Coexist

by Anna Tan

  Euthalia brushed her away. “What is done is done.”

  “Don’t brush me away like that! You wait until the Ghillie Dhu finds out. He’ll learn you!”

  “I do not come under his jurisdiction.” Euthalia continued to make her way to her grove, silently berating herself for walking into their territory.

  “But you’re still under the Queen!”

  “I have my reasons,” Euthalia said, “and if the Queen asks, I will answer to her. Now shush, before your Ghillie Dhu awakes.”

  There was a loud roar in the distance and an angry rumble. “Too late,” Euthalia mumbled.

  “What is it?” the Ghillie Dhu stumbled out of his sleeping place, black-faced and bleary eyed. “Can’t a faerie get a decent nap anymore?”

  “Tell him what you did, Euthalia! You just tell him!” Althea squeaked, pointing a finger at him.

  “It has nothing to do with him,” the dryad replied. “You keep your nose in your own business, Althea.”

  “The Queen—”

  “Has nothing to do with it. There is nothing else to say.”

  The Ghillie Dhu sighed. He hated it when these spirits quarrelled. They weren’t his to take care of—he was a shepherd and protector of the trees themselves, not their detachable spirits if they had one—but he did anyway. There didn’t seem to be much of a difference, except that dryads and tree nymphs were much more excitable because they could talk. He rubbed his eyes and yawned, studying the pair.

  “Euthalia.”

  “Yes, Ghillie Dhu?”

  “Tell me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “She’s making a fuss over nothing. Seriously, I think her priorities—”

  “Euthalia.”

  “Fine,” she snapped. “A child wandered into the Kingdom and I helped Charon escort her out before she could do any harm.”

  “Now the Fairy Queen will be after our heads, Ghillie Dhu! You have to report her! She broke the rules and—” Althea stopped when the Ghillie Dhu waved her away impatiently.

  “Why did you help her?”

  “Her father once did me a good turn.”

  The Ghillie Dhu stared at her suspiciously. “A human once helped you?”

  Euthalia nodded. “He saved everyone in my glade.”

  Chapter 5: The Glade’s Protector

  1933

  Fire. Fire and iron. The end had come; it was only a matter of time. Euthalia could feel the heat of the fire on her face, much too close for comfort. She wished she could shut her ears from the noise of the men who had invaded her glade. She opened her eyes and glared at them as they sat on a fallen tree, joking as they sharpened their axes. They hadn’t seen her—couldn’t see her—and it was just as well. Men with such hard hearts should never see any of the fairy creatures, lest they start capturing and murdering them. If they could kill a tree for sport, who knew what they would do to the many wondrous living creatures of the Fairy Kingdom?

  Euthalia stood as one with her willow, whispering words of bitter farewell. At least she had lived for over two hundred years before the tree-killers had finally come. She supposed it was good enough, though she knew of trees who lived to reach near a thousand. She had also had friends who had been cut down in their youth, at a mere fifty, so she didn’t have much to complain about.

  She looked around the glade saying silent goodbyes to her friends and family. Some of them had fled, unable to stomach the coming destruction. They would eventually die once their trees did, but they wouldn’t have to see it happen. Maybe they wouldn’t even feel it. Some of them had long given up their mobility and were now stuck in their trees unable to leave. She refused to go. She wanted to be whole when her end came. Even if sorrow broke her heart first.

  It wasn’t as if they hadn’t tried to save themselves. The dryads had sent a delegation to the Fairy Queen, begging her for protection. The Queen had folded her arms and shrugged. “Your community stands at the edge of my domain. What do you expect me to do? You could have planted your trees deeper into my lands and then I would have been able to help you. There is not enough time nor magic to transplant all of you.”

  “How were we to know?” Euthalia had replied indignantly. “In the old days, the humans respected and took care of us. We coexisted harmoniously in the glade. Now they—”

  “Bring up your complaints to the humans then,” the Queen cut her off as she strode away.

