Chapter 26 Deities & Dust Motes #2
In one corner, I found a lectern with an open book perched on it.
Beneath the stand was a basket, and I nearly fell to pieces when I saw a collection of small toys inside.
They were crude, like anything a poor child in Nottingham might have.
A cloth doll with hair made from yarn, dressed in gingham and lace scraps.
A wooden horse on a wheeled platform. A rattle made from a painted turtle shell.
I knelt and ran my fingers over the basket’s rim, but did not have the strength to touch any of the things inside.
My shadows curled around the lectern, inching upwards like snakes and pulling my attention away from the unremarkable reminders of a life that had been torn from me.
Brushing tears from my eyes, I stood and carefully swept dust off the dry pages of the displayed book.
It appeared to be an illuminated historical text, similar to the ones kept at Locksley Abbey.
Gently as I could, I flipped it closed to see the title, which was blessedly written in my own language.
Folk of the Arden Court. I turned a few pages at the front, then stopped on the interior title page.
Histories, Songs, & Tales as recorded by Lyric, daughter of Queen Titania & King Oberon.
“You wrote this yourself,” I whispered, letting my fingers glide over her charming, looped signature.
I closed the book again and pulled it from the lectern, then grabbed one of the round cushions and flipped it over, sending dust flying into my own face.
Once I had finished sneezing, I placed the book on the cushion and tried to call up a small amount of my power, concentrating hard on what I wanted to do, and on what I was—Shadowspinner.
The shadows were my connection to the Arden and its elements.
They did my bidding, or at least, they should.
I twisted my hands, trying to imitate the way the air moved, the way it spiraled the dust in on itself in tiny whirlpools.
My shadows slowly transformed from vines into faint waves and followed the same pattern.
Once I had them wrapped around my torso like a ball, I shot my hands out and the shadows followed, taking the dust with them.
This maneuver did not clear the entire loft, but it was enough for me to sit comfortably on the cushion, feeling pleased with myself.
Only five minutes later, however, I was hurrying down the stairs again, lugging the heavy book along with me.
I nearly tripped on the final step and was grateful that the dress I’d picked only came as far as my ankles.
When I regained my footing, I looked up to see Simeon watching me from a nearby table, his feathered eyebrows raised.
“A little less dust blown over the railing would be appreciated, my lady,” he said dryly.
For a moment, my face burned, and I forgot why I’d come down. “I-I’m sorry. I didn’t realize…”
“Not to worry,” Simeon said, gentling his tone. “What can I help you with?” I set my mother’s book on the table in front of him, then flipped to the page I’d been marking with my finger.
“Is this true?” I asked, pointing at the colorful, two-page illustration and accompanying caption. “Did the Fair Folk and humans really live together once?”
Simeon pursed his lips in a patient smile and slid into a chair.
I did the same, holding my breath. The image I’d found was one of the first in the book.
I hadn’t been reading so much as soaking in the feeling of closeness that my mother’s writing and drawings gave me.
But when I came across this particular story, I knew I needed answers.
Sir Toby sauntered over and dropped his heads into my lap, expecting ear scratches, which I delivered as I waited for Simeon to speak.
“It is true,” he said slowly. “Many, many thousands of years ago, we did live side-by-side.”
“What happened?” I asked in a hushed tone, then admitted, “I’m afraid I did not read the entire chapter…” Simeon leaned back and threaded his long fingers together beneath his chin.
“I ought to start at the beginning, then. You asked me if the Twelve were ever ‘real’. In this story, you must suppose that they are, for this is the creation myth of the Fair Folk, and of humanity. The Twelve were all brothers and sisters, molded into being by the forces of nature—the very first living things. When they were younger and more curious, they worked together to make our earth and all its wonders. They made the sea and the clouds, the sun and moon and rain, the mountains and forests and rivers. Then, they made the animals. The creativity and playfulness of youth allowed them to mold whatever beings they could imagine, who lived on instinct alone and did not stop to wonder where they came from, or who made them, or why. For a time, the Twelve were satisfied with this. They watched their creatures grow and change according to their environment, they altered the earth as they saw fit, but otherwise interfered little. Eventually, however, some of them became restless. The Huntress and her twin brother, the Minstrel, were quite…competitive. They had already made the sun and the moon, the light and the shadow, day and night, so now they wanted to challenge each other once again. Each agreed to make a new sort of creature, in their own image, and then they would see which was better suited to life.”
Simeon flipped back a few pages in the book, showing me a banner of illustrations running along the bottom of the page. I followed along as he pointed and continued the story.
“The Huntress wanted to make people who were long-lived enough to gain true wisdom. She hoped that by giving her new people many centuries to learn and grow, they would be able to guide younger generations and be true stewards of the earth. She also granted them magyk gifts, so they could adapt to or control their environments. But she did bend the rules of the agreement somewhat, giving her creations the features of different animals or plants, so they would understand that they were not set entirely apart from the natural world.” He reached up and ran a hand over his own feathers.
I couldn’t help but smile, even as a small pang shot through my chest. I was still desperate and impatient to learn whether or not I had wings of my own.
“So, the Huntress created all the Fair Folk?” I asked. “Not only the ones in the Arden?”
“That is correct,” Simeon said. “The Arden was simply…her favored place, where she felt most at home. Ah, but I am getting ahead of myself now. Where were we?”
“The Huntress created faeries, and her brother created…”
“Mankind, yes.” Simeon cleared his throat and continued.
