The Bitterbynde Trilogy (183 page)

The green marble courtyard gave onto a luxurious salon, carpeted in sombre yellow. It was filled with massive wooden furniture upholstered in tawny shades of marigold and spice. Here and there fires burned in small, pierced braziers of bronze. Lizardlike saurians darted on bats' wings from fiery nests to mantelshelves, their lithe forms armoured in copper scales. The chairs were adorned with hideous feet, clawed and taloned. Grotesque faces grinned from chair backs. One of these moved its mouth and spoke. It was in fact attached to a shrivelled body which sat like a toadstool in a squat chair, its hands clutching the armrests.

‘You thought yourself rid of me, eh,
erithbunden
?'

Yallery Brown grinned like a row of old candles. A skinny rat peered from among the withered dandelions growing in his hair. Ashalind heard Caitri's sudden indrawn breath. She herself flinched, but hurried on after a brief glance at the unsavoury wight.

‘Make haste, make haste,' he jeered at their retreating backs. ‘Yallery Brown will not be far behind!'

The yellow salon opened onto a gallery the colour of apricots. Underfoot, fallen leaves formed a carpet. Sombre amber paper lined the walls, stamped with leaf motifs. The furnishings and hangings were of coppery velvet. From the crevices of the bracketed ceiling high overhead fell a continuous shower of leaves in Autumn hues: ochre, scarlet, saffron, umber. The spriggans pranced and capered in the rustling drifts, sniffing for larvae.

Stolidly the foundered Maghrain brothers marched on behind their charges. Here, time seemed drawn out, spun like thread from a sack of lint. As they walked, one day might have passed, or several—doubtless one of the tricks played by the bewitched fortress, but surprisingly, the two damsels experienced no discomfort or undue fear.

‘The Lady of the Circle arrives!' a clear and lilting voice declared.

Two Faêran lords stood on either side of a door. Lofty was this portal, Winter-white, hinged and studded with lustrous metal. Indeed, it soared thrice the height of the Faêran knights. Ashalind tightened her grip on the folds of the cowl beneath her chin. Leaves whispered, swirling in gouts and streamers, lightly brushing her cheek.
Had Morragan's lords found the Gateway in Arcdur?
Doubtless not—they would not appear so equanimical had they discovered their way home. Indeed, they would not have returned to Annath Gothallamor.

The eyes of Lord Iltarien rested upon Caitri, not unkindly. Leaning down, he laid his hand lightly upon her head.

‘Accompanied by her pet nightingale,' he added to his previous announcement. Stepping back, he said, ‘Enter!'

The white door swung open.

A blast of icy air assaulted Ashalind and Caitri, and went hunting after the swirling leaves. The mortals walked forward into a parlour wherein miniscule motes drifted like swans' down.

A snowy ballroom.

It seemed Winter dwelled here. Icicles depended from chandeliers, where slender tapers burned with a glacial flame. Snow sifted like Sugar-dust across the floor and piled up in banks against the legs of couches and sideboards, the walls of shimmering ice. Star patterns frosted great mirrors. Rime edged everything with silver stitchery. Through this freezing haze, the shapes of furnishings loomed indistinct. Slowly the mortal girls wandered into the mist.

The Prince's bard appeared.

‘Someone left the window open,' commented Ashalind.

Ergaiorn laughed. With a movement so swift it might have been imagined, he cast something from his hand. Gratingly, like the rim of an iron wheel on gravel, a sphere of crystal came rolling along the floor. It ground to a halt in front of Ashalind. Her gaze was drawn and clinched into its limpid heart, where an image developed.

‘Behold!' said Ergaiorn. ‘The Legions of Erith are come to Evernight.'

Below gaunt turrets, the outer walls of Annath Gothallamor dropped, sheer and vertical, to join the folded and crevassed skirts of Black Crag. A narrow road wound down to the open flat of the High Plain which spread out to form a circle half a mile in radius. Gibbous rocks covered this tableland—curious, lumpy stones in odd shapes and sizes, some of which seemed to roll of their own accord, or to suddenly sprout skinny limbs, or to dissemble into shadows between equally queer-shaped bushes and stunted trees racked by the wind. The High Plain teemed with wights.

Visible beyond the rim of the plateau lay a vast sea of winking lights: the campfires of the five armies of the Empire.

