The Seventh Daughter (16 page)

The Lios Foltaigg took to the air again, drifting on the wind like leaves as Tania and the others made their heavy-footed way down the winding valley. They came around a sharp bend and suddenly the world opened up in front of them. The valley tipped steeply to a wide rocky bay where the gray-green sea smashed against the land with a sound like splintering glass. Out across a mile or so of choppy waters, Tania saw a black hump of land rising from the sea.

“Behold the Black Isle,” said Clorimel. “Behold Ynis Maw!”

Tania stood on the seashore, staring over the waves at the sinister black fist of Ynis Maw. Edric and Cordelia were at her side, and many Lios Foltaigg were gathered nearby. Tania's mind was filled with thoughts of Gabriel Drake, of how Oberon had exiled him to that bleak hunk of rock—and of how the Sorcerer King's evil power had set him free once more.

“We could really use Zara right now,” said Edric. “She could whistle up a couple of turtles to ferry us over there.” He looked at Tania and his voice lowered to a whisper. “Do you think these people would carry us?”

Tania pulled her eyes away from the dismal island. “I suppose we could ask,” she said. “But they're really small—I'm not sure they could manage it.”

“And how will we return with the King?” Cordelia added. “And how will we bring him safe to our Mother? Even when we set foot upon that cursed isle, I deem our troubles are but beginning.” She smiled
grimly. “A worthy challenge, indeed!”

Tania had the bad feeling that she was right. All the problems and dangers that had beset them so far were just the preamble to the huge unanswerable question of what to do once they found Oberon. Without black amber, they had no way of freeing him from the iron-bound Amber Prison.

There was a whirring sound in the air behind them. Tania saw one Lios Foltaigg descending toward them in long spirals. He landed lightly, his small feet hardly disturbing the stones.

“Thy steeds are galloping south,” he said. “They move at great speed. They will not return.”

“Thanks for letting us know,” Tania said. She hoped Tanzen and his companions would get safely back to their home. She looked at Clorimel. “We need to get to the island and it's too far to swim.”

“There is a boat,” Clorimel said. “It is old, very old. It may not bear thee after all this time.”

“A boat?” Tania said in surprise. “Where?”

“It lies in a cave not far from here.”

“Take us to it, by your mercy,” Cordelia said. “And let us test its seaworthiness.”

With a delicate unfurling of her wings, Clorimel lifted from the ground and drifted feather-light across the shoreline. Tania and the others followed, as did several Lios Foltaigg, rising and skimming the stones with the soft whirr of their shimmering wings. They came to a place where the dark cliffs reared up into the sky and the waves broke in a welter of foam.
Clorimel led them over sea-wet boulders hung with slippery weed.

A dark crack appeared in the cliff face. The cave had a shingle floor and reached back into the cliff beyond the sunlight. Lying to one side just inside the entrance was a slim black rowboat.

Edric leaned over it, his hands on the gunwale. “It seems to be intact,” he said. He looked at Clorimel, who was standing by the cave mouth. “When was it last used? What was it for?”

“It is not of our making, nor was it ever used by Lios Foltaigg,” she answered. “The minions of the Sun did once on a time use the vessel, but I know not its purpose, save that it is said that the blood of the stones is food for the Sun.”

“What does that mean?” Tania asked.

Clorimel cocked her head. “It means what it means,” she said. “No more, no less. Is the boat serviceable?”

“I think so,” Edric said. He looked at Tania and Cordelia. “Help me get it down to the shore?”

Between the three of them, they managed to haul the boat out of the cave and down through the stones. Tania saw that a pair of oars lay in the keel. Clearly at some time someone had used this boat to get to and from Ynis Maw. Oberon had no need of a boat to send exiles to the Black Isle—he did that with the power of his Mystic Arts. So who had used the boat and why?

They pushed the boat into the sea. Edric waded in waist deep, fighting the waves as they tried to drag the
vessel away from him.

“I see no water seeping through the boards,” Cordelia said. “I think the hull is sound.”

