by Lisa Tuttle
I stopped, recalling the other fly in the room, buzzing around Hugh's head. That was her.
“So that's it? He failed? She's gone for good?” Laura gazed at me in anguish.
“No way. We're going back there tonight. And this time we'll bring her back.”
29. William
William Noy was a respectable young farmer who lived near Selena Moor in western Cornwall in the early 1800s. He had courted Grace Hutchens, and the two had been very happy, intending to marry, until one day she went missing. Several days later, her body was found on Selena Moor, with no evidence of how she died.
However, that tragedy was three years in the past when this story begins, and William Noy was a sociable bachelor well liked by his neighbors. When he failed to return home after visiting the local inn one night, he was soon missed, and the alarm raised. The local people all turned out and searched for him for three days.
Finally, in a treacherous, boggy area only half a mile from his home, the searchers heard dogs howling, and when they went to investigate, discovered William's horse tethered to a thornbush in a grassy spot, with the dogs, thin and starved-looking, crouched trembling nearby. The dogs led them to a ruined barn, where they found the missing man asleep.
When they woke him, he was confused, surprised it was morning already, and astounded when his friends told him he'd been missing for more than three days.
He said he'd decided to take a shortcut home from the inn, but had lost his way on the moor and had wandered for many miles through a country strange to him, unable to recognize a single landmark although the moon was bright. Eventually he was cheered by the sound of music, and distant, glimmering lights. But his horse shied and refused to go on, so he dismounted and tied it to a tree. The dogs shrank back and whimpered and would not follow him, so he went on by himself. He came to a fine orchard, where he admired ripe plums hanging from the branches, and wondered who owned them. Beyond the trees he glimpsed a house where some sort of party was going on—perhaps a Harvest Home supper, he thought. The place was lighted by hundreds of candles, and there was a crowd of richly dressed folk on the lawn. Some sat at tables, eating and drinking, while others danced; still others played musical instruments or sang. His eye was caught by one particular girl playing a tambourine. She looked taller than any of the others and was dressed all in white. As he began to approach, she signaled him urgently to stay back.
He stopped and waited, and saw her give the tambourine to one of the others; and then she walked in his direction, murmuring as she passed, “Follow me to the orchard.”
He did, and there, in the moonlight that filled the quiet grove, he recognized with a shock his old sweetheart, Grace, whom he thought dead. He made a move to kiss her, but she drew away nervously and warned him not to touch her, and not to eat or drink anything if he wanted to see his home and friends again.
She told him what had happened to her:
Searching for a strayed sheep on Selena Moor one evening, she had heard the sound of her lover's voice, calling to his dogs, and so she had decided to take a shortcut past his house, in hope of meeting him. But somehow she got lost and wandered for hours before she eventually came to this orchard. Feeling hungry and thirsty after her long walk, she'd plucked a beautiful golden plum. As she began to eat it, it turned bitter in her mouth and she'd fainted away. Coming to, she found herself surrounded by a crowd of people, all of them smaller than she, who were excited at having found this strong young girl to be their servant.
She had been bitterly unhappy at first, and found it a trial to serve these people who had little sense or feeling but lived what seemed to her false, unnatural lives. They were not Christians, but star-worshipers, and took pleasure only in appearances, and in memories of what had pleased them when they had lived as mortals, perhaps a thousand years ago.
She told him: “People believed, and so it seemed, that I was found on the moor dead; what was buried as me, however, was only a changeling or a sham body, I should think, for it seems to me that I feel much the same as when I lived to be your sweetheart.” More recently she discovered she could take the form of a small bird, and fly about near her old sweetheart and others she had cared about during her mortal life, and this made her more content with her fate.
From beyond the orchard the small people began to call for Grace to serve them more ale. She begged her sweetheart to keep himself hidden, and promised to come back and help him escape very soon.
