by Sarah Rayne
“He’s very well organised,” said Dorrainge unwillingly.
“I’d follow him into hell and back,” said Tybion, and was frowned at by Dorrainge, because hell was not a word you should use, even if you believed in it, which Druids did not.
Cathbad said they ought all of them to remember that in the legends the Beastline had been Princes of Ireland. And wouldn’t they all of them recall the great Conaire of the Eagles? demanded Cathbad, getting very excited. Conaire, who had ridden alongside Cormac himself in the historic battle against the terrible Erl-King. “I’d follow Raynor anywhere,” said Cathbad devoutly, and would not listen when one or two of the soldiers said vulgarly that Cathbad would follow anyone anywhere.
But Cermait was right; the men were responding to Raynor and quite a number of them were heard to remark that breeding showed: hadn’t Conaire of the Eagles been some kind of cousin of the Wolfline anyway? Wasn’t it time and more that they had a drop of the ancient Enchanted Beastline blood back with them?
“Rubbish and nonsense,” said Dorrainge, who liked to believe that all Men were equal, but he said this quietly, so that not many people heard. And he took himself off to search for Lugh Longhand, because you could not have the nominal head of the Queen’s army disappearing just when you were going into an important battle. Dorrainge had not yet settled with himself whether he would ride in the charge, because Druids were supposed to be peace-loving people; still, you could not have Medoc riding off with Ireland’s Queen and plotting fresh evil. Lugh would have to be found, said Dorrainge, because didn’t they need the head of the Fiana to lead them in all this.
“But he isn’t the head,” said Tybion, overhearing. “Fergus is the head.”
And then Cathbad, who had been scuttling about under pretext of gathering up the soup bowls, but who had in reality been eavesdropping on any promising bits of gossip that might be going, turned round and beamed and pointed, and said, “But there is Fergus.”
And everyone stood up and stopped what they were doing, and looked, and Tybion let out a raucous cheer.
Fergus, Taliesin, and Annabel, and the lost boys from the Prison of Hostages, were walking towards them down the hillside.
*
Lugh of the Longhand was confused, which was not a thing that often happened. He had been the first one to wake from Medoc’s dark spell, which was no more than you would have expected, and he had seen at once that the clearing was positively awash with the sidh. This had been extremely worrying, and Lugh had blinked and rubbed his eyes in the hope that the sidh would have vanished when he opened them again.
They did not vanish. They wreathed closer if anything, and Lugh began to have the impression that slender, snakelike blue-green arms were writhing towards him.
Come away with us, warrior of the Fiana …
Well, of course, Lugh Longhand was not going to be taken in by that! Dear goodness, didn’t everyone in Ireland know the sidh for what they were, and wasn’t it an ignorant man or a fool who looked on the sidh, looked on them fully and properly and saw them in all their unearthly beauty and lost his wits and his senses and his virility, or worse.
If anyone was going to commit the supreme folly of looking a sidh in the eye, it was not going to be Lugh of the Longhand.
The trouble was that once you had glanced at them, even by mistake, it was quite difficult to look away. Well, it was impossible actually. And there was a sort of beckoning, a slender, silky, “Come hither” sort of feeling.
Yes, yes, come to us, warrior of the Fiana, for we are the most beautiful beings in the world, and there are few who have looked on us and lived to tell of it …
And of course, it would be rather nice if it could be a Longhand who became the only human ever to look on the sidh and see their world and live to tell of it. This was a very interesting idea, and Lugh would very much enjoy seeing the legendary water caves, which he would probably be able to escape from with the utmost ease. Also, if there was going to be a march on Tara, it might be tactful if Lugh was out of the way when it happened. This was not cowardice, merely discretion, because it was pretty certain that Medoc would refer to the arrangement he had had with Lugh about the Wolfchild being killed. Actually, it was a foregone conclusion that Medoc would refer to it, and as publicly as possible, because Medoc was a mischief-maker and he would probably enjoy giving Lugh away before the entire Court and half the Druids and the Beastline and the Cruithin. This was something that could not be allowed to happen. Lugh would be better off exploring the sidh’s water caves and bringing back a grand tale for the story-tellers. It would be good, as well, to be able to rival the tales of the silly battle that everyone else was going off to wage on Medoc. Lugh would have something different. The story-tellers would very likely thank Lugh for it for generations to come.
