The Faeman Quest fw-5

by Herbie Brennan

  She heard the sound of the securities before the door itself opened and Hairstreak came in. There was a woman behind him. Both were smiling. ‘Time to get going,’ Lord Hairstreak said cheerfully. He held out his hand to her.

  ‘Who’s she?’ Mella demanded suspiciously. The woman was pleasant enough looking and very well dressed, but she had much the same effect on Mella as Lord Hairstreak, although that might just have been because she was with him and they were obviously friends.

  Hairstreak looked around to smile benignly at the woman. ‘This is your aunt Aisling,’ he said.

  Mella stared at the woman. She was very slightly overweight, with a self-satisfied expression behind her smile. Uncle Hairstreak and Aunt Aisling. ‘She’s your wife?’ Mella asked. Aunt Aisling looked too young to be Lord Hairstreak’s wife – far too young.

  Lord Hairstreak’s smile broadened. The woman’s smile metamorphosed into a simper. ‘Not… yet!’ Lord Hairstreak said. Aunt Aisling giggled like a schoolgirl.

  Mella found herself wondering if either of these people was telling the truth. How could she be sure Lord Hairstreak was her uncle? How could she be sure this Aisling woman was her aunt? How could she even be sure that Hairstreak was a Lord, or that his name was actually Hairstreak? He could be anybody, anything. He might be a brigand or an axe-murderer or some horrid pervert who liked young girls. The woman might be his accomplice. What better way to set a victim at ease? First you have her memory wiped, then you introduce yourself cosily as her uncle and auntie. Lull her suspicions. Except Mella’s suspicions were definitely not lulled. She had no proof this creepy pair were who they said they were, no proof at all.

  Mella ignored the outstretched hand. After a moment, Hairstreak (if his name really was ‘Hairstreak’) shrugged and said, ‘Aisling, dearest, perhaps you would take her out to the ouklo. You know what to do when you get there. I shall have Ysabeau make sure there is no one to see you except our own guards.’

  The self-satisfied expression was momentarily replaced by a frown. ‘Ouklo?’

  ‘My carriage,’ Lord Hairstreak explained. ‘It’s what we call a flying carriage in the Realm. You can’t miss it – it’s gold plated.’

  ‘Ooooh,’ Aisling said. ‘Gold plated!’

  Mella’s mind was working at top speed. Why did Aisling have to have the term explained? Even with her memory wiped, Mella knew what an ouklo was. And why say It’s what we call it in the Realm as if Aisling wouldn’t know what things were called in the Realm? Did she come from somewhere else? She was clearly no shape-shifter, so it couldn’t be Hael. The only other possibility was the Analogue World. But what was a woman from the Analogue World doing with a so-called Lord of the Realm? And that answer of Hairstreak’s – Not yet – suggested that if they weren’t married now, they soon would be. (The woman had looked so pleased by that prospect.) Why would a noble of the Realm choose to marry someone from the human realm? It just didn’t happen. Or hardly ever. There was something wrong with this couple, something very wrong.

  ‘Aunt’ Aisling (who couldn’t possibly be Mella’s aunt) put on a (phoniest of phony) smile and walked across to take Mella firmly by the arm. ‘Come along, dear,’ she said. ‘The sooner we get you home, the quicker we can fix your memory and then you won’t feel so confused and miserable.’ She was surprisingly strong. Mella found herself virtually frogmarched from the chamber, noticed Aisling gently stroking Lord Hairstreak’s back en passant, wondered if she should struggle, but decided not yet. What was the point of staying locked up in a little room? If she went with Aisling, there was always the possibility she might escape. Actually (the thought suddenly occurred to her) if she went along with their little charade, if she pretended to buy into their story, she might lull them into a feeling of false security, which would surely make escape a little easier.

  She hadn’t actually been struggling, but now she ceased to resist altogether and covered her suspicions with a sudden smile. ‘Thank you, Aunt Aisling,’ she said cheerfully. ‘That would be wonderful.’ She even managed a second smile flashed in the direction of his pervy Lordship and felt Aisling’s grip on her arm relax at once. The woman was an idiot. So long as Hairstreak did not come with them, escaping from her should be a doddle.

