Gallowglass

by Jennifer Allis Provost

  He raised his head at that. “That I am,” he murmured, his icy blue eyes searching mine. Robert cupped my chin, and grazed his thumb across my cheek. “Karina lass, ye do no ken what you’re asking,” he murmured. “The Good People, they aren’t all lovely, like the storybooks would have ye believe. Some are right terrible, both in appearance and in deed.”

  I shivered, only partially due to the prospect of coming nose to nose with a real live fairy. “Sounds like people,” I said with more conviction than I felt. I took his big, warm, callused hand, and held it between mine. “Robert, please. Let me help you.”

  He sighed, then stood and pulled me to my feet. “All right. Do no’ say I did no’ warn ye.” Robert strode toward the door while I grabbed my daypack. “Firstly, we’ll be needin’ to visit the apothecary.”

  Chapter Eight

  Chris

  I plodded down the cobblestone streets, so furious I hardly saw the people or shops I passed by. I was shocked—no, make that appalled—that Rina had taken in that guy from the kirk, bought him things… And no matter what she said, that freak had killed something at Inchmahome. Maybe it hadn’t been a little old lady, but Robert had killed something. All that blood didn’t appear out of nowhere. And those teeth…

  No. This was not about the teeth. This was about Rina taking some random freeloader’s word over mine.

  A cold gust of wind chilled me, so I pulled up my collar. I turned a corner, and saw a slender woman with a long, dark braid cross the road and disappear down a cross street. Even though I was half-drunk and in an unfamiliar environment, I’d know that braid anywhere.

  “Olivia,” I called, and ran after her. If she was here, it meant that she’d come looking for me, probably to make whatever amends she could. We weren’t too far gone, this could all be fixed. I just had to catch up, and we would talk, and we would fix this.

  If Olivia was here, it meant that she still loved me.

  I wound up at a crossroads, unsure of which direction she’d gone. I checked one street after the next, frantic to find her; after I’d run the length of the third street calling her name, I admitted defeat. It was a feeling I’d become all too accustomed to these last few months.

  At the end of the street was a pub, the sign promising cold ale and strong whisky. I could do with both. I slipped inside the darkened pub, and claimed the booth in the far corner. It was quiet save for the clink of glasses and the dull cracks and pops from the fire, and the other patrons ignored me. I hoped fate had finally thrown me a bone, and given me a place to rest and get my thoughts in order.

  A waitress came by. “You’ll be having a pint?”

  “Yes, please.”

  The waitress walked toward the bar, and I leaned back against the worn leather seat. As much as I was not willing to believe that Robert had spent time in a fairy court, or was anything other than a freeloader and a murderer, I had seen the dead woman’s head. Those teeth, rows and rows of them, thin and sharp like needles, so many packed into that mouth that they protruded outward from the too-wide maw…

  I shook my head. Those hadn’t been human teeth, of that I was certain. But the body had been human, with human skin and hair and clothes. And, whatever it was, Robert had killed it, chopped off its head and set loose a river of dark blood. I didn’t know if he should thank Robert for ridding the world of whatever that thing was, or run back to the cottage and rescue Rina from a killer.

  “Long face, eh?”

  I looked up, and saw the waitress standing at the end of the table. On her tray was two pints and a shot of golden liquid. “I only ordered one pint.”

  “With a face like that, ye will be needin’ a wee dram of something a fair sight stronger than ale,” she said as she plunked first the pint, and then the whisky in front of me. When I hesitated, she added, “Come, now. On the house.”

  I glanced from the whisky to the waitress; I guessed she was on the younger side of middle-age, with the beginnings of laugh lines creasing the skin around her eyes and mouth. Her coarse dark hair was messily secured on the top of her head with one of those plastic clips you could find in the drugstore. Rina always put her hair up with clips like that. Olivia had thought they were tacky.

  Since I didn’t want to offend her, or waste free whisky, I muttered a thank you and drank the shot. It burned more than most, and I grabbed my pint.

  “There’s a lad,” the waitress murmured, setting down her tray with its remaining pint on the table. “I’m called Sorcha.”

