It should have felt like an anti-climactic and disappointing end to our journey, but we were too exhausted to really care.
We were relieved, knowing that never again would a human baby be stolen by fairies and replaced with a changeling.
Never again would a child have to grow up knowing that their life would be cut short. Knowing that, despite their parents’ constant reassurances, they were created by magic, not the parents they looked so much like.
We were allowed to spend the day recovering and relaxing. The servant, Mae, who brought us steaming hot water to bathe in, explained that the Queens had been discussing relations between their two kingdoms since breakfast. With King Ferchar dead everything would be improving, not only for us humans, but for the fairies in the north as well.
“The Queen looks better than she did last time we saw her,” Glen said from where he lounged on the bed.
I was bathing in the corner of the room, letting the warm water ease my aches and pains.
“She does, it’s strange to see her talking. The last time we saw her I wasn’t even sure if she could talk.”
“It’s almost impressive, how one king managed to affect all of our lives, despite us all living in different kingdoms. He damaged so many families, not even his own was spared,” Glen mused.
“He was a prick.”
A few hours later Tormod appeared. He guided us through the castle to a hall where the Queens, as well as the guard who had sat with Queen Freya, were speaking together.
I watched Glen and Tormod out of the corner of my eye as we walked through the long stone corridors. Neither of them made a move to kiss the other, or act like they were anything more than friends
It looked like their short-lived romance was over now that we were in the castle. It reminded me of Finnian and I, we too had shared kisses then easily parted ways.
“You two look like you slept well,” Queen Aelwen said cheerfully.
She did not look as if she had been up since before breakfast, negotiating the relations between two kingdoms, but I supposed she was simply a natural. Ruling came easily to her.
“Yes, thank you,” I thanked Queen Freya who simply smiled in response.
It looked as if the morning’s discussions had tired her out more, perhaps because she had to deal with Queens who had been ruling for over a decade.
There were a few moments of awkward silence as Glen and I took our seats at the table. Then, not wanting to waste another moment, Queen Aelwen spoke.
“Do you have many prisoners here in Culhuinn?” She inquired.
“The prison currently only holds Laird Brochan and Darach, the gifted fairy,” Queen Freya’s guard answered. “King Ferchar preferred to execute rather than imprison.”
“That does not surprise me,” Queen Euna sighed, the first time I’d heard her speak since we arrived.
Clearly after Glen, Tormod and I left the table the previous night, a bond had formed between Queen Freya and Queen Euna.
Perhaps it was their mutual hatred of the late King that had sparked this new friendship. I remained wary of Queen Euna, but I was oddly pleased to see her looking more cheerful.
“We have not questioned either of them since they were imprisoned,” Queen Freya admitted and I could understand her reluctance.
“Well, perhaps now is the perfect time to get some answers,” Queen Aelwen said, smiling encouragingly at me and Glen.
Not even the thought of questioning fairies, who had ruined lives throughout the human kingdoms, was enough to dull her spirits.
We entered the castle prisons through a door to the side of the chamber. Although Queen Aelwen had suggested it, she and Queen Euna stayed behind, claiming they had no right to question the prisoner of another kingdom.
The guard, whose name was William, led us all down some stone steps, the temperature lowering as we went. I felt Glen grow tenser and tenser as we descended and I realised just how similar it was to the prisons in Norbroch. However, here they did not have an underground river and so the silence was thick and oppressive.
Not caring that we were surrounded by royalty I reached out and grabbed Glen’s hand, wanting to remind him that I was there, and that we would be leaving this place.
William led us to a cell near the foot of the stairs. The guard at the door seemed awestruck at the sight of his Queen. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from laughing as he fumbled to open the door and allow us in.
William entered the cell first, with Queen Freya following close behind him. I was about to enter, when I noticed that Glen was not moving. I turned to nag at him to hurry up but the look on his face stopped me.
Even down in the dimly lit prison I could see how pale he was. His posture was tense and he was rhythmically clenching and unclenching his other hand, trying to work up the courage to enter the cell.
It broke my heart to see him so afraid. I floundered, trying to think of something reassuring to say but Tormod beat me to it.
“Glen,” he said sharply, rousing Glen from whatever thoughts he was trapped in. “You hold the door.”
He pointed to where the door was being held open by the still awestruck guard.
“Make sure it doesn’t shut on us,” I added, with a look I hoped was encouraging and didn’t betray how sad I felt for him.
I knew he wouldn’t want my pity.
Glen looked like he might refuse but Tormod cut him off again, knowing what he was going to say.
“I’ll stay with Morven and make sure nothing happens,” Tormod promised and with that, he gently placed a hand on my back and ushered me into the cell.
I glanced back to see Glen take over the guard’s post holding the door.
Unlike our cell in Norbroch, this one had a small wooden bed, a pitcher of water for the prisoner and a few blankets. I couldn’t imagine Queen Freya wanting to starve anyone and it made me feel safer, knowing that they treated their prisoners well.
