The Bastard from Fairyland

by Phil Parker

  His fist hit my chin before I realised he’d moved. That was a result of his training with Gamesmaster Murtagh, who’d spotted a well-built moron who was perfect for fighting in the lists at the Belthane festival. I stumbled backwards, dropping the pannier as my arms windmilled to stop myself falling. I landed on my backside heavily with a loud, ‘Oof!’

  Irvyn laughed and dropped to his knees to straddle my chest, fists bunched ready to launch his attack.

  ‘You’re up to something shit stain. I’ve seen you carrying that fucking basket into the garden for weeks now. What are you up to?’

  ‘Get off me!’ I shouted as I tried to wriggle loose, only to find his legs tightened their grip on either side of my ribs until the discomfort made me lie still, defeated.

  Irvyn wrinkled his nose as though he smelled something unpleasant, he got off me.

  ‘Gladly. Your skin’s the colour of shit and you fucking smell like it. You shat your drawers have you?’

  He chuckled as he stood up but planted a booted foot on my chest.

  ‘Tell me where you’re going, you filthy hybrid bastard or I’ll crush you like a fucking bug.’

  He pressed his boot down hard on my chest, making it difficult to breathe, I felt tears sting my eyes and tried to hold them back.

  ‘It’s for the spriggan guards. Rations. They get overlooked. Here. At the rear of the palace.’

  There were guards stationed everywhere these days, they’d increased their numbers because the High Lord had spotted another assassin a few days before. I had to hope Irvyn would find my lie believable.

  He looked sceptical.

  ‘Doesn’t sound like Mistress Cera, to consider bloody spriggans.’

  He was right, it didn’t.

  ‘I know.’ I feigned a lack of interest. ‘Just follow orders. Don’t want. Beating.’

  The boot on my chest was lifted and he stared at me with distaste.

  ‘Why do you stay here, shit stain? Everybody despises your fucking hybrid blood. And with that shit brown colour, how are you ever going to fit in when the rest of us have white skin eh?’

  It was a good question. I wished I had the answer.

  ‘Do everyone a favour. Leave the palace and fuck off will you? I hear there’s a gateway to the fucking human realm around here somewhere. Go see them, you might fit in there, because you fucking don’t here!’

  He kicked my backside hard. The pain triggered the tears I’d been struggling to hold back. He snorted his disdain and marched back through the doorway, slamming it behind him.

  I was trapped on the outside of the palace grounds now. To get back in I’d have to enter through the main gate and get interrogated by the guards.

  I stood up and cursed Irvyn with every form of bad luck possible but his final words refused to leave me. I’d considered running away lots of times. He was right, I didn’t fit in. Not just because I was a hybrid but because of the colour of my skin, it made me stand out so that everyone looked at me with distaste. There were several hybrids in the Dark Court, some of them quite highly placed, it wasn’t always easy to be sure who they were, they were like pure-bred Fae, pale skinned and blonde haired. The opposite of me.

  When you were a slave, already worthless, and you looked so conspicuous, you drew attention for all the wrong reasons. I always got the blame because I was the first one everyone thought of when searching for a scapegoat.

  For as long as I could remember I’d fantasised about finding the lost gateway to the human realm to set out on a quest to find others like me. It was the kind of tale which storytellers like Oisin would entertain lords, ladies and courtiers with on dark winter nights. Except I wasn’t the kind of hero you found in such stories because I didn’t have the courage, I saw disaster and terror everywhere. Knowing my luck, life in the human realm would be even worse than it was here.

  The drizzle turned heavier and it made me shiver as I scooped up the things that had fallen out of the pannier, thankfully the flask of milk hadn’t broken. I avoided the two spriggans shambling along the garden wall, disinterested in anything other than the end of their duty shift. I waited until they’d gone before climbing the branches of an old pear tree that reached up and over the garden wall. I jumped down the other side, carefully holding the pannier tight, and jogged along a cart track, over a meadow and into the wood that was no more than a dark smudge in the gathering twilight.

