She shivered in the warm room but her gaze never wavered. “I am my father’s daughter. And if those are the terms, then I freely stake my life as well as his on my blood and training.”
Death was still shaking his head. “I shall need to consult outside authorities. Perhaps some judges to mediate—”
“Agreed,” she said, “on two conditions.”
“So young and so importunate,” he sighed. “What are they, then?”
“That the judges be truly impartial. It is the harping that should matter most, not my years or my sex.”
“And the second condition?”
“No ghosts,” she said emphatically. Death looked slightly wounded but she pressed on. “You reign over shades and spirits, but two lives weigh in the balance. Our judges should know of life at firsthand, not as a vague, half-forgotten memory.”
“Then I must insist, in turn, that my viewpoint be represented too. Our judges should possess an equal knowledge of death—agreed?”
She considered, then nodded. “This is a matter of life and death—and music. They must understand music most of all.”
“Judges who understand life, death, and music,” said Death, fingering his neat beard. “And if they decide my harping is superior, then I take you and your father. And should they prefer yours—”
“Then you release us both until our proper time.”
“Those are your terms?”
Kylvan nodded as she slung her own harp over her shoulder. “Irrevocable…and non-negotiable.”
Death glanced down at Kennon Corrie, lost in fever dreams. “You do not, I surmise, wish your father to be privy to our arrangement? Just as I thought—very well, then, I accept your terms. The judges will be impartial but possess all requisite knowledge, and your father will remain asleep, unable to interfere. I leave it to you to determine whether he wakes in this world—or the next.”
The room had begun to change even as he spoke. Before Kylvan’s eyes, the low roof of the hut melted away, the thick walls grew insubstantial as mist. And the bed—
Her eyes flashed up to meet Death’s. “Where’s my father?”
Death raised a restraining hand. “Back where we left him. Unless, of course, you wish me to bring him here—”
“No,” she broke in, hating the fear that dried her throat and hoarsened her voice. “Our agreement stands.”
They stood now in a narrow chamber, high-ceilinged and dimly lit. No, rather, the light flickered and flashed as on the surface of a stream. Or…glancing upward, she froze. The ceiling’s arch was formed of branches latticed together and the light filtering through a loosely woven canopy of leaves touched their faces with green-gold shadows. Her heart hammering, Kylvan looked down and saw the ground, so soft and dense beneath her booted feet, carpeted with grasses never sown in mortal soil.
“The judges approach,” Death observed, with the barest nod towards the other end of the chamber, where three slim figures glided into the light to seat themselves upon three carven thrones.
Kylvan’s heart threatened to stop altogether. Yes, her opponent had chosen well. They knew of life, who had at once too much and too little of it. They knew of death, which came at last for all of them, however brave or fair. And most, they knew of music, who had enticed many of the finest harpers and singers within their gates never to return. Faerie. Elves. The Seelie Court. There were as many names for them as there were songs about them.
A youth, a broad-shouldered man just past his prime, and between them, a woman of regal bearing and unearthly grace, who wore no crown but needed none. Her unbound hair, the same green-gold as the falling shadows, was crown enough.
“You wish an audience with us?” Her voice would have made the sweetest bells discordant by comparison. “Approach, and speak.”
Stepping forward, Death bowed with the grace of a courtier. “Your Majesty.”
The youth beside her stiffened and the older man frowned into his beard as they looked upon Death, but neither spoke. The Queen, however, regarded her guest with equanimity. “My lord Death,” she returned coolly, tilting her head to one side to study him. One perfect eyebrow slanted up. “You wore a different face the last time we met.”
“So I did.” And suddenly Death was a younger man, raven-haired, with features as pale and patrician as the Queen’s. The harp slung over his shoulder no longer looked out of place. Even the grey jerkin had vanished, replaced by a flowing black robe, edged with sable and trimmed with jet. Thus clad, he was worth the gaze of any court. “Better, your Majesty?”
“Better,” she acknowledged with a faint smile.
