The Lost Child Read online

  Then he clapped his hands together, mixing our spilled blood in his clasped grip, bending his head forward so he looked as if he was in prayer. Slowly his head rose, his eyes opening to reveal that the grey pupils had vanished so his whole eye shone like silver. He seemed to stare out beyond us, seeing to the edges of the realm, to where the mixed blood led him.

  Finvarra’s hands parted, and the silver drained from his eyes. “I see her.”

  “You do?” I asked, amazed.

  He nodded. “I can tell you where to find her.”

  FIVE

  BRYN

  Odran had been right about the Ice mountains, but Finvarra was able to give us much more clarity about where, in the that huge area, we would find our daughter.

  “They call it Tor Clyd,” explained Finvarra, resting by the fire after his exertions. “A spur of ice bound rock like a claw, extending from the top of a mountain in the heart of the range.

  Any of the locals will be able to point you towards it.”

  “We can never thank you enough,” I said, fervently, feeling guilty for how standoffish I ’d been when he arrived. He’d done us a huge service, truly.

  “I am happy to have been able to put a little to right what my people did to you,” replied Finvarra. He stood, suddenly seeming more like the old man he was. “Good luck to you all. I wish I were young enough to come with you.”

  “Thank you, High King,” said Odran, grasping the older man’s hand and shaking it firmly. I’d never seen Odran so overawed by anyone, and I wondered if Finvarra reminded him of his ‘Daddy’.

  “I was glad to help,” Finvarra replied. “The Seelie Court is less without you there, Odran, formerly of Norroway and Kinloch. I hope that one day, you will want to return and I may welcome you back.”

  He stepped back, raising his hood over his greyed locks, and then, as we watched, his heavy frame dissolved into black smoke, though still keeping more or less the form of a man. The smoke drifted away from us, billowing and blowing back into the night, heading back for home.

  “What an incredible guy.” It was Klassje who spoke, but it could have been any one of us. It was hard to put Finvarra into words and ‘incredible guy’ seemed to sell him short, but it would do.

  Those grey eyes had seen so much, those gnarled hands had done so much—not all of it good, I was sure—and yet he still had time to help us; his code as a warrior would not have allowed him to do otherwise. I found myself wondering if that was a glimpse of what Sinjin might be like if he lived that long. He would not age of course, but that dignity and that desire to help after a long life of mixed fortune—yes, Finvarra seemed very much a possible future for Sinjin. I wondered if the old man had any children.

  I hugged Sinjin and he hugged me back.

  “We’re going to find her,” I whispered

  “I know we are.” There was more emotion in his voice than I expected.

  #

  The following morning felt like a new beginning, as if we were just starting out and were not several frustrating days into this expedition. Everything had changed since yesterday; we were alone, but we knew where we were going and I didn’t think I would have felt any more confident with the Seelie Court and the whole of Faery at our back—we could do this.

  Odran led the way. We couldn’t see the mountains yet, but that meant little here in Faery, as Odran proved when he asked if we wanted to see them.

  “You have a picture?” asked Klassje.

  But Odran laughed and waved his hand. The air in front of him shimmered and formed a narrow wormhole, at the epicenter of which we could see a range of white mountains, shining as if they were composed of ice.

  Odran dismissed the vision. “In Faery, everythin’ is there in front o’ ye an’ yet also not. The mountains are right there, only a breath away, an’ yet it will still take oos time to get to them.”

  “What a ridiculous place,” Sinjin muttered.

  “You didn’t think it was ridiculous back in the Castle,” I reminded him, trying to keep him in a positive frame of mind.

  “And look how that turned out.” Though the rest of us were more optimistic than ever, Sinjin seemed to have woken in a foul mood.

  “I am not a fan of the cold,” said Dureau, thinking of the ice mountains.

  “Well there’s little enough to be done aboot that,” said Odran.

  “I know,” said Dureau, glumly. “I just thought I’d mention it.”

  “I don’t mind the cold,” mused Klassje. “Comes of being dead, I suppose.”

  “I kn ew there had to be an advantage,” said Dureau.

  We laughed. All but Sinjin.

  As Odran led us on, I allowed Sinjin and I to slip to the back of the group so we could talk.

  “Is something wrong?”

  Sinjin looked at me in amazement. “Is something wrong? We are hardly here on a holiday, Bryn.”

  If he was calling me ‘Bryn’ then things were bad. “You think I don’t know that?” I snapped. “But copping an attitude and being shitty to people isn’t helping your daughter. If you’re going to live and die with her fate every step of the way, then you’ll be in no fit state to rescue her when we get there. Besides,” I increased my pace, giving him the cold shoulder, “I don’t think that’s why you’re behaving like this.”