  To her delight, Hairstreak didn’t. Aisling led her from the chamber and along a corridor. The guard on her door did not accompany them, nor did any others. The sun was still climbing over the horizon as they reached the outside and Mella found she was leaving an enormous building set in its own grounds. Aisling took her arm again. ‘Just a moment…’ They stood at the top of a short flight of stone steps and watched as armed soldiers left their guard posts one by one to form what Mella at first took to be an escort detachment. But to her surprise, they simply marched off and disappeared without once glancing in their direction. As they disappeared, Aisling said, ‘Come on…’

  The ouklo was obvious. Its gold plating gleamed copper in the early-morning sun. Mella licked her lips. Perhaps the Hairstreak person really was a Lord: he was certainly extremely rich, whoever he was. But being a Lord didn’t mean he was her uncle and being her uncle didn’t mean he was telling the truth. Her mistrust was deepening. There was something about Hairstreak she simply didn’t like. And the dislike extended to Aisling. Besides, if they weren’t married… yet… how could she be her aunt if Hairstreak was her uncle? Mella frowned. Actually she could, quite easily. She could be her mother’s sister or her father’s sister with no married ties to Hairstreak at all. And Hairstreak could be her mother’s brother or her father’s brother or a stepbrother or even a friend of the family – family friends were sometimes given the honorary title of ‘uncle’. And it still didn’t matter because there was something positively creepy about Uncle Hairstreak and Aunt Aisling.

  ‘Come on,’ Aisling said again, impatiently this time.

  Mella went with her. Aisling, she could see, was almost blinded by the ouklo; and not just in the literal sense. She had the look of a child shown the greatest toy in the entire world, the most precious plaything. Gold obviously unhinged her; at least the amount of gold that was plated on the carriage. Which meant, Mella thought, she was vulnerable because she was distracted.

  Mella glanced around. A straight road led away from the entrance steps. To her right were open fields. To her left, beyond the sentry posts, were lawns, some ornamental shrubs and, beyond them, a treeline. Neither the road nor the open fields would give her any cover if she ran, but the terrain to her left looked more promising. She wondered why the guard posts had been vacated. Clearly there was more going on here than she knew, but this was no time to worry about it: just give thanks to her guardian gods that she would not have soldiers chasing her… at least not until Aisling sounded the alarm and got them back. But by then she might have a decent head start.

  She walked to the bottom of the steps. The ouklo was less than a hundred yards away. She glanced left again, surreptitiously. She could see distant trees now, tall shapes against the lightening sky. They might be no more than a copse, or a single stand, but if they were the edge of a wood, or, better yet, a forest, they would give her good shelter. Once there, she had an excellent chance of hiding herself from any pursuit; once there she had an excellent chance of escape.

  What then? a small voice whispered in her mind. You have no memory. She pushed it away. She would worry about the what then? later. For now she had to concentrate on getting away from creepy Uncle Hairstreak and Aunt Aisling.

  She made the decision. She would run left. She would run through the space between the first two sentry posts, run fast until she reached the ornamental bushes, then use them as cover until she reached the trees. Even if Aisling came after her at once, Mella was younger and lighter and fancied her chances of being faster. But she didn’t think Aisling would come after her. Somehow she seemed a little too… soft, a little too concerned about dirtying her fine clothes. Mella reckoned if Aisling did anything, it would be to call for help; and by the time help ar
rived, Mella could be long gone.

  As they passed the gap between the first two sentry posts, Aisling took her arm again; and there was nothing soft about her grip.

  ‘It’s all right,’ Aisling said reassuringly, her voice positively dripping with insincerity. ‘There’s someone in the ouklo I have to take back. You can wait while I do so, then we will take you home and make you well again.’