Sat on the bench, allowing his hands to be bound with rope, was the fairy that had ruined the lives of so many humans. The fairy who stole the baby my ma gave birth to and left me in her place.
He was the reason humans all over the land were afraid to leave their new-borns alone. The cause of so much death and grief.
Since learning how changelings were created, I’d expected the fairy responsible to look like something straight out of my worst nightmares. A fairy so evil that even the sight of him would terrify me.
Instead, the fairy before us was a round little man with long spindly fingers. The first thing that popped into my mind was that he almost resembled a toad, which started a laugh from me.
He didn’t look frightening at all.
My laugh drew his attention and when he saw me he stood abruptly, pointing his long thin fingers at me with a look of surprise, and hunger.
“It’s you!” He cried and I couldn’t tell if he was angry or delighted.
He made to hurry towards me but William anticipated it and pushed him back down onto the bench, whilst Tormod pulled me back a few paces.
All eyes in the cell were on me and I hurried to explain myself.
“I’ve never seen him before in my life!” I exclaimed, feeling my hands beginning to sweat.
There were far too many of us in this cell and I felt my face burning with embarrassment. The tension made me want to grab Glen. run back up the stairs and escape out into the courtyard.
“Explain yourself,” William said, in a tone which allowed no arguments.
I found myself wondering what they would do if he didn’t explain himself. I couldn’t imagine Queen Freya allowing others to be tortured inside her castle.
“I remember all of my children, but never has one come to visit,” he said with a smile. “Never before has my magic returned to me.”
Tormod pulled me back even further as I felt my stomach drop.
“I am not your child.” I hissed, disgusted at the thought.
My parents were down south in our village. Ma
and da and Malcolm and Munro, they were my family. Not this disgusting toad-like fairy.
“I made you. That makes you mine.”
“No, it doesn’t!” Glen shouted from his spot at the door.
“Tell us how we can stop the changelings you created from dying so young,” Queen Freya said, moving the conversation on.
“There is no way.” Darach said bluntly and I felt as if someone had punched the air out of my chest.
“There must be a way!” I blurted out, unable to leave the questioning to William and the Queen.
Darach let out a bark of laughter.
“You, of all changelings, want more time?”
Again, all eyes looked at me to explain, but I simply shrugged. I felt my heart sink further when Darach laughed again.
Nothing he had said so far made any sense.
“Explain.” William demanded to which Darach looked smug. Clearly, he was enjoying being the one with all the answers.
“Each time I create a changeling, I give forth a small piece of the gift I was born with. Each time a changeling dies that part of the gift returns to me. My gift is not infinite. Much to King Ferchar’s dismay, I could not create as many changelings as he wanted over the last decade,” he paused with a smirk. “You, my child, took a much larger piece of the gift. Have you never wondered why you lived so long whilst around you, your fellow changelings sickened and died?”
I thought back to every changeling I had ever known or heard about. I thought of Ailsa, the boy who lived to be fifteen, Wallace’s children, Eithrig’s sisters, Finnian’s family. Each of them had died so young, some not making it past four or five.
But here I stood, eighteen years old and aging with every passing day. Though I got sick easily and struggled with my breathing on occasion, I was still healthy enough to travel for weeks through forests and mountains.
“The Others wanted you to have a much larger piece of the gift. Wanted you to live a longer life than the other changelings I created. I can feel it right here, the gift that flows through your body. It calls to me.”
“Why would they do that?” I whispered, sickened.
“Why is the sky blue? Why is the grass green? None of us mortals know why the Others do anything. While I can control who I use my gift on, it is the Others who control life. They decide how many changelings I can create and how much of my gift it takes to bring each of them life.”
Standing there in that cell, listening to Darach call me his child and claim that the Others had given me life for a reason, I longed for my parents.
Da would have marched over to him and broke his nose for daring to say that I wasn’t their child.
I felt like part of a game. Just a human shaped bundle of magic for Darach and the Others to play with. It made me want to claw at my own skin and escape. If it even was my own skin, perhaps I was nothing. Every part of me was created by someone else.
I couldn’t stand to be there any longer. I couldn’t hear any more.
If this was the truth we’d been searching for this whole time, then I didn’t want the truth.
I turned on my heel and ran out of the cell.
I wanted to go home.
20 YEARS AGO
“S top it Euna!” Aelwen complained after trying to take a drink of her nettle tea, only to find that I had frozen it solid once again.
“Euna, be kind.” Mother chided gently, and I let the tea turn back to liquid.
Aelwen smiled, took a sip and promptly looked disgusted.
“It is cold now!”
“We can swap. I like it cold,” I hurried to reassure her, swapping our cups as she smiled gratefully.
She lifted the cup to her lips, only to be met once again with frozen tea. She threw it down on the table with a screech whilst I laughed hysterically beside her.
She fell for it every time.
It had been years since I discovered that I was gifted by the Others and able to control the temperature of small things. Freezing liquid was easy, but warming it back up took a lot more energy.