  “Then what do you suppose the matter is?”

  I cocked my head to the side. “I think you’re using it as an excuse. When you’re ready to behave like an adult and tell me what’s actually wrong then I’ll be happy to listen. Until then you can sulk back here in peace.”

  Sinjin was adept at hiding his emotions, but I knew him too well not to see the fleeting expression of desperation that crossed his face—there was something eating away at him. But I also knew him well enough to know he wasn’t going to share it yet.

  #

  One thing about Faery; you always knew you were somewhere else.

  It’s not that it was aggressively surreal—the plants and animals talked more than in our world but you got used to that—everything wasn’t that different to back home; there was just something . We passed through a grassy pasture that could have been anywhere in the world with a reasonably temperate climate, and yet you could taste the tang of Faery on the wind. The greens were a touch greener, the flowers moved contrary to the wind, the clouds took on shapes.

  When humankind had first learned about Faery, the names they’d given it were mostly variations on a theme of ‘Over There’. It didn’t seem that different, like another country or another world; it just wasn’t here . That was the sense I got from the place as we travelled. Everything was the same and yet not the same. You were always aware of being ‘over there’.

  We met few people as we travelled; the Fae didn’t welcome visitors. Had we been alone, then they would probably have played tricks on us, which was how they preferred to treat trespassers in their realm. The problem with Fae was that their definition of tricks was a broad one that ranged from giving you the wrong directions to stealing your eyesight. What was a hilarious joke to them was devastating to people from our world, and many of them simply didn’t understand that.

  A favorite Fae trick of old was putting people to sleep for a hundred years. They could not understand why doing so was so terrible; it was only a hundred years . They would watch their victim go home to find everyone they had ever known dead, and wonder at how the joke had gone wrong. A visitor in Faery had to be very careful.

  Fortunately for us, we travelled with Odran. He might not be a king anymore, but everyone still knew who he was, and any thought they might have of playing some devious prank evaporated as they saw our guide striding out ahead of us. I wondered if it was out of respect or fear that they left him alone. Either way was fine with me.

  His value became all the clearer to us on the second day after we had left the Seelie Castle.

  “Somethin’s oo p ahead.” Odran had slowed in his pace as our path took us through a wood.

&
nbsp; “Sounds like an argument,” said Klassje.

  Odran observed the trees around us. “Blackthorn.”

  “What does that mean?” I asked.

  “Lunantishee.”

  We walked on towards the noise, keeping close together and watching out around us.

  “Come on! Bring it down!” A harsh cry announced the presence of a small clearing ahead that had been only recently opened up.

  Five or six ugly-faced creatures—goblins of some sort—in military tunics, wearing red hats on their heads and wielding axes had been cutting down the blackthorn trees.

  One of them now raised his axe, ready to fell another, but from the dense, spiny branches of the blackthorn above his head, a thin, grey arm extended to deftly snatch the axe. The goblin, from whom it had been taken, started in shock, then ducked as the axe was sent spinning through the air to land, blade buried in a trunk, narrowly missing the head of another goblin.

  Cackling laughter issued from the blackthorn trees.

  “You’ll all pay for this!” yelled the goblin in charge, yanking the axe from the tree. “For every one of your precious trees you try to save, we will cut another down! If you don’t want to lose them all, I suggest you stop now.”

  “If you want a fight, Redcap, then you’ll get one.” The voice had a creeping, insidious quality to it that contrasted with the brash ferocity of the Redcap, though I didn’t much like either.

  “Why don’t you come out and fight rather than hiding like cowards?” snarled one of the Redcap goblins.

  “Why don’t you come up here rather than hiding down there like cowards?” came the response.

  Across the clearing, another grey arm slid out of the dense blackthorn foliage, beckoning with a long, thin finger. “Come on.

  We don’t bite. Much.”

  “What do we do?” I asked Odran.

  “We walk on,” he responded. “It’s nae concern o’ ours. The Redcaps always want more territory. The Lunantishee will do anything to protect their blackthorn trees. Boot beware o’ both, they are nae to be troosted. Those red caps are dyed with human blood.”

  We walked on, into the clearing.

  “Who goes!” one of the Redcaps barked, levelling a spear at us.

  Redcaps have a military manner; they live in ruined castles and behave like guardsmen.

  “Do ye nae know?” Odran drew himself up. “Ah am Odran o’ Norroway and Kinloch. Whit right have ye to stop me?”

