Flushed with success, the druid was delighted to have achieved so much. Being able to actually see young Fiery Hair in the fairy realm, if only for a moment, was more than he had expected. But at the chieftain’s urging he doubled his efforts, chanting exhortations, drawing patterns in the air with his ash stick, directing the people to bend their bodies this way and that in a reconstruction of the dance.
Once more, the mist formed in the center of the circle on the Hill of Usna. Darker this time, more opaque, it revealed little, only a hint of moving forms within.
Conn of the Hundred Battles made a move as if to hurl his body into the mist, but his druid caught him by the tunic and held him back. “You must not do that, you would be destroyed.”
“Let me go, you old wart-faced fool! My son is there.”
“Your son is so far away there is no way to measure the distance. It is only his image you see, and if you try to join with it, you will be lost somewhere between here and the Isles of the Blest. Even I would not have enough power to summon you back, and I have no doubt the Sidhe would not make you welcome in their realm either.”
Conn continued to struggle, though with diminished effort. The mist was fading again. Dimly, he perceived his own people beyond it, on the other side of the circle.
The old man slumped to his knees, covering his face with his hands. “I just wanted one more look at my son’s face,” he said.
The druid bent over him, moved by pity. “You shall see him again,” Coran promised. “There is a gateway, we know that much now. We will keep striving to reach your son and someday we may bring him back for you.”
A haggard face looked back at him. Hundred Battles bore little resemblance to the dauntless warrior of earlier fame. He was a man of great age and getting older, with all his victories and all his defeats scored across his features like the roads of a well-used land. “Bring him back,” he pleaded. “Bring my son back to me while there is enough life left in me to see him. I have so little time.”
Ten
BLATHINE WAS WISE. She eventually abandoned her efforts to make Connla of the Fiery Hair agree to the sorceries that would make him forget his people. She guessed, to the width of a clipped lizard’s hair, just how far he could be pushed, and she did not push that tiny bit farther which would have turned him against her. Instead, when he continued to resist, she smiled and bided her time, for Blathine was free of the relentless pressure of the seasons as they sped by.
On the Isles of the Blest, no time passed.
No one grew sick, no one died—except for brief moments of velvety blackness that faded quickly, leaving only a sense of refreshing sleep behind. Between the splendid battles of the heroes, these brief respites took place.
Only Connla did not share them, for no matter how badly he was wounded, he could not die even briefly.
But he learned to enjoy the fighting. Since he did no one permanent harm, he could use his skills to the utmost, and he proved himself a master of strategy. His sometime enemy Fiachna was so impressed he introduced the human man to the techniques of the Blue Sword. These consisted of complete sets of stylized maneuvers involving jewel-hilted weapons with rippled blades, and mastering them required a grace Connla had never learned on the battlefields of Erin.
When not engaged in war one could always seek amusement with friends. Connla’s best friend was the pointy-eared little chap known as Whimsical, who took it upon himself to be at the human’s elbow whenever Connla desired masculine companionship.
Whim was a storyteller by nature. He boasted of knowing every joke that had ever been made by one of the Sidhe, and a great number of jokes from the world of mortals as well. To entertain Connla, he ran through a whole repertoire of tales that made the fairy folk laugh, but Connla could find nothing even faintly amusing in any of them.
Whim confessed to being baffled by this. “Perhaps your people and mine do not have the same sense of humor,” he said finally.
“I think not,” Connla agreed. “Tell some of the funny stories you have learned from listening to humans and I believe you will see the difference.”
Whim obliged with jokes he swore were of human origin, but they were no funnier to Connla, though the little fairy man could hardly complete some of them for laughing.
His laughter dwindled away, however, when he realized Connla was not chuckling along with him. “No good?”
Connla shook his head. “No good. Not a giggle. Not a smile. Are you certain those were supposed to be jokes?”
Whim looked downcast. “Perhaps I’ve misremembered some of them. I am certain they were funny when I first heard them. But you know how it is, things slip away from you.” The poor little fellow was so crestfallen, Connla felt very sorry for him.