  Now Euthalia stood watching the men, their faces glowing in the firelight. One of them tested his blade and grunted with satisfaction. He hefted the axe on his shoulder and started towards her. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes one last time, waiting for the bite.

  “Stop!” A new voice cried out. Not what she was expecting to hear.

  “What do you want now, Darrick?”

  “You can’t destroy this glade, Rowan.”

  Euthalia couldn’t believe her ears. She opened her eyes to see a young man with a mop of messy brown hair standing between her and the axe-wielding man.

  Rowan grimaced. “We have been through this before, Darrick.”

  “No. I finally got the stay order from the Council. Look,” the young man waved a sheet of paper in front of Rowan’s nose. “Your father signed it.”

  “Hold it still,” Rowan growled, snatching the paper from his hands. “What nonsense is this?”

  “By order of the council, you are to move your operations to the other side of the village. This place is protected by law.”

  Euthalia could see the growing displeasure on Rowan’s face. “Humph! In reference to a treaty signed more than twenty years ago. Is this thing even still valid?”

  “Well, it hasn’t been revoked. The treaty, I mean. So it has to be.” Darrick snatched the paper back and pressed it against his body, smoothing it out.

  “Fine. Fine.” Rowan turned to his crew. “Come on men, let’s clear out.”

  Grumbling, the men packed up their gear and doused their fire. One of them spat at Darrick as he passed. Darrick didn’t seem to notice. He was busy walking around the glade, brushing his fingers against the trunk of each tree.

  “Who are you?” she asked when he had walked a full circle around the glade and stood before her tree again. He looked vaguely familiar, as if she had seen him before. Then again, all humans looked alike to her.

  He started at her voice. “I didn’t notice you there,” he said.

  “Oh, I was, um, picking flowers in the forest.”

  “Were you?” he replied, with arched eyebrows. “What’s your name?”

  “I believe I asked you first.”

  “Darrick,” he replied. “Darrick Hays. Pleased to meet you.” He stuck out a hand in her direction.

  She stared at his hand, trying to remember what humans did with their hands, but couldn’t. In the end, she touched it briefly. “I’m Euthalia. The trees—I mean—I wanted to thank you for saving the trees.”

  “Oh, you saw that, did you?” He paused and smiled fondly at the trees, his hand caressing the bark of the oak he stood beside. “I have fond memories of this place. I wanted to preserve it.”

  She weighed her words. “The oaks seem to know you.”

  He looked at her oddly. “What do you mean?”

  “You speak to them, don’t you?”

  “Well, I have before... but...”

  “Thank you, Darrick Oak-knower. Thank you for saving this land,” she said as she walked back into the forest.

  Chapter 6: The Ghillie Dhu’s Decision

  1954

  The Ghillie Dhu rubbed his chin thoughtfully. “You do understand, Euthalia, that everything you do affects the dryad community? And everything that affects you dryads and tree nymphs will affect my trees?”

  “Yes. I know that, but a good turn—”

  He lifted a finger to shush her. “You can’t just—just help humans and not expect that our community will not be affected. You have to think of the Kingdom as a whole. Not just what affects you personally.”

  “T
hat’s what I said, Ghillie Dhu, I told her,” Althea whined, rolling her eyes.

  “If she’d stayed, we would have been in bigger trouble,” Euthalia protested. “She would have eventually wandered into our territory, and if the Queen found her here, then wouldn’t we be implicated?”

  The Ghillie Dhu hesitated. “That is true. If she had eventually come here...”

  “You said she was with the centaur. Why would she have come here?” Althea asked.

  “She was at the edge of the forest trying to get home and the trees were closing in on her. Where else would she have fled if the centaur had not called me? Maybe you should have told your trees to let her through so that she could have gone home on her own,” Euthalia turned on the Ghillie Dhu.

  “I wasn’t paying attention,” he admitted. “It was such a peaceful night that I just drifted off to sleep without listening to their murmurs.”

