As the harper waved his hand, Dana felt the slight push that sent her through the veil.
The palace and gardens were gone. She was back on the broad summit of Lugnaquillia, surrounded by bog and windy mountains.
Moments later, the harper’s promise was fulfilled. A little gray mouse came scampering through the grass and up to Dana. Then it changed before her eyes into a little old lady with a whiskery face.
Dana could have hugged Mrs. Woodhouse, but the situation was urgent.
“Can you help me find my mother? I’ve got to hurry! For her sake and the King’s!”
“Yes, my pet,” Mrs. Woodhouse assured her. “I am here to show you the way.”
She led Dana to the western edge of the South Prison. It overlooked the bog between Lugnaquillia and the lower slopes of Slievemaan. Dana shuddered. This was the place where Lugh had lain buried and where he had risen up in his madness to cause the bog-burst.
“It is the path you must go,” the old woman said quietly, “the dark trail of your story which you must follow. Be of good courage. Do not fear your own ruin, for there is a treasure within you.”
“Are you coming with me?” Dana asked, though she already knew the answer.
“This is your quest, a leanbh. Your mission. When a girl goes to seek the Great Mother, no one may go with her. It is a sacred journey she undertakes alone.”
“Slievemaan,” Dana murmured to herself. “Sliabh na mBan. The Women’s Mountain.”
Mrs. Woodhouse handed Dana the leather satchel she had left behind in the palace.
“You will need this.”
Assuming it held provisions, Dana slung the satchel over her shoulder. And with her golden-brown cloak wrapped around her, she set off. Though she felt nervous and excited and almost dizzy with fear, one thought overrode all emotion: I’m going to find my mother.
She stopped only once to look back at Mrs. Woodhouse.
The old woman’s appearance had changed yet again. Half lost in the rising mist, draped in a gray mantle, a gigantic female figure stood against the sky.
Dana continued on her journey, making her way across boggy ground, past craters of black peat exposed by wind and rain. Clouds shrouded the morning sun. A cold mist streamed over the landscape. Soon she could see only a few feet in front of her. Banks of gray haze hemmed her in on all sides. Lone trees stood out like the masts of tall ships emerging from a fog at sea. Her face felt wet, as if with tears.
She was walking in the Wicklow Mountains and yet she wasn’t. To bolster her courage, she tried to imagine the wolf padding alongside her; tried to think of Saint Kevin and his quiet strength. But neither image held for long. Nothing could hold firm in this liminal space on the threshold of the unknown. Though her fear was growing, she didn’t think of turning back. Half fairy, half mortal, this was her birthright: to walk between the worlds.
It seemed like hours before the sun broke through the clouds to burn away the mist. She found herself walking in a green valley not unlike Glendalough. The sudden beauty of it made her smile.
Then they came.
At first she thought they were rain clouds speeding over the mountainside and into the vale. Then, as they drew nearer, she saw what they were: a swarm of black crows with their eyes sewn shut. As they poured into the glen, they attacked everything around them: ripping out plants and stripping trees, tearing apart animals, devouring birds and insects. The silence of the slaughter made it seem more terrible. A fog of blood obscured the scene.
When the demon birds departed, there was nothing left.
Dana stood on barren ground. Not a single blade of grass in sight. No bird sang. No creature stirred. A chill wind wailed around her. A gray light dimmed all. Was this Dún Scáith? The Fort of the Shades? Or was it Dún Eadóchais? The Fort of Despair?
She could sense the suffering of the land. With each step she took, it seeped into her body and withered her soul. Generations have trod, have trod, have trod. With a new and dawning horror, she realized she was not walking on solid earth, but over a cesspit of noxious substances. Her stomach heaved as the sweet sickly smells rose up.
And even as she recognized the worst of her nightmares, it began to happen.
The noisome mud gurgled like a throat. Now the ground opened up to swallow her. She fell into a stinking pit. Like a wild thing she tried to claw her way back up; but not even the silver nails in her shoes could help her climb the slimy walls.
She screamed for help.
Her screams fell like stones into a bottomless well.