“The Minstrel is a god of great wit and skill. He believed his sister’s choice to grant magyk and long life to her creatures was doing them a disservice.
He wanted to make a race that would need to live by their wiles, by strength and cunning, rather than by magyk.
And he wanted them to appreciate the short lives he gave them.
He thought everything might taste sweeter to them, knowing they had precious little time.
So, he created humanity. Some, he blessed with great intelligence, others with physical prowess, and others with charm or persistence or warmth.
Gifts of the spirit, rather than gifts of magyk.
They were made in all shapes and sizes, like we were, but without any features common to other forms of life, because the Minstrel wanted them set apart, to know they were different and special.
And so, these two new peoples were set loose upon the earth.
At first, it was quite peaceable, and we used our strengths to build great cities, communities, and to care for one another. ”
Simeon turned the page to show me images on a new banner—fay and humans working side-by-side to construct mud-daub houses and plant rows of crops.
Dancing, feasts, winged children carrying their human companions into the air, even a wedding between a fay man and a human woman.
A small fist of sadness gripped my heart and twisted as I brushed a finger over the happy couple and their wedding party.
“What happened to us?” I whispered.
Simeon just shrugged and turned the page again.
“When species are too different…they eventually separate. Over time, humans grew wary of fay wisdom and longevity. They called us arrogant and unyielding, but also said that we were soft, that we did not understand the sacrifices needed to build a great civilization. They resented our long lives, and claimed that we sought to control them. Meanwhile, we watched them grow fat with greed, haunted by their own prejudice and bloodlust. We realized that they would never learn. Each new generation, we would need to teach them again, repeating the cycle over and over and over for millennia. We were exhausted.”
“As if the Fair Folk are innocent of those things…” I muttered.
“Of course not,” Simeon agreed, “but we have only learned prejudice very recently, since becoming divided by human borders. And our bloodlust is ultimately directed by centuries of experience. I know you are thinking of what Lady Titania did to the soldiers at the time of your birth, and I would caution you not to judge her too harshly. It might have begun as a misguided mission of revenge for Lyric, but she and Hippolyta also spared the Arden from a terrible fate. On Johar’s orders, his men entered the forest intending to burn it, because he had been led to believe that his brother had formed an unholy alliance with the Arden Court.
” I let out a long breath and sat back in my chair.
No one had ever bothered to tell me this part of the story before, and it forced me to consider that Oberon’s motives for keeping me away from Titania might not be as straightforward as I imagined.
“Did…Rykard have some kind of bargain with any of the Fair Folk?” I asked.
“Not that I am aware of. But Titania did not differentiate in her slaughter, so even if he did, it mattered very little in the end.” Simeon took a breath, and I thought he was about to continue the story, but instead he stood rather abruptly.
I looked up to see Oberon reentering the library.
Sir Toby loped over to greet him first and he seemed in a good mood, which made me hopeful for what the day might hold.
“Ah,” he said, eyeing the book, “you found your mother’s loft.”
“I hope it’s alright…” I said quickly, glancing at Simeon.
“Of course,” Oberon sighed. “Of course. She would have wanted you to have it. This book in particular was quite special to her.” He flipped the book back to show me the inside of the front cover, which I had originally skipped over, where a short message had been scribbled on the yellowed endpaper:
Henry,
Something to help cure you of your human ignorance.
For all my eternities,
Lyric
Beside her name, she had sketched a tiny heart with dragonfly wings on either side, and I couldn’t help but let out a weak laugh. Simeon quietly shuffled away as Sir Toby came over to sniff along the edge of the table, leaving a trail of drool behind.
“Ugh!” I cried, hauling the book into my arms. “You monster!” All three of his heads whined at me, then he walked over to flop on the thick rug in front of the fireplace.
“How does your magyk feel?” Oberon asked. “Have you been able to use it at all?”
“I used it to clear some of the dust upstairs. I could control the air…sort of.”
“Good. That’s excellent. Are you ready to try more?”
“Yes!” I came around the edge of the table, still holding my mother’s book. “May I keep this in my room? To read later?”
“Of course.” Oberon motioned for me to follow him out of the library and we made our way down the stairs.
“What else will I be able to do?” I asked eagerly. “Once I can control the magyk properly?”
“I cannot say for sure, but I would like to unlock enough of your power that you can learn how to transport yourself through the Arden.”
My ears practically perked up like Sir Toby’s. “I was wondering about that…”
“With certain types of magyk gifts, and a strong enough connection to the forest, you can…pull yourself through the channels of power. I am able to share the ability with others, like Puck, but only on a limited basis. If you can master the ability, you will not have to rely on anyone else to take you places, and you will be much safer for it.” He glanced over his shoulder as we stopped on the landing outside my room.
“Meet me outside. I must speak to Ceres for a moment.”
In my room, I carefully laid the history book on my desk. Devil’s orbs of pale light had dissipated, and Ceres had come in to clean, but I noticed something new laying on top of my neatly-made bed.
As I approached and realized what it was, I spun in a circle and called out, “Devil?”
I checked the balcony, and even peeked inside my wardrobe, but there was no sign of him.
No sign, other than the single red feather, and my bronze snake torque.
I picked it up and ran my thumb over the swirling, green malachite eyes, Devil’s words from the day of the revelry echoing in my head: Only the most respected, or feared, rulers were granted the honor to wear them.
If I was going to earn anyone’s respect, or even fear, I knew it would begin with playing the part, so I carefully slipped the torque around my neck and went to meet Oberon.