The Bitterbynde Trilogy

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  Now from every country came, at last, the Talith. The scattered remnants of that race gathered at Court to meet the Lady Ashalind, the betrothed of the Faêran King—she whose hair now glimmered with a golden sheen to match their own. Old and young, they came—the few who were well off and lived on the bounty of their estates; the few who were poor and who generally sold their tresses for wigs or who had gone into service, such servants being much sought after for their looks; and the majority, who dwelled in middle-income comfort.

  If the Talith wondered at this newcomer in their midst, in their delight they put aside their questions. It may be that their natural curiosity was dulled by the gramarye hanging in heavy veils about the palace, drifting like incense through the corridors and halls. Avlantia’s dispossessed formed a coterie about Ashalind, reviving the ancient songs and lore of their northern land, polishing their innate skills of eloquence, sharpening their scholarship, revelling in poetry, music and theatre, showing off their skills in the sports of field and track.

  With her anointed eyes, Ashalind perceived the wakened Faêran of Eagle’s Howe here and there at Court, sometimes where others could see them, sometimes not. They preferred to spend their time in the gardens, or riding and hawking in the Royal Game Reserves of Glincuith, rather than enclosed within walls. She thought them selfish, sternly moral, callous, cruel and kind, with a love of courteousness and an infinite capacity for joy. They were as swift to punish as to reward. She glimpsed them helping people with a wave of their hand, or bidding small (also generally unseen) wights pinch lazy servants and frowzy courtiers until their flesh appeared smudged with cobalt and charcoal.

  Yet it could be argued that they were neither better nor worse than mortalkind, and in any case this sanctioning of vice and virtue was not a frequent occurrence. In general, the Faêran ignored mortals, taking more interest in their own affairs. Sometimes they mingled with the Talith, but only half a dozen mortals commanded their whole-hearted attention—Ashalind, Prince Edward, Ercildoune, Roxburgh, Alys and young Rosamonde.

  One evening a flight of eotaurs came hurtling out of the sunset. Stormriders had brought tidings of the brothers Maghrain.

  ‘Your Majesty,’ panted the Wing-Leader of the Royal Squadron, bowing low, ‘they were found as you described, standing beside the black loch. The waters were boiling, as though some violent storm raged beneath the surface.’

  ‘A storm indeed,’ said Angavar.

  ‘As we speak, the Dainnan bring them here aboard a patrol frigate.’

  ‘You have done well.’ The King dismissed them.

  That night the Dainnan Windship docked at the Mooring Mast of Caermelor Palace. The Maghrain brothers were brought before Angavar and Ashalind.

  She looked with joy and horror upon the red-haired men. They stood to attention, their faces blank. Neither spoke. Water trickled from their clothes. Kelp was tangled in their wet hair.

  Turning to her betrothed she said, ‘Enchanted they remain! Wilt thou free them, prithee?’

  ‘Goldhair,’ said Angavar, ‘these men have existed in Erith far beyond the span of their years. Unlike thee, they have lived and breathed every mortal moment of the last millennium. Dost thou understand what will happen, should the spell be broken?’

  She paled.

  ‘Oh,’ she said. ‘That I had not considered.’ She paused pensively, for the space of six heartbeats. ‘Does one still speak only untruth, while the other is honest?’

  ‘Nay. That was laid on them only for the purpose of thy test. Yet two words only may be uttered by them. Down the centuries they have been permitted only “yea” or “nay”, for the Each Uisge detests the sound of men’s speech.’

  She went to the Ertishmen, searching their dispassionate faces.

  ‘Do you wish to remain enchanted?’ she asked.

  ‘No,’ replied one of the brothers. A vein stood out at the side of his neck, pumping hard. Every sinew seemed knotted, as though he strove against some mighty force. Yet he and his brother faced no visible opposition.

  ‘Do you know what will become of you, when you are freed?’

  ‘Yes,’ said the other brother, whose brow was beaded with seawater, or possibly sweat. His jaw was clenched, his knuckles white, as though he strove to speak but could not.

  Ashalind bit her lip. She kissed each brother on the cheek. Cold was their flesh, which for centuries had known only the touch of water under stone.

  ‘Then may goodness and mercy go with you, and the sun to shine upon you, and the wind ever at your backs.’