Sycophant, thought Kylvan, feeling very small and grubby beside such elegance. But she would simply have to make the best of what she had. As the Queen’s gaze came to rest upon her, she paced forward and bowed as she had been taught to do when playing before the great lords of the realm. Taught by her father. Determination steeled her spine and kept her knees from knocking together. When she straightened up, the Queen had once more turned to Death.
“What is it you desire of us?”
“Your judgment, madam, and that of your son, Prince Tammas, and Lord Lyr, ambassador of the Water Fey.” Death sketched a bow to the occupants of the other thrones. “Twenty-five years ago, Kennon Corrie the Harper bested me before the walls of Famastra, but he agreed we would play again, for the same stakes. But Master Corrie is too ill to oblige me tonight. His—child, Kylvan, has offered to harp in his stead, knowing the consequences of failure.”
The Queen rested her chin on her hand. “We need not inquire, I suppose, what the stakes are. And you wish my son, my ambassador, and myself to judge which of you is the superior harper.”
“Young Kylvan stipulated that I find judges knowledgeable about life, death, and music. You perceive, madam, why I thought of you.”
The Queen’s gaze traveled to Kylvan. “And you agreed to this, girl?”
“I did, your Majesty.” Kylvan schooled her expression to betray no hint of surprise. She could feel the amusement emanating from Death, that the Queen had penetrated her disguise so easily. She refused to gratify him further by showing any reaction.
The faery and the harper’s daughter studied each other in silence. “Brave,” the Queen acknowledged, “if imprudent.” She turned to Death. “Very well, we will act as equal judges, until one of you has achieved a clear victory. You, as initiator of this contest, will play first.” She gestured towards two chairs that Kylvan did not remember seeing a moment ago, which now occupied the throne room as if they had always been there.
Both harpers bowed to the Queen, then seated themselves. Flexing his long fingers, Death stroked the strings of his harp, sending a rippling arpeggio through the still chamber. Satisfied, he braced the instrument against his shoulder and began.
Sometimes he played, sometimes he sang, and his voice was a torrent of gold. Now it caressed the ear like silk, now it flamed aloft like the light of a thousand torches. Why fight, he sang, why struggle? For Death came to all, whatever their age or station. It might come in battle for the young and valorous, a swift blaze of everlasting glory that made their memories immortal even as their bodies crumbled to dust. To the old and infirm, it came as a welcome guest, soothing aches and pains no earthly hand could ease. And each year spring’s blossoms and summer’s fruit yielded to autumn’s sere leaves and winter’s frost, only to return again, and fairer than before. What purpose, then, to strive against the stream, to prolong a life grown stale and cold? Could anyone bear to see friends, lovers, or worse still, his children laid in the earth before him and not long for the embrace of Death, who knew and loved him, as he did everyone, best of all?
On that last lingering note, his harp sighed into silence. Death raised his head, a faint smile playing about his lips. The pale, still people on their thrones sat like graven images, more remote, it seemed to Kylvan, than they had appeared on entering the hall.
For what seemed an eternity, no one moved or spoke. Then,
almost wearily, the Queen lifted an acknowledging hand.
“Well-played, my lord Death.” For the first time, her beautiful voice carried the weight of countless years. Beside her, young Tammas gazed at Death with mingled awe and dread, while Lord Lyr grasped the arms of his throne, the lines on his face suddenly more pronounced.
Smiling, Death inclined his head; the Queen turned toward Kylvan. “And you, child?” The unsettling languor still marred her voice.
Biting her lip, Kylvan fumbled for her harp with hands that felt cold and dead already. The shoulder strap gave at exactly the wrong moment and she had to lunge forward to keep her precious instrument from crashing to the ground. She caught the harp just in time but her numb fingers tangled briefly in the strings with a horrible jangling discord.