She screamed again.
And again.
A sudden thought struck her. This was not only her nightmare, but her mother’s too! The hellish dream of a light being trapped in matter. It could only mean one thing. Her mother was near!
Dana started to shout at the top of her lungs.
“MAMA! MAMA!”
A noise sounded at the top of the pit. Dana gulped back her cries as a white face peered over the edge.
It wasn’t her mother.
onor! A slender white arm reached down toward Dana. Jumping to catch it, she hung on for dear life. As she scrambled up the wall, she felt as if she were being dragged from the grave.
“Oh, thank you!” she cried as she clambered out of the pit. “I’m so—”
Her words died as she stared at the older girl.
Honor was shivering uncontrollably. Drenched to the skin, she was deathly pale, almost blue. The jeans and T-shirt were those she had worn briefly at the fair, and once again they were wet and strewn with seaweed.
“Do y-y-you … know … wh-wh-o I am?” she asked Dana.
Her eyes were dark and empty; her voice, lifeless. “Oh God,” Dana whispered.
Worse was to come. Even as Dana watched, a red stain appeared on the girl’s T-shirt, as if she were bleeding from the heart.
“You’re wounded!”
Honor shrugged indifferently.
“It c-c-comes and g-g-goes.”
Dana could bear it no longer. As the waves of horror washed over her, she backed away from her friend.
“Help me,” Dana whispered, pulling her fairy cloak around her.
Only then did she remember her satchel, still strapped over her shoulder. Acting on instinct, she opened it. There inside was a little bronze pan, some pieces of kindling, a tinderbox, and a handful of hazelnuts. She looked around her. She was standing on an empty plain that had been blasted by fire. The stubble of vegetation was burned and blackened. The air was ashen.
Honor followed her look and shuddered.
“N-n-nothing l-l-lives here.”
Dana could feel the horror trying to reclaim her, but she fought it off. Removing her cloak, she threw it over Honor’s shoulders. The other girl stood straighter as the golden-brown folds enveloped her. Now Dana trembled in the bitter cold, but she knew what to do.
There was enough kindling to start a small fire with the tinderbox. Just as she had hoped, the fairy wood burned without being consumed. The two girls hunkered down in front of the flames. Both kept their eyes on the fire, as if to ward off the shadows that hovered beyond. Dana was silently thanking Mrs. Woodhouse as she placed the pan over the fire and roasted a few hazelnuts. The moment she popped one into her mouth, she felt strengthened; but when she offered the pan to Honor, she was met with a blank stare.
Dana took a hazelnut and put it to the girl’s lips.
“Eat,” she commanded.
Honor obeyed. Moments later, a faint flush entered her cheeks.
“More,” Honor whispered.
Between them, they finished what was in the pan.
Dana could feel the courage surging through her veins. Her mind grew calm and lucid, ready to deal with the situation. Honor was clearly restored. When the older girl insisted on returning the cloak, Dana saw that the red wound had disappeared and her clothes were dry. Yet it wasn’t the blue-eyed Lady who crouched opposite her, but the human girl Honor sometimes became.
�
��Dana?” she said at last, her voice shaking with emotion.
“Yes, it’s me!” Dana almost cried with relief. “What happened? What are you doing here?”
“This is Dún Scáith. The Fort of the Shades.” Honor glanced at the desolate plain around them. “I came into the Mountain Kingdom, as I said I would, to find out why Lugh was asleep, and maybe discover what the demon was doing here. I wanted to protect you but …
I … fell into darkness.”
“Did the demon capture you?” Dana thought of her mother. “Did he bring you here?”
“Yes and no.” Honor gave her an odd look. “I’m only beginning to understand the nature of this place. It’s not the monster outside that holds us here, but the monster within. Yet, for me, these two are the same. I can’t explain it, Dana, but I can show you: the nightmare I was reliving before you called me from the shadows. If you will, take my hand.”
Dana hesitated, balking at the prospect of another nightmarish experience. But she needed to know more about Dún Scáith if she was going to free her mother. She reached out for Honor.
