The Cursed Towers

by Kate Forsyth

  ‘Indeed, Your Highness, many times we would have all given in, no matter the cost, such despair o’ the spirit we felt, but never would she allow us to falter. It was my dear lady who oversaw the rationing o’ what little food we had, and ordered the punishment o’ those who broke the rule. It was she who thought o’ pulling up the cobblestones in the courtyards to catapult over the battlements, and she who tore up her own petticoats and bound the men’s wounds wi’ her own hands …’

  They climbed the narrow stairs to the tower height and came out onto the wind-blown battlements. Overhead the square green flag of the MacThanach clan snapped in the breeze. A crowd was gathered near the doorway of the guardroom, and Iseult could hear the MacThanach’s voice raised in entreaty.

  Within lay an old woman, so thin the bones of her face pressed sharply against her parchment coloured skin. Her lips were stiff and twisted, and one side of her face seemed frozen, but her eyes beneath the discoloured, wrinkled lids were bright as jewels. ‘We carried the yoke for ye, my son,’ she whispered, clutching at the MacThanach’s sleeve with one clawlike hand. ‘Though the load was heavy indeed, we did no’ falter.’

  The MacThanach was weeping. He bent and gathered the frail form close to his breast and whispered words of reassurance. Her bright eyes turned to Lachlan and she mumbled something, then seemed to gather strength. ‘So this is the young MacCuinn,’ she said clearly. ‘Indeed, we are glad to see ye, Your Highness. Though ye took your time in coming.’

  Lachlan bent over her and said, ‘We came as quickly as we could, though I wish it had no’ been so long.’

  She gave a twisted smile and said, ‘No matter. We carried the yoke.’

  He smiled and squeezed her hand. ‘Indeed ye did,’ he said, but she did not return the pressure, and her eyes beneath her drooping lids were glassy.

  As a weeping Muire drew the Dowager Banprionnsa’s plaid over her face, the MacThanach dropped his head into his hands and sobbed. ‘Curse ye, Bright Soldiers!’ he cried. ‘Ye have destroyed my home and taken my mother’s life! I shall no’ rest until ye are all as stiff and lifeless as she!’

  It was cool under the overarching trees, and Lilanthe stretched thankfully, lifting her long white arms to the sky. The nisse Elala clung to the flowery tresses of her hair, while Brun trotted purposefully ahead, the odd collection of shiny objects around his neck jangling noisily. Niall the Bear followed close behind, although the nisse turned often to make rude faces at him and call out insults in her own language. Although the big man could not understand a word she said, the faery’s tone and expression were unmistakable, and his face was red with embarrassment.

  They had waited out the winter storms at Strathrowan, the village where they had met Finlay Fear-Naught and his company of soldiers. Once the thaw set in, they had set off again for the Tower of Dreamers in Aslinn, the nisse growing shrill with excitement as the forests grew nearer.

  The witches’ Tower was just as Lilanthe remembered. Sitting in the old kitchen while Brun pattered around, preparing them all a meal, she grew quite nostalgic and wondered where Dide was and what he was doing. Last time she had been here he had slept, curled under a rag of a blanket, his olive cheek flushed and warm. A pang of tenderness shot through her at the memory, sharper than grief. She sighed and her broad, spreading toes curled together. Brun came and rubbed his head against her arm and gave her a speckled blue bird’s egg he had found.

  At the Tower of Dreamers they left the horses with the rest of the soldiers to guard them, for the nisse said the soldiers would not be welcome in the garden of the Celestines. The little faery would have liked Niall to stay behind as well, but the big man insisted on accompanying them. His Rìgh had entrusted Lilanthe and Brun to his care, he said, and he would not risk harm coming to them in the dangerous forests of Aslinn. Lilanthe was secretly glad, for she liked the big, slow-spoken man and thought she would like to have him by their side should they be attacked by the vicious satyricorns.

  They had seen no sign of the horned faeries, however. Niall thought the many battalions of Bright Soldiers marching through Aslinn must have frightened them away. They had passed a few Tìrsoilleirean encampments, but had had no difficulty in avoiding them. Although Niall was large, his woodcraft was near as good as Lilanthe’s. He explained placidly that he had grown up in the forest, as his father had been a woodcutter. This admission earned him a hiss of disapproval from Elala and a little shiver from Lilanthe, but he merely smiled and said, ‘No need to fear, lassie, he never took his axe to a tree-changer that I know o’.’