“Everyone’s memory fails them from time to time,” he said. Then he thought: a memory is a hard thing to hold onto, even when one tries. So it must have value. Should I be willing to surrender mine?
He felt a gentle touch and looked down. Whim had patted his hand, ever so lightly. The fairy man’s oversized eyes were brimming with sympathy. “I was not always one of these,” he said in a low voice, waving his hand to indicate the carefree group capering nearby. “I began as a human too, you know.”
“You did?” Connla asked in astonishment. To his eyes, Whim had seemed a perfect model for one of the Sidhe, fanciful and sprightly and otherworldly.
“I did. There was a time when I knew hunger and thirst and how to cry. You have to know how to cry before you can appreciate laughter. But I thought the life I knew was too hard. It was a long-ago life, I think. Many—what do you call them? years?—many years before your grandfather’s grandfather was born. I wept and gnashed my teeth over the shortness of life as I knew it, and its brutality. One of the fairy folk overheard me and came to tell me of the Isles of the Blest.
“Never had I dreamed such a place might exist. I told my family and my friends, and at first they doubted me. But finally they came to believe. They never believed as strongly as I did, however, or yearned so hard.
“Then the Magic One came back and offered to bring me here. Something terrible ... I do not remember what, of course ... had just happened in my life, and so I agreed without hesitation. Almost before I knew it, I was here.
“At first it was hard for me, as it is for you. Ah, you smile, but I can tell. I’ve stood where you stand. Only when I agreed to give up being human altogether, could I put all my sadness behind me.” He grinned a sudden, gaptoothed grin, demonstrating his cheerfulness.
“In order to shed your sadness ... did you have to give up some memories?”
“I did, of course. That’s why I understand the struggle going on within yourself. But surely you are burdened with sad memories, just as I was. Letting go of them was like putting down a huge burden and I have never regretted it. I do seem to have lost memory with memories, however,” Whim added. “Perhaps that is why I cannot tell jokes in a way to make you laugh; I do not quite remember the trick of language or point of view to make them funny for you. But here comes Blathine! Listen while I tell her one of my tales; I’ll wager I can make her laugh.”
So Whim told a joke to Blathine, a long and complicated story that made no point Connla could see. Yet she laughed. She threw back her head and laughed as if she had never heard so funny a tale.
Whim threw Connla a triumphant glance. “I do not remember how to make humans laugh, but I can always amuse the Sidhe.”
The fairy folk do, indeed, have a different sense of humor, Connla thought. Then he remembered Whim’s remark: “You have to know how to cry before you can appreciate laughter.” In giving up his painful memories, little Whim had given up his ability to cry. Without tears to balance the scale, laughter had no meaning—at least not for a human audience.
After that, Connla was careful to at least smile whenever Whim told one of his jokes, and sometimes Fiery Hair managed a laugh he did not feel. But not for all the rainbows would he have hurt his little friend’s feelings.
&n
bsp; And soon—because he did indeed have a very limited memory—Whim forgot that Connla had ever failed to be amused by his stories.
Everything painful can be forgotten, the young man reminded himself. And how easily! All I have to do is agree, as Finvarra and Blathine have urged me to do...
Yet still he hesitated, though he could not say why.
Then the dragon came.
Connla was with Blathine in her bower when the sky began to darken. He had grown so used to its unfailing light that he glanced up in surprise. The fairy woman also looked up, and bit her lip.
She pulled slightly away from Connla and got to her feet.
“What is it, Blathine? Is night coming at last?”
“There is no night here,” she replied impatiently, but it was obvious her thoughts were on something else; something which made a tiny little vertical line appear between her feathery eyebrows.
The tone of her voice carried a hidden warning. Connla also rose, and picked up the blue sword Fiachna had given him. He always laid his sword down upon entering Blathine’s bower, for it seemed out of place there. But when its hilt was nestled into his hand he felt better, tilting his head back and watching the shadows creep across the sky. “If not night, what it it?”