He was surprised at how quickly they seemed to reach the sidh’s caves, because he had not been aware of travelling anywhere at all. He had, it is true, been conscious of soft silky arms entwining him, and of cool turquoise smoke obscuring his vision, and now and then of narrow glittering eyes watching him, and beckoning him deeper and deeper into the soft, formless lights.
This was ridiculous, of course, because eyes could not beckon in that way.
Oh, yes, they can, warrior of the Fiana. There are eyes that can beckon, and there are eyes that can eat your soul …
Lugh thought they might be in some way travelling under water now, and he remembered that in all of the tales, the sidh dwelled beneath the ocean, and lived in the cool green water caves, and sometimes came out and sang their gentle seductive music and lured unsuspecting humans down into the caves’ depths. And then he thought that it was not water they were travelling through but sky; a huge expanding infinity of sky, fold upon fold of it opening up before him.
We are below the oceans and beyond the skies, warrior of the Fiana … we are beyond the bounds of infinity and into the starlit worlds that are forbidden to humans. There are many worlds, and there are many creatures … Man is not the only creature, warrior of the Fiana. You shall see our world, and we shall not let you leave it ever again …
And then the lights were changing, and Lugh glimpsed the roaring ocean beneath them, and saw the cave openings, and quite suddenly they were there, in the cold green caves, and they were going down and down, and surely they were going to the earth’s centre, only that it was so cold, and people had always told how the earth’s centre would be hot …
But the caves were cool and rather clammy and damp feeling. It was not the least bit dangerous, and Lugh was not the smallest bit frightened, but on the contrary, very interested. To be sure, he could have done without the cold, but that had to be expected, because the sidh were chill faery beings, they had the cold inhuman blood of the Elven King’s people in them, and you had to expect that their dwelling place would be cold. And there was sufficient light to see by; there was a soft green waterlight rippling on the walls.
Lugh was not afraid, dear goodness, of course he was not! He would tell all this as a very good adventure when he got back. Ah, they’d all have to look to him after this. Anyone at all could ride on Tara and drive out Medoc, but no one in the world had been to the sidh caves and returned to tell of it.
Even so, the caves were chill and rather eerie. There was the sound of the ocean somewhere over their heads, and there was the sound of singing in the water as well.
The music of the waters., Fiana warrior … we make it and we preserve it, and we pour it back into the world for your people to enjoy. But we have to take from you before we can give, human, we have to take human senses to make it … Sight, hearing, touch, taste, smell … which shall YOU give to us, Fiana warrior …?
The sidh’s voices were whispery and really rather nasty. Lugh did not know when he had heard anything quite so nasty, in fact. You could discount pretty much of everything they said, and Lugh would discount it. Even so, you could not discount the fact that the sidh were here, in the cold green tunnels, and th
at they were beckoning and luring, and pulling so that you did not have much choice but to follow them.
And the light was not as good as Lugh had thought. It was rather dim as a matter of fact; a few good stout candles would not have come amiss, or one or two well-placed wall brackets. Lugh would have brought his lantern with him if there had been time. It was a good lantern, fashioned from horn, with a hole cut in it for the lighted candle to shine through. You could not beat a good strong lantern flare in a dim cave. It showed you where you were going. It would have stopped Lugh treading on the small, twig-like objects beneath his feet. This was in fact quite as horrid as the sidh’s whispery voices, because every time he moved, the twig-like things crunched, or sometimes they disintegrated, and a tiny cloud of evil-smelling very dry dust stirred.