  There were only a few days till the summer solstice left, and Lilanthe was conscious of both anxiety and anticipation. By now they were deep into the forest, having left all roads and paths far behind them. The tree-shifter knew Niall at times suspected the nisse of having led them astray out of mischief or malevolence, but she herself trusted the little faery, knowing how desperately Elala wished to have her wing healed so she could fly again.

  Suddenly they heard high shrieks of glee as a flock of nisses swooped out of the canopy. They darted through the group of travellers, swift as hornets, fragile as glass, rainbow-bright as sun-dazzled water. As they shot past, the nisses pulled Niall’s hair and beard, tweaked the cluricaun’s ears and pinched Lilanthe’s arm so she cried out in pain. Elala screeched in excited greeting. Her unbroken wing fluttered madly as if she too wished to take off into the air. The nisses turned and swerved past again, their wings flashing silver.

  The Celestines’ grove garden is close, Elala said.

  Lilanthe felt her pulse quicken. She had often longed to find one of the fabled gardens of the Celestines, but despite all her years of wandering in the forests, she had never yet stumbled across one. They were said to be beautiful indeed, full of peace and wonder. Her tree-changer mother had told her tales of the Celestines, and she knew that there had once been many gardens scattered through the forests, though only a few still survived.

  The flight of nisses soared before them, leading them down an avenue of moss-oaks. The earth between the thick, upthrusting roots was rich with lichens and mosses which muffled their footsteps. They picked their way carefully through the tangle of roots, some slender and sinuous as snakes, others curving higher than their heads in a silver-grey surge. Here and there were the frail skeletons of trees that had managed to catch what little sunlight filtered through the lacy weavings of moss. They were all choked and tangled with the stuff, and the ground about was smothered by it.

  Silence fell over the party as and they looked about with reverence. It was hard to tell the passage of time under the great trees, for the sunlight barely filtered through, and all was quiet. It must have been at least six hours of difficult walking before the dim, green light at last gave way to golden sunlight, the avenue of moss-hung trees leading out into an open meadow where flowers grew in drifts of colour. The cluricaun bounded ahead, his ears pricked forward with anticipation, while the nisses swooped back like a flight of flaming arrows.

  To one side a dappled brown brook meandered, all overhung with trailing greenberry trees and branches of flowering may. A massive mossy rock was gently carved into the graceful form of a woman, her lap offering a comfortable seat. At the far end of the meadow an arrangement of three tall stones led the eye to a break in the trees where blue vistas of distance could be seen. Lilanthe had never seen anywhere as beautiful, and she drank in the scents and colours eagerly. Elala shrieked in excitement, swinging on Lilanthe’s hair as if it were a flower-entwined rope.

  Under one of the trees a Celestine was sitting, dressed in a loose robe of pale shimmering silk. The thick mane of hair that flowed down her back was as white as moonlight, while the eyes that regarded them serenely were as translucent as water, without iris or pupil. Her forehead was whorled in the centre, like a whirlpool of skin.

  Lilanthe could sense such a deep and profound sorrow in the Celestine that tears started to her own eyes in sympathy. The forest faery smiled gently when she saw
the party of weary travellers, however, and rose to greet them with a low, sonorous humming, her thin, multijointed fingers rising to touch the whorl of wrinkles between her brows. The nisses hovered about her head, a crown of bright-winged faeries.

  Welcome to the garden of the Celestines, she said. We have been expecting you. It is almost time for the sun to sink to sleep. You must be weary. If you will come with me, we have prepared a place for you to rest and refresh yourselves. In two days’ time, the sun shall reach its closest point above our world, and we shall sing the sun to life so all may flourish. Then shall the Summer Tree bloom and all the peoples of the forest come together to celebrate the green and growing season. You are all welcome, even the one of human blood, for we sense you are in harmony with this earth and wish none of us any ill. Do not fear the anger and hatred of the other creatures of the forest, for in our garden all are at peace.

