The Bitterbynde Trilogy (129 page)

‘Caitri!'

‘I can run no further. Go on without me.'

Green eyes, long and narrow, popped up like sudden lamps. A skinny, pale hand reached for Caitri. Her mistress slashed at it with a knife. Black blood spurted. The screech was like a white-hot arrow through the eardrums. Encouraged, she slashed right and left, back and forth. On her hand, Thorn's leaf-ring flared. Shadows leaped up and away from it, and so did the mad things of the night. Some of the screaming was pouring from the knife-wielder's own mouth, a wordless battle cry of which she had not known she was capable, a song of frenzy. Her knife was everywhere, flashing in a kind of whirling cocoon, of steel within which her two charges huddled.

When she stopped, arms hanging by her sides, the blade no longer gleamed. Inky blood covered it, splashed her arms and dripped from her clothing. Silence on silver chains hung suspended from somewhere far above. The damsel wiped the knife, ineffectually, on her sleeve.

‘Trouble us no more!' she shouted into the quiescent shadows—or tried to shout. The words emerged in a strangled whisper. She sank to her knees on a whispering carpet of leaves.

‘You saved us,' said Viviana, awed. ‘Are you hurt?'

‘Is there any water?'

In the woods, the night was long. She whose memories had been reborn did not sleep. She sat with her back to her dozing friends, holding a knife in each hand. The ring shone. Strangely, wights' blood had never smeared it.

I must recall the image of the Gate
.

Somehow, as she sat through the night, she happened to glance again at the golden bracelet that symbolised her kenning-name. Her eyes began to cloud over. More memories returned …

Arcdur. She had travelled through it.

Avlantian riding-habits had not been designed for hard walking. The skirts of blond and turquoise saye tangled about Ashalind's legs and caused her to stumble. On her feet, the soft leather boots yielded to sharp angles of adamant. Only the amazing Faêran cloak flowed with her movements, never snagging on projections, conforming to her body with a gentle caress.

Jumbled stones and scree slopes made progress even slower and more difficult. Constant water and wind kept the rocks swept clean of silt in this region—only in the deepest cracks it found refuge, and there the mosses grew, or the tenacious roots of the blue-green arkenfir.

The cadence of the wind amplified as Ashalind approached the summit of a hill, and it was as if she walked at the edge of the world, for there was only the deep sky beyond. In a few steps, a majestic vista of far-flung hills and stacks stalking into the distance unfolded unexpectedly at her feet, and the wind swept up over the rise to meet her, soughing in her ears. She paused, looking out over lonely Arcdur, devoid of human habitation. Overhead, choughs on the wing caught updrafts. A dark patch of conifers clothed the opposite ridge. To her right, a glint on the horizon suggested the sea.

She picked her way down the hill and lay flat to drink at a clear beck, then went on, hoping to reach the shelter of the trees before nightfall. The Faêran cloak provided extraordinary warmth and protection, and without it she must surely have perished by now, but fallen pine-needles would be a softer cushion than rock.

From stone to stone she stepped, conscious always of keeping her footing, aware that her next enemy in this remote region was injury. She kept going on a course due south, memorizing landmarks along the way; a stack of flat rocks like giant pancakes, another like loaves of bread … most of the constructions reminded her of food, and she wondered how long it was since she had eaten. Searching her memory, she recalled honeyed pears poached in a cardamom and anise sauce, followed by buttered griddle-cakes, eaten for breakfast on the morning of the Leaving. The memory tied knots in her belly, and she directed her musing elsewhere.

She pondered all the strange events that had brought her here, and the foolishness of Men and Faêran that had caused them. Images of her loved ones in the Fair Realm made her choke with longing and she suddenly stopped and hurled herself down among the boulders, digging her fingers into gravel.

‘I cannot go on. I must go back.'

There she lay, rigid, while the sun moved a little farther across the pearly sky and the choughs wheeled, inquisitive, above. Eventually, out of her confusion arose a conclusion: she had decided to attempt this venture in order to be rid of the Langothe and to bring the High King back to his Realm. Yet even as she reached this disposition she knew the answer was not really that simple; there was more, if only she had the courage to admit it. For now, however, the important point was that she had freely chosen her own path. No one had coerced her. She had elected to pursue this quest, and all pain, all longing, must be contained and controlled if it were to be achieved.

