The Bitterbynde Trilogy

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  ‘What’s amiss?’ shrilled Alys.

  But the Faêran knights knew.

  ‘The Cearb comes this way!’ cried the Lord Dorliroen, peering into dark valleys between rocks.

  Naifindil’s horse reared. ‘And with it, the last lords of the Unseelie Attriod!’ he shouted.

  Their blades glittered, sliding from the sheaths. ‘We are ready,’ called the knight-lords of Faêrie, but they were laughing now, flourishing their swords above their heads so that the supernatural metal sang a song of death.

  The rocks and the soil shuddered at the coming of the Cearb, the Killing One—he who wore the three-cornered hat and possessed the ability to fling hills, and move the very ground—yet he was not the only unseelie lord that now appeared. The waters of Arcdur welled in their springs as the Prince of Waterhorses approached. Scorpions and vipers scattered at the sight of Gull, largest and swiftest of all spriggans. These three Princes of Unseelie had sworn vengeance against the mortalfolk who had taken up arms against them. And yet they were greatly outnumbered. It appeared certain their onslaught would lead only to their destruction.

  ‘A madness is with the wicked ones,’ Ashalind heard Maeve One-Eye murmur in astonishment.

  Indeed a madness seemed to be upon the very fabric of Arcdur. The stones walked.

  Or else, they appeared to be walking. As if they had uprooted themselves from their age-old positions they waddled from side to side, impelled by subterranean vibrations. Pebbles bounced and rolled along. Small fissures began to unseam themselves.

  ‘Fear not, Lady Ashalind!’ said Lord Naifindil, riding up to speak with her. ‘We shall prevent these monsters from reaching thee. The Dainnan warriors surround thee, and the two carlins also. They will protect thee while we indulge in the pleasure of defeating those who dare to challenge us. Prithee, ride on in peace, fair mistress! Seek the Gate!’

  Ashalind perceived the Faêran were beckoned by the opportunity of a skirmish. ‘Go to it!’ she said. The Faêran lord bowed, murmuring a courteous reply, and wheeled his steed about, before cantering away.

  The remaining Faêran knights rode forth to meet their foes while the mortal retinue gathered around Ashalind. The standing stones of Arcdur obstructed a clear view. Between the tall, broad-shouldered monoliths, little could be seen of the encounter between eldritch wights and Faêran, save only flakes of smashed granite jetting high in fountains, and sundry flashes of brilliant light. But, even as the mortals watched, these signs of conflict were moving further off.

  Ercildoune scowled. ‘Three wights pitted against more than two score Faêran knights!’ he said. ‘By rights the clash should be decided in a trice. Yet it appears that instead of engaging, those corrupt plague-sores are deliberately drawing the Faêran away from us. What they hope to achieve by such strategy, I cannot guess. They are mad! We have been made secure from all peril of eldritch origin.’

  ‘Methinks the appearance of the Raven was also a ruse,’ said Alys with suspicion, ‘intended to lure Angavar and his bonny knights from us so that the wicked ones could strike. Have we been so easily gulled?’

  ‘Is it that Angavar himself has been beguiled?’ barked Ercildoune, made short-tempered by frustration. ‘No wiser counsel have I ever known than his!’

  ‘I suspect his judgement was clouded,’ murmured Ashalind.

  ‘Fain would I join the Fair Knights in battle!’ Roxburgh shouted furiously, but he had given his word to remain at Ashalind’s side and would not be forsworn. Even as the last words left his lips, a vast crack unclosed in the stony ground right under their horses. Three of the Dainnan riders slipped sideways into it and vanished.

  ‘We stand upon a delving of the Fridean!’ cried Ercildoune. ‘Ride to safety, all!’

  Generated by the violent percussions of the Cearb’s footsteps, the foundations of Arcdur were disintegrating, collapsing into hungry crevasses. Close beneath the surface the ceilings of Fridean tunnels were caving in, for throughout this region of Arcdur the ground was perforated, honeycombed with wightish caverns and rights-of-way. Ashalind and her companions looked about desperately for some sign of firm footing, but, hemmed in by natural architecture, could not discover which direction led to safety. Everywhere they turned, rock and gravel was dropping away, massive stones were toppling. Riders, undermined, were sliding into abysms. The carlins drove their wands into these cracks. Great grappling roots thrust forth like muscular fingers, driving through the shifting soils to grasp the particles and hold them together. Yet the gramarye of the two Daughters of Grianan was not sufficiently swift or encompassing. Horses and men floundered as the unstable ground subsided beneath them. Ashalind and her companions were rendered helpless against a peril that was not directly of eldritch origin.

