Chapter 3 #2
Isabeau said nothing, obviously dissatisfied, anxious, afraid of the looming future. Anne could hardly reassure her, so fast were the fears, plans, memories coursing through her own mind. She said, “Shall I tell you a story?”
Her sister gave a pleased wriggle and rolled to face her. “Oh, yes!”
“You must lie down properly. And close your eyes.”
Isabeau rested her head on Anne’s shoulder.
Anne stroked her hair. Let us go far from here, at least for a moment.
Her voice took on something of Hawiz’s measured cadence; she changed from courtly French to the soft Breton of their earliest childhoods.
“I shall tell the story of Keris, the city of cedar and gold, the city in the bay of Douarnenez that conducted its commerce from the backs of sea-dragons, and entertained delegations of the korriganed, the fair-folk, in halls of white marble.”
Isabeau resettled herself so that Anne had to push her off her ribcage. “I will tell it only if you promise to be still,” she said.
“Very well,” said Isabeau, penitently.
“Once,” said Anne. “Long ago, there was a beautiful king called Gralon Meur who ruled the whole land of Cornouaille from his seat in Quimper, within sight of the sea. This king had no wife. But rather than wed a mortal princess, he rode alone into Brocéliande, and thence by ancient ways into the Lost Lands. There he sought the korrigan-queen’s daughter and asked for her hand in marriage. ”
Isabeau shifted her weight. “A queen’s daughter? Was there not a king?”
“Do you want me to tell the story or not?”
Isabeau stilled and Anne went on: “The chronicles do not tell how he won her. They only say that when Gralon Meur was next seen in Cornouaille, he had a korrigan wife, whose name was Malgven, and that the two were greatly in love. But Malgven missed the Lost Lands, missed her mother and her people, and her mother missed her child also. So when Malgven conceived her firstborn, the queen of the korriganed put forth all her strength and made the couple a present for the child’s christening. ”
Isabeau was still far from asleep.
Anne said, “Are your eyes closed?”
“Yes,” said Isabeau, lying stoutly.
“The korrigan-queen’s gift was a city entire.
Such a city as had never been seen in the world of men.
It split the water of the bay of Douarnenez like a spike of pearl, like a heap of jewels.
A city raised by sorcery, by arts that the world has since lost. A city that lay upon the twilit border between the mortal lands and the Lost Lands. ”
“But how?” said Isabeau. “If the Lost Lands are in Brocéliande, which is far from the sea?”
“I do not know. That is just the story. Perhaps it is a chronicler’s mistake, or else some lore whose nature we have forgotten.
Now listen. This city was called Ys, which is a word whose meaning we have forgotten.
But the chronicles call the city Ker-Ys, or Keris, for ker was their ancient word for ‘city.’ And now the city is remembered as Keris, the city of cedar and gold. ”
Isabeau’s breathing had begun to slow, despite herself, and her head finally got heavier on Anne’s shoulder.
“The chronicles do say that Paris took its name from Keris, that par means ‘like,’ and the old Gauls wished that Paris might compare to Ys, the white jewel of the sea. Well, long may they wish it so.” She paused to grin at Isabeau’s derisive snort.
“For a while, everyone that lived in the realm of Gralon Meur was content. But it could not last. For Malgven was brought to bed of her firstborn, and there she died, leaving only a girl-child to be the heir of Keris and Cornouaille.”
Anne wished she’d not said that. Women died in childbed every day, and it did not matter if you were a queen or a korrigan or a fishwife. The cold hand came for you and that was that. But there was no need to remind her sister.
Isabeau didn’t move.
Anne drew a deep breath. “Gralon Meur, they say, mourned his wife, retreated from the governance of his people, and instead took to wandering the Lost Lands, where all lost things and people and places may be found.
Perhaps Gralon sought a glimpse of his lady there and did not trust to the hope of the Resurrection, since he had married a woman of the korriganed.
“All this while, Gralon Meur’s daughter was coming to adulthood.
She was called Ahèz, which means key-bearer, for she held the keys to the great seawalls that held back the water in the bay of Douarnenez.
This princess was masterful and self-willed, and very beautiful.
The chronicles also say that she took no interest in government, but only in the arts of pleasure.
“In those days, Keris was at its height, an enchanted city of gold and sorcery.
They kept not a fleet of ships but rather a fleet of sea-dragons, who went all around the world and brought back wonders.
And they also bred horses, whose sires were gifts of the korriganed, for Queen Malgven to ride.
And these horses could run upon the sea as swiftly as destriers run upon the earth.
“But as Gralon Meur retreated from his duties, the days of Keris darkened. Riches still came in, but their joy crept out. The sea-dragons were no longer ridden by merchants seeking trade but by corsairs who bade their beasts crush ships in their coils and steal their cargoes. At last the sea-drakes fled altogether, and would no longer answer the commands of men. By then Gralon Meur was old and wandering, living like a hermit in some dream of the Lost Lands. It fell to his daughter to raise the city’s fortunes.
But Ahèz did not. She loved only her own pleasure. ”
Anne broke off. Isabeau was finally asleep, which was as well.
The next part of the story, she remembered now, was an evil one.
Anne closed her eyes and spoke no more. But still she could not sleep, still the tale unwound in her mind, bright as a cold blue sea, as though Anne was a child again, listening to Hawiz finish the story:
Every night, as the city crumbled into decadence and disorder, the heedless Ahèz held banquets.
And in the dark of the night, Ahèz would choose a person from among the revelers, one who particularly caught her eye.
She would bid this person put on a mask and follow her to her tower, with its mullioned windows and moonlight streaming in.
Then, smiling, she would peel the mask away with her own hands and lie with her chosen partner, breathing the wind off the sea. But when their joy was over, Ahèz would tell her paramour to put the mask back on.
“That you might go from my tower unrecognized,” she would say.
But the mask was enchanted. When her lover put on this mask a second time, it closed down tight and smothered its victim dead, and then Ahèz’s bodyguard would throw the body over the parapet, into the mouths of the wild sea-dragons.
Until one night a new reveler came to Keris.
No one knows who this person was. A hero of legend.
A korrigan. A knight. A simple woodcutter.
The devil himself. None of the stories agree.
But they do all say that when Ahèz gave this stranger her mask, he refused.
She begged, for she liked him best of her lovers, but still he refused.
Instead, he asked her for another gift, for the key round her neck.
The key to the seawall. And Ahèz, drunk and besotted, gave it him.
This guest left her sleeping and went and opened the wall and the sea came. It rose and it swirled and consumed what it touched. The galleries and passages and gardens and streets and stables and markets were washed away in the space of one night.
Now, some chronicles say the city of Keris was not drowned at all, but drawn back into the Lost Lands. Either way, after that night, Keris was lost to the mortal world. Now there is only water in the bay of Douarnenez. And sometimes, at twilight, the sound of bells.
The morning light, which came early at that time of year, crept between the bed hangings.
It was dawn, and soon the bells would ring for Lauds.
Well, Anne could sleep another night. There was too much to do this day.
She rolled softly out of bed and parted the curtains, waking Hawiz from her pallet to go and keep Isabeau warm.