‘Where is this place?’
‘The Court of Peaceful Days.’
‘I heard you the first time. But where is it? I walked for a while.’ His day’s journey came back to him in flashes, impossible to place in any context. ‘On the way to Bath?’
‘It is further away than you could have walked in a lifetime.’
Her smile melted him instantly; he could no longer resist. ‘My injuries—?’
‘We healed you. They were minor.’
‘They didn’t feel minor.’
‘To us they were.’ She stretched out a supple arm; her hand was pale and delicate. ‘Come. Let us walk outside.’
He took it, despite himself. Though he had almost recovered, he still felt as if he was existing in a dream. ‘Who are you?’
‘My name is Rhiannon. The Court of Peaceful Days is my home.’
‘I’m Mallory.’
‘I know.’ She led him out into a long stone corridor. Guards were posted at regular intervals, dressed in a strange golden armour designed with an avian style. She nodded to each of them as she passed. Outside in the warm night she let go of his hand and they walked side by side across the grass until they reached a fountain of fire. The flames gushed out of a spout in the centre and rolled down into a surrounding pool, swirling like liquid against all the laws of physics. Even close to it, Mallory could feel no heat.
‘Where is this place?’ he whispered, suddenly overcome by awe.
‘In the Far Lands. A heartbeat away from your own fields, yet as distant as the farthest star.’ She stood before him, still smiling benignly. ‘You were brought to me by some of the market people. They feared for your safety.’
‘When I was blacking out, I thought they were going to rob me. Or worse.’
‘Indeed, some of the traders come from far afield, and they have a predatory nature. But those who live within the remit of the Court of Peaceful Days would never harm anyone. That is our law, immutable, a law of all Existence, though recognised by few.’
There was something about her that reminded him of Sophie, an odd combination of gentleness and power, perhaps. ‘As laws go, that’s one of the best.’
‘It is a law of Existence.’ Rhiannon looked from the flames to the stars scattered overhead. ‘So simple when compared with the great philosophies, yet it is the only law that matters. We are all brothers and sisters of spirit, joined on levels Fragile Creatures can never comprehend.’
Mallory looked back at the building. From his new perspective he could see that it was quite enormous. It stretched far back into the trees, and in parts, on the fringe of his vision, it appeared that the trees were growing in it and through it, were part of the very structure. Though the construction was simple, there was a breath-taking majesty to it that made him feel as if it had a slumbering life of its own, as peaceful and gentle as Rhiannon.
‘Fairyland,’ he said. ‘That’s what you’re talking about.’
‘It has always existed, though for many generations of your kind the doors were locked.’ Her brow furrowed as she examined his face closely; Mallory had the strangest feeling she was looking deep into his mind. ‘Does it trouble you?’ she asked.
‘I’m not surprised by anything anymore.’
Her smile returned. She motioned for him to follow her into the trees where the perfume of summer vegetation was more heady. Enough moonlight broke through the cover to allow them to see the nocturnal animals scurrying out of their path and the ghostly imprint of owls in the branches over their heads. Mallory was surprised to see glitter trails moving through the treetops, which he at first took to be fireflies, but which eventually revealed themselves to be tiny gossamer-winged people frolicking amongst the branches. They, too, made him feel powerfully happy, as if they radiated an energy field that altered his emotions. For the first time in ages he felt at ease. In his swirl of feelings, he suddenly felt like crying, and he hadn’t cried in a long while. The thought of going back to the bleakness of his own home depressed him immensely.
‘I think I’d like to stay here a while,’ he ventured.
She shook her head, looked away into the dark. ‘You have a job to do, Mallory. Every Fragile Creature has work of the greatest importance to do before they finally depart die Fixed Lands. A task that is unique to them, so important it is stitched into the fabric of Existence. And you cannot rest - none of you can rest - until your personal task has been completed.’ She paused. ‘There is always time to rest, when the work is done.’
‘What task?’ he asked. ‘What use can I be?’
When she turned her face back to him, there was something profound locked in her eyes and her smile, but it was too enigmatic for him to decipher. She carried on amongst the trees in silence until they reached a large clearing where the moon appeared to have come down to earth, so milky and luminescent was the light reflected on the metallic items scattered all around. Swords were embedded in the ground. Shields lay like seashells; helms and breastplates, axes, spears and other weapons Mallory didn’t recognise had been discarded there. It was the detritus of some great battle.
‘These remain here, so even at this, the most gentle of all the Courts … especially at this Court … we never forget,’ Rhiannon said gravely. ‘Suffering is always only a whisper away. Peace and happy days never last. Pain and war and despair will always rise up.’
‘That’s a depressing view of life,’ Mallory said.
She disagreed forcefully. ‘Peace and happy days have their potency because of this dark side. Without it, the things we treasure would tarnish with boredom. They shine because we know the dark is always over the next rise.’
‘So you’re justifying war … and suffering … ?’ He was deeply surprised by her position after what he had seen of her so far.
‘Justifying? No. Accepting. It is the way of Existence. There is a meaning for everything that happens. We deal with the unpleasant things in the same way that we celebrate the wondrous. And we must always deal with them. Never turn our backs, let them gain an upper hand, throw Existence out of balance so the darkness gains ascendancy, for that is what the darkness always wants.’