“Something darker than the darkest night,” she answered absently. “If any of our people are out on the sea, or in the spaces between worlds—” Breaking off abruptly, she left the bower and began running, lightfooted as a fawn, in the direction of the distant spires marking Finvarra’s palace.
Connla followed her, sword at the ready.
He had never entered the palace of the king of the Sidhe, though he and Blathine had passed it many times. He understood it was forbidden to him until he was fully a member of the fairy tribe. Like the banquet food, the royal palace was only for initiates.
Or so he had thought. But when they got there this time, Blathine seized his hand and pulled him after her, right between the two guards who stood at the gateway. Neither protested; they, too, were standing with their heads tilted back, looking up at the changing sky.
Blathine strode purposefully forward, leading Connla up a flight of broad stone steps bordered with a bewildering array of flowers blooming in alabaster pots. At the top of the steps a great gilded door swung silently open at their approach.
Connla stepped into Finvarra’s palace and a great sense of wonder overtook him.
So far, all his experiences on the Isles of the Blest had been in the open air, beneath the azure sky. Without rain or cold or cloud, the fairy folk needed no roofs. But a king must have a palace, even when the climate does not require it, and the king of the Sidhe had a palace like no other.
It seemed to be built of coral, its walls glowing with every shade of pink and creamy yellow and palest apricot. There were no windows; a series of archways served as both interior doors and openings onto little enclosed courtyards a-riot with flowers. The floor was carpeted with more blossoms, and still others had been woven into gorgeous tapestries hung everywhere on the walls. Some were purple, shading from the darkest hue to a pale and delicate lavender. Others were predominantly red—rose-pink and wine-red and a vivid scarlet. Yellows and blues and greens, and the fresh crisp touch of white, mingled with these blankets of living color so that each chamber of the palace offered fresh delights for the eye.
Each chamber also had its own musician. These were generally harpers, who sat in a corner facing outward, with magnificent harps of gold and precious woods cradled on their knees. Their music seemed a part of the perfume of the flowers and the sweetness of the gently stirring air. An occasional piper offered a note of variety, sending one clear, bright rill of music after another through the maze of rooms.
Indeed, the chambers of the palace hardly seemed to be rooms at all, but merely enclosed versions of Blathine’s bower, places that were neither inside nor outside. Walking through them was like walking through a succession of brilliant soap bubbles surrounded by sheer and ephemeral color that might dissolve if one attempted to touch it.
“I have never seen a place like this,” Connla breathed in awe.
“There is no place like this,” Blathine told him, though her thoughts were still very much elsewhere.
They went on, through still more chambers; down long passageways where it was as bright as the day outside, though there were no wall-torches; through more chambers again; across courtyards, up stairs and down; through archways and turnings. The palace was vast, more so than Connla had ever imagined. Seen from outside, in passing, it was just an assemblage of delicate spires and slender towers. Within, it was more like a city—though Connla had never seen a city.
There was a constant flow of fairy servitors moving through Finvarra’s spacious palace. Someone was always brushing past Blathine and Connla as they advanced. Servants trotted about importantly, carrying silver trays laden with flacons and goblets of crystal, or golden bowls heaped with fruit, or shining caskets that might contain jewels or magic. Everyone was a-bustle.
“They have not looked outside,” Blathine muttered. “They do not know—yet.”
“Know what? What is coming?”
“Wait until we find Finvarra,” was all Blathine would tell him.
At last they entered a passageway much wider than the others, with a tall pair of doors at the far end. These, too, opened as if by invisible hands, and a great audience chamber yawned before Connla and Blathine.
Here was the throne of the king of the Sidhe, and an equally fine high seat for his queen. Each glittered with jewels; each was cushioned with silk.
Both were empty.
Blathine looked around in distress. “Finvarra!” she cried. “Where are you?”
“Here, of course.”
Connla and the fairy woman spun around to find the king standing behind them, having entered the hall on their heels.
