“You have never seen the sea before,” observed Red quietly. I had not. Though my brothers had told me of the great expanse of wild water, and the myriad birds, and the light that glittered and changed and played on the shifting surface, nothing could have prepared me. Our cave was high up on a steep slope, that lower down became a sheer cliff, and I looked out over a vast distance, and the whole of the distance was water, water all the way to the horizon. The sky was hot blue; there was no sign of cloud. The rocks around me steamed gently in the sun. All trace of the sudden rain storm would soon be gone. Except maybe later, in stories. And our pursuers would be on the move. I turned back to the Briton.
He sat with his back against the rock wall, and one leg stuck out awkwardly in front of him. There was blood on his clothing, quite a lot of blood. Now that I looked at him properly, he was rather white in the face, with a grim set to his lips. Men can be a bit stupid about injuries they get in battle, as if pretending there’s nothing wrong will make it go away, or that people won’t notice if you keep quiet about it.
“They’ll be after us,” he said. “And not a dagger or a bit of scrap metal between us. I’m afraid there’s no choice but to stay here until after dark. Maybe then we can slip by them. There’s a settlement up the coast a way, and small boats moored there.”
I stared at him, thinking of that vast expanse of water, unwilling to accept the implications of what he said. But from the looks of that leg, he’d be lucky to hobble as far as the cave mouth, let alone down the cliff and off to some village. And what was meant to happen then? I decided his friend Ben had been right. He was crazy. That being said, he needed my help, and I was determined to give it. For I had no doubt he had saved my life, once at least, probably twice. I owed him something, whatever his motives.
I still had my little pack, and he his. A small mercy. He watched me as I crouched by him, examining the wound. So he’d lost his sword, and I his other weapon. That was a problem. But wait. What about the little knife he’d used to cut up an apple so neatly? I rummaged through his pack. He looked on in silence. I found the knife and the remnants of the old shirt he’d used to make bandages for my feet. I looked down ruefully; the wrappings were completely gone and my feet were a mess of blood and dirt.
“Water,” he said helpfully. “You’ll need water. You can understand me, can’t you?”
I nodded; it seemed as if the time of pretense was over. He had known, I thought, as soon as he told me to take his small dagger and defend myself, and I did as he bid me. I pointed within the cave; there was the sound of running and dripping, and I knew that I would find fresh water further down. What to do first? His clothing was already torn open; I slit it further, and eased off his damaged boot. This must have caused him great pain, but apart from a sudden intake of breath he did not acknowledge it. There was enough light for me to see the ugly gash that split his calf from knee to ankle; to see the fresh blood still welling out, to see the depth of it and the glint of metal lodged far inside the wound. I glanced up at his face.
Strong-minded, aren’t you
? The injury would not kill him; not if he had prompt treatment, and a healer skilled with the knife, and the right nursing after. But here, trapped in a cave, with no supplies, and the two of us covered in mud and debris, and the need for quiet on us, that was a different matter entirely.
“Not good, huh?” he said expressionlessly. “Can you patch it up? Wrap a bit of something around it for me?” I nodded, trying to look capable and reassuring. I don’t think I succeeded; I saw one corner of his tight mouth twitch up for a second in what might have been an attempt at a smile. On second thought, it was probably an involuntary grimace of pain. A Briton had no sense of humor; how could a people with no magic, with no life of the spirit, ever really know laughter?
I found the skin water flask in Red’s pack and made my way deeper into the cave. Further down, it opened up wondrously. It was quite dark, but I caught the shadowy shapes of great rock pillars reaching up, and others stretching down to meet them; I sensed small creatures sleeping, high above me in the gloom. And I found fresh water, dripping down to rest gently in stone-rimmed pools. I filled the flask and returned.
I wished badly for Father Brien, or another of his skill, that day. I did my best. At least it was possible to wash my hands, and then to clean the wound. The fresh flow of blood was good, oozing only, not rushing forth in deadly tide. It would help the ill humors to leave the body. I remembered the man I had slashed with Red’s little dagger; he might have lost a lot of blood. I could have told them how to stem the flow; but I had not. Watching them close in on Red, I had forgotten I was a healer.