  “Christopher Stewart.” I set down the pint, and shook Sorcha’s hand.

  “Mind if I join you, Christopher?” Sorcha asked. “My shift’s just ended.”

  I gestured toward the opposite side of the booth. “Be my guest.”

  Sorcha slid into the booth, and clinked her pint against mine. After a moment, she pulled the clip from her hair, letting her long, dark curls tumble around her shoulders; when she set the clip on the table, I noticed it was gray metal—pewter, maybe—not plastic. Elegant. And how could I have thought her hair was coarse? It slid around her neck and shoulders like silk, a Stygian waterfall of softness. I wondered if those curls felt as silky as they looked. “Pleasure to meet you, Christopher.”

  I nodded, noting how her dark eyes gleamed in the low light, and how her smooth, pale skin was like that of a porcelain doll. I had been wrong about her age; the lighting must have been to blame, for she looked to be no older than Rina. She could have been as young as Olivia.

  “Chris,” I said, as I raised my pint. “My friends call me Chris.”

  Chapter Nine

  Karina

  Despite his insistence that making fairy ointment was a bad idea, Robert and I were soon out the door, with the map and an ingredient list in hand. Now that he’d told me there was a way I could actually see the magical creatures he claimed existed, no way was I letting him off the hook.

  “There are some things you should know,” I began as we walked toward the center of the village. “The places you knew as apothecaries are now called pharmacies. And we probably won’t find all of the ingredients there.”

  “In my day a body could acquire anything needed at one,” Robert muttered. “Why should that be different today?”

  “Really? You got everything there?” I teased. “You could just wander into any old apothecary and purchase a loaf of bread or jar of jam?”

  “O’ course not. Those were made at home.”

  “Well, today you can buy those things,” I said. “I’ll have to teach you about these modern conveniences. After we make the ointment.”

  Robert grunted. “Be careful what ye wish for, lass.”

  I glanced up at him and grinned. “Why start now?”

  Much to Robert’s chagrin, the pharmacy only stocked one of our ingredients, and that was beeswax. We ended up going to the adjoining florist for roses and marigolds, pesticide-free versions of course. Our next stop was the grocer, where we purchased a double boiler, small glass canning jars, lavender oil, dried thyme and St. John’s wort, and assorted other supplies necessary for ointment preparation. Robert had been disappointed that all of our plants weren’t fresh—“’Tis the life force what makes it potent, lass,” he’d said—but had been quite pleased to come across the lavender oil.

  “What’s the lavender for?” I asked. “To make the Good People appear more attractive?”

  There was that twinkle in Robert’s eyes. “To make it smell nice, o’ course.”

  We laughed at that; for not the first time, I thought this reverend was a bit of a rake. I supposed that three centuries in Elphame would have had that effect on anyone. Once we’d left the grocer I’d assumed that we had all of our ingredients, but Robert informed me that we were still missing the most vital portion.

  “But we got everything on the list,” I said.

  “What we’re missing is no’ something you can purchase,” he explained. “Our last ingredient is something that one o’ them has touched.”

  �
�Couldn’t we use you?”

  That earned me a withering glare. “Enough o’ that. Let us look for a fairy ring.”

  With that, we walked away from the shore and into the grassy plains beyond the village proper. Since I had no idea of what I was looking for, and doubted I’d even be able to know when I’d found something a fairy had touched, I let Robert hunt through the grass while I admired the view. The grass in Scotland was just so much greener than American grass. Maybe it had something to do with all the sheep droppings.

  “Ah,” Robert said at last. He beckoned me to his side and indicated a circle of mushrooms.

  “Oh,” I murmured. “The mushrooms?”

  “Nay, lass, the grass within.” He got down on his knees, and brushed his palm across the tips of the blades. “This, Karina me lass, is what’s known as a fairy ring.”

  I dropped to my knees beside him, gazing at the circle in mingled awe and confusion. I’d heard of fairy rings, the spots that marked where fairies cavorted under the moon and stars, the place of their revels being temporarily marked by a ring of mushrooms. Only, the circle before us was less than a meter in diameter.