As soon as they clasped hands, the landscape changed. The sudden shock of color made Dana’s head spin. Instead of the dreary gray, there was blue sky, green trees, and sunlit rock. She knew at once where she was. On the hillside of Bray Head, the small mountain by the seashore of the town where she lived.
Honor was beside her; but when she spoke, her voice echoed in Dana’s mind.
Because of the spell on the marker stones, I could not stay long in the Kingdom as a fairy. I donned my human guise. But since that part of me is dead …
Dana shuddered, remembering Honor as the ghost of a drowned girl. Was that how her friend had died? But what about the wound? The blood? Where did that come from?
They were standing at the edge of a cliff overlooking the Irish Sea. Cold waters crashed on the rocks below.
This is where I died.
Suddenly they were on a narrow shelf just below the cliff edge. Dana let out a cry as the wind whipped around the corner and made her teeter. A hang glider called out a warning from above. Now a whirring sound came behind her. She glanced over her shoulder. At first she wasn’t sure what she was looking at. There was a crack in the air itself. Then a fiery arrow shot through it! Beside her, Honor let out a death cry. The arrow had pierced her back and heart. For one awful second, she was impaled against the rock wall.
Then the arrow dissolved.
Honor jerked back in shock and surprise. That was when she lost her balance. Screaming, arms waving, she plummeted into the sea.
Dazed, Dana saw her friend’s body strike the water below. Yet she also saw a luminous imprint of Honor tumble through the rend in the air.
It was like trying to view a puzzle that contained two pictures at the same time. There was Honor sinking through the murky sea. But there she was, also, at the bottom of a well of blue light.
And in that blue well, she wasn’t dead; but lay fast asleep, like a pale flower, shining and innocent, a newborn soul.
“Oh,” said Dana softly.
Let me tell you what you see. While I died in the water, my soul fell through the crack into an in-between place. There I slept for a year and a day.
Dana was glad that Honor explained what happened next, for the images were so startling and alien.
A great golden eagle dived into the blue well. Like a gull plucking a shell from the sea, it fished Honor out. Yet the eagle’s face was human and seemed to mirror Honor’s own.
That is my twin sister. She undertook a mission to save me.
The eagle’s wings enfolded the sleeping girl like a shawl of golden feathers that were also tongues of flame. The whole scene exploded with fire. Now Honor stepped out of the conflagration, awake and reborn, with gold-tinted skin and hair crowned with flowers. She glided toward the rend in the air that hung over Bray Head like a fiery mouth.
Look closely! Do you see it?
Dana’s heart tightened. There was something caught in the crack. Red and segmented, a writhing shape, it burned in the flames. Dana recognized the thing that had pursued her through the mountains. It was dying in the fire.
But now as Honor stepped through the rend, the red shape broke free and dropped behind her. And when Honor disappeared through the crack just before it closed, the demon fell onto the summit of Bray Head.
The images faded. Dana and Honor were back on the dark plain in front of their campfire. Honor’s voice echoed with guilt and horror.
“The Midsummer Fire would have killed the demon except for me. The shadow of the Destroyer used my shadow to free itself. It’s all my fault. I am the one who brought this doom upon us; the thing that threatens both worlds! This truth I discovered when I came to Dún Scáith and I cannot bear it.”
She buried her face in her hands and wept.
Dana didn’t know what to say; but she was beginning to see how people got trapped in the Fort of the Shades.
“Don’t do this!” she said, at last. “You’re only one person. How can you blame yourself for something this big? You didn’t ask for the demon to come. And anyway, he’s been here before. You didn’t start this. You’re just one small part of it.”
As Dana spoke, she hurriedly roasted more hazelnuts and made Honor eat them. Though she wanted to take some herself, she didn’t. She needed to ensure there was enough for her mother.
It took a while for Honor to recover. She smiled at Dana with warmth and affection.
“Thanks,” she said softly. Her voice sounded abashed. “I came here to help you and instead you’ve helped me! Let’s go find your mother.”
Dana shook her head.
