by Anna Tan
Chapter 20: The Crone's Tale
1939
The world was young once, and men ruled it with an iron fist. Life was hard; they had much to do to shape the world in their image. Their women and their young, seeking escape from drudgery, created worlds of their own with words and belief. Some of these were dark and frightening: the dragon that breathed fire, the old crone who cursed those who crossed her, the Fairy Queen who protected her lands from the evil of mankind. Some were beautiful and majestic: the wise centaurs, the pure unicorns, the laughing dryads.
Some of these stories changed through the years: the elves, once tricksters, grew noble and stately. Mermaids, sirens as they are, sometimes betrayed their nature and fell in love with humans. For years and years, fairy creatures existed in these worlds, some separately, some together, each growing on their own, and growing apace with the humans.
But time passed, and the world grew old. Not only were the stories changed beyond recognition, more were being forgotten. Fairy creatures faded from memory. Powers waned. Fear and chaos gripped the world of imagination. The wise felt it and sought to preserve their powers.
Then Baba Yaga met an adlet who was once a man. He came from the land of the frozen seas, and she knew nothing of him or his kind until he came to her hut. It was then that she realized another change that was happening. A happier, kinder change, perhaps. Stories, on the verge of being forgotten in their own homelands, were being retold in the lands of others, renewing and reshaping each one.
Baba Yaga, curious to know how things would turn out, sent the adlet on his way, tasked to find out what he had unwittingly told her. In truth, she wanted to see how far his story would spread. For years she heard nothing of him, until finally, a whisper came back to her. Then she traced his footsteps to find three coexisting lands – the land of disbelieving man, the ancient kingdom of the Fae, and the forests of the elves. And in Ivy Iliana, Baba Yaga found new hope—if she could keep her and her growing family alive.
Darrick was fading. Ivy had tried every trick she knew, but couldn’t find a way to stop drawing on his life force. She was amazed that he had lasted this long.
“Blast this curse,” she screamed to the rafters. “Leave me alone! Leave my husband alone!”
The door slammed open, revealing an old crone holding a broomstick.
Ivy could have laughed at the absurdity of the image, but instead she scowled, too annoyed and heartsick to deal with unwanted guests. “What do you want?” she asked brusquely.
“Do you treat those who would help you this way, Leanen Sídhe?” the crone replied mildly.
“Can you help? How?”
“Oh, Baba Yaga can help you, sure enough.”
Ivy’s scowl deepened. “Who?”
“Me, of course. I divined that you needed help this night, so here I am.”
There was a long pause before Ivy replied. “What do you wish for in return?” She couldn’t keep the cynicism out of her voice. She realised she didn’t really want to either.
Instead of being offended, Baba Yaga chuckled. “Ah, the price, always the price. You are wise to ask first. I ask for safe passage in the Old Kingdom, for as long as I shall need it.”
“Why do you ask me? Surely you should request passage from the Queen herself. Are you not a fairy creature? How else would you know of me and mine?”
“Ah, I am, but I come from a different set of stories, a different Fairy Land, if you will.”
Ivy looked her over, weighing her words. If her name was not indication enough, Baba Yaga’s strange clothes were testament to the fact that she had not come from the Old Fairy Kingdom. Besides, Ivy was quite sure that she knew everyone—or almost everyone—in her old home by name, if not by sight.
“Is not my price cheap?” Baba Yaga coaxed, interrupting her thoughts. “Grant me what I wish and I will teach you what you need to know.”
Ivy’s lips tightened. “For as long as you shall need it and not a moment more.”
“Ah, well. That will suit my purposes.”
Ivy watched as Baba Yaga clucked over Darrick as he tossed and turned, whispering comforting words in a foreign language. But Baba Yaga’s spell would not hold; Ivy’s mere presence demanded his life. There was no ebb to its demand. She shooed Ivy out of the room.
The wise old witch proceeded to build protections around him. With a word, she strengthened one nature and with another, she suppressed the other, until finally he slept peacefully, his human self momentarily shielded from her spirit’s hunger.
Ivy fretted outside until the old woman came out and closed the door behind her.
“He is sleeping peacefully now. Now, my child, how far along are you?”
“Along? What do you mean?”
The old woman took her by the hand and led her out of the house. “We must let him rest and regain some strength. He is stronger than a mere man, but he still needs time to recuperate. Your child—when is she due?”
Ivy placed a hand on her womb. “How did you know—”
“I know many things, including your nature. And his.” She led Ivy into a strange-looking hut that had appeared in her front yard.
“Aren’t you afraid that the villagers will see this?”
“Don’t worry. It’s a foggy night. Besides, there is a cloud of forgetfulness that covers my hut. Not only fairies have magic, you know.”
Baba Yaga sat on her stool at the table and pulled out her mortar and pestle. Ivy took a seat opposite her and listened as the crone showed her different herbs and taught her their medicinal and magical properties until the cock crowed.
Ivy stood up and stretched. “When my daughter comes, will Darrick get worse?”
Baba Yaga smiled. “I have a spell for that.”
Laying her hand on Ivy’s belly, she muttered a long incantation.
