Chapter XVII
CHAPTER XVII
“Why do we travel at night?” Aisling asked Lir. The fae king seized her waist, lifting the mortal queen onto Saoirse’s saddled back. Gilrel, Liam, and the rest of Lir’s knights mounted their beasts alongside the mortal queen. As well as, unfortunately, Filverel. One who’d grinned as she’d approached the stables with stags prepped and tethered to their belongings. Mounts prancing eagerly before the lip of the forest as though the rustling of the leaves in the night-time gale were curses only the beasts could understand.
“Unseelie prefer the night, creatures of shadow and moonlight,” Galad interjected, grabbing his saddle’s horn and swinging himself atop the mount. “It’s said the gods forged strange phantoms that climb down from the skies and lace every bite of night with a juice that makes the lips loose, the body wild, and the thoughts feral. And while the diurnal creatures slumber, their nocturnal brethren rise from their dens to stalk the midnight tonic till the sun ascends come dawn”—he grinned devilishly—“the evening fiends reign, beckoning their spirit brothers to drink up the starlight.”
For the past several hours, the sky had burned with embers of rose, the sun descending and bowing to great summits. Now, the moon took its seat on the starry throne, tilting its head to observe their fae procession.
Aisling peered into the surrounding woods. Her skin grew cold. No longer pressed beneath the light, these forests had abandoned their daylight persona; now, the trees tiptoed in the shadows, humming to the chorus of mating insects. The woodland was watching. Anxious to greet its guests even if this fae cavalcade would forge a trail through its agrestal keep. Did they know Aisling was the daughter of he who burned so many of their kind? He who laid waste to countless trees till nothing but ash carpeted the floors upon which men built their castles?
“ Frell regla ort uirli má téann lú le do guid scéalta ,” Hagre chastised, sitting near enough to overhear their conversation. His fae accent was thicker than most. So dense, Aisling couldn’t interpret his words even when he spoke her tongue. Hagre was also the largest member of the Aos Sí, head shaved and scarred with countless angry lesions—iron wounds, Aisling realized.
“The mortal queen is not so easily frightened, Hagre,” Gilrel quipped, twirling a whisker in her paw. The marten donned countless weapons: daggers, small throwing axes, a custom bow, and a quiver filled to the brim with reeds. Aisling had already witnessed her proficiency with the bow, eager to behold how she made use of the rest.
“We’ll see how she fares against the bocanach then.” Filverel winked. The court advisor dressed in combat leathers of his own, throwing knives strapped across his bandolier, and his long hair tied behind his head.
“Try the fomorians,” Aedh added.
“The fomorians?” Aisling asked, all too aware of the foul taste the word burned onto her tongue.
“One of the more”––Rian chimed, nudging his stag nearer to Aisling’s––“ vicious species of Unseelie.”
“Some say they were cast from the blackest cauldrons of the great Forge, skin as pale as the light of the moon, fangs carved for ripping their prey to shreds,” Aedh said, tossing back a thick flask of fae wine. Aedh bore the loudest laugh of all the fae knights, often cajoling the rest into some wild, misbehaved nonsense.
“And everything they touch, rots,” Cathan added. “The personifications of death and darkness and blight.”
Aisling averted her eyes from the shadows and yellow-eyed beasts peering back from the abyss beyond.
“You believe you’ll find these fomorians?” she asked.
“With your mortal scent wafting from this edge of the forest to the next, they won’t be able to resist crawling from their pits.” Aedh offered Aisling a drink from his flask. A flask Gilrel slapped away, hissing a vulgar phrase in Rún.
Aisling swallowed, Aedh’s descriptions given life in her imagination. What the beast wanted with her, Aisling dare not dwell upon lest she lose the resolve plated against her confidence like armor, the only variable precluding the chattering of her teeth. That and her willingness to remain poised before the fair folk.
Lir secured several more travel sacks onto Saoirse’s back, knotting them with a braided thread, a string of silver said to be sourced from starlight itself. Unbreakable save for by blades of gold, Gilrel explained after she’d caught Aisling admiring the embroidery of a freshly sown fae gown. But it was so fine and so lovely, Aisling knew Clodagh would go to great lengths to collect this string for herself, fae or not.
Lir leapt onto Saoirse’s back, positioning himself behind Aisling, his arms wrapped around her to grab the reins in his gloved hands.