‘See the Legions of Erith,' said Ergaiorn as Ashalind contemplated the crystal's moving pictures, ‘encamped some small distance from the foot of the escarpment. They have defeated the mortal brigands of Namarre—all are taken prisoner or slain or fled. Far have the Legions advanced, but they are mistaken if they believe victory is within their grasp, for although the wights of eldritch have harried and harassed them, they have not as yet mounted any genuine adversity. Having beguiled the Legions with a hollow simulation of battle, giving ground before them to lead them on, now the Unseelie Host is ready for encounters more devastating. Should eldritch powers in earnest be brought to bear, mortals shall find themselves sore oppressed. And though the men of Erith might zealously use the tight-sprung limbs of their battery against these saucy foes, they shall fling missiles in vain, for gramarye eludes brute force and passes it by, to smite with stealth from the flank most unguarded, using the very frailties of men to great advantage.'

Ashalind dragged her gaze from the jewel's heart. In the Winter room she stood at Caitri's side, and despite the snow her blood ran warm and rosy. Ergaiorn's hand enclosed the crystal sphere. The Leantainn Pipes hung at his side, ebony wood mounted in silver.

‘What frailties?' she demanded of him. ‘Hearts that rule our heads? Fear of the dark? These are not
frailties.
Merriment lacking in deep joy, passion that knows no true love—those are true frailties, and they belong not to
my
race!' She stepped closer to the Bard, driven to boldness by sorrow and anger. ‘Have you a conscience, Ergaiorn? You are forsworn! You and all of Morragan's gallants are forsworn! By opposing Angavar, you have broken your oath of fealty to your sovereign.'

Coolly he replied, ‘Only because thou art favoured of the Fithiach do I have reason enough to justify the deeds of Faêran knights to thee,
erithbunden
maid, and because of the beauty of thy face. Ephemeral beauty remains ever a cause for leniency among us. 'Tis true, all Faêran lords swore never to take arms against our High King. This vow we keep intact. We swore never to succour his enemies. This vow also remains virgin. No promise was made to hinder his enemies and we hinder them not. Wights may plague the human race as they have done for millennia—what is it to us?'

‘Then you contrive at semantics,' cried Caitri, ‘like the lawyers of Erith, to thwart and pervert the very purpose of the contract!'

‘Thy tongue rattles overloose in thy head, sweetness,' warned the bard with a cold smile. ‘Beware lest it grow so long as to trip thee and make thee fall. The Legions of the Empire outnumbered the defeated barbarians,' he continued, tossing the translucent orb from hand to hand and spinning it on his fingertip, ‘naturally. They have advanced into Evernight. At Plain's Edge the vanguard is forced to halt. At that place they are vulnerable to attacks launched from the plateau above, from secret forests on either flank and from Fridean delvings underground. Be not mistaken, the battle plan has been drawn. The strategy of the Fithiach is certain. When the Imperial forces threaten Annath Gothallamor they shall find themselves at the mercy of the Raven. With but a simple gesture, how easily the Fithiach might strike them down.'

Carelessly, he threw the ball into the air and let it fall. With a harsh clangour that forced a squeal from Caitri, it smashed to brittle diamonds on the floor.

‘But the men of the Empire have a protector,' Ashalind challenged tremulously.

‘Dost thou believe that Royalty would use gramarye against Royalty? That Angavar would use it to oppose his brother? True, the High King and the Crown Prince have drawn lightswords against each other before the Gate at the Hour of Closing, but no more than that.' His voice roughened. ‘Should the Royal brethren unleash upon one another the fullness of their powers, why, then the forces of nature would be waked to a struggle which must shake the very roots of the mountains, and cause the seas to boil and overbrim. They would darken the skies with wild storms to lash the cities of men with terrible winds and cast down living things with utmost violence. Nay—lords of the Realm have no desire to be the destroyers of Erith. Full well do we love the land of mortals despite its several shortcomings and uncouth inhabitants.'

‘Uncouth!' cried Caitri, her vexation again breaking its bonds. ‘How can you so miscall mortalkind? Is it couth to keep us here against our will?'

‘The nightingale's throat has lost its sweetness,' said a masculine voice.

A darker figure shaped itself out of the pastel haze, moving with the gracefulness of vitality, emerging and sharpening into the form of a tall warrior, staggeringly handsome. He was clad in the close-fitting buckled leather harness usually worn beneath armour. At his back, nebulous others seethed and waited.