  “So—”

  “So we do not speak of this again, Althea,” the Ghillie Dhu cut the dryad off. “She came in, and she left and that is all there is to this. That is all we know. The Queen cannot fault us for that. If she asks, Euthalia will answer. Now go away and let me get back to sleep.”

  He waved them away then lay on his bed of moss beside the stream and closed his eyes, ignoring Althea’s angry mutters. Peace reigned in the forest again as Althea led her band of angry tree nymphs away. Every so often, she turned back to scowl at Euthalia.

  Euthalia made her way back to the glade slowly, worry etched on her face. True, she had led Mary back to the village, but what she hadn’t mentioned to the Ghillie Dhu—though it was only a matter of time before the trees told him—was that there was another girl, this Jane, who was also somewhere in the Fairy Kingdom. Something seemed odd to her; something she couldn’t really put a finger on. The storm hadn’t seemed entirely natural. Why had it been so driving and forceful for just such a specific time at dusk until near twilight? Why had it stopped now instead of continuing into the night? Surely if it were such a heavy cover of clouds it would have continued raining late into the night. The sky rumbled apologetically and Euthalia looked up, her brow contracted in thought. It seemed as if something had conspired to drive Jane into the Fairy Kingdom. She shook her head, unable to figure it out.

  “What do you think I should do?” she asked her willow as she sank down beside it. “I don’t like the idea of this girl wandering about—though, if she is Darrick’s daughter she’s probably harmless—but what can I do? Even if I head out to the adlet’s cottage now, the portals will be closed by the time I reach her. It’ll be closed any minute now, actually. And then if I were to be with her I would be in trouble for harbouring a fugitive.”

  She tilted her head to the left as her tree rambled on about the gossip around the adlet’s cottage. “Yes, the adlet should know to lead her out now that the rain has stopped. I suppose I’ll go have a look tomorrow morning.”

  Euthalia nodded emphatically. “I hope it’s not too late.”

  Chapter 7: The King’s Secret

  1954

  The stillness unnerved Darrick. Where were the foxes that slunk through the bushes in search of prey? Where were the stripe-faced badgers digging for grubs? Where were the owls that hooted in the dark? Where was the wind herself?

  No, it was unnaturally quiet for an evening out in the woods. His eyes scanned the edges of the path, hoping to see where his daughter had left it. The rain had stopped, but everything was mud and slush, making it impossible to track her. He only hoped that she wasn’t lying somewhere with broken bones.

  There was movement in his peripheral vision. He whipped his head around and was greeted by the point of an arrow. Beyond the shaft, his assailant’s face was impassive. Darrick’s eyes wandered past the hard eyes to the long, blond tresses that lay thick and straight down to his chest, and the slightly pointed ears that peeked through. He became aware of the movement of people silently surrounding him.

  “Amused?” The elf lowered his bow. “What are you doing here?”

  “Can’t a man take a walk in his own backyard?”

  “You’ve strayed quite a bit from your backyard,” he said, glancing in the general direction of the village.

  Darrick followed his gaze. Not one twinkle of light shone through the foliage, nor did any peak of the encircling fence peek through. He hadn’t realised he had come so far. “I had need to.”

  “Need does not justify your breaking the covenant.”

  “What covenant?”

  “Do not try to hide your guilt with protests of ignorance, child. The ancient covenant my father swore with your forefathers must not be broken. The night is ours, boy, as sure as the day is yours. Do you see us break our word? You should not be here now.”

  “My daughter is missing. And I know nothing of this covenant you speak of.” An uneasy feeling tickled Darrick’s thoughts. What had governed their unwritten laws? What lay behind the old wives’ tale of danger in the forests at night? He had been out before—certain herbs had to be harvested by the full moon—but he had never kept to the known paths, always favouring stealthy runs to sacred Druid hideouts. Until today.

  “Does not your council still rule?”