Bone dust, Fiana warrior … the bones of all the humans who have ventured into our world. With every step you are scattering the bones of your fellow creatures …
But we shall gather it all up for our music, Fiana warrior, for there is no part of a human that we cannot use in our music. Which is it to be for YOU … Eyes, ears, tongue, lips, skin …?
This was all becoming very disconcerting. Lugh was not precisely frightened, but he did begin to wonder whether it had been an altogether wise decision to follow the sidh. If there had been more light instead of this absurd green dimness, he would have felt considerably better. He would certainly have felt very much braver.
And then, without the least warning, there was light of the most dazzling degree. Lugh moved a bit uncertainly, the sidh pushing him forward. He felt his sight blur and his senses swim.
Opening in front of him was a great silver-blue cavern, and directly ahead of him, seated on a massive carved silver throne, watching him from narrow turquoise eyes, was the Elven King.
*
Lugh knew exactly what they were going to do to him now, because you could not live in Ireland without hearing the stories about the sidh.
They stole any one of the five senses to weave into the music. It was this, said the stories, that made their music so beautiful and eerie and unearthly. It was this that made it so powerful, so that humans could not resist it, said people, and told how you should never look on a sidh.
And now, here was Lugh, standing in the sidh’s water caves, actually in the Elven King’s silver cavern, entirely at their mercy. There did not seem to be any escape, although if one was to be found, Lugh would be the man to find it, of course. He wished he was not remembering every grisly tale ever told about these creatures; how they tore out Men’s eyes and their tongues; how they took their time in doing it …
It flickered across his mind, rather wildly, that this was just the occasion for a bit of a speech, but no words rose to his lips, and then he remembered that he might not have any lips quite soon, and he might not have any tongue either, and he felt so sick that he did not think he could have spoken anyway.
Aillen mac Midha regarded him from his brilliant inhuman eyes, and Lugh shivered, because the creature was cold, so cold that you could freeze to death standing here.
The Elven King smiled, and it was a terrible and beautiful smile, cold and merciless, and yet with some kind of understanding in it. Lugh had the feeling that Aillen mac Midha saw right through to his soul (if you believed in souls, that was), and that he did not much like what he was seeing.
“I do not like it,” said the Elven King, and Lugh saw, as they had all seen outside of Folaim, the words take substance and lie on the air, like silver filaments of thread.
“I do not like what I see,” said Aillen mac Midha again. “I see that you have been a traitor to your kind, Fiana warrior.”
Lugh started to say that he had not been any such thing, not a bit of it, and the Elven King raised one slender hand for silence.
“You intrigued with the dark necromancer, Medoc, to kill the Prince,” he said, “and therefore you are no friend to the Queen.”
Put like that, it sounded really much worse than it had been. Lugh started to explain, because weren’t the Longhands faithful and true, every one of them, but Aillen mac Midha forestalled him again.
“We are constantly hunting in your world for victims,” said the Elven King, “for it is only by luring humans to our caves, and taking their senses and their souls, that we can survive. A question of practicality, you understand? It is a war that has long since raged, and both sides know the rules.” Never look on the sidh …
Aillen mac Midha smiled the eldritch smile as if he had heard Lugh’s thoughts with ease.
“We could have taken any one of you from Medoc’s Dark Slumber,” he said. “And to take at least one was necessary, for if we were to dissolve the evil Enchantment he had spun, there had to be a price.”
A price … and Lugh would pay it.
“We took you” said Aillen mac Midha, “because we knew that you had murder in your heart for the Prince. And we are constrained to protect Ireland’s Royal House, Fiana warrior. We spun the Enchantment about him when he was born in secrecy to the Queen, and we have watched him and guarded him ever since. Did you really think,” said the Elven King, “that we should allow anything to stand in the way of the Prince and his rightful inheritance?”
His rightful inheritance: Tara.