  I felt my spirits lift the moment I saw the old barn. I whistled twice and heard the thin crooning noise that drifted back in reply. It made me smile. I pulled open the rotting door wide enough to squeeze through to be greeted by a snuffling sound that fluttered out of the darkness on soft wings as a shadowy form stepped out of the darkness.

  ‘You can smell your dinner, can’t you?’

  The crooning noise grew louder from behind a stack of hay bales. I emptied the contents of the pannier onto the floor and stood back and kept very still.

  From out of the darkness stretched the long, scaled neck and head of my wyvern. She dived on the food enthusiastically and ate noisily. I poured the milk into a battered bucket nearby then sat on a hay bale and watched the animal with fascination.

  ‘I’m sorry I couldn’t get here sooner. You’re hungry, aren’t you?’

  The animal glanced at me briefly as it chewed on the mutton leg, as though she understood what I was saying to her. It had felt silly at the start, speaking to an animal. I’d only done it out of panic, but when she responded to my voice, I decided if it stopped her eating me, I’d happily chatter away for as long as needed. When she stuck her snout into the basket I’d been carrying on my foraging mission in the woods, she eaten everything I’d found without caring what it was.

  ‘I’ve been reading about you. I found a book in the palace library. I’m not allowed in there but you are worth the risk.’

  She plunged her snout into the bucket of milk and drank noisily.

  ‘Did you know you’re a wyvern? A smaller-than-average species of dragon? Your red colour is typical of your type apparently. The book said you’re very intelligent and loyal. But I can see that for myself.’

  She took her snout out of the bucket and snorted through wide nostrils, blowing milk all over me. I laughed. She twisted her head from one side to the other, behaviour I started to think showed she was trying to understand me.

  She stepped closer, the rest of her body emerging from the shadows as she did so. She was bigger than a bull at the shoulders, perhaps half as big again with powerful legs and jaws that could easily rip me to shreds. Thankfully I didn’t appear to be on her menu, quite the opposite, she’d realised I brought her food and that action had caused a bond to form between us. She sat down in front of me and planted her scaly head on the hay bale. Gently, and very slowly, I reached over and stroked it, and got a low moan of satisfaction that made me smile. It was like a dog or cat you’d stroke and be rewarded for your affection.

  The book I’d found was very old, covered in dust and on the shelves at the furthest corner of the library where no one went. Not that anyone used the library except me. The final chapter of the book had talked about how dragons were being hunted to the point of extinction. No one knew anything about them now, I’d made very careful enquiries of Master Sidwell and if anyone would have known, it would have been him.

  The real mystery was why a wyvern would be roaming the woods on its own now.

  My thigh got a gentle nudge and I laughed.

  ‘I’m sorry, I forgot our after-dinner ritual.’

  There was a point behind the frilled area at the back of its head that protected a small hole in its scales, the book told me it was the wyvern’s ear. She liked me to massage her there so I pressed the heel of my palm on the muscle tissue around it and instantly got a low groan.

  ‘You like this, don’t you?’

  Another grunt that made me laugh even more.

  ‘I can’t do it for long, I have to get back to the palace.’

  My spirits nose-
dived. I didn’t know why I felt so happy in this animal’s company but I did. Returning to the palace meant going back to drudgery, beatings and never-ending hardship. I was a slave; those things were my heritage and my future.

  My thoughts spiralled around the reason for being born in the first place, I couldn’t work out why any member of the Fae had conceived me. It wasn’t uncommon for them to use human beings as sexual partners but they took great care to find one who was similar in appearance. I couldn’t understand why my parents had gone out of their way to be so conspicuous about doing the opposite. The only conclusion I could reach wasn’t nice to consider; I was an indiscretion, a mistake.

  Irvyn’s reprimand echoed in my head and that ever-present fantasy sprang to life of finding the forbidden gateway and running away to the human realm.

  The wyvern nestled against me with a throaty moan, I stroked her tenderly and indulged in a new fantasy I’d started to develop recently; a future with my wyvern. I imagined myself training her to do things so that we could travel the land entertaining people. She was clever, she would frighten people but then they’d see her tricks and be amazed at my courage at handling this frightening animal. No one would mock me then, not with such a vicious friend to protect me.

