Once Upon a Dreadful Time

by Dennis L McKiernan

  “Please, Camille,” said Simone, “please go on. I would hear of the beginnings of Faery.”

  “Very well,” said Camille, “though it is but speculation on my part.” She took a sip of tea and set her cup aside.

  Alain looked at Émile and said, “It was when I had gone missing, and Camille was in search of me, though the only clue she had was to look for a place east of the sun and west of the moon. None she asked knew where such might be. But then she came across an Elf named Rondalo. He told her that his mother Chemine was a First, and she might know just where such a locale lay. Yet she did not, but she said there was one other who might know—Raseri the Dragon, who she thought might have been the very first First to have come unto Faery. Chemine suggested that Rondalo guide Camille to the Drake. Rondalo was bitterly opposed, for he was a sworn enemy of Raseri; it seems the Dragon had slain Rondalo’s sire Audane. Even so, given Camille’s plight, Rondalo at last agreed to guide her to Raseri’s lair.”

  Camille smiled in memory and said, “And so I met the Dragon. We spoke of many things, during which Raseri told me that he remembered nought of killing Rondalo’s père or anything of his life ere he found himself in Faery. Still, he said he must have slain Audane, though he could call nothing to mind of the battle. His speaking of it spurred my supposition, there at the Dragon’s lair. . . .”

  Camille shook her head in puzzlement. “Tell me then, are all Firsts as are you: knowing nought of what went before you each came unto Faery?”

  “So it seems,” said Raseri, peering toward the oncoming light.

  Camille fell silent and took another bite of biscuit. Around the mouthful she said, “Have you heard of the Keltoi?”

  “Indeed. Most in Faery know of the legend. Wandering bards all—those whose tales caught the ear of the gods, and they in turn made Faery manifest.”

  Camille swallowed and took a drink of water. “Well then, Raseri, answer me this:

  “What if it is true that, as they wandered across the face of the world, the Keltoi did tell their tales, and the gods did listen, and they so enjoyed what they heard they made Faery manifest so that they could be entertained by the stories that followed? Mayhap long past, ’round a campfire a gifted Keltoi began a tale, the first one the gods listened to, and it went something like this:

  “Once upon a time there was a terrible Drake named Raseri, a Drake who breathed flame. And in a hard-fought duel with an Elf named Audane, Raseri slew the Elf. Yet it was Audane’s wedding night, and he had lain with his bride ere the battle, and some ten moons after the terrible death, Audane’s grieving widow, a Water Fairy named Chemine, birthed a son. And Chemine gave over unto the wee lad Audane’s silvery sword, the one with the arcane runes hammered down the length of its blade, and she said, ‘One day, my Rondalo, you will battle with vile Raseri, foul murderer of your sire.’ ”

  Camille fell silent, and Raseri cocked his head and said, “Mayhap ’tis true that such did happen. Even so, where does that lead?”

  “Oh, don’t you see, Raseri, ere that tale perhaps there was no before, no existence whatsoever for Faery, no existence even for you. Mayhap that’s when Faery began. Perhaps that’s when you were born full-grown. Mayhap there was no Audane, yet even if there was, if the legend of the Keltoi and the gods is true, then it is no fault of yours he was slain. Instead ’tis completely the fault of the Keltoi who told that story, the first the gods had heard, and this blood vengeance, this sword-oath Rondalo swore, should instead have been sworn ’gainst the tale-teller, or the gods who made it true, for in truth they are the ones in combination who did murder Audane.”

  Raseri grunted, but otherwise did not reply, and Camille ate the remainder of her biscuit in silence, her thoughts tumbling one o’er the other.

  Finally Raseri said, “If you have the truth of it, Camille, then much needs setting aright.”

  “Wh-what?” said Camille, shaken from her musings.

  “I said, have you the truth of it, then much needs setting aright. Even so, there is this to consider: although the Keltoi, or gods, or in combination, are responsible for much grief and rage, they gave me, they gave all of us, life as well. Without them we would not be. Hence, if the legend is true, we owe them our very existence. Those tales, though fraught with peril and desperation and fury and sorrow such as they are, without them we would not be.”

  Camille nodded, somewhat abstractedly, and Raseri tilted his head to one side and said, “You seem preoccupied, Camille. What were your thoughts that I so interrupted?”