  Angavar placed a hand briefly on each waxen brow.

  ‘Sain thee,’ he said.

  The brothers turned towards one another. Expressions of joy slowly spread across their faces. With hoarse shouts they opened wide their arms to embrace each other, but even as they leaned into the embrace, time caught up with them. Before they could meet, two columns of dust rained down upon the floor. So fine was this pollen that a slight breeze was enough to lift the particles, and they blew away.

  Sometimes it was a terrible thing, to be at the side of the Master of Gramarye.

  But it could also be exalting.

  Always, to be in the presence of the Faêran was an exhilaration. It was like experiencing the prelude to a storm when the wind rises, the skies darken and the air is charged with magic. On the doorstep of storms the world is an altered place where anything is possible, where you become so buoyant that at any moment that gusting wind will whip you off your feet and carry you up, over lashing treetops to its elemental domain of turbulent air and purple steams. That is what it was to be with the Faêran.

  How much more intoxicating to be close to the Faêran King.

  ‘When I am with thee, I believe I can fly!’ Ashalind exclaimed.

  At that, Angavar laughed aloud.

  ‘It would please me to see thee take thy pleasure of the sky,’ he said, and he took her flying.

  To fly, without visible means of support, is an ancient dream. Mortals have forever desired to fly like a bird—this was not that way of flying. It was not the way of a swan, dependent on muscular effort and skillful balance in gliding the lofty currents. Nor was it the sildron-borne way, the courtly, mechanised glissanding, with a flying belt for hoisting and ropes for propulsion.

  The Faêran manner of levitation was like that of a mote, of thistledown, of a butterfly, a leaf, a fly, a blackbird, an arrow, an eagle, a firework a storm cloud, an ideation and more, combined—for it permitted ascents far beyond the reach of the highest flying birds, to thousands of feet above the ground where temperatures dropped to extremes and the sparse air would have been hard to breathe, had not the forces of gramarye sustained life in effortless comfort.

  It was to float, weightless, amongst lofty leaves on fragile twigs, passing through bowers of foliage which swung like green spearheads—as birds could never do without breaking their feathers. It was to hang suspended above a limpid pool or the wavelets of a wide, grey mere, and then to let down one foot and dip the toes into the water. It was to jump from a cliff top, arms wide-spread, and hurtle out into the abyss, descending in a gentle curve, only to bank and climb into the low cumulus, or catch an updraught back to the cliff top, or alight halfway down the rocky face on some precipitous ledge, impossible to gain by any other means. It was to be as light as gossamer, to walk across a bed of flowers without crushing a single petal, to ride on the back of a storm with the thunder exploding in your ears and the wind racing unchecked through your veins, the outraged thunderheads towering all around like a giant city. It was to feel every nuance of change in air pressure, wind speed and direction, yet to master every fluctuation; to be as conscious, as capable of altitude and flying speed and navigation as perambulatory land-bound creatures are sensible of the act of walking.

  Yet for the Faêran, flying was purely a leisurely pastime. It was no use for long-distance travel, for it was too slow—especially in the heavy airs of Erith. As a swimmer labours in the wake of a sailing s
hip, as a walker falls behind a chariot, that is how Faêran levitation compared to riding on winged horses or voyaging in Windships.

  Thus, Ashalind and her lover made a progress on eotaurback, visiting many of the regions of Erith they loved best. When they arrived at each location they dismounted and flew, unsupported, except by gramarye.

  In Lallillir, they swooped over the misty fells and down into the damp river-combes where gruagachs, like slender iris flowers, combed their buttercup hair beside reedy pools.

  To Haythorn-Firzenholt they rode. There they alighted on hedge tops, disturbing their close-growing foliage no more than would a fallen leaf, for they could walk light-footed where any Erith-bound creature would sink into the green mass.

  At twilight in the rolling hills of cuinocco country, a slender white ‘horse’ shyly approached the couple and bowed its horned head, trembling with delight as Angavar’s hand caressed the moonbeam arch of the neck.

  ‘My people title him unicorn,’ he said.