Someone snickered. Face flaming, Kylvan bowed her head and set about tuning her harp, using the time to warm her hands and gather her wits about her. What could she play, what could she possibly know, that might stand her in good stead against Death? Death who always won in the end…
Against those centuries of Death’s handiwork she had but twenty years, a handful of dust to fling into a strong wind—
But they are my twenty years. And intertwined with the life of the finest harper in the land. Hesitating no longer, Kylvan set the harp against her shoulder and began. Not fully trusting her voice, she concentrated on the playing, letting her fingers tell the tale. A clear, lilting melody rose from the strings, gaining breadth and complexity as she grew more confident, for it was her life that she spun into song.
The faerie hall, the pale, still people, Death himself, all but faded from her mind. Could they hear, as she could, the echoes beneath the music? Of a childhood spent traveling the roads with her parents, her father singing as he walked beside the cart, her mother serenely handling the horse’s reins? She herself would walk beside her father, taking long strides to match his, until her legs grew too weary to keep up and he would lift her onto the seat next to her mother. For seven years, this had been her life—hardship and hunger were sometimes part of it, but so were the freedom of the open road and the songs that seemed to go on forever.
Kylvan’s music widened and darkened, conjuring up the winter of her mother’s death. Something had gone out of her father from that point—he abandoned the road within a year to settle in a village where the local earl had spoken well of his playing. But seasons passed and the keen edge of her loss softened into something more bearable; contentment came back, if not joy, and father and daughter drew closer together.
Until…the spring Kylvan had started making tunes herself, picking them out on the child-sized harp gifted to them by one of their wealthier patrons. Simple ditties, nothing elaborate, that still had a way of staying with the listeners. Too good a musician to deny what he heard, Kennon Corrie had become teacher as well as father to his daughter, encouraging and demanding at once, driving her to excel, even as he thwarted her deepest longing. He’d wished to groom her for some royal court, not the hardscrabble, vagabond existence of the open road that had claimed her mother and for which his daughter pined like a captive bird.
The music divided again, the anger and frustration of their last year together weaving a dark counterpoint to the brighter melody of love and instinctive duty. Dreading the inevitable, Kennon turned tyrant, while Kylvan grew sullen and intractable in response. Each sought to bring the other to his or her way of thinking, each failed. And so it grew, his demand for obedience, her resistance, love, fear, and growing fury snarled together and jangling like broken strings—
Until…she could bear it no longer and ran, her harp jouncing between the shoulders of the boy’s tunic she now wore—over tightly bound breasts—and the wind riffling the rough ends of her newly cropped hair. Her harp sang of freedom, strong and bittersweet, won at great cost, for she left no word of farewell, nor glanced behind lest love or conscience call her back. Fortunately, she soon found companions—fellow musicians who respected her masquerade, while teaching her the finer points of life on the road. She learned much from her new friends—how to perform with others, how to choose the songs the audiences most wished to hear, and how to leave them just a little unsatisfied, wanting more. For several years, she traveled the singer’s road, sometimes as a youth, sometimes in her true guise, alone or in company, and, save for the nights when she couldn’t help thinking of home and her father, well-content—
Until…the need for something more drove her to take ship for a place she knew only from songs. The towers of Ilsevane rose before her again as she harped, pale columns gleaming by the sounding sea. Music lingered in the very air, in the voices of wind and water. The Bards placed her under their tutelage, to finish what her father and friends had started. In two years’ time she played before them all, and moved their Eldest to tears. The harp soared joyously aloft at her moment of triumph, as the silver brooch of mastery was fixed to her tunic and the Bards welcomed her as one of their own.
But that same night, word had come, from the earl’s men, of her father’s illness, his wish to see her. Hurriedly gaining the Bards’ leave and blessing, she sailed on the evening tide, her new accolade glinting, half-forgotten, at the bottom of her pack. Celebration and ceremony could wait until her return. Once ashore, she bought a horse and rode through the night, heart pounding in rhythm with the horse’s hooves. Love and fear played a duet in her head, rising to a fierce crescendo, for the harp had brought her at last to the reckoning: to the moment when she crossed the room to face the unwelcome stranger standing over her father’s bed. With all her might, Kylvan struck the final chord, and felt the judges’ flinching in her own flesh.