But William felt himself in no danger, and hoped he might find some way to rescue her. He'd never given much credence to fairy tales, but now he racked his brain to recall some helpful detail. Unfortunately, he had no holy water or churchyard sod about his person. Plucking up his courage, he took his gloves from his pocket, turned them inside out for luck, and going out of the orchard, he hurled them into the midst of the fairies, calling out boldly, “Let her that was mine be returned to me!”
Immediately everything vanished, including Grace, and he found himself standing alone in the ruins of an old barn. He felt something strike him on the head, and fell to the ground, and knew nothing more until his friends discovered him.
30. Peri
Laura went up to her room to get a few things and joined me at the car, at which point we realized Hugh had the key. She would have gone back to wake him up, but—
“Let's walk,” I said.
She rolled her eyes.
“I'm serious. It won't be dark for hours. If we keep moving, we might shake off a few midges. Those boots of yours, are they just for show?”
She looked down at her brown leather lace-ups. “I don't mind walking. But if we're hiking all evening, we'll be worn-out when we get there.”
“It won't take that long. Two hours, max. Honest.” I saw the doubt on her face, and pulled out my trusty OS map. “We're not going back down the road. There's a forestry track we can take instead, and it's more direct. Look.” I spread the map out on the hood of the rented car and showed her.
“What's that?”
She pointed, squinting uncertainly at a line of lettering midway along our route—the very thing I'd noticed that made me decide on this walk.
“It's a chambered cairn.”
“You mean one of those ancient graves, the ones called fairy mounds?”
I nodded.
She hoisted her large, soft-leather bag more firmly across her shoulder. “OK, let's go.”
It was wonderful weather for a walk. Yesterday's clouds had cleared away and with them the oppressive humidity. It was warm and the sun still shone strongly out of the clear blue sky, but a regular breeze kept the air refreshingly cool and also drove away the midges. We crossed the road and entered a forest. Silence enveloped us, as palpable as the cool brush of air against skin. I could hear nothing but the rustle of our clothing, the soft padding of our feet, the sound of my own breath.
I had no particular plan in mind, only, as I'd told Laura, a disinclination to spend the rest of the afternoon doing nothing. And I didn't even know that going back to the fairy door would work a second time. It was Hugh who had recognized the fairy door for what it was; it had opened for Hugh, not me.
There was more than one way into the Otherworld. When I'd seen the unnamed chambered cairn marked on the map and tracked with my eyes the obvious route between it and the fairy door, I'd remembered Laura's story of searching through many tunnels, and what Hugh said about how far he and Peri had walked before they came out on the hillside again. I wanted to have a look at the cairn, so old and so long-forgotten in the forest that nobody now living could put a name to it. Maybe, once upon a time, it had been known as Mider's sidh.
We'd been walking, mostly with an easy, comfortable silence between us, for nearly an hour when we came upon it in a clearing in the woods. Although there was no marker or sign to identify what it was, and it had long been overgrown with moss and weeds and the ubiquitous giant ferns the British call bracken, there was no mistaking it. A shaft of sunlight fell through the leafy canopy ov
erhead onto the rocks at the summit of the hillock. Veins of white quartz in grey stone caught the sun and burned like fire.
The hairs rose on the back of my neck for no reason, and I cleared my throat nervously.
“Let's rest here for a while,” said Laura. She looked around. Spotting a substantial tree stump, she tested the surface with her hand, then, finding it neither too rough nor too damp, sat down. With a small sigh she eased her bag off her shoulder and let it slip to the ground. “I hope you brought water.”
“Two full bottles.” I shrugged out of my rucksack and unzipped it to get the water. As I handed her one, my eyes were on her bag, which looked pretty full, and was obviously no small burden. “What did you bring?”
“Oh, various things.” She uncapped and took a long swig. “Thanks.”
I kept staring at her fallen bag. It was moving. She'd set it down on a slope, so I reckoned the contents had tumbled over; but the longer I watched, the more I thought something inside was trying to get out.