  Lilanthe saw there were tears in Niall the Bear’s eyes. ‘Thank ye indeed, my lady,’ he said huskily. ‘I ken I am privileged among men to be so welcomed into your garden. All my life I have wished to see one o’ the Celestines, and now at last I have. My heart trembles at the sight, for indeed ye are bonny, even more so than I had imagined.’

  The Celestine smiled at him and reached up to touch him between the eyes, the tight whorl of wrinkles between her brows opening to reveal a dark, bright eye. Niall started and fell back a pace, and she hummed in reassurance. He let her touch him, and the tears flowed down and disappeared into his bushy beard.

  You may call me Cloudshadow, the Celestine said, for I know you of human blood set much store in naming and classifying.

  Cloudshadow then led them all to a flowery bower near the water, where a feast of nuts, berries and fruits was laid out for them on broad, curving plates of leaves. They drank water sweetened with honey from green leaf-cups and ate hungrily as the golden light slowly faded into dusk. That night they slept heavily and dreamlessly, then woke in the morning to find the leaf-plates again loaded with the delicious fruits of the forest.

  The next few days were spent wandering the sunlit lawns and avenues of the garden, talking with the Celestines tending the flowers and trees, and laughing at the antics of the cheeky little nisses who waltzed about their heads wherever they went. Brun was elated to find many other cluricauns living in the garden, and he joined in their games and riddling competitions with delight. The cluricauns were all lovers of music and played drums, flutes and little round stringed instruments they called banu. Many of the cluricauns were wild, having never left the depths of the forest, though a number had lived for many years among humankind. They ran and hid with cries of alarm when they saw Niall, Brun having to reassure them that the big, bearded man meant them no harm.

  There were many other types of faeries in the garden, some very shy, others as bold as the tiny nisses. Lilanthe saw a family of hobgoblins carrying rocks to build a flowerbed for the Celestines, and one-eyed corrigans crouched like craggy boulders under the trees. Every dusk a screech of gravenings swooped overhead, flying to their roosts in the tall mountain ashes, while shadow-hounds slinked through the undergrowth at the garden’s edge, their green eyes as bright as candles. A herd of horned women fought and wrestled in a meadow, the male satyricorns resting in the shade and watching. Lilanthe’s heart hammered at the sight of them, but they ignored her, whooping loudly as one horned woman threw another over her head and sent her crashing into the ground.

  Nixies played in the water, tinier even than the nisses and far more timid, while a horse-eel lived in the small, deep loch in the heart of the garden. The hairy shapes of araks swung through the branches, while the ugly little faeries called brownies peered out from the bushes, ducking down if their gaze was returned. Although many of the faeries were carnivores, there seemed to be a covenant of peace in the Celestines’ garden and no animal or faery was ever killed or hurt within its boundaries.

  On the day before the summer solstice, Lilanthe was wandering through the garden when she saw a slim girl with green, leafy hair like her own, and a craggy, one-eyed boy sitting together by the brook. She exclaimed in joy and amazement and went up to greet them. ‘Corissa! Carrick! Wha’ do ye do here?’ she cried. She had met the two half-faeries in Arran, for they had been among those rescued from the Tower of Mists. They had escaped Arran with the other students of Margrit NicFoghnan’s Theurgia but had decided not to travel to Rionnagan with the others, being too afraid of returning to human society.

  Both the tree-shifter and the corrigan boy said they had been found in the forests by Cloudshadow and told to come for the flowering of the Summer Tree.

  ‘Faeries from all over Eileanan have been travelling the Auld Ways to get here,’ Corissa cried, her clear green eyes alight with excitement. She looked far more like a tree-faery than did Lilanthe, her angular features bearing only the faintest trace of her human ancestry. ‘The Celestines are guiding them through, for no’ all ken the secret o’ the Auld Ways.’

  ‘Cloudshadow says the Auld Ways are still dangerous, despite the strength o’ the summerbourne the last two years,’ Carrick said. He was a short, squat boy, his face grey and leathery-skinned, his one eye set deeply into his head. ‘They say the rites o’ the Summer Tree have been difficult indeed to perform the last few years, with so few Celestines remaining and most too afraid to travel the Auld Ways here. Most o’ them have been content to stay within their own gardens and sing their own songs, and leave the singing o’ the Summer Tree to the Stargazer’s family. It has taken a hard toll on them, though, I hear.’