“I can ride on my own,” Aisling hissed in a whisper, her breath catching at the cool touch of his armor against her bare skin. All the knights donned parts of their protective plating, gleaming, expertly cast trappings of metal. However, their bodies were, for the most part, not sheathed in silver but rather swathed in training leathers, strapped with every sort of fae weapon imaginable, only one of their shoulders padded with armor and chainmail around their torsos.
Some wore helmets while others wore hoods. Hoods that veiled their expressions in shadow. Lir’s own helmet, embellished with antlers that spread in bone-white wings, hung from the side of Saoirse’s saddle while his hood cast a dark band across the top half of his face. But no night was ever dark enough to extinguish the light in his feline eyes. Eyes that never ceased to catch her wandering glances.
“Would you prefer to ride unguarded should the Unseelie appear?” he asked, leaning his head down to whisper in her ear. Chills ran down Aisling’s spine at the heat of his breath, slithering around her throat until she felt it dissolve within the crater of her clavicle.
“Isn’t that the plan?”
“The plan is to lure them. Not feed them.”
Aisling huffed, “I’d prefer to be far from this place entirely.”
The mortal queen allowed the anger bubbling within to save her from sinking against his chest in search of heat. For despite the warm winds the forest sighed during the day, the dry heaves of night-time were cold and frigid, eager to be felt.
“But that’s not true, is it?” he challenged, commanding Saoirse forward and through the group of stags that surrounded them. “Your body hums with this,” he said and at the mention of Aisling’s body on his lips, every inch of her indeed heated. She squirmed, unable to sit still beneath the weight of his forwardness. “You’re attracted to the peril of it all,” he continued, bringing Saoirse to the forefront of their cavalcade.
“Isn’t everyone?” Aisling asked genuinely. For isn’t that what drove her father? Her brothers? Lir himself gone for days in the forest? Other than their responsibility, of course.
“No,” he said, matter-of-factly, “most live in fear.”
“Do you?”
Lir hesitated before replying. His shoulders tensing.
“Yes,” he said to the mortal queen’s surprise. She hadn’t expected the fae king to say such a thing, something uniquely vulnerable. The mortal queen craned her neck to catch a glimpse of Lir’s expression, his polished emeralds shadowed by memory.
Sympathy bloomed within the mortal queen before she bore the opportunity to trample it. But by the time Aisling blinked, the fae king had already recovered, rather enchanted himself by the forest beyond.
Saoirse stomped her hooves restlessly. Aisling stroked her neck. The stag stood at the head of the procession now, eager to get this quest over and done with. The quicker they entered, the quicker they would leave.
“ Coirrigh an fhoirliú deo !” Lir shouted to his men, turning Saoirse a step so he faced his knights. Each one nodded in response, slipping on their gloves, lifting their hoods, and clicking their tongues. Their mounts obeyed, propelling their riders into a steady trot behind their fae king.
Falling effortlessly into formation, each knight rode in silence. Rian and Galad journeyed side-by-side behind their king and queen. Filverel rode next. Then came Gilrel and Liam, followed by the rest of the fae knights: Cathan, Aedh, Einri, Hagre, Tyr, Yevhen, and several others Aisling didn’t yet know the names of.
Aisling held her breath as they neared the brim of the woods. That first step from glade to forest was the crossing of a threshold from one world to the next. To believe Lir was the sole sovereign to this wooded, arcane empire, the one whose breath now warmed her skin, sent a flock of crimson-eyed ravens through her belly.
Saoirse whinnied nervously, stepping one hoof and then another into the forest. One by one the fae knights sank into the greenwood, peeling back curtains of firs and pines, nothing to indicate they once stood at the forest’s edge other than the branches snapping back into place behind them, waving at the outside world. And just like that, they were devoured by the feywilds with nowhere to travel but onward.
The forest grew dense, dark, and deep. The arms and legs of the woods stretched their limbs to touch their visitors as the fae knights cut through the twisted roots, the fallen trees, and the carpet of fog slithering around the stags’ hooves. Guardians leaning in close to whisper about their company in a language Aisling couldn’t understand.
Together, ten Aos Sí couldn’t wrap their arms around the trunks of the eldest trees nor climb their highest branch. Only the strongest of the moon’s rays managed to break through the canopies in slender showers of white light.
