The Book of Pearl

by Timothee de Fombelle

  “We should make do with what we’ve got,” insisted Joshua.

  “It’s all going to plan, just the way he said it would. He hasn’t lied to us so far.”

  “So far, yes, but…”

  “He wants to protect himself. It’s in his interest to keep us at a distance.”

  Even as he was speaking, El Fassi recalled the hatred that had smouldered in Kozo’s eyes; but he also knew they were hundreds of kilometres from the French border and that neither of them spoke German. What could they do without a map or a compass, and in these clothes?

  “We can manage,” said Pearl. Over there, the faint light was glowing in the window of the hut.

  “Look at me,” said Brahim El Fassi very seriously. “Look at me carefully.”

  Despite the inky blackness, Pearl could make out his friend’s deeply lined face and those eyes as dark as his skin. How was he supposed to cross Germany in 1942, with features like his?

  “So? Do you still believe we can?”

  “I know all about forests,” said Joshua Pearl. “I know how to keep hidden, cross rivers and find invisible paths. I’ll lead the way. I promise you we’ll make it.”

  He pointed in another direction while, in the distance, the whistle sounded from the train departing. But El Fassi was no longer there. He had rushed into the clearing. Just as Pearl made to follow him, a burst of machine-gun fire blew out the hut windows, and swept across the undergrowth.

  Pearl saw his friend being flung into the air and come crumpling back down again. The flames from the machine gun blasted through the window as the bullets hailed down. Pearl was fixed to the spot. He saw the gun switch aim and begin to fire at him with the same intensity, making the bark on the tree erupt and throwing up the earth and frost-covered leaves at his feet.

  He cast a final look at Brahim El Fassi’s lifeless body in the long grass. It was all over. He understood there was nothing for it but to flee.

  There were soldiers rushing out of the hut, and more with dogs closing in on him from behind. But once again Pearl had the reflexes of a hunted animal. As he leapt between the trees he knew exactly what he had to do, despite the sweat blurring his vision.

  Yes, if El Fassi had listened, Joshua would have helped him return home. He had escaped from other chases, from other impossible crossings. He would have led his friend back to the heart of his desert, back to his village in the sands.

  Reinforcements were arriving from the stalag. The woods were staked out, and there were temporary roadblocks at every crossroads for a radius of ten kilometres. Kozo’s men even forced the villagers to comb the area with their hunting guns. But the fugitive was nowhere to be found.

  A hundred kilometres away, the train was slicing through the fog. The driver had made up for some of the two-hour delay by charging full speed ahead through the freezing night. Dawn was breaking, and most of the passengers were asleep. Joshua Pearl kept an eye on them, sitting by the window in a velvet suit that was much too big for him, and which he had removed from a suitcase in the first class carriage.

  His hand had been injured while hoisting himself up onto the moving train. Now, his fist was clenched inside his sleeve and his head hung low. He watched the water droplets rolling horizontally across the window, level with his eyes. The whiff of wax from the carriage seat, mingled with a female traveller’s eau de Cologne, reminded him of Madame Pearl’s dining room in Paris. A little girl was staring soberly at him from the arms of her dozing mother.

  He had just lost his only friend and destroyed the delicate trail that might have led him back to his realm and to the buried layers of his memory. But he also had to acknowledge that he was now forming memories on this earth.

  These were his first tastes of nostalgia since arriving here.

  It was because of the tenderness of certain moments in our world that he would have to remind himself, for the rest of his life, that in order to preserve his desire to return to the Kingdoms, he had to keep his grief alive.

  17

  A FLEETING GLIMPSE

  Iliån was discovering happiness.

  They spent hours together, following one another in silence through the forest, or waiting in the branches for flocks of starlings. They encouraged the little puma to regain his liberty by bringing him to swim with them in the middle of the lake. For Iliån, whose childhood had been one of absolute solitude, Oliå’s presence was revelatory. He didn’t even need to glance at her to realize how his inner world had opened out to be twice as wide, twice as gentle. Yet he was also aware of the occasional shadows that passed across Oliå’s face.

  “The water is clear here,” he said to her.

  “So it is.”

  “It’s the stream from the source that flows into the lake.”

  There was no response from Oliå, who was swimming ahead of him.

  “Can you feel how cold it is?”

  She dived beneath the crystalline waters to reach the warmer currents below.

  Iliån knew that Oliå was a fairy. He had known from the very first instant, despite her talent for keeping her powers invisible and hiding them away among the ordinary mysteries of life. Whether it was a rain shower at an opportune moment, or a rock that jutted out just enough to offer them shelter, Iliån understood each of her gifts in turn. He had heard enough stories from his father, who had told him about the indomitable character of fairies; how they defied evil kings and wicked stepmothers. Oliå was like them, but she had something else too: a deep-set pain, a haunting woe, a secret that tugged at Iliån’s heart.

  Their happiness could have lasted forever. They were kindred spirits, both of them accustomed to a clandestine existence. They rarely spoke, preferring to listen to the wind and to breathe in the earth. Occasionally, when it was stormy, they would walk huddled together, leaning forward as though pushing at a wall of air and rain, before building huge fires to warm themselves again.