“What did you do?” Ivy asked curiously.
“I have suppressed her magic until the day she is presented at the Fairy Queen’s court, or the day she comes of age, whichever comes first.”
“Will it harm her?”
“Only time will tell.”
Ivy memorised the words, in case she ever needed it again.
Chapter 21: The Story’s Unravelling
1954
Baba Yaga continued to speak, ignoring the Queen’s gestures for her to stop. “Our lives depend on the stories men continue to tell, and for our stories to continue to be told, we need to re-establish the ties we have long held with them. It is impossible now for us to open our world to humans again—their greed and callousness now knows no bounds. We need those who can go between the worlds for us to have a chance for survival. The Vila helped me in that last night, calling the high winds, brewing a storm strong enough to lure Jane into the Old Fairy Kingdom for protection. She came, and later so did Mary, though I had not planned for that.”
“So you sent me on an impossible quest,” Ataneq said. He had been nudging his way to the front of the crowd ever since Baba Yaga started speaking.
She regarded him briefly. “Baba Yaga does not create impossible quests. You had nothing to give me, so I had nothing to give you in return. I suppose I could have sought you out once you led me to Iliana, but why should I? You did not return to me as I asked.”
“Your question was so vague! You sent me away without any help, any clue!”
“Blame your shaman then for he was the one who sent you my way.”
Ataneq’s shoulders slumped. “So that’s it?”
“This is beside the point,” the Queen said impatiently.
“Do you still wish for your cure, once-man of the tundra?” Baba Yaga asked a little more kindly.
“I—”
“Think about it carefully,” Baba Yaga cautioned as she turned her attention back to the Queen. “Jane at least has blood enough of the Fae that you yourself cannot deny it.”
The Queen set her lips in a tight, hard line. “That doesn’t mean they are welcome here.”
“Are you ab
le to chase them out? They need no invitation, like the sons and daughters of men do. You can’t deny them their birth right.”
“What do you plan to do with them?” Ivy asked.
“Nothing, my dear. It is what they plan to do. Your children are special, Ivy Iliana. In them, all three bloodlines are present, and in them is our salvation. Remember what I said: it is their remembrance that sustains us. To deny them any part of their heritage is to deny all our futures.”
“Three!” Ivy said with astonishment.
Before Baba Yaga could explain, the sound of running feet made everyone turn and rise to their feet. Elves poured into the court, weapons at the ready.
“What is the meaning of this?” The Queen’s face darkened with anger as the Elven King strode up to her throne.
“Hello, my dear,” he smirked.
“Why do you come armed to the teeth and ready for war?”
“There was a disturbance in the balance,” he said, his glance flicking towards Darrick. “I believe you were about to murder one of my subjects.”
“Your subject?”
“Yes. Estranged, surely, but one of mine.”
“And why would I have done that?”
The King shrugged. “I have never professed to understand the way you think. But I felt it, as sure as you feel my sword at your throat now. You were draining his life force—”
“Who? Prove it!”
“Adanion.” He beckoned Darrick with a finger. Erurainon escorted Darrick to the King’s side.
“I stopped when—how is he yours?” the Queen asked the King in confusion.
“It appears that he is my daughter’s son.”
It wasn't just the Queen who stared at him. Ivy and Jane looked first at the King with wide eyes. Jane then looked at her father with astonishment whilst Ivy burst out laughing.
“His natures! Oh Baba Yaga, I could never figure out what the imps meant by that. So as part-elf—” Ivy was interrupted by a commotion in the distance.
“What now?” the Queen grumbled as a cohort of elves tramped up to them, dragging a stout man between them.
“Ah, you found him,” the King said as they deposited the man at his feet.
The man stood up, brushing the dust of his clothes indignantly. “What’s the meaning of this? How dare you kidnap me from my village and bring me to this... this freak show?”
“I believe you are Rowan, son of Adrian, son of James, are you not?”
“You! Darrick!” Rowan ignored the King, rounding on the one face he recognised. “I knew you would be involved in this ridiculous scheme. What are you trying get me to sign now? More protection for the trees? Anti-hunting licenses? Another way to block revenue from our village?”
“Do you see why we cannot allow any of them in?” the Queen hissed, her nails digging into Baba Yaga’s forearm. The old woman raised an eyebrow and shook off her grip.
“I have nothing to do with this, Rowan,” Darrick replied. “These fairy creatures themselves brought me here.”
“They did?” Ivy looked surprised.
“Yes. Some imps asked me to follow them here on some mission for a witch. Then they ran away as soon as I met Jane.”
Ivy burst out laughing.
“I fail to see what’s funny,” the Queen said scathingly.
“Oh, Mother. How your rule of law fails! Darrick has broken no law. The imps, those blessed rascals, invited him into the Old Kingdom.”
“It is settled then,” Alexei the centaur announced. “No law has been broken. This court is adjourned.”
No one moved, half of them watching the blustering man who was getting more agitated by the minute, the other half still waiting for the resolution to Baba Yaga’s story.
“I don’t care what you say, Darrick. All this is your doing, you and your family,” Rowan hadn’t stopped complaining.