“No, you’ve done enough. You showed me what I need to know. You can’t stay here. You’ve got to go home.”
The golden tint seeped through Honor’s skin. Her eyes gleamed like blue stars. But even as the Lady reached out for Dana, her touch began to fade.
“Dear one, a chroí. Thou art a trueheart and a brave-heart. May you fare well on your own journey into the dark.”
Dana stood up slowly. She was alone on the burnt plain, surrounded by shadows. Reluctantly, she turned away from the fire. She knew what lay ahead. She understood. It wasn’t the demon that imprisoned the Queen in Dún Scáith.
Dana hoisted her satchel over her shoulder and drew her cloak around her. Then she set out.
To free her mother from the private hell she had made for herself.
ana trudged over the bleak plain. In the distance rose a jagged range of mountains. The sky was gray; the ground, ashen. Dread seeped into her bones along with the chill. The strength of the fairy food was leaving her, but she wouldn’t take more. She needed the hazelnuts for her mother who had been too long in that place. Would they be enough? Could they draw her from the shadows? And what if they didn’t?
Dana pushed the dark thoughts away. She knew they were part of Dún Scáith. It would try to attack her with doubts and fears.
She had decided to head for the mountains, though they seemed so far away. She couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. But with each step she took, she felt more drained and hopeless, more insubstantial. Would she end up like Honor? A lonely ghost, wandering lost? And if she did, who would call her from the shadows?
Stop it.
Sometimes she cried out for her mother.
“EDANE LASAIR! WHERE ARE YOU? CAN YOU HEAR ME?”
Her words never traveled far, but fell around her like stones.
Sometimes she whispered.
“Mum? You there? Mum?”
Yet she did not falter, nor did she turn back. And as she pushed on, drawing nearer to the uplands, she felt herself turning into a thing of steel and stone; a creature that neither weariness nor despair nor endless miles could defeat. And she began to know in her heart that she would prevail.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.
At last she reached the mountains and the path that led through them. Soon she
found herself on a narrow road that wound along the side of a cliff. The bare rock was dark-red, sheering miles above her and plunging miles below. The air had grown dimmer. Was night falling? Could she continue in the dark?
She was just beginning to wonder if she should turn back, when a light bobbed on the trail ahead of her. It appeared to be swaying back and forth. As it approached her, she saw the hooded figure carrying a lantern, and the donkey behind it, laden with baskets.
By the time the stranger reached her, Dana had given up trying to discern its gender. The features inside the hood kept wavering; one minute, male, the next, female. To further confuse her, the masculine face was sometimes soft and gentle, while the feminine could be cruel and fierce. In the end, Dana accepted that this person was both man and woman, and somehow neither.
“Who are you?” she asked in wonder.
She was glad to hear her own voice. A good solid sound. Not a ghost yet.
“I am the Singer of Tales.”
The voice was melodic, yet again lacked the distinction of gender. What followed next had the same bizarre logic of a dream. The Singer pointed to the panniers on either side of the donkey. They were filled with books.
“Choose one.”
Dana searched through them tentatively: paper scrolls and Egyptian papyri; tablets of wax and clay; manuscripts of vellum; hand-sewn texts bound in calfskin; even thin sheets of gold with letters worked into the metal. As well as illustrated tomes and glossy paperbacks, there were talking books, computer disks, and videotapes. A metallic box glowed and hummed with laser, electronic, and holographic devices that she guessed were books yet to be invented.
A few volumes she recognized from Gabriel’s collection, but most were a mystery to her. The Book of Time. The Book of Names. The Red Book of Westmarch. The Yellow Book of Leccan. The Book of the Dun Cow. The Book of Lindisfarne. The Books of Mica Schist. The Mahabharata. The Mabinogion. The Book of the Dead. The Book of the Living.
She picked one whose title caught her eye. The Book of Childhood. The cover showed a wide river flowing through a green countryside. There were hundreds, no thousands, maybe millions of children gathered on the riverbanks. All were drinking the water. Some scooped it up with cracked cups, while others used their bare hands.
The Light-Bearer's Daughter Page 19