The Bitterbynde Trilogy

by Cecilia Dart-Thornton

  Lord Voltasus, Storm Chieftain of the Seventh House, had fallen in battle. Lord Noctorus—the new Chieftain of Stormriders—unexpectedly posted the heir of Voltasus, Lord Ustorix, to a lonely port at the Turnagain Islands. Controversially, he announced that Ustorix’s sister Heligea would become the new head of the Seventh House. She was invited to Court and travelled to Caermelor by Windship, accompanied by her mother Lady Artemisia; the Lords Sartores; Isterium, Callidus and Ariades; their new wizard, Andrath; and several servants from Isse Tower, including Brand Brinkworth, Keat Featherstone, Dain Pennyrigg, Tren Spatchwort, Carlan Fable and Teron Hoad.

  Above Caermelor the clouds billowed and surged like drifts of blown apple-blossom. Keels sliced through the vapours, which frayed to reveal towers of piled-up sails bellying taut, straining with the wind. Windships sailed in from each of the Twelve Houses of Stormriders, each escorted by squadrons of outriders. Heligea’s sister Persefonae attended with her husband Valerix, Lord Oscenis of the Fifth House, and Lady Lilaceae.

  The Lady Dianella had been betrothed to an elderly earl in the Sorrow Isles. She was not invited to attend the festivities. Of her uncle the wizard Sargoth, a hunted man and an outcast, there were scant tidings. Some while ago a group of foresters in eastern Eldaraigne had glimpsed a vagabond, barefoot, wasted to the bone and clothed in rags. He had shrieked incantations at them, warning them to beware, and not to approach him, for he was a wizard and could easily cast them down. Yet, he was bereft of wizardly contraptions. The foresters laughed, and passed the madman by.

  The towering, square bulk of the keep overlooked the Autumn Garden of Caermelor Palace. The five-lobed leaves of the ornamental grape, deep crimson, embroidered the stone walls of the park. Beneath the spreading tupelo trees with their long red leaves and tiny fruits of vivid blue, clipped hedges burgeoned richly with scarlet berries. The hedges were a glorious medley of autumnal vegetation—the purple barberry, whose oval leaves were turning from deep bronze to flame, the garnets of glossy evergreen cotoneaster, dense, dark holly hung with bunches of blood-red beads, and the orange-crimson baubles of pyracantha, the firethorn.

  Around the roots of the winter cherry trees bright hard orbs lay scattered, as though necklaces of topaz and carnelian had broken, spilling their gems. Lillypillies scattered the shiny cherries of their own fruiting, deep magenta, like rose quartz struck with light through purple glass. Errantry sat brooding on the boughs of a ginkgo tree, whose fanlike leaves stood out crisply against the cloudless sky of morning, a striking display in clear, bright yellow. On the flowering cherries, standing erect and columnar, the foliage was changing from green-bronze to red-veined amber. Camellias bloomed, their rosy or creamy petals pleated like dancers’petticoats. Leathery-skinned coppery fruits the size of a woman’s fist were ripening on the boughs of the pomegranates. Immobile among leaves piled up like surf, a watch-worm twined its rainbow coils about the pediment of a mounted statue of King William the Wise. A thick, sweet fragrance permeated the garden, exuded by the double flowers of gardenias, white as starched ruffles. Birds were singing.

  In the days leading up to the coronation of Edward, two richly dressed people strolled along the paths of the Autumn Gardens, deep in conversation. As they went, they pushed aside the long branches of golden willows which drooped to the ground. The withies poured like softly swaying curtains. Their faded yellow leaves fluttered through the air, as thick as snow.

  Over a dark-green tunic, Angavar wore a long, deep-red surcoat of velvet, worked with his own Faêran Royal Arms: the eagle gorged with a star-tipped crown, wreathed with hawthorn blossoms. A magnificent cloak covered his shoulders, fastened by a jewelled strap across the breast, lozenge-shaped clasps and golden cords. Its heavy folds were stitched with a pattern of hawthorn leaves. Holly-green breeches were tucked into cuffed boots reaching to midthigh, and a plain golden fillet encircled his brow.

  His companion was clothed in a gown of rustling, lime-coloured silk, embroidered with gold cinquefoils. Its tight-buttoned sleeves extended well down below the wrist. About her neck she wore a collar of red-gold studded with emeralds and rubies. Her heavy hair, which shone like the flowers of broom, flowed loose. It was garlanded with Autumn leaves and berries on gold wire, fashioned from beryls and carnelians. Strings of miniature emeralds were wound loosely through her tresses. Her costume included a super cote-hardie lined with ermine, which was caught up on one side to reveal the silken gown beneath. Her girdle was composed of a series of square, jewelled brooches to match the collar.