They journeyed for several hours, parting the evening winds like rapids in a running river, never once stopping to rest. Aisling imagined that should this voyage be under any other circumstance, she might find herself dozing off while riding, lulled to sleep by the steady crunch of Saoirse’s hooves on the pine needles below. But adrenaline fueled her. Not to mention, little could make her forget about the savage that rode behind her, plunging them further and further into the northern wilderness. And with every snap of a branch, every hoot of an owl, every bristle of a nearby bush, Aisling hesitated, hand racing to the dagger on her thigh. A reaction met with amused laughter from the group when nothing more than a hare leapt from the surrounding foliage.
“You can rest if you need to,” Lir whispered into her ear from behind. “I’ll keep you steady.”
“And wake to an ambush of some bestial horde?”
“As good a time as any to wake,” Lir said. Aisling didn’t need to turn to witness his smirk, his words steeped with amusement. “Very well, if you won’t rest, tell me a story then, to keep myself from dozing.”
“Surely the great king of the Sidhe does not tire?” Aisling said sardonically, fluctuating her voice dramatically.
Lir exhaled a laugh. “Rarely but he does grow bored.”
“I know of no tales other than those smuggled by Castle Neimedh’s staff, all stories revolving around your kind.”
“And do these tales live up to the reality you’ve now faced?”
Aisling frowned. “Some, yes. Others, no. And still some, I’m not yet certain.”
“Indulge me,” he said, his voice vibrating against her back.
“There are those who claim the Aos Sí can shapeshift, take the form of a horse to steal children away into the forests. Is that true?”
Lir laughed, this time louder. “Unfortunately, no. It appears, in this story’s case, the mortals have mistaken the phuka for the Sidhe.” Aisling had assumed as much after learning of the Unseelie. It was appearing more and more as though the Unseelie were often mistaken for the Aos Sí in the eyes of mankind. Many mortal civilians were too sheltered from either the fair folk or the Unseelie to understand the difference between them. Including Aisling herself. So why hadn’t Nemed made this difference clear? He was among the few who might know of it. Instead, he perpetuated these stories.
“Tell me another,” Lir demanded, leaning forward, his chest pressed against her back.
“There are tales claiming the Aos Sí reside in caves, tunneling through the highlands. There, the Aos Sí devour lost mortals and collect their bones. Bones and hair alike.”
“Goblins,” Lir said. “Another.”
Goblins . Aisling toyed with the word in her mouth. Perhaps one day she’d meet one.
“Someone once told me the Aos Sí inhabit even the oceans, singing sailors to their deaths and collecting shipwrecks.”
“There are Sidhe who occupy the seas,” he said, adjusting the reins wrapped around his left hand, “but the creatures you speak of are sirens. Tell me something else.”
“I have no other stories. Only those experiences shared with my brothers.”
“You must miss them,” he said.
Aisling considered changing the subject. She’d already shared her own name, but to share those of her family, to exchange memories of them with the fae king, felt like a betrayal. Like a jewel she hoarded lest it fall and break, shattering whatever recollection she still bore.
On the other hand, she wished to speak life to the memories, to keep them alive and well. For each day, her upbringing in Castle Neimedh felt more and more like a passing dream.
“Aye, I do. I often wonder what they’d think of all of this. Of the Aos Sí, of Annwyn. Of everything.”
“What are they like?” Lir continued, his voice so low only Aisling could hear. Another whisper amongst the forest’s lazy drawl of groaning trees, ruffling canopies, and the skittering of those nocturnal creatures on the woodland floor.
The mortal queen’s heart panged with an ache-like longing. She hadn’t allowed herself to think of her family for longer than a moment. For longer than a passing thought. Not since she’d wept every last tear she thought her body capable of producing those first few weeks. And now that she let down those barriers, the dam began washing through, flooding the mortal queen with the days of her childhood past.
“Iarbonel is the kindest. He taught me how to hold my dagger.” Aisling smiled to herself. “Annind is the most intelligent, knows every morsel of history on this continent and beyond. Fergus, on the other hand, is as thin as a rail yet perpetually insatiable. He’d struggle with the food here.” Aisling swallowed the stone in her throat. “And Starn, the eldest, is the fiercest. The only one my father allows to accompany him, work with him. The direct heir to his throne.” Aisling gnawed on the inside of her cheek.