  They would have had no difficulty staying hidden from the rest of the world; even the blood-soaked realm that besieged the forest and the lake had ceased to exist for them.

  Returning late to the summer palace in a dreamlike state, Iliån took his father by the arm and lead him down to the pontoon.

  “She’s watching me,” the king said.

  Iliån stared around him in the darkness. His father saw the queen everywhere, in the red embers of a fire or the scuttling of a lizard. Tonight, the reflection on the water made it look as though there were two moons on the horizon, like a pair of open eyes.

  “She’s asleep on her bed. She’s watching me.”

  On cloudy nights, or when the moon wasn’t out, the king would whisper, “Let her sleep. It’s fine. I made her wait for so long that I can easily hold out until morning.”

  He slowed his pace as if he didn’t want to disturb the dark, before turning to look at the son he was unable to recognize.

  “I will return alone on horseback. Away with you, boy. Your parents must be waiting.”

  Iliån knew that his father had long since ridden his last horse, and formed his final cavalcade. Only the clouds, for their part, were galloping across the moon.

  When he had accompanied his father back to his bedchamber, Iliån went to sit by Fåra’s side.

  “You come back a little later each day,” the old man would comment, stitching a boot or carving pins out of little bird bones, as the water lapped at the stilts below them.

  “I hope one day you don’t come back at all.”

  Every time he would utter this phrase as though it were a prophecy, breaking off from his task to look at Iliån. Fåra was in no doubt that something had changed in the young prince’s life.

  One evening, his words sounded like an order.

  “Life is not meant to be lived in a hole.”

  “This is no hole,” Iliån answered for once. “And even if it were, I’m happy here.”

  “Think about the larvae that grow in the pontoon…”

  Iliån watched Fåra’s hands, wh
ich continued working delicately as he spoke.

  “If the larvae do not leave their holes,” said the servant, “they dry up like grains of barley and get eaten by the birds. You must leave before that happens to you, Majesty.”

  “What about you? What about my father?”

  “We are too dry, too light for the birds.”

  “So what are you waiting for here?”

  “The wind.”

  Iliån lay down on the floor and surveyed a star through the tattered straw roof. From the alcove came the sound of the king breathing on his bed.

  “Don’t worry about us any more,” said the servant.

  “Fåra…”

  “I’m thinking about what your father would have wanted. About what your mother must be screaming in her silence. Go!”

  “Fåra, I have to tell you…”

  “I don’t want to know.”

  “Why?”

  Fåra looked at him solemnly.

  “Don’t let anyone bind you to these forests. You must leave them behind.”

  Iliån closed his eyes. Fåra had guessed at the secret love he was harbouring.

  “You will soon be fifteen, the age when princes can become kings.”

  “I have no age. I don’t exist.”

  “But your brother…”

  “He has no reason to fear me. Doesn’t my name mean ‘he who shall never reign’?”

  “As far as Iån is concerned, you go by another name. One that will take his breath away when he finds out that you exist after all.”

  At that very instant, however, deep in the woods, King Iån was breathless for different reasons. It was the third time he had seen her.

  The first time, two months earlier, she was crossing a bridge made of forest creepers high overhead. He had positioned himself in a crevice in the ground, and was lying in wait for two rebels that he and his archers had been pursuing for several days. The young king stayed on his own while the others scoured the banks of the lake. Suddenly, on seeing the bridge pull taut, he drew his dagger, only to discover that a young woman had appeared and was walking along, oblivious of his presence. It was a fleeting glimpse.

  The second time, he wasn’t there by accident. He had spent several long, sleepless weeks haunted by that vision. It was back in the same place on a misty day. He had to edge closer to get a better look at her face, causing her to vanish into the wispy fog before reaching the other side of the bridge. Afterwards, he took the captain of his archers into his confidence, charging him with finding out her name and the place where she lived, without breathing a word to Taåg or anyone else.

  The captain’s efforts had been in vain.

  This, the third time, he’d managed to stay by her side for several minutes as she slept by a flickering fire. He hadn’t needed anyone’s help. The smell from the fire, mingled with his hunter’s instincts, had drawn him towards her. It was cold. She slept wrapped in a green and gold cape that once upon a time must have been magnificent, but was now as worn as an old saddlecloth.

  Her head was resting on the forest floor, and the light from the embers danced across her skin. He was right next to her, unable to move away: he found her truly dazzling. He wanted to be someone else, to wash the blood from his hands and be worthy of the enchanting soul he saw before him. He wanted her to feel no fear when she woke. For the first time, Iån felt the desire to look into a person’s eyes and read something other than terror. But he did not disturb her, choosing instead to retreat over the moss, his heart pounding, the way one might recoil from a scorpion.

  He went back to his horse, which he had left in a nearby thicket. He sought to numb himself by galloping all night across the hills, past roving families and the scorched remains of villages, causing the crows to fly from the fields. His disfigured land was like a mirror held up to his soul, and it drained him of all hope.