He had a feeling she was no longer talking in abstract terms; indeed, was talking directly to him.
‘We must be vigilant,’ she continued, ‘all of us, and even the gentlest must take a stand, on their own terms, when needs call.’
She moved amongst the weapons of the dead before selecting a sword. She nodded knowingly as she weighed it in her hands, then handed it to him. Moonlight limned its edges so that it appeared as if a faint blue light was leaking out of the very fabric of the blade. Its handle was inlaid with silver and was carved with two entwining dragons, like the flag he saw flying over the pagan camp.
‘I have a sword,’ he said.
‘Your sword is built to despatch the threats of the Fixed Lands. This is a sword of my people. It has a power that transcends the space it holds. Three great swords were forged from the very stuff of Existence, so our stories tell us. Three swords that can cleave the very foundations of life. One is the Sword of Nuada Airgetiamh - that stands alone and will not be seen again until the Dragon-Brother returns. The second is lost, believed corrupted, a danger to all who wield it. This is the third, and it is linked to your land in a fundamental way. Keep it close. It will bring you light and warmth in the dark days ahead.’
‘You’re talking as if it’s alive.’
‘It is, in the way that all things are alive, from the stones of the field to the clouds of the sky.’ She proffered the sword. Mallory hesitated before taking it, but when it slipped into his fingers it felt instantly comfortable. A tingling warmth spread through his palm into his arm. It felt as if the dragons on the handle were shifting to accommodate the unique musculature of his hand. ‘It is called Llyrwyn.’
‘It has a name?’ Mallory said wryly.
‘There is a reason it has a name, and that reason should be clear, if not now, then in good time.’
‘I told you, there is a meaning to everything that happens. You are not here by chance. In the terms of your world, you may have arrived a little earlier or a little later, but you would always have come here, to this spot. For the sword.’
Mallory turned the blade over in his hand curiously. The faint blue glow wasn’t a product of the moonlight at all - it truly was coming from the weapon. ‘I don’t understand.’
She moved her hand slowly to indicate the trees, the sky, the grass. ‘Everything is alive, everything is linked. There is a mind behind it all. We cannot know it, nor begin to know it, but it shapes us all … Fragile Creatures, Golden Ones … We are all part of it. And it demands champions. In its wisdom, it has decreed they come from the ranks of Fragile Creatures … of your kind, Mallory. They fight for the very essence of Existence, for Truth and Life. They are known in the Fixed Lands … in your world … as Brothers and Sisters of Dragons. At any time, five are chosen, though they may never be called to fight the enemies of Existence.’
Mallory didn’t like the way the conversation was going. ‘What are you saying?’
‘The five who held that role throughout the troubles that devastated your land are broken, Mallory. Gone … to time long gone, to the Grey Lands, to different roles where the need for them is greater. A new five must arise.’
He shook his head as if his own denial would prevent what she was saying from being true.
‘You are the first, Mallory.’
‘That’s ridiculous. It’s so ridiculous it’s laughable. Me, a champion?’
The concept was absurd in so many different ways he couldn’t begin to tell her.
‘There is a need for you, Mallory. A great need. And you will be ready for it, though there may be more forging necessary. Existence does not choose its champions unwisely. You are a Brother of Dragons.’
‘A Brother of Dragons,’ he repeated with a disbelieving laugh. ‘OK, I’ll bite. For now.’
She gave him a scabbard, which he fastened to his belt, and then she motioned for him to follow her again. Mallory’s mind was racing. He’d just about accepted that he was nowhere on earth, that he was in a place that had slipped into folklore as Fairyland and that the woman with him was of a race that simpler people had come to call fairies. But where he really was, and what she truly was, escaped him. What made him uneasy was the realisation that since the Fall the world was not simply at the mercy of isolated supernatural predators that looked as if they’d wandered in from Grimm’s Fairy Tales. There were other powers, perhaps higher powers, that had some interest in humanity; mankind was no longer in control of its own future.
As they moved back through the trees towards the Court, he put his tumbling thoughts to one side and said, ‘Why are you helping me?’
‘You were brought to me, and I never turn away a creature in need.’ She appeared to consider this for a while before adding, ‘My people have always had a relationship with your kind, sometimes friends, sometimes enemies, but always there.’
An owl broke through the branches and circled her until she held out an arm for it to land. Her skin remained unscathed under its claws. She leaned towards it, apparently listening, as it made a series of strange sounds deep in its throat. ‘There is food and drink on the table if you wish to refresh yourself,’ she said as it took flight.
On the way back to the Court, Mallory thought he could sense a deep sadness underneath her calm, as if she had lost someone or something very dear to her. He found he had warmed to her with remarkable speed; she appeared uncomplicated and uncorrupted by cynicism.
In the Court, they walked for ten minutes along corridors where the only sound was the soft tread of their feet. Eventually, they entered a large hall with a beamed ceiling and luxuriant tapestries hanging on the stone walls. Food and drink were laid out on the table - silver dishes and platters containing seafood, spiced meats, breads and fruit, and decanters of a deep red wine - but there was no sign of any servants.