“And yourself?” Lir continued. “Where does the princess find her place?”
Aisling frowned. “I’d often hoped to be the strongest, besting my brothers with a blade. Hoped to be the wisest, a well of guidance for the North when I came of age. Hoped to be the most disciplined, reaping the fruits of such self-mastery. But alas, I coveted that which wasn’t meant for me; often weak, often foolish, often impulsive and disobedient, I was rather creative with my lies, stealthy when I cheated at our games, unteachable when it came to the law, my clann’s savage daughter.”
“You say it as though it’s shameful.”
Aisling considered. “I was a misfit. My only salvation, the love of my tuath and the Neimedh legacy.”
For several moments, Lir was silent. Aisling’s own voice echoed inside her mind until at last he spoke.
“The skin of a lamb will never flatter a wolf.”
Aisling glowered, shaking her head. “You misread me. I am no wolf. My blood is rich in iron, my heart pledged to mortality, my will loyal to the North.”
“Are those the qualities that enchanted the princeling?” Amidst the darkness, Aisling couldn’t see Lir’s grin but she could hear it, the self-satisfied inflection he awarded his words.
The mortal queen hesitated. What could she say about Dagfin? The mere mention of the Roktan prince brought fire to her lungs.
“Why don’t you humor me with a fanciful tale? I myself am growing quite bored of these questions.”
“Because your blatant refusal to answer a simple question now has me interested,” he said, growing more amused. How strong were fae senses? Could they hear better? See better than mortals? For the forest was now stained in ink and Aisling was certain he couldn’t witness her flush nor measure the pace of her heart.
“The king of the greenwood is interested in the mortal prince of Roktling? Dagfin will be quite flattered when I have a chance to te?—”
“So, the princeling’s name is Dagfin,” Lir surmised, and Aisling clamped her mouth shut. “Let me guess, he proposed then chronicled his undying love in a poorly written mortal ballad.”
“You’re wrong,” Aisling scoffed, toying with Saoirse’s mane between her fingers. “He never proposed but we were to be married.”
Lir jerked his head back then recovered. “That explains his indignation last we met.”
“I can assure you that had nothing to do with myself.”
“And everything to do with my race?”
“Aye, as does your loathing of our kind.”
“I can assure you, princess, my loathing cannot be fully blamed on race alone.”
“Neither can mine,” Aisling simmered, her posture stiffening.
“And what do you loathe about me?” he asked, pulling her back towards him with a gentle press of her waist as they ambled down a steep slope.
“To begin, your bloodthirst.”
He laughed. “Ah, yes, we often despise our own vices reflected in others.”
Images of the trow’s head rolling to the side, flashed across her mind’s eye.
Aisling wished it were daylight, for if it was, Lir could witness her furious grimace. A scowl that reddened her mortal features.
Lir brought their stag to a sudden stop. It was only then that Aisling glanced over her shoulder and found the rest of Lir’s knights several paces behind. Steadily, they made their way towards herself and Lir, murmuring to one another in Fae. A far cry from their usual boisterous nonsense.
Lir tugged Saoirse towards a nearby tree. An ash tree, Aisling assumed by the looks of it, its darkly painted bark was riddled with deep grooves, like rivers painted on a map. It was also both wide and tall, roots bursting from the undergrowth, forming arcs and bridges in the surrounding land where moss clung, and arachnids scurried. This bestial tree was primeval. Exhaling and inhaling to the rhythm of the wind.
The fae king positioned Saoirse directly at the tree’s base. Lir removed one of his gloves and pressed his bare palm against the trunk of the ash. Aisling blinked, encouraging her eyes to dilate. She wanted to witness what it was the fae king did. But the darkness didn’t impede her understanding for Aisling first felt and then heard .
The ash moaned, leaning forward and pressing its bark more firmly against Lir’s hand. The sound of the tree’s voice haunting, travelling through its skin and into the earth beneath. Then, Aisling felt Lir’s chest rising and falling against her own back. Both the fae king and the tree were…they were speaking to one another. Aisling could feel it.
Aisling dared not utter a word. Dared not interrupt whatever it was the fae king and the tree whispered to one another. The words they passed from one charmed breath to another.
So, it was Lir who spoke first, releasing his hand from the bark of the tree.