  ‘How did it all begin?’ mused Ashalind aloud. ‘Thou didst go hunting, and William of Erith tried to steal thy quarry. Yet thou wert lenient with him, and thus the bond of friendship sprang up between Erith and Faêrie. Now, methinks thou dost no longer savour the chase.’

  ‘Faêran stags run no longer in Erith,’ he replied. ‘It is Faêran practice to hunt only beasts of gramarye, which do not perish but spring to life after they fall. Such beasts are well versed in evasive manoeuvres, and great skill is necessary to outwit them. They do not fear pain and death, for there is none. They take joy in the thrill of the chase, much as children delight in their games of hide-and-seek.’

  He reached up to touch a sprig of fading willow leaves. ‘From years of dwelling amongst humankind I have grown to honour the fragile lives of mortal creatures as never before. But this new compassion has become a great burden to me.’

  Ashalind understood. Her lover possessed a kind of reverence for life which the Faêran did not normally own. It was against his nature. He had lost something of the carelessness innate to all immortals. Immortals could not care too deeply—it would destroy their hearts and minds. For who could know better than they that forever is a long time?

  Sunlight through the willows dappled Ashalind’s skin, its touch like syrup. He who walked like a tiger at her side was the fragrance of leaves, the essence of sunlight. His hair glinted as though droplets of dew were caught therein. Fragments of an old, clumsily translated Talith song strayed into Ashalind’s thoughts.

  All the day was his, and the night,

  Wind and rain, sun, moon and stars,

  Snow and ice, frost, fire, stone.

  His was the power of the storm and ocean tides,

  And of the quake that sunders rock,

  Of the fire-mountain, the whirlwind, the o’ertowering wave.

  The drop of dew quivering on a web,

  Caught in a spangle of dawn glow,

  The painted butterfly’s wing,

  The jolly bud, the leaf nodding on the twig,

  The blackbird’s song—they were his also.

  The white owl in the hollow tree,

  The red fox and the golden eagle,

  The carp leaping the waters, mailed in silver,

  And all that was fair and wondrous,

  Every thing rare, joyous and awe-ful.

  Laughter, merriment and song,

  Wrath and vengeance, these were his too.

  And the rising of the sun was his,

  And the going down of the sun.

  Her spirit was suddenly moved with a desire to see the Realm again.

  ‘I can give the world to thee,’ said Angavar, pausing among the amber-threaded willow curtains. ‘Is there aught thou dost desire, which is not already in thy possession?’

  Against the rim of her awareness, a black bird brushed its wings. Ashalind ignored it.

  ‘Yes!’ she cried. ‘Together, let us right all wrongs. Let all slaves be sought out and freed, and slave-traders be pursued unmercifully. Let the beating of servants be outlawed, and domestic wights be installed in all domiciles, especially of the Stormriders, to enforce this precept. Let the treasure taken from Waterstair be distributed among the deserving poor of Gilvaris Tarv and wherever else they may dwell!’ The words tumbled forth as she warmed to the subject. ‘Let us gift Appleton Thorn with a new gorse mill, a sturdy plough, a dozen scythes of Eldaraigne steel and twenty stout draught-horses. Oh, I have so many aspir
ations—I shall think of them all presently. Not least, to revise the dining etiquette of the Court!’

  Lean lines of amusement briefly bracketed Angavar’s mouth. ‘As thou wish’st,’ he said, ‘so shall it come to pass. But do not forget, it is Edward who must henceforth decree new laws for Erith, not I.’

  ‘I am assured of his agreement, should the suggestions proceed from thee. He loves thee well, and honours thy wisdom.’

  ‘As perhaps thou dost not—it appears thou wouldst upset my erstwhile governance willy-nilly!’

  ‘Not at all! Fie—thou dost tease me! Hadst thou been aware of the mistreatment of servants, thou wouldst have remedied the situation straightway, I’ll guarantee! When I was a child in Avlantia I never heard of such ill handling as later was laid upon me at Isse Tower. I feel certain that no such cruelty towards menials occurred in those days when thy people passed often to and fro between Erith and the Realm, seldom glimpsed by mortals. They deplored unjust abuse and would have punished hard masters.’