Here stood Prince Morragan, of that there could be no doubt. Snowflakes did not dare to touch him, or maybe they melted if they did.

The mortals curtsied low, fixing their gaze on the floor, for there was that about the Prince which hurt their eyes when they tried to look directly at him. Words rose like dust in Ashalind's throat, stuck there and disintegrated. Inside the icy shell of her flesh she burned like a cresset.

‘Fly away,' said the Prince. At the caress of his hand, a bird flew up from where Caitri had been standing. It circled once, twice, thrice, then, with a piercing cry, winged its way towards a high, dim window and disappeared.

Aghast, Ashalind stared into the swirl and mist.

‘No! 'Tis too cruel. What will become of her?'

Without replying, Morragan stripped the cowl from Ashalind's head. Snowflakes nipped and brushed her ears, the smooth white dome of her skull, her bare neck. She stood silent while he studied her intently. His features remained without expression, betraying no sign of any passion. Presently, at his signal, his cup-bearer came forward. After pouring some wine, he presented the goblet to the Prince with a bow.

‘Drink.' Uttering this command, Morragan held the rim to Ashalind's mouth with his own hand. She could not help but sip and swallow.

Instantly, the liquid raced through her blood, like molten gold from a crucible. This was not like any wine she had known. It drove through her veins, branching and rebranching as wildfire races along the limbs of a tree to its outermost extremities. She choked, spluttered, caught her breath, and now the wine's intolerable potency rushed into her fingertips, her toes; it fountained upward into her skull and filled it, pushed through the scalp into the roots of the hair and exploded there with a great lifting and a bursting forth. The blood roared in her temples. She squeezed shut her eyes, tottered and fell, was caught by lightning and let down, crumpled, to the floor.

Her lids lifted.

Ashalind kneeled within an arbour curtained with gold filaments, through which streamed primrose light. Gold rained down past her shoulders and waist to her knees, in a
falaise
of hair thicker and more luxuriant then ever before. With her hands she parted the curtains and shook back the heavy tresses, opening her view.

The snow had ceased to fall in the elegant, white room.

With a look which might have been anger and tenderness mingled, Morragan spoke her name.

‘Recall the Geata Poeg na Déanainn,' said he, ‘or consider thyself the destroyer of the Legions.'

Rising to her feet Ashalind recalled instead, something Tully had once told her.

‘
For the Fair Ones to take arms against mortals, there is no honour in that.'

‘You would not use your power to smite mortal men, who are without gramarye with which to defend themselves,' she said, rallying her resources. ‘You are more chivalrous than that, sir. Your threats are merely implications.'

‘In sooth I would not treat them so,
lhiannan
, nor would my knights. Howbeit, there are many here who joy in bloody work amongst mortalkind and would fain be hard at it. With one recollection can thou restrain them.'

‘Should you set all the wights of unseelie upon the men of Erith, still Angavar would force them back!'

Thorn's true name tasted strange on her tongue.

‘Shouldst thou desire to make a test of it?' mocked Thorn's brother.

Visions of large-scale slaughter unfurled across Ashalind's mind. At once she could no longer meet the challenging gaze of the Prince, whose piercing grey eyes seemed to penetrate her very thoughts, almost to unlock that final memory. Averting her face she let the new-sprung hair swing across for concealment. After a moment she said, ‘No. Let me search for the Gate once more. I will try to find it.'

Another mineral bubble was placed into her hands, cool and hard. Distantly, Ashalind wondered at the fact that her blood ran warm, even in the wintry room. Then the oracular pearl seized her concentration.

Scarcely had the search begun when it was interrupted. The new-budded images of Arcdur clouded. She looked up. A messenger had been conducted into the room and was bowing on one knee at the Prince's feet.

He was a mortal warrior, a doughty Dainnan captain—none other than Sir Tor of the Fifth Thriesnun. Leather armour covered him and his buckles were of bronze. He bore no iron—as an emissary he was bound to come unarmed and unshielded to the stronghold of the enemy. Beneath his walnut-brown beard, his visage was the colour of ashes. No comely man was he, yet she looked long and lovingly upon him, as the first mortal—other than Caitri, Viviana and the supernaturally preserved Maghrain brothers—she had seen since leaving Appleton Thorn.