  In Rosedale the briars bloomed out of season, powdering the entire valley with a profusion of pink and white rosettes, dainty as kittens’ paws. How different Erith looked, seen from above, as the sun’s eye saw it. Forest leaves reached to the source of light, spreading their arms so as to receive its fullest out-pourings. Tender shoots of palest green and gold hid the old and faded bark below.

  The swan-girls of Mirrinor gathered around Ashalind and Angavar like dark flowers, as in a boat of glass the couple skimmed the placid lakes or stood balanced on the water before slowly sinking together into the diaphanous world of the asrai.

  The laval meres of Tapthartharath scorched them not, and they flew among the black spires, immune to vapours and noxious gases arising from that desert landscape.

  Flying itself was a source of hilarity. Far from the eyes of courtiers—indeed, out of range of human vision—the fliers tumbled on aerial currents as pups play on a lawn. Free from gravity’s constraint and garbed in the woodland dusken of the Dainnan, Ashalind learned how to somersault in the air, how to make loops, dives, steep turns, rolls and other aerobatic manoeuvres. She was a child again. Not since the age of ten, a millennium ago, had she indulged in such foolishness. Never had she been abetted by such an accomplice in frolicsome absurdity, lawless in the streaming air, a dance partner whose beauty made her weak.

  Errantry looked on with a frigid eye. To raptors, flight was a livelihood.

  ‘I would like to remain in levity always,’ said Ashalind, floating with Angavar among the outermost leaves of an oak. ‘Gravity is too grave a condition.’

  ‘Alas, thy race is not designed for constant lightness,’ he said. ‘Their bones lose density, their sinews shrink. In idleness, the mortal heart shrivels.’

  ‘Then I call it a shame!’ said Ashalind, swimming in deep-green, scalloped foliage. ‘Yet it matters not, if I may fly with thee sometimes.’

  ‘Where next?’ inquired Angavar.

  ‘To Tiriendor, now. I would fain see that fair forest in Autumn, as I shall always love it best.’

  In Tiriendor, the liquidambars were formed from jewels of light showered from the sunset, and the oaks were hung with balconies of bronze. The air had a dreamlike cast, as if a haze of gold dust floated through the trees. Bright leaves bubbled past, whirling, escaping in sudden outbreaks from the boughs, glimmering and whispering in the sunlight. They lay on the ground, palms upturned and empty, like begging hands. Wild quinces ripened on their boughs like gold-green lanterns, and scarlet-capped toadstools resembling goblins’ caps thrust up from the mold.

  This time, brambles failed to catch at Ashalind’s apparel. Briars and thorns waved themselves aside. Nor did animals and birds flee—on the contrary, they came willingly to Angavar’s hand, docile and unafraid. Some, he called to his side; others came seeking him. Timid fawns and wary wolves, gentle doves, falcons, bears, squirrels—all approached him with trust, seeking his caress. Even the white moths of eventide fluttered in circlets above his head, crowning his dark beauty with cold flames flickering palely.

  ‘Why did the animals not gather thus when first we passed this way?’

  ‘I bade them stand aloof. Wouldst thou not have suspected a Dainnan with a retinue of wild creatures?’

  ‘I suspected thee nonetheless!’ she answered with a smile.

  More flocks of swanmaidens visited them, and the baobhansith in great numbers, and wights of every kind. Few had discovered the true identity of Erith’s erstwhile King-Emperor. His Royal glamour had remained too strong, impenetrable. Those few that had learned of it had heard the truth from the Unseelie Attriod, who had been apprised of it by the Fithiach.

  Seelie or unseelie meant nothing to the Faêran, who had naught to fear from wights. Whereas a mortal King might have punished them, Angavar had made no reprisal against those of the Unseelie Host who had answered Morragan’s Call. According to Faêran Code they had done no wrong. It was neither treasonous for wights to gather at the summons of a Faêran Prince, nor criminal for them to harry mortals and assail them. Customarily, the Faêran did not concern themselves with dealings between wights and mortals.

  While fulfilling his pledge to protect the Empire, and when fighting his way through wight-invaded Isse Tower to find Ashalind, Angavar had ridden against the Unseelie Host. Yet the greater part of the wights who had been defeated at the hands of Angavar and his knights bore no malice against their conquerors. Even the Waelghast, once Chieftain of the Unseelie Hosts, had challenged Angavar out of pride only, and a perverse desire for sport, no matter how perilous. They might at times provoke an engagement with the Faêran, for it was in their nature to be battle-hungry, but it was nigh impossible for wights of eldritch to nourish hostility towards them. There were, perhaps, exceptions to this rule amongst the remaining lords of the Unseelie Attriod, but they were now scattered.