  ‘How dost thou know aught of Faêran practice?’

  ‘In Hythe Mellyn the lore-masters taught us what they knew of Faêran ways. My teacher was Meganwy, a carlin well versed in the code followed by …’ Ashalind faltered. All her life hitherto, whenever conversation had touched upon the sovereign of the Fair Ones, he had loomed as a fabulous figure in her imagination, a remote and glorious legend enduring since time’s birth, only to be dreamed of, never to be glimpsed, no more to be reached than the stars. It was difficult to reconcile this entrenched vision with the fact that he was standing beside her, that she was speaking with him, that he was Thorn. ‘… the code followed by thy subjects,’ she continued shyly, for a moment incapable of looking in his direction. ‘I know how strictly thy laws are enforced.’

  ‘We condemn slovenliness,’ observed Angavar frankly. ‘Slatterns deserve punishment.’

  ‘Perhaps, but not with blows,’ said Ashalind. ‘That is where we differ, thou and I.’ She hesitated again then spoke, though hardly knowing what she was saying: ‘We differ in many ways. The more I know of thee, the stranger it feels.’ Her breath escaped in a soft sigh. ‘But how that strangeness stirs my blood …’

  ‘Boundaries,’ answered he, ‘can be crossed.’

  He leaned towards her, holding out a small jar of enamelled glass as green as flames from burning copper wire. Intricate decorations of foliage and birds twined about the sides, so beautiful and lively that they put Ashalind in mind of the leaf-ring.

  ‘Wist thou the contents herein?’ he asked.

  A lock of his long hair swung from his shoulder, brushing against her cheek like thistledown, and for a moment she was unable to speak. From the highest boughs of a gingko tree a blackbird whistled three notes. Ashalind cleared her throat with a discreet, dry cough and regained her equanimity.

  ‘I have not seen its like before, and yet methinks I know of something similar—I have heard a tale.’

  Angavar twisted off the lid, revealing an ointment the colour of new spring grasses. Dipping a fingertip in the stuff, he touched it to her eyelids. She blinked. ‘Good faith!’ she said in wonder. ‘And is that not the self-same salve accidentally used by the midwife in the tale of Eilian? The old woman who attended Eilian in childbirth, after the damsel wedded a Faêran lord?’

  ‘Even so.’

  ‘Now I shall be able to see thy people, when they are hidden to other mortals!’

  ‘Indeed. No mortal can see the Faêran unless they wish it. But, anointed, thou mayst see them whether they wish it or no. And thou mayst pierce all eldritch glamour besides.’

  ‘A useful faculty! Yet all appears unchanged,’ she added uncertainly.

  ‘No illusion is yet nigh.’

  Gleefully, Ashalind laughed. ‘This is fun! Thou’rt indulgent with thy gifts!’

  ‘Ask for more. Thy pleasure pleases me.’

  ‘Yes I will ask for more. A boon comes to me now. Would that it had occurred to me beforetime—long have I yearned for the freedom of the servants of the Each Uisge, whose lives were ruined in a single moment of youthful folly.’

  ‘Ere the sun has thrice set, they shall be discovered.’

  She laughed again, in amazement and relief. How easy it all was!

  ‘I can scarcely credit that this should be happening.’

  Angavar’s slow smile was beautiful, a stab of sunlight.

  ‘Believe it,’ he said.

  Never had the Court of Caermelor seen such a gathering.

  Like living jewels the Faêran danced and strode among them. Their poetry and songs enchanted mortal hearts with a keen delight, despite that sometimes the last echoes of the lyrics might leave the hearers imbued either with heart-bursting joy or an ineffable sense of tragedy and loss. The villagers of Appleton Thorn, servants from Isse Tower and Tana, an ebullient family from Rosedale, a crazy Ertishman with his swaggering niece and nephew, a chandler from Rope Street in Gilvaris Tarv, children with webbed fingers and hair the colour of pewter—all were welcomed as equals with the courtiers, whose initial dismay at this motley concourse turned first to fascination, then to pleasure. The cut-glass manners of Court, seen as baffling and pointless by the newcomers, quickly became redundant. The lords and ladies of Caermelor Palace found themselves charmed and diverted as never before. Goblet the Jester formed a firm friendship with Sianadh, which proved dangerous to the dignity of almost everyone. There was no end to the larks of these two, but most folk learned to take their mischief in good part.