  Far off, several of Angavar’s Faêran knights saw what was about and swerved their horses, veering away from the attack and racing toward the stricken riders. A misty light, like that which clung about the Faêran, now bloomed all around the struggling mortals, enfolding them. They were lifted, so that their horses’ hooves no longer slipped and sank into the treacherous ground.

  In the confusion, Ashalind was separated from her mortal bodyguard, but two Faêran lords rode up to her and led her steed to solid ground. The mare stood trembling and sweating beneath a tall arkenfir. One of the Faêran knights held the reins.

  ‘Lady Ashalind, you must stay here while we put an end to the enemy,’ he said. ‘The roots of this fir tree go deep and grip hard. They bind the rocks together with strong force. Who bides beneath these boughs stands upon sound foundations. Do not move from this place, no matter what happens. As long as you remain here, you shall remain secure until our return.’

  With that warning they left her alone and rode away to join their comrades.

  But even as the mortals were being plucked free from the disintegrating foundations of Arcdur, the greater number of Ashalind’s Faêran guardians had finally joined battle with two of the lords of Unseelie. Only the Cearb somehow still evaded them.

  At this, Ashalind wondered. So many against so few—with such odds, the skirmish would soon be over. The Cearb seemed curiously elusive—conceivably, their delight in the thrill of the chase had caused the Faêran knights to prolong their enterprise longer than was necessary.

  Unexpectedly the Cearb himself, a massive figure clad in tricorne and black coat, emerged from behind a cluster of boulders close by. He strode past, producing his curiously shattering effect, and the terrain began to crumble in places that had previously appeared secure.

  Falling stones slammed into the ground, throwing thick clouds of dust into the atmosphere which blotted out the scenes of chaos surrounding Ashalind. No matter how hard she stared, she could barely make out the figures of riders moving in the haze, or the receding back of the Cearb as he moved away, apparently without noting her. It was like looking at reflections through breath-misted glass. Only the trunk of the arkenfir, towering close, seemed real. Out of the fog issued the ringing shouts of the Faêran, the shrill war cries of the rook-youths and a stream of bellowed curses in Ertish.

  The fog swirled and came together in a blot. The blot dissipated like smoke, and where it had been stood seven duergars, the leader holding a whip.

  They pinned Ashalind with their baleful eyes and stepped forward.

  ‘Avaunt!’ she cried.

  Her mare threw up her head and made to run off, but Ashalind held her hard, pulling on the reins. ‘You cannot frighten me,’ she snapped at the unseelie dwarves. ‘I stand in a protected place and from here I shall not budge. Be off!’

  The duergar leader grinned, raised its arm high and cracked the whip. In panic, the mare reared on her hind legs, and by the time Ashalind had steadied her, the wights had disappeared.

  The ears of the mare flicked and swivelled. New sounds grew amongst the clamour. They did not arise from within the land-bound fog but instead pierced it from without and above, cutting across all other noises as scythes sever murmuring rushes.<
br />
  Three strident calls grated against the sky—three creaky doors, three unoiled hinges—like a guttural keening of strange children, hoarse prophets predicting the end of the world. A trio of huge black birds flapped out of the fog. Crazed with fear, Ashalind’s mare jumped sideways, threw her rider off and dashed away. Dazed, Ashalind grabbed hold of the arkenfir’s stem and heaved herself to her feet. Like a triad of tombstones the hoodie crows perched sombrely, with folded wings, atop a monolith. One by one their black beaks opened like pincers and snapped shut. The eyes of these manifestations seemed not to be eyes at all, but empty sockets into which one dared not look for fear of being drawn into the unspeakable regions of madness beyond. Ashalind felt utterly alone, abandoned and vulnerable. There came over her an urgent desire to flee.

  ‘Get you gone,’ she sobbed violently. ‘Macha, Neman, Morrigu—do you think I do not know you? Do you think I do not perceive you are trying to drive me hence? You shall not have your will of me. Here I stay!’