So far, so good. My dumb show was proving ever more difficult. I tried to indicate to Red that there was something in his leg; something I would have to remove. It would have helped if he’d been a little less stoical, or if there had been some mead, or ale, or a few well-chosen herbs for a sleeping draft.
“I’m not sure what you’re saying,” he said. “You need to do something else to it? It’s going to hurt? Well, get on with it then.”
I mimed that he would have to stay very still, for I had only the sharp point of the tiny knife with which to dislodge the metal object. He nodded grimly. I wondered why he hadn’t told me to stop messing about and leave him alone. He had no reason to trust me.
It took a while. I learned another oath in the British tongue. Apart from that, he kept quiet, although I heard his breathing change, and his face grew clammy with sweat. My hands were not as deft as they had been, but all the same, it had been some time since I had spun or woven starwort, for I had neglected the task in my misery, and the swelling in my fingers had begun to go down. Just as well. It was a tricky job. The small sliver, where dagger or sword had chipped against bone, was deeply lodged, and I had both hands covered in blood above the wrists before I got it out. I cleaned the wound again with fresh water, and dried it as well as I could. There was no chamomile, no sweet lavender nor poultice of juniper berries. There were no skilled hands or fine thread with which to sew up the wound. I took a few deep breaths, and then I got out a bone needle, the smallest I had, the one I used to bind the necks of the shirts when I had finished them. And in my pack there was one good spool of thread, a thread not made from the starwort plant, but soft and strong, which one of my brothers had thieved for me that midsummer night. I clenched my teeth and set to work, with an ear to his breathing. He was keeping it slow and steady, but with some effort. I did not hurry the job; it was done as neatly and thoroughly as I could manage. He’d have a scar, but the leg would mend. I finished, and bit off the thread, and felt his large hand encircling mine.
“Tell me,” he said levelly, “why does a girl of good breeding, with skin as white as new milk, have hands like a fishwife’s? Who has inflicted such punishment on you? Your crime must have been heinous indeed.”
That was it for my strength, I’m afraid. All at once, hunger and shock and exhaustion got the better of me, and I sank down to the ground, as far away from him as I could get, and put my poor hands over my face as bitter, silent tears coursed down my cheeks. I wasn’t angry at him, or at the men who had attacked us, or at anyone in particular. I was wet and miserable and tired, and I wanted my brothers, and I wanted my little garden and my dog, and to be able to tell tales and laugh again. I wept in self-pity, and because I knew you could never go back. You chose your path, and that was it. I wept for Father Brien and for Linn, and for what my brothers might have been, and for my own lost innocence. I wept because I had ugly hands. After all, I was but fourteen years old.
“I’m sorry,” he said awkwardly. It didn’t help much. I found that now I had started to cry, I couldn’t stop. Much like it is for a small child, whose woe often outlasts the injury, as if the weeping itself engenders more tears. I wept until my head ached and I saw stars before my eyes, and finally I lay down on the hard rock and went to sleep, still sniffing. After that, he must have forced himself to move, to lay a cloak over me, and a folded shirt under my head, for that was how it was when I woke, much later. It was dark everywhere, night time outside. For a moment I was quite disoriented, groping around me in a panic. I forced myself to sit still, to breathe slowly. And after a while, pale moonlight was apparent, thin fingers of it creeping through the foliage at the cave mouth, and by its dim light I could see the Briton lying asleep against the far wall, his face white, his eyelids heavy with the slumber of complete exhaustion. His bandage looked clean enough, what I could see of it. No new bleeding. That was good.