  A short chuckle escaped Darrick’s throat. “Our council is made up of drunks and thieves. They’ll not remember anything more than where to find the best free wine and women.”

  “And who leads the council now? Adrian, son of James?”

  “Adrian’s son, Rowan leads the council,” Darrick replied, wondering how much this stranger knew of the workings of their village.

  “Is Adrian dead then?”

  “No, but he is too old and senile to be bothered with the council and their bickering.”

  “Ah.” The elf gestured at someone behind Darrick.

  Darrick protested as his arms were twisted and bound behind his back.

  “The law was broken, and you must pay. Tomorrow I will speak to your council and rectify this terrible state of affairs.”

  “My daughter—”

  “We have not seen anyone...” He paused as one of his companions approached him and whispered into his ear. “Ah, a young girl was seen going into the cottage of the dog-man during rainfall. We have no jurisdiction there.”

  “Who does then?”

  “She has entered the Old Kingdom, under the rule of the Fairy Queen.”

  “And where is this?”

  “This is where the Elven King rules,” the elf said as they threw a sack over Darrick’s head.

  Darrick thought that he knew the forest well, but the elves’ path looped back and forth until he lost all his bearings. He lost count somewhere after turning left over forty times and turning right more than thirty. It didn’t matter anyway; he knew the elves were deliberately obscuring their route. He perked up when the ground beneath his feet changed. Where he had been stumbling over gnarled roots and tangled weeds, the ground now was smooth and lush. There was a spring and a bounce that accompanied each step, as if he were walking over a thick, luxurious carpet. Very like the grass in his front yard, the only place in the village where it thrived.

  Before he had much time to mull over that thought, new noises filtered through the sack—running water, footsteps, laughter, voices. Darrick guessed that they must have reached wherever it was that these elves lived. A short while later, the ground changed again. It felt like pavement, if pavement could be made out of something other than stone. ‘Packed earth’ his old friend and enemy, Rowan, would have called it, but it seemed to Darrick a little too mundane for the sensation that seeped through Darrick’s boots into his toes and up his thighs. Pavement, he decided, although he could not yet see what it was made of.

  Finally, they stopped. The musical voices that had filled the air hushed only to be replaced by muted conversations edged with worry. The hands that guided Darrick pushed him to his knees.

  “What is this, Erurainon?” The deep voice came from in front of him.

  “We found th
is human wandering in the forest, in direct defiance of the covenant, Sire.” Darrick recognised the voice of his captor.

  “Is that so? What did he have to say about it?”

  “He claimed he had no knowledge of the covenant and that none in their village know of it.”

  “A likely story. Well, let me see him then.”

  The bag was pulled off his head. Darrick looked around to find that he faced a tall, ornately-carved oak throne in the middle of an unfamiliar forest, if forest it could be called. The growth of the trees was too planned, as if they had been deliberately cultivated to form a building-like structure. Aligned closely in two straight rows, the trees here rose higher than any he had remembered seeing, and were lit with a strange ethereal glow. The tops of their boughs leaned towards each other and interlocked, like the arched roof of a cathedral. All around him, elves stood scrutinizing him with varying expressions. He looked down at the ground, remembering his vague musings. Grass pavement, he amended.

  Darrick could almost feel the weight of the Elven King’s stare. He lifted his eyes to the throne and matched it with a glare of his own.

  “Bring him closer.”

  In response, Erurainon gripped Darrick’s forearm and pulled him to his feet.

  “We can do without those restraints,” the King said.

  “But Father—”

  The King stepped forward, waving aside Erurainon’s protests. Reluctantly, the elf untied Darrick’s hands.

  “What are you looking for?” Darrick asked as the King scrutinised his face. He rubbed at his wrists, where the rope marks stood out red and angry.

  “What is your mother’s name?”

  “Lisa. But—”

  “Lisa or Lisse?” the King interrupted.

  The murmurs in the background grew louder. Darrick frowned. “Our village called her Lisa, but my father—he called her Lisse.”