  Camille glanced at Scruff and then at the Drake, then out to where Rondalo might be, and she shrugged and said, “I was just wondering whose silver tongue or golden pen is telling the tale we find ourselves in.”

  Raseri’s booming laughter echoed among the peaks, but when he looked down at Camille, she wasn’t laughing at all.

  “. . . and so you see, Simone,” said Camille, glancing at Avélaine as well. “If I am right, then each of the Firsts is the first of its kind to have been spoken of in a Keltoi bard’s tale, one whose story was made manifest.”

  In the armory, as Alain fell silent, Blaise said, “Did this Rondalo fellow ever fight Raseri?”

  “Non,” said Alain. “After Raseri bore Camille to someone even older than he, the Dragon flew to see Chemine and told her of Camille’s conjecture. Chemine and Rondalo and Raseri made a truce, and, as it so happens, Rondalo and Raseri became the best of friends, and these days they go adventuring together.”

  “Huah!” grunted Émile. “An Elf and a Dragon adventuring together. How odd.”

  “Only in Faery,” said Roél.

  Émile nodded and then turned to Valeray. “Well then, now that I know what a First is, tell me of this person Orbane.”

  Valeray said, “Orbane is one of the Firsts as well, evil wizard that he is.”

  “But why would the gods do such?” asked Émile. “I mean, why would they make manifest a vile wizard who wished to rule all of Faery?”

  “Because of the adventures he would spawn,” said Valeray. “Terrible as they were, it would be entertainment for the gods.”

  Laurent slammed a gauntleted fist into a gauntleted palm and gritted, “Gods be damned.”

  “Oh, Laurent, tempt them not,” said Roél, “else something might befall you as befell Avélaine.”

  Laurent looked at his brother and wrenched off the gauntlets and flung them to the table where others lay. “Pah! That was the Lord of the Changelings and no god who stole our sister.”

  “Nevertheless . . .” said Roél.

  Laurent took a deep breath and slowly let it out. “I hear, little brother. I hear.”

  Émile said, “What of this war with Orbane, Lord Valeray? I assume this monstrous mage was defeated.”

  Valeray nodded and said, “Many of the Firsts—Raseri the Firedrake, Jotun the Giant, Adragh the Pwca, Tisp the Sprite, and others—banded together to oppose Orbane and his conquest. Yet he was too powerful for them, and something had to be done. My friend, Duke Roulan, Michelle’s sire, came up with the seed of a scheme. You see, at the time he and I were neither duke nor king, but thieves instead. Yet we were caught up in the war against Orbane, for his minions were ruining our business. And so . . .”

  “What we need,” said Roulan, “is a way to turn Orbane’s own power against him.”

  Valeray nodded. “But how?”

  “Well, Val, I know where one of his castles is located, though it is said to be warded by a witch; but surely you can get in and discover something of his own that we can use against him.”

  “We . . . ?”

  “Well, perhaps not we directly, but certainly the Firsts could.”

  “I don’t know, Roully. I would think the castle well guarded, and it might—” Of a sudden, Valeray fell into thought. “Guile. We can use guile. Though if Orbane is in residence, it’s the end for us both. But if he’s elsewhere, and the witch stands ward, well . . .”

  Roulan pushed out a hand of negatio
n. “You know Orbane is off opposing the Firsts, and this castle is one of his lesser. What is it you have in mind?”

  Valeray smiled and said, “Remember how we fooled the mayor, and . . .”

  A moon or so later, at a grey stone castle on a bald hill in the midst of a dark forest, a hag knocked for entry. From the battlements above, the Troll guard shouted down for her to go away, yet she croaked that she was a soothsayer who had private words for Lord Orbane within.

  After repeated demands by the crone and threats by the Troll, disturbed by the racket without, the mistress of the castle appeared. It was a witch who announced she was in command of this holt.

  “I have a dreadful message to give to the dark one, and I would see him,” called up the hag.

  “Dreadful message?”

  “I am a soothsayer and I have seen, and I’ll only speak with Lord Orbane.”

  “Seen what?”