“Like what?” I asked. “Live mice?”
Laura looked down and caught her breath. As we both watched, astonished, something greyish and hairy pushed through the opening. A moist black nose, the gleam of an eye, the shape of the narrow head, and then two hairy paws that scrabbled for purchase on the mossy ground before managing to haul the rest of itself out of the bag. It was some sort of wolfhound: large, brindled black and white, very shaggy. While I was still struggling to accept the evidence of my eyes, something even more impossible happened, as a full-sized horse erupted from the bag. How? I have no idea. I felt I was witnessing some incredible birth. Seconds later, the leather shoulder bag lay limp yet whole, and a large, chestnut-colored mare and a big dog stood beside us in the clearing.
Laura looked as dazed as I felt.
“Peri's Guardians.”
In response, the horse whinnied softly, and the dog's tail wagged furiously.
I cast a sidelong look at the bag. “Did you bring the doll along, too?”
“I couldn't find it.” Her voice was soft and faraway-sounding.
The dog came over and thrust its long snout into my hand. Being a well-trained human, I stroked behind its ears. It leaned against me and panted happily. The horse dropped its head and looked at Laura, who didn't seem to notice. She stood still, zoned out.
“Maybe they'll take us to your daughter,” I said, speaking sharply to get her attention. “Come on.”
The dog pulled back and gave a short, sharp bark, watching me eagerly.
“Yes? Peri? You know where she is?”
He barked again.
“Come on, Laura. This is what we came for.” I moved toward her, meaning to take hold of her if I had to, but she was moving, finally, bending down to pick up her bag, recapping the water bottle and dropping it inside. Then she looked at the horse and reached out a tentative hand to touch its neck. A shudder ran through her as, I suppose, she felt its undeniably warm and living flesh against her own. The horse snorted gently and as it moved away, Laura followed.
The dog trotted after the horse, with a look around at me to make sure I was coming, too.
We left the forest and emerged onto rocky, open moorland. I could see no sign of any path or track, but we didn't really need one as long as we had the animals to follow. I still wanted to have some idea of where we were going, so I looked around, trying to get my bearings and fit together this bit of countryside with what I remembered of the map.
I couldn't do it. Of course, one bit of Scottish moor looks, to the stranger, very much like any other bit: rough ground, projecting lumps of rock, tough springy heather, and spiky gorse bushes punctuating every stretch of open land. Not a lot of distinctive landmarks, especially not to a visitor. But normally I have a pretty good sense of direction, and that, coupled with my knowledge, from the map, of the general contours of this area, should have let me know if we were heading westward, toward the coast or instead walking farther inland; if we were circling back around the forest through which we'd come or heading away from it.
Unease crept through me as I realized I had absolutely no idea where we were or which way we were headed. I turned to look behind us, but already the forest was out of sight, and all I could see was more of the same uneven, open moorland. I couldn't even take my bearings from the sun, because it was hidden by low cloud and the sort of mist that forms on Scottish hillsides unexpectedly at any time of year.
I stopped walking and broke out into a sweat. I made myself stand absolutely still, because if I kept walking it would be all too easy to go faster and faster until I was running, and once I began running I didn't think I'd be able to stop. It was safer to stand still.
On my watch, the digital display flickered between zeroes and eights. Only then did I realize, finally, what had happened.
The understanding broke through my paralysis, and I could move again. But I'd lost sight of Laura, the horse, and the dog, and without a guide, I had no idea which way to go.
Before I could get into another panic, I heard a welcome bark, and, moments later, saw the dog racing back to fetch me. I hurried forward, my eyes scanning the horizon and finding nothing but more of the emptiness ahead. I was just wondering how Laura and the horse managed to move so quickly out of my range of vision when I heard her call.
“Ian! I've found her! I've found Peri!”
I looked all around. The mist was gathering more thickly, and lower now, not far above my head. There was no sign of anyone—only the dog at my side—although Laura's voice was so clear I was sure she could not be far away.