“He has yet to fight Medoc,” said Aillen mac Midha, “and we cannot tell whether he will be victorious, for he is younger than we would have liked, and Medoc and the Twelve Lords are more powerful than they were at his birth.” The narrow glittering eyes regarded Lugh with the pitiless stare of a predator. “But, the Prince must be given every opportunity,” said Aillen mac Midha. “We have removed his enemies before now, and we are removing you.” And you will lose one of your senses to us, Fiana warrior, and you will go into our music, and our music will he poured back into the world. True immortality, human … you will not quite die. We shall use every part of you and you will not quite die …
The Elven King remained perfectly motionless, perched on the massive, elaborate silver throne. But his eyes were watchful, and there was a wariness about him.
At length, he said, “You are well come to our world, human,” and paused and smiled. “But you know our laws.”
Any one of the five senses …
Lugh gulped and found nothing to say, and Aillen mac Midha smiled again and lifted his left hand.
The sidh surged forward, avid and writhing.
“One of his senses,” said Aillen mac Midha softly. “Which shall it be?”
And then, into the silence that followed, during which Lugh could hear the singing of the ocean above them, and could hear as well the faint, far-off chanting of the sidh’s music, the Elven King said very gently, “We will take his sense of touch.
“Peel his skin off. Flay him.”
Lugh did not escape. Immediately Aillen mac Midha had pronounced sentence, the sidh whipped about his arms and his legs, pinioning him so firmly that he could not move, twining their silken arms about him, and then stripping his clothes from him, so that at last he stood naked and trembling before them.
Silvery laughter filled the cavern now.
A poor specimen … we should have taken the eagle one, Majesty. This one will not enrich our music …
“Nevertheless,” said Aillen mac Midha in his silvern voice, “we have him, and he is our prize for dissolving the necromancer’s spell. And he is a traitor to his own kind, and for that alone he must die. Do what you will.”
The laughter rang out again, and now Lugh could see the sidh as clearly as ever a man had seen them; he could see them in their blue and green faery garb; cold and terrible, but so beautiful and so alluring that he knew the sight would stay with him forever.
Forever is a long time, human … Let us say, throughout Eternity …
The twining arms had become sharp and pointed now; hundreds of slender gleaming knives and pins that would slide beneath his skin. He felt the coldness of steel, and knew it could not be steel in fact, and he tried to stru
ggle, but the silken cords held him down. He tried to cry out for help, for surely there would be someone, but the knives and pins were already beginning their work …
Pain began to explode all over his body in dozens of different places, and there was the feeling of slivers of light penetrating his skin. He thought they had started with his fingertips, and he experienced the truly sickening pain of having every fingernail bent backwards, far, far back until the nail was ripped out, and his fingers were a mass of raw agony.
He dared not look, for he knew he would see his fingers being stripped of their skin, and he could feel the white-hot knives sliding deeper and farther up his hands and then his arms.
He thought he must surely be bleeding in hundreds of places now, but when he caught sight of the floor, there was no blood, only a trickle of colourless fluid, seeping on to the ground beneath him.
The sidh were surging closer now, pressing in on him, and he tried to cry out, but the pain was smothering him, and he was drowning in the blue and green smoke and in the glinting eyes of the Elven King.
More, more, human. Give us your sense of touch … You will not need it, we will strengthen our music with it …
There was a dreadful thin tearing sound now, and the pain was searing his arms and covering his shoulders and his neck. He dared not look down now because, if he did, he might see raw flesh, muscle, bone …
A part of him still unaffected by the pain became aware that the sidh were slitting his body now, laughing and swooping down on him, beginning to pull back the skin of his chest.
He was screaming with the torment and the cruelty of it now, for surely, surely, there must be someone who would come to help him; it was not to be thought of that he should die like this, in these terribly lonely caves, at the hands of these cold faery creatures …
His entire body was a raw open wound, and he felt a dreadful slithering sound, and he knew that the internal organs held in place by skin were shifting, and that if he moved and if the sidh cut any deeper, his insides would slither on to the floor, and when that happened he would be lost and these creatures would devour his soul, and he would be soulless, lost forever.