Darrick rolled his eyes, exasperated, turning instead to Ivy who was scanning the crowd intently. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“The imps! The imps are here, Darrick, but I don’t see Mary. They wouldn’t have left the house if she were still there. Why isn’t she with them?”
“Your daughter! She’s the one! Talking to strangers and getting me involved in this whole... whole fiasco!” Rowan interjected. “Inviting them into your house—how could I not step in and caution her? And then they dragged me all the way through the forest, destroying my best trousers! I demand compensation—”
“Is she here then?” Ivy interjected.
“Oh, somewhere!”
“That is enough,” the King cut them off. “You were brought here, Rowan son of Adrian son of James, as the head of the council, to answer to me. Why has your council not upheld the covenant between our lands? Why do your people not know of our covenant?”
“What covenant? What ridiculous nonsense are you talking about?”
As the King explained, Ivy went in search of her younger daughter. Rowan listened, his arms folded, his foot tapping. At the end of it, he shook his head. “Unbelievable.”
“Your grandfather was our friend,” the King said.
“Awfully sweet to talk about friendship now after you’ve cut us off for, what was it, forty years?”
“We do not require your friendship. We require your cooperation and your enforcement of the treaty,” the Queen said.
“So the rest of us poor humans can’t enter your sacred realms? But they can?” he jerked his thumb at where the Hays family had been reunited.
“What they do is none of your business,” the King snapped.
The Queen stared down at Mary, who now snuggled on her father’s lap. “And who is this, Iliana?”
“My second born,” Ivy replied.
“So. You were the second intruder,” the Queen said, a slight trace of rancour in her voice. “And I suppose I have no recourse against your intrusion either, seeing as you are... of my blood.”
Baba Yaga cleared her throat. “We are getting off the topic at hand,” she said sternly, a small voice of sanity before the cacophony erupted.
“The humans need to uphold—”
“I refuse to believe in this balderdash—”
“I don’t know what I’m supposed to—”
“—covenant. Your grandfather would never—”
“—Darrick's ploy to keep us all beggars—”
“But what do we know of this old crone—”
“What about Mary? Is she also—”
“—do you really trust her, Iliana? With your children’s future—”
“—demarcation of boundaries—”
“—clear enough that all you think about is money—”
“—but what does she mean, Mother—”
“—rather starve? Logging is our only income—”
“—Our forests are off limits to—”
“Quiet!” Alexei’s voice was like a gunshot, ricocheting off the trees. Everyone fell silent.
Chapter 22: The Dragon’s Solution
1954
“It is obvious we cannot settle this on our own, with both the King and Queen squabbling like mere commoners.” The King and Queen exchanged embarrassed glances at Alexei’s biting remark. “Have you no greater respect for the Queen’s Court? This is more than a family squabble—though by the looks of it...” The centaur sighed unhappily, taking in the mixed-up family at the centre of it all.
“And what would you do, Alexei?” the Queen asked. “Would you presume to be our judge?”
“We are in a bind,” Alexei mumbled to himself. “Unless...” His demeanour brightened as he raised his voice. “There is one, my Queen, who is eldest of all and who exists in all legends. The eldest of the dragons.”
“The Great Wyrm! Who would call him? Who would dare raise him from his slumber?” the Fairy Queen asked.
“The ancient enemy,” Darrick whispered under his breath, even as Baba Yaga’s face blanched. “The great evil whose blood even the earth rejects.”
“Wisest
and most dangerous,” the Elven King added.
“Dragons!” Rowan exclaimed, shaken. “Do these nightmares not cease?”
“So will none call him to council?” Alexei asked.
Soft murmurs arose, each one shaking their heads.
Then a tremor shook the ground where they stood. Great terror fell upon the fairy creatures, and they scrambled to safety or took to flight as they could, as the ground rumbled and trembled. Heat arose in waves, and a strong wind blew. With the great beat of huge wings, a massive reptilian creature with reddish-gold scales landed in front of the silver throne, scoring the ground where his talons touched.
“Above the four winds I was flying, and I heard my name. Which of you puny little creatures dared call upon the Great Wyrm?” His voice was like deep gravel.
“We do not call you with impunity, Eldest,” the Queen said, holding herself as regally as she could. Beside the great creature, she was like a doll of ice, fragile, breakable. “We seek to find an end to our impasse.”
“Speak, then.” He shook himself like a lion as he folded his wings and settled to rest on his haunches, then nodded at the King. “One at a time.”
“I seek to re-establish the covenant we made in years past with the village of man. They cannot come and plunder our forests and murder our people until there are none of us left. There are few of us remaining, as it is now.”
“You cannot stop progress,” Rowan rebutted. “The forest is the livelihood of my village. Without the wood that it provides, animals we hunt, and the herbs that we gather, none of us would have anything left to eat! Our farms need more land. We’ve only left that side of the forest alone for this long because of Darrick’s bull-headed—”
“And who might you be?” the dragon interrupted. He inspected the quivering man. “I have not given you leave to speak, have I?”
Rowan squeaked. “I speak as the head of the village council!”