  For one long moment the Crows of War regarded the mortal with their profane vacuums of eyes. Then, as if in answer to a signal, they extended the great arcs of their wings and flapped their way slowly, deliberately, into the sky.

  The sounds of conflict had ceased. The encounter was over and the dusts of aftermath were settling now, revealing the broken landscape and a ragged pool of water lying spilled at the foot of a pile of granite boulders. Ashalind glimpsed riders, both Faêran and mortal, cantering back towards the arkenfir where she stood. She fancied she heard them calling her name, but could not be certain. The sensory battering of noise, choking dust and turmoil she had experienced had been overwhelming. Exhausted by confrontations with the wights, she felt wrung out like a mop-head, wishing only to find some haven. For a fleeting instant it seemed to the beleaguered damsel that her lover had abandoned her. She felt that she could endure no more fear, having expended her strength and been left vulnerable.

  Close by, the water in the pool stirred. Out of it climbed a one-eyed man with a huge, lolling head. His torso was growing out of a horse’s body. Stinking white vapour poured from his mouth. Completely devoid of skin, his entire surface was red raw flesh, in which blood, black as tar, ran through yellow veins, and great white sinews, thick as horse tethers, twisted, stretched and contracted as the monster moved, stretching out his extraordinarily long, single arm.

  At this first actual sight of Nuckelavee, Ashalind’s courage failed her. The vision she had seen in Morragan’s looking-pool, and all the well-known tales about this monster, burst upon her mind with the impetus of sheer horror. According to the practice of the Faêran, Angavar had defeated but not destroyed the creature. By far the most hideous of all unseelie wights, this abomination had slain the parents of Prince Edward. Uttering a half-smothered cry she fled, darting and dodging amongst the stones.

  As she ran she could hear her name urgently being shouted, but louder still was the rampant clatter of eldritch hooves on disintegrating stone, and a rhythmic hissing as of a steam kettle boiling. Underfoot, the ground was treacherous, mazed with cracks. Out of them, like maggots from a disturbed corpse, scuttled the small, light-fearing denizens of the underworld whose dwellings had been disturbed by the quakes. Ashalind’s blood roared in her ears like tormented bulls. Heat scalded the nape of her neck as though the blast of Nuckelavee’s breath were already singeing her flesh. She dared not slow her progress by glancing back to find out how close he was, but in the recesses of her mind she took some courage from the sounds of grating and sliding that came to her as Nuckelavee’s hard hooves slipped on the broken ground. Surely this labour must impede his progress! Still, her shoulders tensed against the blow that must soon fall from his flayed fist, crushing her against jagged edges of granite.

  Wildly, as she ran, she scanned her surroundings for some hope of rescue. Between the towers and stacks glimmered a satin sky of the palest blue deepening to indigo in the east. Fine strands of cloud streaked it like chalk marks. Straight ahead loomed a tall grey rock in the shape of a giant hand. A slender obelisk leaned towards it, coloured as the lip of a rose petal. Both monoliths were capped by a lintel-stone shaped like a doorstep. Near at hand in a granite hollow welled a dark, spring-fed pool.

  Seemingly just another rocky crevice among many, it stood motionless and unnoticeable in the deep shadows of afternoon, as it had stood for many lifetimes of kings: the Gate she had left behind. Yet not quite as it had always stood—a crack was pencilled down one side of it where it remained slightly ajar.

  Here was a safe haven to lock out what pursued her.

  Her fingernail slid swiftly into the almost invisible opening. At her touch, the massive portal swung gently aside as though it were feather-light. A shadowy haven lay within, but even as a flying pebble dislodged by eldritch hooves rebounded off the gatepost, the refugee hesitated, struck by that familiar sensation of having forgotten some matter of crucial importance.

  In that elusive moment, beneath the unstable ground near the Gate, a thin barrier of silt responded to the Cearb’s vibrations and gave way. A handful of gravel poured from a pocket. This undermining shifted the stones which had roofed that pocket. On the surface above, a boulder which had been balancing precariously atop a stack now tilted. Motivated by its own momentum, it crashed down. The shock of the bouncing impact split open new crevices. A rat jumped out from a fissure and ran over Ashalind’s foot.

  It was too much.

  Fear and revulsion spurred her. With a scream of outrage she slipped inside the Gate, kicked aside three strands of hair and a broken knife, and slammed the portal shut.