The harp shrieked aloud, a dissonant wail of grief, for this was death, too—not a serene and timely passing, but a violent sundering that left words unspoken, promises unfulfilled, and songs unsung. Countless regrets, ties broken past mending, left raw and bloody as a severed limb, with no hope of healing this side of the grave. Dropping her hand from the strings, Kylvan let the broken notes hover in the air, like a desolate sobbing.
As when Death had finished, there was no sound. Kylvan licked salt from her lips, eased aching shoulders, then slowly raised her head to face the judges.
What she saw would have made her smile, had she not been so weary. Three pairs of startled eyes, no longer remote, but unsatisfied, wanting more. Across the hall, Death eyed her in fresh appraisal but she forced her attention away from him, for the Queen was leaning forward.
“Harper, why did you stop?” The unexpected motion of her hands betrayed her agitation. “How can you leave it thus incomplete?”
Kylvan met the Queen’s gaze steadily. “My song is yet unfinished, your Majesty. And the ending…waits upon your judgment.”
“Our judgment?” The Queen glanced at Lord Lyr, meditatively rubbing his bearded chin. “What say you, my lord?”
The ambassador fixed keen sea-colored eyes upon the two harpers. “In my kingdom,” he rumbled, “I have heard the songs of mermaids, of selkies, and of Death himself. I will long remember Harper Kylvan’s song. But…I feel I must rule in Death’s favor, for polish and perfection.”
Kylvan’s heart plummeted, but she made herself nod acknowledgement. At least Lord Lyr had sounded regretful.
“But it is the imperfection that makes the pearl,” Prince Tammas spoke up abruptly. “Perfection takes no risks and can be—dull.”
The Queen glanced probingly at him. “You choose Harper Kylvan, my son?” Her tone was casual but both harpers sensed the urgency beneath the query. Despite Tammas’s youth, his mother clearly set great store by his opinion of music.
“Of course.” The youth’s light tenor was tinged with surprise at the question. “I know how his song ends.” Prince Tammas jerked his chin towards Death, in a gesture more human than faerie. “And it is always the same. I do not know how Harper Kylvan’s will end, but I wish to.”
Kylvan drew a slow breath, feeling the faintest stirring of hope. Death’s sm
ile chilled, his eyes narrowing to dark glittering slits, but he inclined his head, accepting the judgment.
“Truly, if impudently, spoken,” his mother remarked. “Graceless child.” The Prince had the temerity to grin.
“I see,” the Queen continued, “that mine must be the deciding voice.” Turning to Kylvan, she beckoned the younger woman forward. Rising from her chair, the mortal harper crossed the room on legs that felt like wet string and knelt at her feet. The faery looked down at her, unsmiling, her green eyes thoughtful. “I have heard that the greatest artists always leave unfinished work behind. Yet I would not have your song end a moment sooner than it must—or your father’s. I too rule in your favor. Go to him, and bring your music to its proper close.”
“Thank you, your Majesty,” Kylvan whispered, relief thinning her voice to a thread. At the other end of the hall, Death nodded reluctant assent. But the Queen was gesturing to him now.
“My lord Death.” He came forward and knelt before her in his turn. Her gaze was oddly wistful and she spoke with unusual softness. “When my time comes to pass beyond, I wish you might harp for me then as you have tonight.”
Death bowed his head. “I shall remember, madam.”
The Queen smiled, only half-mockingly. “It is not within your power to forget. Farewell, both of you.” Motioning them to rise, she herself stood, taking Lord Lyr’s proffered arm. With a last nod to the harpers, both glided away from the thrones, back towards the way they had come.
The Prince still lingered by his chair. “I meant what I said, about hearing the rest of your song.”
Kylvan managed a wavering smile. “Did you so, Highness? Well, perhaps, one day—”
“Oh, of a certainty,” said Tammas, with more than a trace of blithe faerie arrogance. “I know something of music, and I’ll not be gainsaid. You see,” he added, “my father was a harper too.”
Awakened and Other Enchanted Tales Page 3