  “Oh, Mistress, this is not for your ears, and I certainly cannot say it in front of your warders; it might dishearten them. Besides, I am tired and need a rest, and I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea. I would have you take me to Lord Orbane.”

  “He is absent,” called down the witch. “So you will have to tell it to me, and I can get word to him.”

  “Tell it to you?”

  The witch drew herself up to her full height. “I am Nefasí, Orbane’s acolyte, and he trusts me with his very life.”

  “Ah, Mistress Nefasí, I do not know whether to tell you or not.”

  “I can always force it out of you.”

  “Heh. Maybe. Maybe not. Yet perhaps as Orbane’s acolyte . . . —But if I tell you, it must be in a place of protection—a place of power and transmutation—ere I will divulge the message dire.”

  The crone and the witch haggled, but finally, fearing the worst for her master, the witch allowed the hag to enter the castle for the message she would tell.

  Accompanied by well-armed Troll guards, by winding ways and up stairwells and past many rooms—ways and wells and rooms the crone committed to memory—Nefasí took the aged soothsayer into Orbane’s own alchemistry chamber, where a pentagon of protection was permanently inscribed upon the floor. There did Nefasí cast a spell, one that temporarily rendered the Trolls deaf and mute, and then told the old soothsayer to speak. And so, surrounded by unhearing and unspeaking guards, with the crone and the witch sitting at a table within the pentagon, the hag looked about and then whispered, “Orbane will be defeated by his own hand.”

  At these bodeful words, Nefasí’s gaze flicked briefly toward a small locked chest sitting atop a table, a chest the soothsayer clearly noted, though the crone did not let Nefasí see that she had. Nefasí asked if there were more to the sooth divined, and the beldame shook her head. Nefasí rewarded the soothsayer with a single gold piece and sent her on her way, and in spite of the hag’s grumblings, the witch did not give her the promised cup of tea.

  That very same night, his disguise now gone, Valeray scaled the outside wall to the alchemistry room, and he picked the lock and found within the chest two clay amulets. Valeray was disappointed, for it seemed that they were nought but trinkets. Regardless, he wrapped them well and stood in the window and, using a sling, he cast them to Roulan who was waiting at the edge of the woods. Then down clambered the thief, and soon he and his accomplice were riding agallop to the waiting Firsts. Yet even as Valeray and Roulan passed through that dark forest, they were seen and recognized as strangers and pursued.

  They managed to reach the Firsts, and the hounding enemy was routed.

  King Valeray took up a sword and sighted down its length, saying, “Despite their lowly appearance, Émile, the clay amulets were descried by Lisane the Elf who is a true seer, and she told the Firsts what they were: powerful magical artifacts cast by Orbane himself. Lisane called them Seals of Orbane, and said that likely there were at least seven of these dreadful relics about, for it seems the residue of power on the seals indicated such. In any event, the magic within—curses all—would be loosed when the clay seal was broken, and it would obey the desires of the one breaking the seal to the detriment of the one who was the target of those desires. These two seals were used against their maker: the first to destroy Orbane’s protection, the second to cast Orbane into the Castle of Shadows in the Great Darkness beyond the Black Wall of the World, where he remains still, for the Castle of Shadows is inescapable.”

  Valeray fell silent, but Alain said, “Because of Hradian, three of those seals were used against us: one to make my sire and dam seemingly vanish; one to curse me to be a bear by day, though I could be a man at night; and one to snatch me and my household away and betroth me to a Troll if my truelove ever saw my human face.” He paused a moment and smiled unto himself and added, “But Camille took care of that.”

  Blaise frowned. “Why were those three amulets used in that manner? I mean, if they were so powerful, why not use them to set Orbane free?”

  Valeray shrugged. “I repeat, the Castle of Shadows is inescapable, and apparently, the seals are not powerful enough to set him loose. Besides, that would be a boon to him and not a detriment, and the seals can only be used to visit ill upon someone or something.”

  Laurent shook his head. “Any prison can be breached, given enough men and arms. Hence the ones held therein—be they criminals or innocents—can be set free.”

  “Not the Castle of Shadows, my boy,” said Valeray. “Those who go in do not come out.”

  “How can that be?” asked Simone, sipping her tea. “How can a mere castle be inescapable? Surely a large army could break him free, and if I understand you aright, he had a large army at his beck . . . or if not him, at the beck of this Hradian creature.”