Edric held the boat as steady as he could while Tania and Cordelia climbed on board. It rocked and bucked on the waves, but they were able to help Edric in without mishap. Cordelia took an oar and fended the boat off the rocks. Edric joined her in the stern and together they managed to push off. Tania sat in the narrow prow and Cordelia at the stern while Edric took the middle seat and began to row with long, firm strokes. Tania could see on his face the effort it was taking for him to get the bobbing boat under control. He gritted his teeth, fighting the waves, plying the oars expertly as the boat moved away from the shore.

“It's working,” Tania encouraged him. “You're doing it.”

He nodded, the sweat standing out on his forehead as he lunged forward, lifting the oars in a wide arc out of the sea, then heaved back, twisting the blades as he plunged them into the waves and dragged them through the water. It was several minutes before he managed to row the boat away from the shore and beyond the breaking, foam-capped waves. As he rowed them out into the gray-green sea, Tania saw that a few Lios Foltaigg had lifted off from the shore and were following, hanging as buoyant as thistledown above them.

It wasn't an easy crossing. The sea fretted at the small boat, spitting foam at them, jolting them this
way and that as if a spiteful intelligence was at work, determined to force them off course. Tania clung to the side and looked over her shoulder, watching the black shore of Ynis Maw come closer.

They made landfall in a flurry of sucking foam. Drenched to the waists, they fought against a sea that seemed to be trying to pull the boat away from them and leave them stranded. But at last they managed to drag it clear of the hungry waves onto a sloping shore of black shingle. Tania stared up at the slick black rocks that jutted from the top of the beach. They shone under the gray sky, their dull sheen ghostly and sickly.

Cordelia gazed up to where Lios Foltaigg hung in the air a little way off the coast. “Do they come to spy upon us or to give us aid?” she asked suspiciously.

“I don't know.” Tania looked up, cheered a little by the sight of the delicate people floating like curiously shaped kites, gazing down with their almond-shaped sea green eyes while their dragonfly wings held them aloft and away from all harm.

She envied them at that moment more than she could have said.

Clorimel circled lower. “We shall help thee in thy search,” she called down. “Tell us what it is that thou seek'st.”

“That's really kind of you,” Tania said. “We're looking for a large amber ball. There's a man inside it.”

“Thank you for your aid,” said Cordelia. “Courtesy unlooked for is a great boon.”

Clorimel nodded and rose to rejoin the others. Tania watched as Lios Foltaigg darted off one by one over the island, vanishing inland above the cliffs. She heard a crunching of shingle and turned to see that Edric and Cordelia were making their way up the slope of the beach. She followed them toward the greasy-looking rocks.

It was hard work to get up that first frowning wall of cliffs, and Tania's arms and legs were trembling from the strain of the climb by the time they finally stood on the top and saw Ynis Maw stretching out in front of them.

“A desolate place, indeed,” said Cordelia. “A fit kingdom for a traitor.”

There were some signs of life among the knife-edged cliffs and jagged valleys: a few bleak wind-scoured bushes and spiked grasses that jutted from the black rubble. The island lifted in uneven terraces toward a cracked dome of fanged rock. The hills looked as if they had been battered and broken by gigantic hammers, the land ripped open and wounded by monstrous axes.

Edric's hand slipped into Tania's. His voice was low and full of horror. “I know what Drake did to you, and what he tried to do to us all, but I wouldn't wish this on him…not
this
.”

Tania didn't want to talk about Gabriel Drake—this place was dreadful enough without that. Besides, they had come here for a reason. “Where should we look first?” she asked. She had always imagined that
once they had reached Ynis Maw, she would be able to sense her Faerie father's presence—like a kind of warmth or a feeling of well-being in the air. But there was nothing.

“The Amber Prison might be out in the open somewhere, but it could just as easily be hidden away in a valley or a cave,” Edric replied. “We'll have to look everywhere.”

“Then let us begin,” said Cordelia. “Do we stay together or search alone?”

“We should keep together,” Tania said, uneasy at the thought of being alone in this ghastly place. “I know it'll take longer, but I don't think it's a good idea to split up.”