  I jerked awake.

  Above me, though a hole in the roof, I could see stars. I’d be seeing a different kind when Mistress Cera punished me for being late. My brain searched frantically for an excuse as I ran out of the barn and back to the palace, leaving the pannier and my best friend behind.

  Chapter 5

  We were met by snarling dogs. Oisin moved nearer and looked at them nervously. They pushed muzzles through an ancient wooden gate and ran up and down a thick hedge yapping and barking. A half dozen cats surrounded us, backs arched in hostility, while dozens of birds eyed us suspiciously from gnarled fruit trees. We came to a halt on a tarmac track Nature was reclaiming with alarming speed outside a thatched cottage, its roof green with age and neglect.

  ‘You can call off your welcoming committee!’ I shouted over the din. ‘You’ve made your point!’

  Amelie de Leon appeared on the threshold to her home with an expression that matched the mutts at her gate. She was a lot thinner than when we’d last met, the denim overalls she wore emphasized her bony angles and her lined skin gripped her face with the kind of tenacity that prevented a smile. She brushed wiry white hair out of her eyes and smeared flour on her cheek in the process.

  ‘What do you want, you queer bastard?’

  ‘I’ve come for a fuck. You’re the only woman who can tempt me, looking like that.’

  Despite her efforts, it earned me half a smile. Oisin looked bewildered.

  ‘Major, call them off.’

  The fiercest of the dogs, muzzle covered with scars, one eye missing and ears that looked like bits of chewed leather gave a single bark, deep and resonant and instantly there was silence. Oisin raised blond eyebrows in surprise and I smiled. He was going to get better shocks than that one.

  I pushed open the gate and walked up the garden path, Oisin half a step behind nervously watching the wildlife.

  The old woman remained in the doorway, she hadn’t taken her eyes off Oisin the whole time. I prepared myself for the worse. I leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek. She smiled, half turned to go in the cottage and swung her arm and gave me a stinging slap across the cheek. Oisin took a half dozen steps backwards and almost trod on Major, who gave him a deep growl. He froze in position and looked petrified.

  ‘What was that for?’ I asked, holding my cheek in a pantomime of hurt.

  ‘For abandoning me. I haven’t seen you in months, you bastard.’

  ‘I’ve been busy.’ It was an automatic response.

  The old woman shook her head and gave me a loud snort of contempt but she moved inside. I glanced over my shoulder and smiled at Oisin and beckoned him in. He moved with caution, not taking his eyes off Major.

  Amelie’s kitchen always smelled good, there was usually food being cooked and from the ceiling hung bunches of every kind of herb you could mention. On the huge range saucepans bubbled away, emitting pillars of steam. She’d moved to an enormous wooden table in the middle of the kitchen and ladled soup into three bowls, it was full of vegetables and smelled delicious, as did the freshly made bread that had been carved into huge chunks in the centre of the table. I settled myself down to eat, motioned for Oisin to do the same though he took a while to notice, he was more concerned with the other features of the kitchen.

  Wildlife inhabited the place in even greater abundance.

  Cats dozed on shelves, armchairs and window sills, three goats were curled up on blankets in a corner and birds perched on rafters and amidst the dangling branches of herbs.

  ‘No need to ask who this is.’ She nodded at Oisin and gave him a gap-toothed grin. ‘Those blond curls, the blue eyes and perfect bone structure. The perfect man.’

  She plonked my soup bowl in front of me heavily.

  ‘At least that’s what he used to call you.’

  Oisin blinked and looked at her, then at me and blushed.

  ‘Ignore her Oisin. When she sees a man it arouses long-dormant hormones that addle her brain.’

  She waggled bushy white eyebrows suggestively. ‘And every inch a man. No doubt lots of inches too.’

  Oisin gasped and flushed a perfect shade of scarlet, it made me laugh. She turned her attention to me and nodded her approval, as though she thought I needed it. It was time for introductions.

  ‘Oisin, this Amelie de Leon. The locals think she’s a witch, they use her name to scare their kids and her temper you’ve already witnessed. I don’t need to tell you about Oisin apparently, nor how he got here I assume.’

