief and tossing it on the fire. Jarred made to retrieve it, then checked himself.

  “How did you find me?” he asked, watching Lilith’s gift burn.

  For the first time since he had encountered her, Fionnuala seemed at a loss for words. She said awkwardly, “I confess, every time there’s a Fair, I watch for you.”

  He shook his head. “I do not know what to make of your words.”

  “For years I have watched, observing you from afar each time you came to the city. Since you arrived at this Autumn Fair, I have been following you.”

  Uncomfortably, Jarred asked, “Why?”

  “I love you.”

  The last corner of the green kerchief turned black. It twisted into a spiral and fell apart. Soft, sooty flakes flew up the chimney like a flock of strange birds.

  “Won’t you take me with you?” said Fionnuala, now on her knees beside Jarred. “Escape to the north, away from this city and the marsh? Or westward, to the free airs of the ocean? We could live well, you and I—you with your sorcerer’s powers—we could do aught, have all.”

  After her declaration of fourteen years of unreturned affection, Jarred could not bring himself to meet Fionnuala’s savage gaze. Averting his eyes, he said, “For your help, lady, gramercie. You say you love me. I cannot understand how it should be so, since you do not know me. I would that you did not feel thus, but if you do, you will understand I must return to my wife and daughter in the marsh.”

  Jumping to her feet in a storm of swirling, tattered skirts, Fionnuala stamped her calloused foot. “I have saved you from capture, risking my life to abet you, and you repay me with naught but scorn!”

  “Not scorn—”

  She overrode his words. “You say you have a daughter? Why then, the palace and the sanctorum would be most fascinated to meet her, for if you do not wish to unlock the Dome for them, perhaps she will!”

  Jarred too was on his feet now. “In that case I must go at once to warn my people to hide her!”

  “And how quickly can you travel? Do you have a horse? I know you do not. You must go on foot.”

  “Then I must start now.” Jarred leapt toward the door.

  “Wait!” she cried. “In daylight, you will not go far before you are seized. I have promised to help you, and that I shall do. If you wait until nightfall, I will get a horse for you and guide you out of the city by way of desolate lanes frequented only by the blind and the sick and those too drunk to take note of us. Then you may go to warn your daughter.”

  “You are generous.”

  “But in return,” she said, “you must make me a promise.”

  “What promise?”

  “If I help you get away safely, you must give me your word that you will leave your wife and go with me.”

  “I will not!” Jarred cried.

  “In that case, I shall go at once to the palace. I shall tell them the man who took the Star is a marshman. On their thoroughbred steeds, the king’s men will reach your daughter first, long before you have a chance to get home and warn her.”

  Jarred regarded the unkempt woman, and if there had been no scorn in his former glance, there was ample now.

  “Is this your notion of love?�
� he said in a low voice.

  Fionnuala tossed her head carelessly. “In these streets, one learns to survive. Do you accept the offer or not?” A myriad of possibilities raced through Jarred’s mind, but she seemed to read his thoughts. “You might bind me and leave me here so that I could not go running to the palace. But Finn will be coming in soon, or maybe later. He would set me free. You might slay me instead, but I think you will not, for you are a good man.” Her demeanor was fleering, challenging. “You presume I do not know you, but I do. I have watched. You are a man of honor and will not harm me. What is it to be—your daughter’s safety, or her peril?”

  Jarred glowered, thunderous. “You leave me no choice,” he said grimly. “If you help me escape, and if you do not betray me, I will do as you ask.”

  Triumph kindled in the woman’s pale eyes. “We shall go north together. Swear that you will meet me on the eastern side of the Scamallach Pass this Lantern Eve, or before. I shall be waiting there for you.”

  “I swear.” He spat the words from his tongue as if they were rancid gravy.

  “So,” she said, “we wait for nightfall.”

  A red-robed novice held a burning taper to a candle in a brightly lit room of the sanctorum. As he attended to the lighting arrangements, he moved amongst richly embellished furnishings. Massive brass candelabra stood seven feet high, thick with crocketted pinnacles and tracery; the settles, bookcases, and escritoire were diapered, chamfered, and quatrefoiled. A table was set beneath an oriel window. Marquetry-topped, it was bordered with a frieze of mouchettes. From each corner of the tabletop projected an ornate candlestick holder. Four slender candlesticks grew thereon.

  At this table, in a rose-backed chair, sat Secundus Adiuvo Constanto Clementer. A prematurely balding man of middle height, in his late twenties, he was clad mostly in druids’ white. His assistant, Almus Agnellus, a short, plump fellow, was speaking to him.

  “It appears this petitioner was asking to see you, my lord,” he said. “He was saying something about lifting a curse of insanity.”