“Where are you? Laura?”
“Here we are.” Laura came out of the mist with the horse beside her, her hand twined in its mane. She was smiling, radiant with happiness. It took years off her, and she looked so beautiful, and so familiar, that my heart gave a great painful thump and I couldn't say a word for the sheer delight of looking at her. In that moment I suddenly knew what she meant to me. I understood why Jenny had been so much on my mind recently, why Laura made me think of her. It was not that the two women were alike, but my feelings for them were.
“I found her,” Laura said again, jarring me out of my self-absorption.
“Where?”
She gave me a strange look. “Here!” She turned her head toward the horse.
Until then I hadn't raised my eyes from Laura's face. Someone rode on the horse's back; a little girl, no more than three or four years old, with long blond hair.
“Who's that?”
The little girl smiled down at me. “I'm Peri,” she said in a sweet, high voice. “What's your name?”
“Peri, sweetheart, this is Ian. Ian Kennedy.”
“No.”
“What?”
“Laura, that's not your daughter.”
“Don't be ridiculous! Of course it is! Don't I know my own child?”
“Peri's not a child. She's twenty-one. That's a little girl. I don't know where she came from, or who she is, but—”
“She's my daughter!” Laura glared at me, absolutely sure of herself.
“Laura, think about it, please. Trust me. This isn't—”
“It is! Why should I trust you? This is my child, and I'm taking her home.”
“How are you going to find your way back?”
I saw her shoulders tense as she stiffened her back. “Is that a threat?”
“A threat?” I stared at her in pained disbelief. “Of course not!”
She relaxed a little and allowed me a tentative smile. “Don't worry. I'll bet the horse knows the way. We don't want to stay here any longer.”
“Laura, we do. That”—I nodded at the beautiful child—“whoever she is, that's not the woman who eloped with Mider. This is some kind of trick, a distraction. I'm not saying you should abandon her—maybe she's your grandchild!—but we still have to find Peri; don't forget.”
Before I'd finished, I knew I'd lost her. What I'd said was impossible. In her mind, probably, she was a youn
g mother again, relieved to have found her missing child; how could she trust someone who told her that the little girl she dreamed of, the little girl she thought she'd found, was gone forever?
“Peri and I are going home,” she said flatly. “You can do what you want.”
It tore my heart to watch her walk away, but what else could I do? No argument was going to change her mind. It was up to me to save Peri.
The dog started to go after the horse, but stopped when I didn't move. He turned and gave me a mournful look, whining softly.
“Stay, boy.”
He fidgeted, and his whines grew louder and picked up in tempo.
“Come on, boy, I need your help to find Peri.”
The other three were just about to vanish into the misty distance. The little girl turned around and waved at us. With a groan, and without another look at me, the dog lunged after them. One heartbeat, two, while I wondered if I'd made a terrible mistake, and they were all out of sight.
The mist was closing in. I couldn't see more than a few yards in any direction, and the silence was as oppressive and ominous as the lack of view. I was just drawing breath for a shout when a voice spoke behind me.
“What are you doing here?”
It was a cool, aristocratic male drawl. I turned and saw a man dressed in the faintly anachronistic gear of the Scottish outdoorsman: tweedy jacket with elbow patches, oddly shaped trousers with high socks and gaiters, even the deerstalker cap. And, of course, a gun. I was happy to see he kept it resting against his shoulder, not pointed at me.
He repeated his question and added, “You don't belong here.”
“I'm sorry. Is this your land?”
“It is.”
He had a natural arrogance about him that went with the voice and the outfit. He was good-looking, of course, in a very noble, northern European way: narrow blue-grey eyes, high cheekbones, sharp nose. There was something naggingly familiar about him, although I was sure we'd never met.
“I'm real sorry. I kind of got lost, I guess. I didn't mean to trespass.” I laid the American accent on with a trowel, trusting it would gain me a warmer welcome.