“What do you seek with me?” Finvarra demanded to know.
“Have you seen the sky?”
His eyes were somber. “I have.”
“What are we to do?” Blathine asked nervously. Connla had never seen her show any sign of anxiety before.
“I am already attending to the matter,” Finvarra assured her. “I have sent messengers to those of our people who are scattered in far places, urging them to hurry to the Isles of the Blest until the Time of the Dragon has passed.”
Connla stepped forward. “What dragon? What are you talking about?”
The king glanced at the sword in the young man’s hand. “I am glad you are a skilled warrior,” he said. “Perhaps Blathine did not act so unwisely after all, bringing you here.”
“I am glad to hear you admit it,” the fairy woman interjected tartly.
Finvarra gave her a silencing look. To Connla he said, “You have not yet agreed to let us cut the bonds that tie you to your human kin, have you?”
“I have not,” the other answered uneasily. He was not certain what this had to do with the dragon; he was not even certain what a dragon was, for there were no dragons in his homeland.
“So you still have your memories,” Finvarra mused. “That is good, good. Do you remember fear, my fiery-haired friend? Do you remember being afraid to die? To really die, to go into a blackness you did not understand and from which you did not know how to return?”
Connla shuddered. He came of a warrior race that did not like to admit fear. But the eyes of the king were compelling. “I do remember,” he said in a low voice.
“Good,” Finvarra repeated. “On the Isles of the Blest we have no fear, for our warriors know they cannot actually be slain. Without fear, there is no real courage. It is a small price to pay, but a price.
“Now we have need of someone who still possesses real courage. Someone who, if he leaves the Isles of the Blest, can be killed and knows it.”
“But I thought—”
“You thought wrong,” Blathine interrupted. “You are not yet one of the ever-living, Connla. Only here. When you pass beyond
the circle of enchantment that surrounds our homeland, you are as mortal as any other human born. You have not yet fully joined us, remember?”
He began to guess the shape of the thing they wanted him to do.
Finvarra crossed the hall and sat heavily upon his jeweled throne. His face had always looked ageless, but now his eyes seemed incredibly old. Blathine and Connla stood before him as he explained, “There are limits to all powers, even those of the Sidhe. We have a safe place here, and when we travel to other realms we can protect ourselves there too, to some extent. But there are forces quite beyond our strength; forces our greatest magic cannot turn aside.
“Such a force is the dragon.
“Every kingdom and every people, whether mortal or fairy, has known the dragon. It has many different names and many different faces, but its purpose is always the same. Destruction for the sake of destruction.
“The gods create; the dragon destroys.” Finvarra slumped lower on his throne.
Blathine made a tiny sound of distress and put the back of her hand against her mouth.
Connla felt his grip tighten automatically on the hilt of his sword.
“Some are attacked by the dragon in the guise of a wild animal,” Finvarra went on. “Mortals are terrified of wild animals, of the savagery they perceive lurking just beyond the light of their fires. In other instances, the dragon comes to them as famine—you almost saw the dragon on the Hill of Usna, Connla of the Fiery Hair.”
“And I helped my father turn it back,” Connla said, suddenly understanding.
“The Sidhe does not fear wild animals or famine,” the king said. “But the great storm that arises from the sea, that is our dragon. It only happens rarely, so rarely that many generations of human men may be born and live out their spans and perish without ever noting such an event.
“But when the dragon stirs in its lair beneath the sea and lashes its mighty tail, islands rise and sink, cities die beneath the waves, mountains burst through the earth, seas boil away ... all is changed.
“Even the Isles of the Blest are vulnerable to the dragon. This may be a small disruption, it may endanger only those beyond our immediate protection. Or it could be worse. It could be something that has only happened once before, even within the life spans of the fairy folk. It could be the death and birth of continents, and if that should happen, all our enchantments might not be sufficient to keep the waves of the cold ocean from washing over our kingdom.”
The Isles of the Blest Page 12