  Underground they passed, Angavar and Ashalind, with their Faêran retinue. Below the graves and sarcophagi of men, they visited caverns of the Fridean, and the workings and delvings of knockers and eldritch miners. Everywhere, diminutive fellows crowded around, laying down their picks and shovels, bowing low in awe.

  ‘Is it hisself? Hisself indeed!’ they twittered amongst themselves, drawn irresistibly by the presence of the Faêran King.

  To the land of the fells their Skyhorses flew. The true wolves of Ravenstonedale, beautiful and dignified, approached the Faêran King and his companion with timid grace. They offered no hurt, and even proudly brought their cubs to show to the visitors. It seemed they had complete trust in Faêrankind—faith enough to accept Ashalind’s presence with merely a sniff of query.

  ‘In the manner of their species,’ said Angavar, fondling the ears of a playful cub, ‘they are not wont to prey on thy race. Their howls are not the voicing of hunger and blood lust, but a communication between their kindred. The fireside legends humans spin amongst themselves do great injustice to the wolves. They hunt for food, play with their young and dwell in harmony with the forest.’ He laughed. ‘As merciless killers, they cannot begin to approach the achievements of humanity!’

  Plundered of their Faêran-wrought treasures, the halls under Waterstair stood empty. They echoed to strands of mortal and Faêran laughter that intertwined like chains of field-daisies and stars.

  ‘Verily,’ confirmed Angavar, ‘this treasure was wrought by my people during the Golden Era. Before we went under the hills to lie down in the Pendur Sleep, we hid it away. The writing on the portal—these are the words of the swan-music riddle. If the word “swan” is spoken aloud in the Faêran tongue, the doors will open.’

  ‘True Thomas was able to translate the riddle for us,’ said Ashalind. ‘Do swans indeed sing as they fly? I have been a swan. I did not notice it.’

  ‘Thou hast not been a true swan, Goldhair. The feathers of true swans possess unusual properties, and make a poignant music as they glide through the air,’ said Angavar. ‘But not all ears are able to hear it.’

  Above mountain
s Ashalind floated with her lover, and across sunset seascapes. They drifted over the riven snowscapes of Rimany, the filatures of Severnesse, the crocus fields of Luindorn, the wild shores of Finvarna and Avlantia’s ruined and forsaken cities.

  In the long, long rays of equinoctial radiance, it seemed forever to be the beginning of a golden day. The sun glided low in the northern sky, mellow and amber, sweet as a honeyed peach, its attenuated beams casting spindly shadows across the land. Low-angled, the light was richly tinted. The season brought not the hard white-gold of Summer hammering straight down from the noon arc, but soft, malleable bars of yellow-gold which speared slantwise through the trees. They changed every leaf into a sliver of stained glass, panes of old gold, blood-garnet and russet, and they painted each tree with translucent gilt on one side, freckled shadow on the other. Eternal morning reigned in that long, low, corn-yellow light—Autumn Evermorn.

  As the season’s glory deepened, they returned to the bustle of Caermelor.

  In the solar of the palace a pile of logs and pine cones burned in the grate of a fireplace luxuriantly carved with the arms and supporters of Eldaraigne. The walls of the solar gleamed with a faint gold tinge emitted by the chromium compound which had been mixed with the plaster. Against this lily sheen the tapestries stood out in startling, brilliant colours.

  Two brindled greyhounds lounged on the patterned hearthrug, wearing strong collars of rubies. Near them stood a small inlaid table of oak, with a chess set of jasper and onyx disposed on top of it. On another table squatted a jewel casket with etched and filigreed lock-plates, its matching keys lying carelessly alongside. Forests of candles blazed in chandeliers and atop tall candelabra.

  A footman stood to attention, bearing a silken cushion. A musician leaned upon a high stool, dreamily plucking the strings of a great golden harp. Notes rained from it like frozen tears of the sun, for the young sovereign was present in the solar, and he was rarely without music.