“Stop using your gift on me!” Aelwen reached out to push me playfully.
The moment her hand touched my shoulder I felt it. It was as if someone had submerged me in an icy cold bath, or thrown me into a burning bonfire.
My head spun and I felt as if I was falling.
Then, from the very tips of my toes I felt my gift leaving me. Rushing through my veins and rattling through my bones to the point where Aelwen’s skin touched mine.
I could not describe what my gift felt like, but now I felt it leave me. Like water sinking down through grass and soil. My gift was trickling away.
As quickly as it started, it was over. I realised that I was sprawled on the floor beside the wooden chairs, feeling too hot and too cold all at once.
Mother had wrenched Aelwen away from me. I took a deep breath to complain about the shrill noise echoing throughout the hall and as I inhaled it stopped. It had been me, screaming.
“I’m sorry, I’m sorry!” Aelwen was apologising between sobs.
She pushed mother away and crawled under the table away from the two of us.
“My princess, what happened?” Mother asked, frantically checking me over for injuries.
“Gone.” I whispered, my throat sore from screaming.
“What has gone?” Mother pulled me to her chest and began rocking me gently.
I let her comfort me, although I knew it was Aelwen who needed her right now. Aelwen who was sobbing so hard I thought she might be sick. Watching her sob and apologise from under the table, I could see how disgusted she was in herself. I knew that she had not meant for this to happen.
For years, we thought that Aelwen had been born without a gift. Now I wished desperately that was true.
Although my body ached, I could not bring myself to blame her. The Others gave gifts, and we fairies just had to live with it.
I could not muster up the energy to hate her for this. I was empty, numb.
“My gift, it’s gone.”
At my confirmation, I heard Aelwen wail and I knew that she must have felt it happen. Felt the gift I had been born with as it was dragged reluctantly from my body.
Mother was frantically calling for healers and trying to soothe Aelwen while she cradled me close. I did not want to deal with what happened, could not bear to think about it.
I closed my eyes and sank into her embrace, shutting out everything and everyone.
PRESENT DAY
Aelwen and I listened in silence as Queen Freya explained what they had learned when they questioned the gifted fairy, Darach.
After their visit to the cells, Glen looked shaken and I felt a flicker of guilt at that. I still could not believe what I had done to the two of them.
The changeling, Morven, looked even worse than Glen. Her skin was pale and clammy, which made her freckles stand out. Her hands were faintly trembling as she sipped the tea which Adair, Queen Freya’s advisor, had brewed after seeing the state she was in.
It was understandable. I felt out of depth dealing with the workings of the Others. To a human and a changeling, it must have been near impossible to comprehend what we were dealing with.
This was bigger than us all.
“So, we have no way to give the changelings a longer life,” Adair sighed, running his hand over his face.
“There is no way for us to give the changelings more of his powers. We are just lucky that the Others saw fit to bless Morven with enough for a long life,” Queen Freya said with a sad smile.
Morven laughed humourlessly and slammed her mug down on the table, not noticing when the tea splashed out over her hand and dress.
“Lucky?” she spat.
“I’m sorry. I did not mean to cause offence,” Queen Freya hurried to assure her, fumbling for words. “I simply mean… isn’t it good that you will be able to live your life without the fear of death?”
“We know you didn’t mean any offence.” Glen said, rubbing soothin
g circles on Morven’s back.
Morven simply gritted her teeth and remained silent, staring down at the now half empty mug, watching the tea cooling on the table.
I felt helpless watching someone else struggle to cope and I wondered if this was what Aelwen felt all those years watching me suffer.
Morven had every right to be furious with Darach and with the Others, but Queen Freya still looked upset, as if she alone had been the one to cause her harm.
“It seems that the best thing we can do is keep Darach imprisoned and ensure that he is never able to use his gift again,” William said from where he was leaning against the wall.
Watching Morven glare at the cold nettle tea and listening to Queen Freya and her advisors discuss ways to ensure that Darach never got free, I was struck with an idea.
There was nothing more to be done for Morven. She simply had to live her life with the truth she did not want to accept. But something could be done to stop Darach from ever creating another changeling.
“Aelwen...” I started, but she cut me off.
“I cannot.” She said, and I noticed just how strained she looked.
“You would be protecting so many humans, stopping so many families from suffering,” she let me take one of her hands and grip it tight. “You could finally use it to do good.”
“Use what for good?” The ever-observant William asked and I silently cursed.
I should have waited until we were alone to voice my idea.
“My gift.” Aelwen sighed, she sounded pained to admit that she was gifted and I feel even guiltier about bringing it up.
The last time she used her gift had been when we were children. She had been annoyed by my teasing and wanted my powers to stop for a moment. Back then we did not realise that she was gifted and so the moment her skin touched mine, she leeched my gift from me forever.
It was months before she touched anyone again, scared that she would take the gifts of ever fairy she met. Thankfully she had control over her gift, unless she wanted to take someone’s gift it would not happen.
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