by James Fahy
“No, not really,” Robin explained. “I mean, I’ve seen actual ghosts, up on the moors. They’re transparent, and well, kind of glowy.” He tossed the ball overarm, it bounced once in the centre of the bare room, sending a satisfying echo around the bare plaster walls. It flew up to Henry, who caught it expertly. “They’re solid, I think, these women. They just look creepy as anything. Like something that’s been dragged out of a grave. All dark and ghoulish. I haven’t seen any of their faces, they’re all covered up like brides.”
Henry looked thoughtful, throwing the ball back idly. “And they’re just here for what? A social visit?”
Robin shrugged, catching it. “Passing through, apparently," he said. “You know Erlking is its own station.”
The links between the human world and the Netherworlde, Robin knew, were gateways known as Janus stations. It was a network of portals, a web that tied the two worlds together at specific points, passing places. He also knew that Lady Eris controlled nearly all of these doorways. Erlking was one that she did not. “I thought you said growing up here there were always people passing through?”
Henry shrugged. “Well yeah, now and again," he allowed. “When I was little. All Panthea mind. I never saw a Fae until I met you. But I’ve never seen spooky-ghost-bride women before, or this other guy, whatever he is.”
“He seems okay,” Robin said, a little doubtfully, remembering his aunt's whispered words of caution. “Bit fancy, all gilt and teeth, and the most over-styled beard and ‘tashes I’ve ever seen. Kind of reminds me of a game show host or something. What on earth he’s got to do with those walking corpses though, I’ve no idea.”
“Can’t wait to meet them all at dinner tonight then,” Henry said. “Me and dad are staying on account of it being your birthday bash and all. Shame Woad won’t be able to join us though. Wonder what that’s all about?”
Robin, who had told Henry that Woad had to stay discreetly out of the way while the guests were here, tossed the ball up in the air and caught it himself. “Well, you’ll probably see a fair bit of them, they’re all staying here until Halloween. That’s a month away.” Robin wasn’t sure how comfortable he was with this. He secretly hoped that whatever rooms Mr Drover had prepared for the new guests, they were nowhere near his tower. He didn’t fancy running into one of those women in a dark corridor in the middle of the night. And he was not at all confident he could control Woad’s comings and goings for that length of time anyway.
Henry grinned. “Well, at least we’ve got a month then to plan our costumes for the feast. I was thinking of getting some face-paint and going as Woad. Does that still count as him staying out of sight? If I’m him, I mean? You could dress up as Karya?”
Robin glowered across the room at Henry, who grinned.
“See, mate? You’ve already got her expression perfect. A scowl of disapproval that could melt through walls.”
“I think Calypso has enough training planned for me this month to keep me far too busy for hilarious cross-dressing, Henry,” Robin said wearily.
Henry rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. It must be such a massive chore for you having private lessons with incredibly gorgeous women. I feel your pain, Rob, really I do.” He held out his hands expectantly, and Robin tossed the ball across the room to him. It bounced once on a white floorboard and continued on its trajectory to Henry in slow motion. “Have to say though, I thought your Tower of Water lessons would be winding down a bit, now it’s autumn. I mean, you can’t go swimming about in the lake much longer surely. You’re going to catch your death.”
“She’s ‘refurbished’ the old pool room,” Robin explained. His tutor, Madame Calypso, was only every truly at home in or around water. It was well known that she was not overly fond of conducting Robin's lessons in the house. She much preferred to be out in nature. However, a short talk with Aunt Irene recently during a rainstorm about the perils of hyperthermia had resulted in this compromise. “I’ve got a few days off lessons though for my birthday, so that's all good. I reckon your dad will be busy helping out with the new guests all weekend so at least you’ll be up here, right? We can have a laugh.”
Henry made a slightly awkward and apologetic face. “Actually Rob,” he said, a little hesitantly. “I won’t be here tomorrow or Sunday. I’ve got some stuff to do in the village.”
Robin frowned, catching the thrown ball. This was highly unusual. Although he didn’t live there, Henry was at Erlking Hall almost every waking moment that wasn’t taken up with school, and he slept over most weekends. This would be the third time in two weeks that Henry had been too busy to hang around.