“Now I’ll tell you something,” he whispered, nudging Saoirse even closer to the ash. “Her name is Yddra.”
“The tree bears a name?” Aisling asked, remembering that Galad had once mentioned something similar. That Gilrel had described Leshy, the oldest spirit of the woodland to her.
“Aye, written in the rings of their trunks, unknown to all who are not of their kind unless they’re split open.” The mention of such violence incited the trees around them as if offended, moaning as they leaned closer to the fae king and his queen.
“All, except you,” Aisling gathered. “You speak to the trees.” She was breathless and too stunned to do anything about it.
“The trees, the animals, all creatures who cannot use their voice as we do.”
“Magic,” Aisling exhaled, suddenly more aware of the clicking branches overhead, snapping their twigs.
“ Whatever abilities they wield are aberrations. Perversities of nature. As they are themselves. Do not let them convince you otherwise .”
“What the mortals call magic we call draiocht . In your tongue, it means breath. This, the ability to speak with the trees, is a form of draiocht reserved for the current sovereign of the greenwood to communicate with the entirety of their kingdom.”
“And what do the trees tell you?” Aisling asked.
Lir considered for a moment, studying the canopies now alive with interest.
“They tell me of all who call these feywilds home, the names of those who enter, their age-old stories that would bleed days to retell, and”—Lir hesitated, turning back to Aisling—“they tell me of you.”
Aisling whipped her attention to the fae king, lifting her chin to meet his eyes.
“What do they say?”
“They tell me you’re strange.”
“Because I’m mortal?” For Aisling believed few if any mortals had ventured into these forests and if they had, they certainly hadn’t journeyed this far.
“Because you’re different. Not quite mortal. Not quite Sidhe,” he said, piercing directly through Aisling with the intensity of his gaze. The scrutiny of a bird of prey eyeing a mouse down below.
The mortal queen averted her eyes. Whatever the trees had told him, Aisling knew they were wrong. Nevertheless, she’d felt their keen gaze, examining her every breath. The way the hazels, alders, birches, and yews rustled outside her terrace when she woke and settled into stillness when she slept.
Before Aisling could respond, Lir grabbed Aisling’s hand. The fae king pressed her palm against Yddra’s body, curling himself around Aisling so she couldn’t move. Aisling squirmed, startled by his quickness.
“Let go of me!” she hissed.
Initially, Aisling felt no more than what she already had during Lir’s conversation with Yddra. But the fae king held her firmly against the ash, his grip impenetrable. And just when she made to curse his name, assail him with a verbal lashing, she felt not a heat but a pressure leaning against her palm. A swelling, invisible force that reached for her as though it had limbs of its own, running its smooth fingers along her arms, her back, her cheeks, her hair, caressing her lips as if it wished to slip inside and possess her fully. Crush her beneath its oppressive weight.
This force was sentient, alive with desire. But Lir persisted, holding her captive against the ash. And as the sensation grew more potent, till Aisling’s ears flushed with white noise, it spread, and Aisling knew its name: magic, draiocht ringing throughout the forest in eager vibrations.
Aisling inhaled sharply, rendered mute by shock, afraid the draiocht would drown her. For now, the draiocht didn’t limit itself to Aisling’s exterior but dove inside, filling her lungs as it did the pines and oaks, the flowers and the weeds, the stones and the river. It spoke to her but she couldn’t understand. Couldn’t translate this lullaby Yddra spilled into her ears.
Aisling reached for Iarbonel’s dagger with her free hand. She hesitated briefly before swinging for Lir. The iron blade licked the back of his palm, singing a bloody red streak. With a curse, Lir released her from his grapple.
And at the loss of Lir’s concentration, the draiocht dissipated as quickly as a passing wind, deflating the world of its impatient energy. Aisling’s ears popped as she tucked her hand against her chest.
“The trees, the animals, they’ve been warning me for quite some time, and I ignored them. It was time I saw for myself,” Lir said, glancing back at his fae procession, waiting on him a distance away. Had they felt what Aisling had felt? Been alarmed by the dancing of the trees on a windless night?
“And what is it that you think you saw?” Aisling seethed, too furious to mind who or what may hear her shouts.
“I don’t know,” he confessed, his voice ragged. “But know, princess, that like the Sidhe, trees cannot tell a lie.”