Hence, with a new strength born of despair, she climbed to her feet again and resumed her journey.

There was no food.

It was very beautiful, this land of stone and pine so close to the sky; clear and clean, embroidered with joyous, glimmering waters. But day followed day and Ashalind could find nothing to eat, not even mushrooms down among the gnarled roots of the arkenfirs. Chitinous beetles sometimes crawled in crevices, but she had no mind to consume them. When they opened their wingcases and became airborne, the choughs swooped to snatch them instead.

The light-headedness and aching she had experienced in the first two days vanished, leaving her with a sense of remarkable calm and vigor. She held her course, but on the sixth day of her journey the land to the east started to climb in ragged notches, more precipitous and sheer, while to the west it gentled, and groves of pine and fir marched over undulating hills.

Using a castle-shaped crag as a landmark for her turning-point, she was now forced to veer westward. Somewhere ahead, she knew, lay the northwest coast of Eldaraigne that looked out over a vast sea whose end was in the storm-ring that encircled the rim of the world. A deep ocean current, the Calder Flow, journeyed from the icy southern latitudes past the island country of Finvarna to touch that coast with its chill fingers and keep Arcdur cooler, year-round, than the rest of the country.

On the seventh day she gathered a few handfuls of watercress and wild sage, the first edible plants she had seen. But she noticed that her hands and feet were always cold, and her limbs quaked. Her strength was failing. At night, proper sleep would not come, only a trancelike state, similar to floating on water, buoyed up and unable to sink. She wondered how long anyone could continue to travel without proper sustenance. Perhaps if she could reach the seashore she would find food. If she did not, then she must lie down there and die, within sight of elindors flying over the waves.

Would elindors still navigate the airs of Erith? How many years had passed? Would Men still walk the world, or would their cities lie in ruin? She stumbled, then shook her head to clear it, but could not focus, and recalled vaguely that she had fallen many times that day and her hands were bleeding.

The sky turned from pearl to grape. Another storm blew out of the west that night, bringing strong winds and lashing rain. It lasted all night and through the next day. The Faêran clothes were waterproof, but moisture insinuated itself past the edges to dampen her neck and wrists.

By nightfall on the ninth day the rain had dissipated to the southeast. The falling sun had at last broken through the clouds, and as the traveller plodded up the side of a grassy dune she saw it, low on the horizon, scattering a fish-scale path across the sea. Lulled by the susurration of the waves, she sat among saltbushes and watched the evening's glory fade. Stars appeared. A gibbous moon looked down at the long pale beach, but Ashalind, wrapped in her cloak, her head pillowed on her arms, was already dozing.

It was a fitful sleep, disturbed by dreams of Faêran feasts. The first gleam of dawn wakened her suddenly, and, raising her head, she looked out to sea. A stifled cry escaped her lips, and in the next instant she had sprung to her feet, and, drawing on her last reserves, was running down to the water's edge, waving and calling.

Triangular sails floated, saffron, in the dawnlight. A boat, not far from shore, was silently heading south toward a headland. Onward it tacked without deviation, seeming unaffected by her cries, and she thought it would pass from sight forever and leave her stranded to become, washed by time and tide, sunbleached bones in the sand. But the angle of the hull changed. It had turned, and now cut through water toward her; she could see the curl of white foam beneath the prow. When the vessel was within earshot, she hove to. Her keel prevented her from venturing into the shallows. A man on board dropped anchor and shouted, honouring the time-worn cliché of mariners:

‘Ahoy there!'

‘Help me,' Ashalind answered. ‘I have no food. I am alone.'

The man hesitated.

‘Please help me.' The damsel's voice cracked and she sank to the sand, heedless of the lace-edged waves swirling around her knees. Perhaps he did not believe her, or thought she was a decoy for some brigand's ambush, which indicated that
whenever
she was, danger lurked still.

There was a splash. He had stripped to his breeches and was swimming to the beach, towing something buoyant on a rope. A strong swimmer, he soon rose out of the water, dripping, and waded out. He was thickset and bearded, with hair as brown as his body. Bright eyes peered from a weathered face.