  Iån returned to his castle at dawn. The squire who took his horse on the drawbridge told him that a man had been waiting for some time to see him. The king paid him no attention and climbed the stone stairs up to his apartments, which were plunged in darkness. He barricaded himself in there until evening, silencing anyone who knocked at his door.

  When, at seven o’clock, he approached the window and drew the curtain aside, blinded by the evening light, he realized that he would give anything for the young girl. He would relinquish his power and hand over the keys of the realm to Tåag if he had to. He would lay down his weapons before her. He would abandon everything to share a corner of that cape, or to warm himself by that same fire out there in the depths of the wood.

  At the next knock, he ordered the door to be opened.

  His chief steward announced that Arån, the captain of his archers, had been requesting an audience since the previous day.

  “I no longer require him.”

  His steward didn’t dare insist, bowing to honour his master’s wishes, but the captain had already appeared behind him.

  “Majesty, allow me to speak with you.”

  The steward barred his entry.

  “Get out,” said Iån. “I succeeded without you.”

  “Majesty, you entrusted me with a mission.”

  “And now I am removing it from you.”

  “I found what you were looking for.”

  “I didn’t wait for you.”

  Arån managed to barge his way up to the young king, who took out his dagger and pressed it against the captain’s chest.

  “I would keep my silence forever if my news were not worthy of your attention,” whispered Arån.

  The king slowly raised the blade towards his neck.

  “In that case, I shall silence you myself.”

  He ordered the steward to leave, before turning back to the captain.

  “Speak.”

  “I found the lady’s trail again.”

  “I’ve already told you – you’re too late.”

  “The trail leads to the source of the great lake.”

  “I know.”

  “The rain meant I could follow her tracks in the mud. They always lead back to the source.”

  “I know all this, captain,” said Iån. “You do not seem to hold your life dear…”

  “Listen to me, Your Majesty.”

  The archer’s dark stare made Iån retract his dagger slightly.

  “Majesty, I must tell you… These footprints in the mud on the path come from the shore of the lake.”

  Iån didn’t move.

  “The shore,” Arån tried again, “directly in front of the summer palace. The girl leaves the summer palace to go to the source.”

  The archer, like everyone else in the land, believed that the haunted palace was inhabited by an old king and his daughter. And that girl – provided she was alive and had not become a spectre roaming the waters – was Iån’s sister.

  The young king dropped his dagger, which buried itself in the floorboards. In the space of a few seconds, his burning love had frozen over.

  She had killed his mother in childbirth. She had made his father lose his mind. And now she was murdering her brother, lifting up his heart only to shatter it more easily.

  When Taåg entered the room later, newly arrived from his marshlands, he did so in the knowledge that a new resolve had taken hold of his king. For the old genie had met the terror-stricken captain on the stone stairs.

  Taåg lingered near the door, awaiting his order to enter.

  “Leave me alone,” said the king.

  18

  FLIGHT

  The night was dark enough to lend her the courage to reveal her secret, but Oliå had been putting this moment off since the very first day.

  She had just felt Iliån’s hand come to rest on hers in the sand. Soon it would be too late.

  “Wait…” she said.

  They were sitting at the lakeside, surrounded by trees whose roots and trunks sank deep into the water.

  In the daytime, it looked as if giants were wading across the lake on stilt
s; by night, it became a living labyrinth that enveloped its mysteries.

  Before them on the water, Iliån saw the faint lights of the summer palace. He had just dared to touch her for the first time, and he wasn’t sure he was bold enough for what was to follow.

  “I need to tell you something,” Oliå continued.

  Iliån’s hand stayed where it was. The forest hummed around them.

  “I know,” he ventured.

  “No, you don’t.”

  “I know about your powers.”

  She sighed. For her, there were no powers. How she wished that was the only thing she had to tell him. Yes, she was a fairy: that in itself was enough to make both of them weep.

  Had it been just that, they would have begrudged time for gradually separating them from each other, for leaving Oliå to her youth while Iliån grew older. The tears might have consoled them in the end. They would have held each other tight, their feet in the water. And they would have told each other that nothing would make them afraid, that nothing could tear them apart.

  “The queen died because I blocked the source.”

  These words from Oliå swooped down on Iliån, attacking him so suddenly that he didn’t even hear them.

  “I blocked the source and the lake dried up.”

  Now her voice was starting to register.

  “It was Taåg… He forced me to keep the source closed until your birth. He said that if I refused, he would contaminate the lake forever with mud from his swamps.”

  Oliå spoke with difficulty, dragging each word from her heart like thorns, or birds that had been nesting there for too long.

  “I did it for the queen and for you… I was the guardian of the source. I wanted you to grow up with clean water.”

  She had to catch her breath between each admission.

  “But by the time I had smashed through the dry clay with a stone, and the water came back … it was too late.”

  Silence from next to her. The only sound was the nocturnal hum of the lake.

  She didn’t tell him how she had taken care of him throughout his childhood; how she had lived in hiding but run across the water every single evening to stand guard before the palace; how she had watched over the prince while he slept. It was her way of mending her mistake. She chased away the raiders who approached in their boats, enveloping them with swarms of fireflies and capsizing their vessels with armies of catfish. In the end, rumours abounded that the palace was ringed by evil forces.