  There were four guards by the ouklo! Their black uniforms bore the same insignia Lord Hairstreak wore on his tunic. She hadn’t noticed them before: they were standing behind the ouklo and shielded by its bulk. How could she escape now? They would be after her at once – fit, strong young men who were probably equipped with net and other capture spells. And how could she break away from the tight grip Aisling had on her arm? With surprise on her side, she might jerk herself free, but if she failed first time it would result in a struggle. Once Aisling called the guards – and Aisling would certainly call the guards – her chances of escape vanished.

  It was too late for her to run through the gap as she’d planned, probably too late for anything much now. The black-uniformed guards were moving forward to meet Aisling. Oddly, they seemed almost threatening, but they stepped back at once when Aisling opened her right hand to show them an authorisation token. The scent of magic wafted into Mella’s nostrils and she saw, beyond doubt, that Aisling was authorised by Lord Hairstreak, the genuine, the one-and-only, Hairstreak. (Whoever Lord Hairstreak might be; but the guards accepted him all right.) After that, it was definitely too late for anything. Mella was being bustled towards the ouklo, Aisling’s grip still firmly on her arm, the guards now ranged around her so there was no possibility of escape. The door of the carriage opened.

  ‘Mella!’ called Aunt Aisling: it was a strangely familiar name.

  Mella dived inside, shot across the carriage and out the other door. She had the faintest impression of someone crouched inside the coach, but no time for anything except slamming the door behind her, racing across the lawn, diving behind shrubs and then, at last, headed like an elated gazelle towards the treeline.

  She had almost reached the forest by the time stupid old Aunt Aisling thought to raise the alarm.

  Forty-One

  There was the sharp snap of a breaking branch some way behind her. Mella felt her heart sink. She’d been so certain of her luck when she reached the treeline. It was not a single stand, not a copse, not even a small wood, but exactly what she had hoped for: the edge of (almost certainly) a forest – a forest that would provide her with a thousand places to hide from her pursuit. There was pursuit, of course. She’d heard the guards blundering through the shrub beds, but by the time they reached the trees she was deep inside the forest, surrounded by exotic plants, and had no difficulty at all in losing them. All had been silence for a while, except for the expected background sounds, but now there was something following her; and somehow she didn’t think it was a guard.

  It was gloomy in the forest. A leafy canopy filtered the sun into a pale, green light, but once her eyes adjusted, she could see well enough. She stopped to listen, staring behind her. There was no sign of pursuit, no further sound of any sort. Gradually she began to relax. Eventually she started off again.

  She didn’t know where she was going. But now she’d made her escape, her mind was racing. She needed desperately to retrieve her memories, find out who she was, where she was, what she was doing here. Only then could she work out what to do. In her mind, she began with first principles, starting with what she knew and what she could know.

  She knew she was wearing decent clothes. They were clean and well cut and probably expensive, which would tally with the idea that she was the niece of a Lord. She knew what she looked like – there was a little mirror in her pocket. But despite the clothing and the mirror, she had no money, not a single golden coin. (Why did she think of gold rather than silver or copper? She filed the fact away for future explanation.) Perhaps she was a pauper who’d stolen the clothing, but somehow she didn’t think so: it fitted her too well. She thought it might be tailored, in which case it could be even more expensive than it looked. So someone had taken her money, along with any clues to her identity.

  But there were some things they couldn’t take away. The skin of her hands was pale, soft and smooth. There was no dirt beneath the fingernails. These were not the hands of a labourer. These were not the hands of a merchant or an artisan or a gardener. These were pampered hands. The niece of a Lord. She found herself staring at her feet. She had dainty feet – faerie feet, her father used to call them – encased in fashionable green leather shoes. She tried to remember where she’d bought those shoes, then suddenly focused on the thought that had passed almost unnoticed through her head. That thought brought a sudden surge of excitement. Her father once told her she had faerie feet! She remembered her father!

  Except she didn’t. The excitement ebbed. She could not remember his face or who he was, or anything about him, only that one remark; and she couldn’t even remember when he had made it. Perhaps yesterday, perhaps long ago. She felt sad she could not remember his face, but at least she had a father, whoever he was. A father who remarked on the size of her feet. Did she have a mother? No picture emerged in answer to the question, no comment about her feet; or anything else. Did she have a home? Nothing. She thought instinctively of gold, she wore expensive clothes and shoes, her hands showed little sign of work… she was a rich girl (but one without money) who had faerie feet and pretty shoes and well-cut clothes and no other memory about herself.