“What stuff?” Robin asked.
The taller boy shrugged evasively. “Just some extra lessons and things, no big deal. I’m having private tuition at the weekends.”
Robin’s frown deepened. Henry was certainly not the most studious person he had ever met. He had spent much of the summer in summer school, when he wasn’t off adventuring in the Netherworlde that is. And now he was having weekend tuition as well?
“Wow, your dad is really cracking down on the school work, isn’t he," Robin said glumly. He felt a little deflated. He had been looking forward to spending his birthday weekend with Henry.
The dark-haired boy shook his head, looking a little embarrassed. “No, it’s not like that, it’s more of an … activity. Like a … sports thing.”
Realisation dawned for Robin and he tossed the ball back to his friend. “Oh, like a football club, something like that," he said, as lightly as he could manage.
It was something of a sore point for Robin that, being the most hunted and arguably most important person in the Netherworlde, he was well guarded at Erlking. It was his sanctuary, but also, in some ways, his prison. He envied the fact that Henry, a normal boy, had a life outside these walls. Other friends, other activities.
“Yeah,” Henry said, still a little evasive. “Something like that.” He noticed Robin looking a little downtrodden and made a face. “Don’t worry, I’ll still be up in the evenings, right?” He rolled his eyes a little, leaning back against the faded and crumbling plaster. “And anyway, you’ve got your delicate patient to nursemaid, right?”
This riled Robin a little. Henry had made no secret of the fact that he thought Robin taking in Jackalope was a bad idea. He seemed to raise the subject at every opportunity.
“Give it a rest.” Robin threw the ball back forcefully, deliberately aiming for a white board. It ricocheted speedily as though shot from a gun. “You’re starting to sound like a stuck record about that. It’s not like I’ve got him staying in your rooms and wearing your spare PJs, is it? I don’t know why your nose is so out of joint about him being here.”
Henry raised his eyebrows at his friend, nursing his stinging hand where he had caught the ball. “He sided with a Grimm … against us," he pointed out. Seeing Robin open his mouth to respond, Henry raised his hands in surrender. “Okay, okay. Your business, not mine. If you want to be the faerie version of crazy cat lady and take in every stray you find, it's none of my business. Just don’t expect me not to say ‘told you so’ when everyone gets a bit stabbed.”
“Nobody is getting stabbed, you drama queen.” Robin rolled his eyes.
“I said a bit stabbed,” Henry said petulantly.
“Not even a bit stabbed,” Robin smirked, despite himself. It was always hard to take Henry seriously. “Karya has been watching Jackalope like a hawk since he got here. I think if he was showing signs of murdering us all in the night, she’d be the first to raise the alarm.”
Henry made an innocent face, silently suggesting that Karya’s hawk-like interest in the pale and sleeping Fae may be slightly less objective than she let on. Robin studiously ignored this, getting to his feet.
“Anyway,” he said. “Seeing as you’re abandoning your best friend all weekend to go play five-a-side netball or whatever, I think you at least owe it to me to help me break the news to Woad that he has to be locked in his room unt
il the end of October. After that, it’s birthday feast with all our new friends.”
Henry tossed the ball over his shoulder, nodding. “Flashy gilded peacock man and the brides of zombie Dracula?” he grinned. “Wouldn’t miss it, mate.” The friends walked out, closing the door on the popping-corn sound of a tennis ball being pinballed between the white boards.
A SPOT OF DARKNESS
Dinner, Robin later considered, was all in all, a strange affair.
It was made stranger as, due to the special occasion of having guests at Erlking, rather than take their evening meal together in the familiar dining room as per usual, they gathered instead in the Hall of the Hunt. Robin had never eaten in here before. In fact, during all his time at Erlking so far, the very few times he had ventured into this long, vaulted hall, most of the furniture had been carefully covered with dust sheets. Henry had explained, rather alarmingly, that this was because the room tended to moult and, frankly, it looked gross. Robin had no idea what he meant, but had learnt the hard way to take such advice as writ. The fact that it had been brought out of retirement and dressed up was an indication that Hestia had clearly made every effort to get the place up to scratch to impress Irene’s guests.