I sat there for a while as the light brightened, and small sounds made their way into my consciousness little by little. An owl hooting, near at hand. Far above me, there must be another entrance to the cavern, for I sensed rather than heard a myriad tiny creatures moving in and out, a creaking, rustling sound. And behind this, a more distant, pervasive roaring, a great, hushed, endless movement. The sea. The sea that was so wide it had no margins; the sea that stretched westward to the isles of ancient lore. The sea that made a shining moonlit pathway to the east; to the home of the Britons. I need not gaze out from the cave mouth; its vast wildness was imprinted on my mind, and I feared it even as it captured my spirit. Did not we once cast our own transgressors out beyond the ninth wave, to perish or be washed up on some inhospitable shore as the gods willed? And had not this stranger, who lay sleeping at my feet, come not just from beyond the ninth wave, but from many times beyond? He had spoken of boats, and cursed the land which had given him no answers. He was going home. A chill invaded my body, making the small hairs on my neck stand up. He was going home; and he would keep me by him until I told him what he wanted so badly to know. I understood with a certainty that weighed like a stone in my heart that I too would travel beyond the ninth wave, and leave my brothers behind.
You could leave now, said my inner voice. You could leave while he sleeps, slip away to that village maybe. Help yourself to a few things, go back to the forest and set yourself up again. He will not wake yet awhile; and when he does he will be slow. So I heard myself; and answered myself. I can’t leave him. His leg is hurt, his enemies are nearby. I won’t leave him.
There were a couple more apples in his bag. I took one and ate it, pips, core and all. I took a sip of water from the bottle; it was cold and sweet. And then I heard the voices. From deep within the cave, soft, compelling, echoing up from the darkness of the vaulted chamber.
Come down. Come down, Sorcha
. And there were lights flickering gold and silver, tantalizing lights just around the corner, coaxing me to follow.
I was compelled to walk after them, hands outstretched to touch the rock walls, bare feet light on the hard cave floor. Down and down and down, where the air was cool and damp, and the weight of the earth hung heavy above me. Down where tree roots hung suspended above the vault; where crystal clear water trickled and dripped and pooled in darkness under the pillars of stone. The lights beckoned, torches, lanterns, always just around the next corner. I stumbled, and thought I heard laughter. And music, the faint humming of a harp, the lilt of a fiddle, and a whistle weaving a garland of notes around an old tune. Even so far to the east, even on the farthest shore, then, the Fair Folk had their dwellings. For I did not doubt that this place where we had come by chance was one of those doorways, told of in many old tales, one of those portals between our world and theirs. In such a place were they found often enough, a cave or crevice, an opening in the earth, where the two realms might touch for a brief moment, when the time was right.
I came at length to a chamber, vaster and more grand than any before, where the pillars of living stone reached from smooth floor to arching roof, their stately forms reflected in a long, still pool. They were there, and their laughter and song ceased abruptly as I came forward into the light of their torches. Many eyes were on me. I saw one face I knew, palely beautiful, with dark intense eyes and hair like rippling black silk. She nodded gravely. But around her were many more of her kind, all of them tall beyond mortal span, and clothed in shimmering fabric, in garments of gauze like butterflies’ wings, or black and glossy as the plumage of a raven. Their heads were crowned with strange adornments, of feathers and shells and seaweed, of nuts and berries and leaves. Their eyes were strange, deep, knowing, searching; their faces were both wonderful and terrible. They watched me in silence. Then the circle of torches closed in slightly, and the tallest of the men stepped forward.
“Well, well,” he said, looking me up and down. “You’re here at last, I see. Step forward, show yourself.” I stared up at him. A long way up. His face was very bright, brighter far than the torches might make it; some light from within seemed to turn his skin to gold and silver. His hair stood back from his face as if he were crowned with flames, and it was a brilliant red, except where frost touched it at the temples, and on his full beard. His eyes were no color, and every color. He wore a plain white robe, but where the light caught it, the cloth sparkled as if with many tiny gems.
My lord
. I greeted him silently. I turned to the Lady of the Forest, who stood by his side.
My lady. What do you mean, here at last?
He laughed, throwing his head back, letting the sound reverberate around the great rock chamber. There was a buzz of voices, which died down instantly as he became silent again. The Lady did not laugh, but watched me gravely.
“You didn’t imagine you were here by accident, did you?” queried the Bright One. “You did? I forget how little your kind can understand, how limited your grasp. Your time in the world is brief, your knowledge matches it.”
I did not come here to be insulted
. I found my temper was short. They had been precious little help to me so far, apart from the rain storm, which I had to admit had been pretty good. But, Fair Folk or no, I would not let them bully me.
What do you want of me?