‘Not many people here,’ he said.
‘The Court of Peaceful Days is filled with life, but my subjects know I prefer silence to follow at my heels.’ She gestured for Mallory to sit. ‘Everything in my Court is given freely and without obligation.’
‘Subjects?’ You’re the queen?’ Mallory suddenly realised how hungry he was. He didn’t know how long he had been out, but after the days of cathedral rations his stomach yearned for sophisticated food. He tore into the ham and bread, washing them down with a goblet full of red wine.
She took the seat at the head of the table but didn’t touch the food, seemingly content to watch Mallory enjoy himself. ‘That is my responsibility.’
‘The queen of all Fairyland.’
She laughed silently at his name for the land. ‘There are many Courts in the Far Lands, and each has its own queen or king, its own hierarchy, its rules and regulations, petty rivalries and intrigues, loves and vendettas.’
Once he had taken the edge off his hunger, Mallory sat back and looked at her in the light of the latest information. ‘When everything went pear- shaped a while back, everyone was talking about gods carrying out miracles all over the place. That was your people?’
She nodded slowly. ‘We were worshipped when your race was in its infancy. The tribes called us the Tuatha De Danann. We are known to ourselves, in your tongue, as the Golden Ones.’
‘Why did everything change?’
She gestured dismissively as if it were a minor question. ‘The seasons turned. It was time once again for an age of wonder, of magic. We returned to the land we knew, and that many of us loved.’
Mallory selected a sharp silver knife and began to quarter an apple. ‘Your kind were supposed to be everywhere during the troubles, but since then there’s hardly been any sign of you.’
‘My people have detached themselves from Fragile Creatures once again. After the rigours of the Great Battle, when suffering and hardship were felt on all sides, the decision was taken to withdraw amongst ourselves, to concentrate on our own affairs. But we can no more leave Fragile Creatures alone than your kind, good Mallory, can leave the Golden Ones alone. Isolationism never works. We are all bound. We must find ways to exist together.’
Mallory poured himself another glass of wine. The velvety warmth of it was spreading through his limbs. ‘I wouldn’t hold your breath. My own people can’t get on together.’
She stared introspectively into the warm shadows in the corner of the room. ‘We are all bound, Mallory. Freedom to act independently is an illusion. Obligations and responsibilities tie our hands, as do love and friendship. And good men can no more turn their backs on need than cowards can face danger.’
Mallory finished his apple and pushed himself back from the table, replete. ‘That’s a very optimistic view of human nature.’
She rose without replying and he trailed behind her out of the room into another chamber, heavily carpeted and filled with sumptuous cushions. She stretched out, catlike, upon them. ‘Threats lurk where you least expect them, Mallory,’ she said.
He slipped into the cushions, cocooned by every aspect of that place; he didn’t want to go back to the hardship of the cathedral, or of his world. He wanted to stay there for ever, listening to her voice, letting her take care of him.
‘Your wounds were caused by something terrible,’ she continued, ‘even to my own people. It has no business being in the Fixed Lands, or the Far Lands, for that matter. It crawled up from the edge of Existence, where even worse things have been stirring. Your kind have been noticed.’ This last comment sounded like a tolling bell.
‘But that thing’s been left behind,’ he said. ‘I’m never going to go within a million miles of it again.’
‘Pick the pearls from my words, Mallory,’ she warned. ‘And beware.’
He pressed her further, but she would say no more. Her statement, though, remained with him, niggling at the back of his head, spoiling the comfor
t he felt. In a bid to forget, he questioned her about her kind. She told him of four fabulous cities that haunted her nomadic people’s memories, an ancient homeland they could never return to and the terrible sadness that knowledge engendered in all of them. And she told of the wonders the Golden Ones had seen: astonishing creatures that soared on the sun’s rays, breathtaking worlds where the very fabric changed shape with thought, the play of light on oceans greater than the Milky Way, the great sweep of Existence. Tears sprang to her eyes as the stories flowed from her, memories of amazement that cast a pall over her current life.
‘We have lost so much, and I fear we will never regain it,’ she said, and the terrible regret in her voice made Mallory’s chest heavy.
At some point, her voice became like music, lulling him to sleep. He dreamed of worlds of colour and sound, bright and infinitely interesting, of nobility and passion and magic, and when he woke with tears in the corners of his eyes he resolved not to return to his world of bleakness and dismal low horizons.
The room was empty. He stretched, surprised at how wonderfully rested he felt. The corridor without had the stillness and fragrance of early morning. He wandered along it, searching for Rhiannon to ask her if he could stay at the Court, but the whole place appeared deserted; not even the guards were visible. He took branching corridors in the hope of finding some central area, but the building was like a labyrinth and he quickly became quite lost.
After a while, he came upon an atrium big enough to contain trees at least eighty feet tall. Sunlight streamed through the crystal glass high overhead, yet the space was cool and airy. A grassy banked stream babbled through the centre of the room, while birds sang in the branches and rabbits and squirrels ran wild amongst the trunks.
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