The Hall of the Hunt, it transpired, was a rather medieval affair. A great dark-wood dining room with flagstone floor, shimmering with numerous candles and wall-sconces. The theme of the room, as the name implied, was game. Countless rather macabre stag’s heads were mounted proudly on the walls, alongside plenty of boar, fish, wild stuffed birds and plenty of other, less identifiable beasts of the forest. It was a taxidermist’s dream, a gallery of stuffed wildlife, a multitude of glassy eyes gleaming down on them in the candlelight. This being Erlking, several of the wall-mounted animal heads occasionally shook their heads, dislodging dust, or rolled their eyes to peer at the diners below. An intermittent bestial snort contended with the crackling flames of the large fireplace, and the various stuffed and arranged pheasant, fowl and partridge ruffled their feathers from time to time, occasionally shedding one on the floor.
Despite its official name, Henry had dubbed it Antler-Pocalypse Hall, and with good reason. When the Fae chose a theme, Robin had discovered, they really ran with it.
A vast and imposing chandelier hung from the beamed ceiling on a long chain, swooping low over the long, dark dining table. The chandelier was composed entirely from a rather gruesome and spiky latticework of antlers, the many candles hidden amongst its angular branches sending a spider web of fractured light and shadow outwards against the walls. The table decorations themselves were likewise pointy in design and equally disturbingly organic, and the high-backed chairs in which Robin and everyone else found themselves were crested with horns like decorative Viking ships.
In this curious and rather intimidating room, Robin sat between Henry and Karya, and across the long table from Mr Drover. Robin was hoping Hestia would remember to make up a spare plate for Woad, who was currently sulking upstairs in his bedroom. He made a mental note to try and fill an extra plate himself.
Up at the head of the shadowy table, Irene herself made polite conversation with the red-haired man, who had changed for dinner into a more formal suit that, incredibly, seemed somehow to hold even more gold brocade, making him shimmer in the candle-light like a frozen firework. On her other side, the three sisters, still veiled, faceless and shadowy, sat all together, bunched up as though they wished to try and occupy only one seat.
Henry occasionally kicked Robin's shin under the table during the meal, nodding rather unsubtly or making a face when a shaking and grey hand, dressed in tattered lace gloves, emerged ponderously from the robes to stab a fork into a plateful of whatever appetisers Hestia had prepared. The three gruesome sisters, from what Robin could observe, seemed awfully fond of mushroom vol-au-vents.
He tried his best to ignore them. The women were giving him the creeps. For a birthday meal, the atmosphere was strangely uncomfortable with their presence.
“So, young Robin Fellows, you golden-haired cherub,” the bright-eyed man called down the table to him, in crisp jovial tones. “Your aunt informs us that today is your birthday.”
Robin nodded, grabbing a bread roll from a tray in front of him. “Yes, that’s right.”
“Your second here at the old Fae pile, eh? But the first you’ve celebrated. No party and cake last year, I understand? Kept it all jolly quiet?”
Robin felt a little uncomfortable under the man’s merry stare. He didn’t seem to blink very often. “I hadn’t been here very long,” he said, aware that all eyes around the table were suddenly on him. “I didn’t want to be a bother to anyone.”
The man slapped his hand on the table, as though this were the funniest thing he’d heard all day. Forks and spoons jumped and juddered with a clatter. “Not a bother!” he grinned. “A-ha-ha-ha! That’s delightful. Absolutely delightful. The world's last changeling, not wanting to be a bother.” He looked over to Aunt Irene playfully. “Isn’t he precious? This charge of yours.”
Irene’s face was a study in contemplative calm. If, like Robin, she thought there was a strange atmosphere in the room, she was ignoring it with tremendously practised decorum. She sipped soup from her spoon. “Extremely precious, Silas," she agreed politely. “To many. Hence his sanctuary here.”