  Slumping against a wall, Ashalind rested to regain her breath. A radiance, ambiguous and strange, illuminated a distorted passageway sealed by a door at either end. The vaulted ceiling was cracked. In places it sagged down like a bag of water. As the walls approached the nearest portal they melded into rough-hewn granite. At the far end where they met the silver Realm Door with its golden hinges, they transmuted into living trees whose boughs interlaced overhead. This, the fateful Gate-passage between the Realm and Erith, had not altered.

  On the floor lay the haft and snapped-off blade of the horn-handled knife Ashalind’s father had given her at their parting. Nearby was the shrivelled leaf of an eringl tree. In the uncertain gloom, it was impossible to make out the three strands of hair which had faithfully served to keep open the gate during her travails in the world of humankind.

  ‘Gate, oh Gate,’ whispered Ashalind, between two realms.

  A sound of sweet, sad singing circulated in Ashalind’s head. She grew calm, and with tranquillity came the recollection for which she had been striving, just before she had set foot inside the Gate-passage.

  ‘Fear no harm from wights now, Betrothed, ‘Angavar had told her, ‘nor from any mortal creature. For when I am with thee, thou’rt safe from all harm. When I am not, I shall leave thee in the care of others who can protect thee, or the thou shalt bide in some secure place.’

  Once, Sianadh had instructed, ‘Put fear aside, for only then will ye see your way clearly.’ His words had proved apt. Terror had been her undoing, for it had driven out rational thought. Neither the duergars, nor the Crows of War, nor Nuckelavee could possess the power to scathe the chosen bride of the Faêran High King, if only she had trusted his word and stood her ground. As for the scuttling rodent (at the thought of which, she flinched), it was no more than a lorraly creature hurrying to shelter.

  As soon as the girl in the Gate-passage reached these conclusions, she thought of something else. How long had she been lying there? Perhaps five minutes? Perhaps ten? Lunging for the Erith Door, she flung it wide.

  Beyond, the land of granite towers and riven rocks lay naked to the night. It seemed empty, frozen, scoured of all living beings. White stars frosted a sky so black it seemed to suck out the essence of her being. Their light bleached the flanks of the monoliths, carving enigmatic shadows in secret crevices and deeply cloven interstices.

&nbs
p; Some unknown measure of time had passed.

  She was alone.

  A profound pang of loss and grief tore through the very core of Ashalind’s spirit. She cursed the legacy of humankind, that fear should ever drive out reason and set the world awry. Her cry rang out over the desolation of cold stone and clear water and dark pine, but it could not summon what had passed forever.

  It could not turn back Time.

  12

  THE BITTERBYNDE

  Part II

  ‘I’d teach you of her looks and of her ways,

  Her lilting voice, the tincture of her hair,

  Her lucent eyes as bright as Summer days.

  I’d teach you this and more, but she’s not there.’

  OLD TALITH SONG

  In the soft sibilant eventide belonging to the land of stone and pine, a wind the colour of water crooned along gullies and canyons, whistled through chimneys and narrow fractures, piped in clefts and rifts and sang amongst soaring columns. Under its caress the tiny beards of mosses nodded. A small rain fell from belts of arkenfirs where each needle was beaded with a glister of water-drops condensed from the mists. It fell on the surface of cold, black waters that lapped new margins of fused glass and congealed stone. Ripples unrolled like ribbons of platinum.

  A lake, where no lake had been before.

  Not far from the lake’s edge there reared a tall grey rock like a giant hand. A slender obelisk leaned towards it, coloured as the lip of a rose petal. Both monoliths were capped by a lintel-stone shaped like a doorstep. As softly as the sighing of the wind, someone stepped from the shadows of the rocks. Her hair streamed out, lustrous, a swathe of gilt threads. Her eyes were two green flowers brimming with dew.

  ‘What have I done?’

  Stooping, she placed some glinting strands carefully in the shadows at her feet. She set her hand on a lofty slab and it shifted, though this time it was harder to move. Something in the door’s framing had skewed. The portal stuck fast and she could not close it. Leaving it partway unclosed she walked along the shore, into the night. In crevices of stone, the wind’s breath carried away her final words like a passing thought which brushes against the brain and is almost remembered.