‘Gramercie. I am grateful,' was all she could think of to say. She tried to stand but collapsed again. He gave her a measuring stare, then asked, in unfamiliar but clear accents,

‘Can you swim?'

She nodded, unclasping the cloak and throwing off the ragged gown and jacket.

‘Come on now,' the man said to the gaunt, hollow-eyed damsel shivering in hose and gipon. Securing her to the cluster of inflated bladders, he towed her out to the boat and dragged her aboard, then tossed a dry blanket over her while he returned to retrieve her riding-habit and mantle.

There was a small cabin on board, and wicker baskets filled with luminous shells like pale rainbows. An older, grizzle-bearded sailor in the boat handed her a bottle of water and some food: stale bread, cheese, and pickles in a stoneware jar.

‘Eat slowly,' he advised.

On his return the younger man dressed himself. Then without another word he dragged in the anchor. The old man hauled on the jibsheet and took the tiller. The favourable breeze bellied out the lateens against an azure sky. Ashalind lay back on a pile of stinking nets and watched the horizon rise and fall.

‘Where are you from? Where are you going?'

‘My name is Ashalind na Pendran. I am a traveller, seeking the High King of the Fair Folk. I lost my way.'

This was the truth, as far as it went. She trusted them, these brown sailors—their faces were open and honest. Nonetheless, the secret of the Gate was too precious to be revealed to any save the High King of the Faêran.

‘My name is William Javert,' said the younger man, ‘and this is my father, Tom. Never have I known a young lass like you to travel alone, but such practices may be common in outlandish regions, I suppose. I doubt not that you seek whom you say you seek, but we have never seen any such people as those you call the Fair Folk. It is not our habit to pay heed to tales and legends of the Strangers. If such folk do exist, maybe 'tis better they remain hidden. To my mind, the less trouble that is stirred up, the better. Some old tales what folks make up when they got nothin' useful to do, tell of a King of the Strangers—the Gentry, as some calls 'em—who sleeps with his warriors under a hill, but I don't put much faith in that. I believe in what I see. In wights I believe, for mickle trouble they do give us. Thought you was one, at first.'

‘Old folk used to tell tales of a Perilous Kingdom,' Tom said, squinting at the damsel, ‘but I do not know where it was supposed to be. Under the sea perhaps, or under the ground. The Strangers dwelled there, it was said, and their King too. But nowt has been seen of that country since ages long gone, when folks was more ignorant and believed in such fancies. Then again, the world's a queer place.'

The son, William, took his turn at the helm. The boat changed tack and they rounded another headland, still keeping the coastline in view to the left. The hull rocked on a gentle swell. As they sailed southward, the distant landscape changed from the barren rocks of Arcdur to wooded hills.

‘Caermelor … who is King there?' asked the passenger.

William regarded her with a quizzical stare.

‘Where have you come from, that you don't know our sovereign's name? Your manner of speaking sounds foreign …'

‘I come from far away. North.'

‘Ach, I wouldna have believed any folk did not know of our good King-Emperor, the Sixteenth James D'Armancourt!'

Ashalind fell silent. In her time the sovereign had been William the Wise, who was grandson of the great Unitor, son of James the Second. Had thirteen generations passed? Two or three centuries? It was difficult to credit that such a vast span of time had elapsed.

‘How old is the dynasty of D'Armancourt?' she asked.

‘Why,' said old Tom, ‘it is traced back, they say, a thousand years, that was the first King James. But not all were called James. Some of the D'Armancourt kings bore other names.'

Shocked at this crushing of her hopes, Ashalind clenched her hands. In a spasm of frustration she hammered her fist on a wooden water-barrel. A millennium! It was too much to contemplate. What far-reaching changes had taken place in Erith during such a long period? Why were the exiled Faêran lost or forgotten?

A flock of shearwaters flew overhead. In the water several yards from the keel, something splashed. Instantly the attention of the men was fixed on the spot.

‘'Tain't
she
, is it?' William asked in a low voice.

‘Nay, 'tis one of the
maighdeans,'
said his father. ‘But which kind I cannot tell.'