  That piqued the other man’s interest and he frowned as he spooned his first mouthful of soup into his mouth, looked at it and smiled with satisfaction.

  I nodded my head at the menagerie of creatures who stared at us. ‘Amelie’s spies told her.’ It was enough to make him pause lifting his spoon a second time.

  She tutted at me. ‘They’re not spies. They’re my friends. They tell me what’s happening now it’s no longer safe to leave my home.’

  Oisin still held a spoonful of soup half way to his mouth. ‘Tell you, how?’

  She looked to me to give the explanation, I shook my head and returned to my soup.

  ‘I’m the descendent of Yvain, who Chretien de Troyes described in his stories as the Knight of the Lion.’

  ‘Who is Chretien de Troyes?’ Oisin’s soup spoon finally reached his mouth.

  Amelia’s voice held the same pride as the expression on her face. ‘In twelfth century France he was a storyteller responsible for the tales of King Arthur and his Round Table knights. A storyteller as successful as you, from what Robin tells me.’

  Blue eyes flicked to me briefly but I kept eating my soup.

  ‘Thomas Mallory stole the stories and turned Arthur into a Christian hero to pacify the authorities who’d imprisoned him for rape and theft.’

  ‘Why Knight of the Lion?’

  ‘The story goes that my ancestor rescued a lion and, with its help, killed two monsters. It appeared Yvain had an affinity with animals, which led Arthur to enlist him as one of his knights.’

  Oisin clicked his fingers. ‘The bird in the tree, when those youths surrounded us…’

  The old woman smiled. ‘I call him Solomon because he fits the archetype, he’s a clever old bird, little escapes his attention.’

  ‘So you can talk to them?’

  She shook her head. ‘Nothing so formal. We share… images, feelings. It takes a while to understand what is being said, you have to think of communication in different terms.’

  ‘You must wield enormous power.’

  Amelie shook her head. ‘The creatures communicate with me. That’s all.’

  I chuckled at her modesty.

  ‘Don’t listen to her Oisin. Let me describe this woman’s power. A le
gion of spriggans arrived in Glastonbury when they first invaded. It’s a sight I’ll never forget!’

  I looked at the old woman with her skin covered in age spots, lined face framed by wild white hair and thought how her appearance hid a force of nature.

  ‘You wouldn’t think to look at her that she repelled the invasion single-handedly.’

  She dismissed my claim with a wave of a bony hand.

  ‘It wasn’t me. Those bastards ran back to fairyland because of my friends.’

  Oisin turned his attention back to me, eager to hear the story.

  ‘She stood atop the Tor, black cape billowing in the wind, surrounded by every animal and bird in a five-mile radius. Dozens of seven foot spriggans flailing their arms against birds that pecked and shat on them while dogs, cats, foxes, badgers and even cows and bulls bit and trampled them into retreat.

  I beamed at the old woman but her expression was bleak. I’d hoped time might have eased her pain.

  ‘I lost lots of friends that day Robin. Those creatures gave their lives out of loyalty to me. It’s guilt I still carry. Don’t make it sound more than it is.’

  Oisin lowered his eyes to his empty bowl and kept them there.

  I suppose she knew me too well. She turned back, caught my expression, realisation dawned and turned her grey eyes to flint.

  ‘No Robin. Not a second time.’

  ‘Come on Amelie. You can do the same thing again, drive them all back, including that psychotic bastard, Llyr.’

  ‘I told you. No. I will not risk the lives of my friends.’

  ‘But if you don’t a lot of people are going to die.’

  She snatched up our bowls from the table and hurled them into the sink where they landed with a clatter. When she looked at me again there was an expression on her face I didn’t like, I knew what was coming.

  ‘Tell me Robin, in all the years since the Fae invasion, where were you?’

  ‘It’s different now. Llyr is here.’

  ‘And who for? Eh? For you Robin.’ Tears formed in her eyes, she brushed them away angrily. ‘This fight has suddenly become personal and now you want help. What about when I told you to go to the authorities and explain everything to them?’