  ‘Who is the Stargazer?’ Lilanthe asked.

  Corissa looked at her in surprise. ‘Cloudshadow is the Stargazer’s granddaughter,’ she replied. ‘They are the family o’ Celestines who live here in this garden. It is the Stargazers who have borne the brunt o’ the Summer Tree’s consecration these last sixteen years, and I have heard only a few of them survived the Ensorcellor’s Burning anyway. They were always too quick to trust those blaygird humans.’

  Lilanthe flushed a little, and the tree-shifter threw her a mocking glance. ‘Did your mother teach ye nothing?’ she said.

  ‘I did no’ see her very often,’ Lilanthe replied gravely. ‘She left me wi’ my father and wandered away. When I did see her, she was often shy and suspicious o’ me, and thought I was far too much like a human for her taste.’ She sighed and asked no more questions, seeking out Niall the Bear’s company instead. Like her friend Isabeau, he did not seem to care that she was neither human nor faery, liking her for her own sake.

  As the day passed, Lilanthe’s mixed feelings grew more intense, so she did not know whether she longed for the meeting with her own kind or dreaded it. The garden grew more crowded as sunset approached, until every glade and grove was brimming over with the faeries of the forest, each bringing a handful of nuts or a bunch of ripe berries to add to the feast. The nisses wove garlands of flowers which were hung from branch to branch, and clusters of fireflies fluttered around, their lights winking.

  As the sun sank down into a blue haze, tree-changers began to wander in from the woods. Lilanthe was too shy to do more than stare at them, her feet crossing self-consciously. Some were as tall and thick as an ancient hemlock, their heads crowned with prickly leaves and bright golden berries, their feet as broad and gnarled as the roots of an oak tree. Some had bark all scribbled over like the doodlings of a child, while others were slim and pale and smooth, with flowing hair all tangled with tiny green flowers, just like Lilanthe herself. They danced that night, weaving all through the trees, bowing and swaying like a forest in a storm, while the cluricauns played their drums and flutes and the nisses darted through the canopy, shrieking in excitement.

  Lilanthe watched, entranced. When the tree-changers began to sing their strange, stormy song, she found herself swaying in slow and stately rhythm, her roots lifting and tapping. One caught her hand, then another, and she bowed with gladness in her heart, dancing along with them, her sap surging in her vei
ns. She saw Niall was dancing too, flowers tucked into his wild hair and beard, a hobgoblin clinging to each rough hand. Brun sat on the bough of a tree, playing his wooden flute, then somersaulted down to jig alongside her.

  All night the faeries danced to the wild, haunting music, the chain of dancers leading them deeper and deeper into the garden. Once or twice, as she twirled and swayed, Lilanthe saw that a tall man led the procession, crowned with antlers like a stag. Illuminated only by moonlight and the fitful light of the tiny fireflies, his face was carved with shadows. By his side danced the youngest of the Celestines, the one named Cloudshadow, and she wept from all three of her eyes.

  All through the sweet-scented night they danced, winding their way to the secret heart of the garden. Lilanthe had not explored so far, the Celestines having always gently but insistently guarded the paths which led that way. She looked about her with fascination as they danced along an avenue of moss-oaks and into a wide clearing. Tall stones stood sentinel all round the grove, each topped with another stone to form crude arches. Within the stones a tree soared upwards, its leaves black against the star-crowded sky, its roots writhing outwards like the tentacles of a giant octopus.

  All through the standing stones the chain of dancers wound, at last collapsing panting and laughing onto the warm grass. As dawn began to finger the sky with delicate colour, the Celestines stepped forward, their pale robes shimmering so it appeared they were haloed with starlight. Silence fell over the gathered faeries as the Celestines held hands around the massive tree. There were nearly fifty of the tall, slender faeries, but even with their arms stretched wide, they were barely able to encircle the tree.

  The antlered faery stood with them, Cloudshadow clinging still to his hand. As he turned and bent his head, Lilanthe saw the antlers were bound to a mask which hid his eyes. The thick, white mane of a Celestine flowed down from beneath it, and his mouth was sad and stern.