  “Isn’t it a little small?” I asked. Maybe only one fairy had been dancing.

  “They can appear large or small at will, solid or insubstantial,” Robert replied. “The rules of our world mean little to them.” He plucked a few blades of grass, and dropped them into one of the zip-top snack bags we’d picked up at the grocer. Once the final ingredient was secured, Robert stood, dusted off his jeans, and helped me to my feet.

  “All right, Karina me lass, let’s be off. It’s time to make ye see things ye will most surely regret.”

  ***

  The late afternoon sun was warm, and we had a nice walk back to the cottage. As soon as we were inside, we got to work on the ointment.

  Robert took care of washing and chopping the plants, and I heated the beeswax in a double boiler. Once the wax had melted into a clear liquid, Robert added the plants and a touch of lavender oil, then he removed the pot from the heat and set in on the counter, so the wort could steep. While we waited, I made tea.

  “I feel that I am needin’ something a wee bit stronger than tea,” Robert grumbled when I set his cup before him.

  “I’ll take you to the pub after the wort’s finished,” I said, omitting the fact that Chris had a stash of whisky in his suitcase. Unless he’d finished it off, that is. “How much longer until the stuff’s ready?”

  Robert glanced at the clock. “No’ much longer, now.”

  We sat in silence, sipping our tea and avoiding each other’s eyes. I understood why Robert didn’t want me having the ability to see supernatural beasts, but I couldn’t think of any other way to prove to myself that he genuinely was a man from the seventeenth century, cursed by the Seelie Queen herself. Even the fuath from the priory wasn’t a definitive answer; what if it had just been a human with a severe dental deformity? And superhuman leaping abilities? While Robert exuded nothing but honesty, the fact remained that until I could see the creatures that he claimed were hunting him with my own eyes, I couldn’t believe or help him.

  And there was the possibility that he was an escapee from an insane asylum. That still needed to be ruled out.

  After a time, Robert got up, gave the mixture a final stir, and unfolded, then refolded, a square of cheesecloth. I stood by his shoulder as he strained the mixture through the fine mesh and into one of the canning jars.

  “It really does smell nice,” I said. “Like spring.”

  “That it does.” Having finished straining the wort, Robert put the cheesecloth aside and took my hands. “Lass, I’ll ask ye one last time, then ne’er again. Must ye do this?”

  His hands, which were always warm and comforting, were now hot. “I must,” I replied. “I need to see them.”

  Robert sighed, and smiled wanly. “I wish to God ye didn’t, but I do understand. I needed to see them, too.” He squeezed my hands. “Close your eyes, Karina lass.”

  I did, and a moment later felt Robert dab the strange mixture on my eyelids. “It’s warm,” I mumbled.

  “O’ course it is,” he said. “We just boiled it.” Robert’s words were light, his fingers gentle. After the first application of the wort had, I don’t know, absorbed, he dabbed a bit more on the corners of my eyes, then dotted it across my cheekbones. Lastly, he swept his thumbs across my brows.

  “That feels nice,” I murmured.

  Robert grunted. “Open, lass.”

  I opened my eyes, sweeping my gaze across the cottage. At first, I was disappointed that everything appeared the same, though I had no idea what I’d been expecting. Brighter, richer colors, perhaps, or a brownie sweeping out the hearth? Then I realized how clear everything was, even though my glasses were sitting on the table.

  “That’s weird,” I mumbled. I put on my glasses, and the world was blurry again.

  “What’s weird?” Robert demanded. “Are ye pained?”

  “Nothing like that,” I said. “I can see better without my glasses than with them. Is better vision a side effect? Seeing things clearly, and all?”

  “I suppose so,” Robert said.

  “Is it permanent?”

  He shrugged. “We will know, in time.”

  I set my glasses down on the table and turned toward Robert, my gaze catching on something around his neck. He wore a wide silver collar, one that hadn’t been visible to my pre-ointment eyes. “Does that hurt?”