  Saissa shrugged, but Camille said, “Mayhap upon a time a Keltoi bard started a story: ‘In the Great Darkness beyond the Black Wall of the World there was an inescapable prison where only the most dreadful of criminals were kept.’ ” Camille paused and looked at Liaze and then said, “ ‘And there was but one key to this dreaded Castle, and it was held by a comte whose full title was Comte Amaury du Château Bleu dans le Lac de la Rose et Gardien de la Clé.’ ”

  “Wait a moment,” said Avélaine, and she turned to Liaze. “But for the name of Amaury, isn’t that your Luc’s title?”

  Liaze nodded and said, “It is when he is at Château Bleu. Amaury was his sire, and the first keeper of the key.”

  “What key?” asked Émile, thumbing the green fletching of an arrow.

  “This one,” said Luc, drawing an amulet on a chain about his neck up from his jerkin. The talisman was silver and set with a blue stone; the chain was silver as well. “Ere he rode off to war, my sire placed it ’round my throat when I was but a tiny babe.”

  “What has it to do with ought?” asked Laurent.

  “It is said to be the key to the Castle of Shadows,” replied Luc.

  “That’s a key to the inescapable prison?” asked Blaise.

  “If what they say is true, indeed it is.”

  “Hold on, now: what if someone, say this witch Hradian, sends her minions to steal the amulet. Wouldn’t that mean she could set Orbane free? If so, I say we hunt her down and kill her like the bitch she is.”

  Luc shook his head. “Non. Trying to steal the amulet would do no good, and in fact would probably result in the minion or minions being dead. The amulet has a powerful spell upon it, and if the witch or anyone else tried to take it without my permission or by means of duress, or if I were slain and Hradian tried to take it, the amulet would slay her too. No, it must be borne by the rightful heir, or freely given by the heir to someone of his choosing.”

  Luc removed the talisman and held it out to Blaise. “Here, I freely give it.”

  Blaise set a helm aside and tentatively took the amulet and looked at it carefully. As he handed it back he said, “And you say this is the only key to that prison?”

  Luc slipped the chain over his head. “As far as I know, it is the only key, though I k
en not how it opens the door or gate or barrier or whatever it is that locks one in.”

  “Oh, my,” gasped Michelle, her cup clattering in her saucer, “perhaps that’s what she meant.”

  “What who meant?” asked Simone.

  “Lady Wyrd,” replied Michelle. She looked at the others and said, “Don’t you remember? It was at the ball celebrating the safe return of Céleste and Roél and Avélaine and the war bands from the Changeling land, and . . .”

  At the midnight mark, King Valeray called a halt to the music, and he took stance upon the ballroom dais, and as servants passed among the gathering and doled out goblets of wine, Valeray called for quiet, for he would make a toast to the successful quest and to those who rode thereon, and he would toast the brides and grooms to be, and of course he would toast the child to be born to Alain and Camille.

  But the moment that all had a goblet in hand, including the servants, of a sudden there came the sound of shuttles and looms, and before the gathering stood three women: Maiden, Mother, and Crone; the Ladies Skuld, Verdandi, and Urd; the Fates Wyrd, Lot, and Doom: one slender, her robe limned in silver; one matronly, her robe limned in gold; and one seemingly bent with age, her robe limned in black.

  A gasp went up from the gathering, yet Valeray and Borel and Alain, and Luc and Roél and Chevell all bowed, the men in the gathering following suit; and Saissa and Liaze and Céleste and Camille and Michelle and Avélaine curtseyed, the gathered women doing likewise.

  “Mesdames,” murmured King Valeray upon straightening.

  “Valeray,” said Verdandi.

  “What would you have of us?” asked the king.

  Verdandi looked at Urd, and she in turn peered at Céleste among the gathering and said, “The gray arrow?”

  “It is in my quarters,” said Céleste. “Shall I fetch it? It is broken.”

  Urd cackled and said, “Broken? Nay.” And with a gesture, of a sudden the arrow appeared in her hand, and even as she held it, the shaft became whole and its leaden point keen. Then she looked at it and murmured, “Even were I to let it stay broken, still it is too deadly to remain in mortal hands.”