“That’s what I’m getting at!” The red-haired man pointed back to Robin, his golden cuff flashing dangerously close to a candle on the table. “Trust me, as one who knows the worth of everything, indeed whose very business is to know the worth of everything. Precious indeed! Every eye in the Netherworlde is either looking for this boy, or resting on him already, and here he didn’t kick up a fuss about passing into the realm of a teenager last year because he …” his grin widened, “…didn’t want to be a bother. A-ha-ha-ha! Classic. I can see why you like him.”
Robin had never encountered anyone before who actually said ‘a-ha-ha-ha’ instead of laughing. The man named Silas had done it twice now. It was quite disconcerting.
“Can you indeed, Silas?” Irene nodded indulgently. “If Robin chose not to celebrate at the time, I feel that is entirely his business, do you not? We were all barely more than strangers last year, when he arrived.” She glanced down the table at Robin, something close to approval in her sharp eyes. “We have all rather grown on each other since. There is more cause for celebration this year. Much has happened.”
“A birthday should always be a time of joy,” the man pressed, wagging his fork at Robin. “None of this false modesty. It’s very unfashionable. There’s never a reason to skip a party.” He winked.
Robin stared at the bread in his hands, feeling everyone’s eyes still on him. His face felt a little hot. “My gran had just died at the time," he said, a little louder than he had intended. “I was homeless. And I didn’t know anyone. I didn’t feel like celebrating much.”
The man paused, fork in hand, his grin frozen momentarily on his face, but he recovered well.
“Ah…yes. Terrible business, of course. Still …” he stabbed a forkful of salad thoughtfully. “I do like a good wake. Jolly things really, once all the mumbling is out of the way and the drinks are flowing.”
Robin caught Karya’s expression out of the corner of his eye. The young girl was staring at the man with open disapproval. He nudged her shoulder, urging her not to say anything. He didn’t know anything about these people, and the last thing he wanted was for his friends to make a scene that might put Aunt Irene in a tight spot.
“You are probably wondering, all of you,” Irene said, setting down her spoon. “The nature of this visit.” It was as though she had read Robin’s mind. Or else she too had registered Karya’s soon-to-be-vocalised indignity at the man’s poor manners. She indicated the ghoulish women at her side, still bundled silently together and exuding quiet menace. “The sisters here are travelling to the Silver Sea. They have been living in the human world for quite some time now. Many Panthea do, those who wished not to be involved
in the Empress' war. There are more Panthea living in the mortal realm than you might imagine. But now, they return. Erlking is the simplest way back to the Netherworlde.”
“Without Eris knowing about it, you mean?” Henry piped up.
“Quite, yes,” Irene nodded.
“What are you going back for?” Henry asked the women. They didn’t answer, but all three of them turned their veiled heads towards the boy, regarding him silently. He shrunk back in his chair a little, as the silence stretched out uncomfortably.
"Damn fine wine this,” the red-haired man mumbled into his glass, breaking the silence after a moment.
“Thank you, Silas." Irene glanced at Henry pointedly over the top of her spectacles, then she looked to Robin.
“Mr Ffoulkes, on the other hand, is here at my request,” she told them. “He too is travelling to the Netherworlde, though I dare say if anyone knows of other secret ways and means to do so, it is he. I wished, before his departure from the mortal realm, to obtain his opinion on something here at Erlking. He is rather an expert at certain antiquities you see.”
“I trade in the arcane and the ancient,” Ffoulkes said with relish, seeming rather happy to be allowed to talk about himself. “Antique dealer, valuer of the rare, classifier of the unfamiliar. A-ha. Interesting line of work. Rather honoured to be invited here by the great Lady Irene, you know. I’ve been absolutely dying to have a look inside Erlking for years.”
Karya nodded, as though something had just slotted into place in her head. “You’re the expert, aren’t you?” she said.
“The expert?” the man blinked at her politely, his grin back on his face. “How so, little girl?”
“Irene came to see you, in London, with the puzzle box we found … well, which Robin found," she replied, heroically rising above being indulgently referred to as ‘little girl’. “That was you.”