  Mella entered a clearing, but felt immediately exposed and headed out of it at once, taking a narrow pathway that carried her back into the shelter of the trees. She found herself jogging beside a stream that widened to a narrow river, then the river ceased to follow her path and disappeared. After a moment she heard a steady roaring sound that blocked out any other noise. It grew louder and louder until she emerged on the shore of a lake fed by a magnificent waterfall.

  The lake shore was even worse than the clearing in the forest – far too exposed for safety. Mella turned back immediately and almost walked into the girl.

  The girl was standing on the path only yards away, any sound of her approach masked by the noise of the waterfall. She was about Mella’s age and build. She stood quite still, her face in shadow, but obviously staring directly at Mella herself. Two words sprang at once to Mella’s mind: Feral Faerie. Or Forest Faerie if she was concerned about being polite. This had to be a Forest Faerie. Were Forest Faeries dangerous? Her memory was vague on that point, but this one didn’t seem to be armed and at least she wasn’t one of Hairstreak’s guards.

  Mella made a snap judgment and decided (for the moment) not to run. She too froze into immobility, thought about it for an instant, then called hesitantly, ‘Who are you?’

  The girl stepped forward so that her face was in full sunlight. ‘Hello, Mella,’ she said softly, using the name Aisling had called out as she dived through the carriage. ‘Don’t be frightened.’

  But Mella was frightened. Mella was suddenly very frightened indeed. She turned and ran. She broke from the trees and ran along the lake shore with the roar of the waterfall pounding her ears. But the girl ran with her, no more than a pace or two behind and there was no shaking her. Eventually, breathlessly, Mella stopped and turned. ‘Get away from me!’ she screamed. Out from the trees, in the full light of the sun, there was no mistaking it. The girl who followed Mella was Mella. Mella was being chased by herself, had been caught by herself. ‘Why do you call me Mella?’ she asked wildly.

  ‘Because that’s your name – don’t you remember?’ Mella said. She smiled. ‘It’s mine too.’

  ‘I’ve had my memory wiped with lethe. I don’t know who I am.’

  ‘You’re Faeman Princess Culmella of the Faerie Realm,’ Mella told her. ‘Mella for short. Your mother is Queen Holly Blue. Your father is Consort Majesty King Henry. Now do you remember?’

  Mella shook her head
. ‘No,’ she said miserably.

  ‘Take my word for it,’ Mella told her.

  ‘Who are you – my doppleganger?’ Mella asked. She knew that dopplegangers could be created or called, but if your doppleganger turned up spontaneously, it meant you were going to die.

  Mella shook her head. ‘I’m your sister,’ she said. ‘I’m your twin. Uncle Hairstreak made me. I’m your clone.’

  Uncle Hairstreak? The man she instinctively mistrusted. ‘What’s a clone?’ she asked.

  ‘I think it’s a spell from the Analogue World.’

  ‘They don’t use magic in the Analogue World.’

  Mella shrugged. ‘Maybe it’s a science then. Uncle Hairstreak used it to make me from a lock of your hair. He definitely used magic to make me grow. I’m you, Mella. All the cells of my body are your cells. I’m Mella too.’

  ‘You’re Mella II?’

  ‘He calls me Mella.’ Mella II reached out and took her hand. This time Mella did not try to run away. ‘He plans for me to take your place, so obviously he calls me Mella. Our Uncle Hairstreak is a wicked man.’

  Take my place? Aloud, Mella asked, ‘Is he really our uncle?’

  ‘He’s really your great-uncle by marriage, once removed. His sister was married to your mother’s father before he married your mother’s mother. I suppose you could say he’s my father, since he made me, but he’s always encouraged me to call him uncle. Besides, if he’s my father, I think that would make you my mother.’

  ‘Your mother?! ’

  Mella II shrugged. ‘It was your hair.’

  ‘I don’t want to be your mother.’