“So be it.” Cordelia began to pick her way through the rocks.

They searched for a long time, climbing down into steep-walled valleys, making their way over wolf-fanged ridges, scrambling among the ruination of pulverized rock. Now and then Tania saw one or two Lios Foltaigg moving across the sky, but any hopes that the flying folk would quickly find the King had ebbed away. The world darkened as battalions of storm clouds streamed in from the north.

Cordelia eyed the clouds. “If we do not find the King while the daylight lasts, what then?” she asked, voicing a concern that Tania had been feeling for some time. “Do we sleep on this cursed island, or must we return to the mainland?” She lowered her voice. “I have seen things,” she said. “They keep away from us
and try to stay hidden, but I have seen them, flitting among the rocks—watching us, following us.”

Tania looked at her in alarm. “What kind of things? Animals?”

“Nay, not unless there are beasts on this isle that walk upon two legs and clad themselves in ragged garments.”

Tania's eyes widened. “You mean
people
?”

“The wretched remains of things that once were people,” Cordelia said. She looked at Tania, and there was a strange light in her eyes. “Thought you that only the Traitor Drake had ever been banished to this place?” she asked. “Nay, sister—there are others.”

A cold chill ran down Tania's spine. She glanced around, half expecting to see crazy-eyed faces peering out at her from among the rocks.

“There are still a few hours of daylight left,” Edric said. “We don't have to decide yet.”

A high-pitched call, like the cry of a seagull but with words in it, came drifting down to them. Tania stared up into the gray sky. Three Lios Foltaigg were hovering near the coastline, two males and one female.

“Maybe they've found something,” Tania said, renewed hope kindling in her.

“Or maybe they're giving up,” Edric said grimly.

They scrambled over the rocks, coming to a high cliff that overhung the sea. The three winged folk came closer. The female was Clorimel.

“The Sun sleeps in a cave upon the north side of
the island,” she called down. “Ithacar and Uriban have seen him. He lies in an orb of yellow light and slumbers with both eyes open.”

“Oberon!”
said Tania. “They've found him.” She called out, “Can you show us the way?”

“That we can,” Clorimel called. “Come, it is not far.”

The Lios Foltaigg led them around the west coast of the island until they came to a cave-pocked valley in a ring of broken hills.

“Merciful spirits!” Cordelia said. “Do you see the light?”

An amber glow brightened the mouth of one of the caves. They scrambled down the hillside, Tania's eyes fixed on that amber light, praying that they would find the King alive inside the cave. It was little more than a scoop hollowed out of the cliffs, the roof low and rugged, and the floor of gray shale. But the amber radiance lit up the walls, so that as they stepped over the threshold it looked as if the cave was made of dark gold.

The Amber Prison hung in the air, a few inches off the ground. It was wrapped around with a network of gray metal bands through which the trapped light welled. A figure lay within. Cordelia let out a low sob, her hands coming to her face. Tania stepped forward, trembling as she remembered how she had found Edric trapped in such a globe.

Oberon lay on one side. He was clad in a robe of dark fur trimmed with white. His eyes were open in
his handsome bearded face, but his gaze was fixed on nothing and there was no life or animation in the sky blue irises. One arm was lifted, the hand stretching out, the open palm upward, as though he had been frozen in amber at the moment of trying to defend himself.

Tania drew closer. A single tear ran down her cheek as she stared through the brutal metal straps at the face of her Faerie father. There was no fear in his expression, but the emptiness in his eyes drained all the hope from her. She bit her lip, hearing Cordelia's sobs behind her.

Edric came up beside her. He said nothing.

For a few moments they just stood there, staring at the amber globe. Then Tania stretched out a hand to touch it. A blue spark leaped from the iron bonds, burning her fingers like a flame, shooting barbs of agony up her arm. She snatched her hand away with a cry of pain.

“I can't even touch it,” she said, her voice shaking with emotion. “We've come all this way and I can't even touch him.” She fell to her knees, anger and frustration and fear overwhelming her at last. “What was the point?” she shouted. “It's all hopeless. It's all completely hopeless!”