  “Never has.” Before I could ask, he continued, “Now ye ken how Nicnevin bound me.”

  “Wow.” I’d assumed that “bound to a fairy queen” was a figure of speech, but the evidence was plain before me.

  Robert spun the collar around on his neck, and showed me a short silver chain. The last link was broken, clinging to its neighbor for dear life. “And, thanks to ye I am bound no more. Ye broke me free, ye did.”

  I touched the dangling links. “Can the whole collar be removed?”

  “Aye, but that’s another discussion entirely. Now, about that pint ye promised me?”

  ***

  Before we left the cottage, Robert had given me a set of instructions on walking amongst the Good People:

  1. Never acknowledge them

  2. Never look directly at them

  3. If they touch you, do your best not to scream

  It was strangely similar to the lecture Chris had given me before the first time I rode the subway by myself. Unlike my overprotective and slightly paranoid older brother, Robert’s instructions were spot on.

  I saw the first member of the Good People as soon as Robert and I stepped outside the cottage. She was in a tree, wound about an upper branch as lithe and supple as any snake. Fun fact about me: I despise snakes with every fiber of my being. After hearing all those adages about ‘no snakes in Ireland’ I’d felt sorely betrayed to learn that there were snakes slithering about in the rest of the UK.

  However, the fairy above me was no slimy, slithery beast. Her skin was a vibrant pink, and I caught a glimpse of bright eyes and even brighter teeth as Robert and I passed underneath, her long, leafy hair dragging across my shoulder. It took every ounce of will power I possessed not to crane my neck around for a better look at such a beautiful yet terrifying creature.

  By contrast, the next fairy we came across was so ugly I assumed that a wild boar had wandered into the village. I started to ask if we should call animal control, but Robert shook his head slightly; when I was too dense to take the hint he squeezed my hand. Realization dawning, I squeezed back, and I studied the creature out of the corner of my eye. It was short and squat, its pink hide covered with brown, wiry hair. Tusks framed its slobbering jaws, but strangely, it had eyes as clear and blue as sapphires, eyes that betrayed an intelligent mind. Just as I finished my assessment, the boar fairy stood up on its hind legs and ambled off, its cloven hooves clicking against the cobblestones.

  Robert and I encountered a few other members of the Good Peo
ple as we strolled down the lane, each of them obviously inhuman. I was impressed with my ability to ignore that which was right in front of my nose. This little walk amongst beasts and monsters was going better than I’d anticipated; I mean, some were beautiful, and some were ugly, but as long as I kept my cool they would have no idea that I knew what they really were. Then we turned a corner, and I confronted the stuff of nightmares.

  It—he?—was tall, like seven or eight feet tall, with a thick gray hide that was peppered with putrefied lesions. Its arms were so long that its blood-crusted knuckles dragged on the cobblestones. Its feet, also too long for its form, and had extra joint or two, with toes that sported long, cracked nails. Above the feet sagged a belly that was taut and distended, as though it had just eaten a huge meal. Crap. What does a thing like that even eat?

  I have no idea what its head or face looked like. Nothing in heaven or earth could have made me look up. As it was, I was gulping down so many screams I thought I might hyperventilate.

  Robert slipped his hand inside mine, and gave it a squeeze. “The pub is just up ahead,” he said, pointing away from the gray creature. “Almost there, now.” I tore my gaze away from the monster and nodded.

  Somehow, we made it past the beast and into the welcome dimness of the pub. We slid into a corner booth, my heart hammering against my breast. How had Robert managed to walk by those creatures every single day? I could hardly breathe when I saw that gray…thing, never mind act as if it wasn’t there. I wondered if time made it easier to ignore them, or if Robert had been born with nerves of steel.

  I looked down, and saw that our hands were still joined across the table. “I hope you realize I’m never letting go of your hand.”

  Robert’s brows raised a fraction, but he said nothing. Instead, he lifted my hand and brushed his lips across my knuckles. That made what, three, maybe four times that he’d kissed my hand? Each time, I minded it a bit less.