  Others were glimpsed at Court, usually by night—in the gardens, or the Royal Quarters. It might be an urisk, or a small innocuous looking waterhorse, or a dark-haired youth dressed in leaves and moss, with a small pig trotting at his heels. At times when Angavar walked beside the leaf-strewn pools of the Autumn Garden with his betrothed, a gorgeous swanmaiden dallied there too, her slender frame reflected in the water like a burning hibiscus. Soon the Autumn Garden began to be shunned by the courtiers and most of the mortal visitors—it was considered to be haunted. Rumour had it that the ponds were connected to the sea by underground waterways, that merfolk and benvarreys and silkies came up through them, and sea-morgans also, and merrows, and the maighdeanna na tuinne, and something completely festooned with shells which laughed inordinately, and dripping gruagachs with the sheen of flowing water gleaming down their ankle-length hair. Of course, the citizens were not surprised that numerous eldritch manifestations should be attracted to Caermelor Palace, because the tidings of an amazing event had spread—the High King of the Faêran had come to Court with his retinue. For that same reason there was not a lady’s heart that did not yearn, not a single human being who remained unmoved.

  Vinegar Tom and various domestic imps lurked among the Autumn Garden’s rufous hedges. High in the golden fire of the trees small figures moved, laughing and chattering in an arboreal language of Khazathdaur, stringing up ropes and ladders until the treetops of the garden were webbed with them. Like butterflies, the coillduine flitted rapidly in and out of the crystalline brilliance of the foliage, trailing auras of soft fire. Unseelie things also gathered to haunt the palace domains, for they loved the Faêran no less than their seelie counterparts—but some enchantment prevented them at this time from wreaking their mischief upon the mortal citizens of Caermelor.

  Even Finoderee loped in one evening, dressed in his new clothes.

  As for Edward, now King-Emperor uncrowned, he seemed at once merry and melancholy. The members of his Household whispered understandingly that the prospect of sovereignty surely filled the young man with both eagerness and dread.

  ‘I urge this upon you,’ Edward said to Ashalind, ‘that you go now with Angavar to seek the Geata Poeg na Déanainn in Arcdur. Now, before the coronation. You must go by sea, for there are no Mooring Masts in that northern land. All my Seaships are at your disposal.’

  ‘If we pass through into the Fair Realm it might be years before we come back to Erith,’ Ashalind reminded him. ‘Besides, Angava
r’s vow to your father is not yet fulfilled.’

  ‘Then do not yet pass through the Gate but mark it only, and set guards upon it to await your return.’

  ‘You are eager to find the Gate.’

  ‘No. But I wist well how Angavar and the others of the Faêran yearn and cannot rest. Mayhap, finding it shall soothe them, for a time.’

  ‘You are generous.’

  But when she put the proposal to Angavar, he looked sombre, thoughtful.

  ‘Edward suggested this?’

  ‘Yes, and I am glad to discover what has been vexing him, for of late he has been as doleful as a—’ She had been about to say ‘crow’, but thought better of it. ‘—as a weeper.’

  ‘Methinks it is not the restlessness of the Faêran that eats him.’

  ‘Then, what? The approaching coronation?’

  But he would not say.

  All over Erith, people wondered where the shang winds had gone. No longer did tableaux glow and shimmer in a numinous twilight, no more did ancient cities awake from slumber to relive their glory days. Angavar had banished the unstorms. As days and weeks went by, folk began to realise that the shang would visit them no more, but they were reluctant to abandon the old, ingrained habit of the taltry.

  Since the return to Caermelor, Angavar laid aside the Lion of D’Armancourt and openly displayed his own eagle escutcheon, the sigil of Faêran Royalty. The couriers and everyone in the kingdom who knew him by sight were fully apprised of the truth—King James had asked the Faêran High King to rule in his place until Edward came of age. Surprisingly, or perhaps predictably, this truth did not affect history as it existed in the minds of the soldiery and the majority of the citizens of Erith, who recognised the face of their sovereign only from crudely stamped images on coins. The King-Emperor had come to be regarded as a sovereign without parallel, a paragon, the most popular ruler in history. The people would have followed him into any sort of danger. They found it difficult—nay, impossible to accept the idea that the entire Empire had been under glamour’s illusion for so many years, that this monarch they loved was in fact not of their race. Popularly, the obvious explanation was that the King-Emperor had been slain at the Battle of Darke, and his ally the Faêran High King had subsequently arrived to stamp out those of his enemies who remained alive.