  The Redcaps exchanged sulky looks between them, clearly recognizing the former king. There was whispered conversation between them as they decided if we might be in league with the Lunantishee.

  “Where are you heading?” asked the leader.

  “Where we please,” replied Odran. “Oot o’ our way.”

  Another look between them and the Redcaps drew aside. “Apologies.

  Your Majesty.”

  To me it seemed as if they were a bit too compliant, as if there was more going on behind those malevolent eyes. But Odran was used to people giving way before his majesty and strode on with a nod of his head, leading the way with Sinjin and Klassje just behind. I lingered a moment, casting a mistrustful eye at one of the Redcaps who was fingering his axe, running a thumb along the blade.

  “Bryn?” Dureau waited for me. “Something wrong?”

  “I guess not.”

  We started after the others.

  “Now!”

  The cry was terminated in the sound of an axe, splitting another blackthorn trunk and Dureau and I leapt back as the tree crashed down into our path, accompanied by the shrill, angry screams of the Lunantishee.

  Before Dureau and I could get back to our feet and try to find a way around the tree that now separated us from the rest of our party, hunched grey creatures with long, spindly arms and legs tumbled from the branches of the fallen tree, baring ugly yellow teeth. The Lunantishee were furious and on the warpath.

  “It wasn’t us!” I yelled as one of them loped towards me, gnashing its teeth. The creature was clearly not in the mood to listen and I was left with no choice but to kick it hard in the face. Unfortunately, the other Lunantishee saw this and decided we were obviously on the side of their enemies.

  “Bryn!” Sinjin’s voice came from beyond the fallen tree. “Bry…

  Get back or you will regret it!”

  If Dureau and I had problems with the Lunantishee, then the rest of our party were now dealing with the Redcaps. I wasn’t worried about them, all three were fine fighters and there was a limited number of the goblins. Dureau and I, on the other hand, did have

  problems. Having identified us as allies of the Redcaps, and seeing us defenseless, Lunantishee poured from the blackthorn trees and settled around us. They weren’t strong and they weren’t good fighters, but they had a wiry tenacity and strong teeth.

  “Ow!” I swore fiercely as one of them bit my leg. “Get off me , you little shit.”

  There were also a lot of them, and they just kept coming. This part of the wood was full of blackthorn trees and every one had a family of Lunantishee as its guardians.

  “Come on!” I grabbed Dureau’s hand and tugged him back the way we had come.

  “But the others?”

  “We’ll find another way around. There’s a billion of these things and I don’t want to start a war with a forest.”

  I didn’t want to split our party any more than Dureau did, but we hadn’t come here to make enemies and there was no way through now without killing a few hundred Lunantishee. There would be another route through the forest, and Odran would have the sense to wait for us on the far side.

  It all sounded sensible and simple in my head, and yet I had an uncomfortable sense of foreboding that, although I was doing the right thing, it would somehow come back to bite me in the ass.

  SIX

  SINJIN

  “We must go back for them!” I could not believe I was having to argue this point.

  But Odran still shook his head. “We cannae go back that way.”

  “Why not? We put those Redcaps in their place.” The goblins had quickly regretted trying to rob two vampires and a Fae King; their trap had most certainly backfired.

  “There will be more o’ them,” said Odran. “They are social creatures. Congregatin’ in troops. An’ our mission here is nae to kill the inhabitants o’ Faery. Besides, we would also have the Lunantishee to deal with.”

  “Those skinny things?” I was dismissive.

  “Aye; a few hoondred o’ them. How mooch blood do ye wish to wade through?”

  “To get Bryn back?” I asked, sharply. “No amount is too much.”

  “Were she in danger,” said Odran, “then Ah would agree. Boot Bryn an’ Dureau can handle themselves, Ah think ye would agree.”

  “Well, Bryn can,” I acknowledged, moodily.

  “Hey,” Klassje spoke up, “Dureau is a good warrior too.”

  “Aye. They can both take care o’ themselves,” said Odran. “So we would nae be goin’ to rescue them. We’d be pickin’ a fight for nae purpose, an’ in Faery that sort o’ rumor spreads fast. Ye dinnae know whit we still have to face oot there or whose help we might need to face it. Dinnae make enemies if ye dinnae have to.”

  He was right, which was a hard thing for a man like me to admit.

  And I was wrong, which was considerably harder to admit. “So what do we do?”

  “We carry on through the wood,” replied Odran. “An’ we wait at the far side. They’ll join oos.”

  “And if they don’t?” asked Klassje.

  “We give them a day,” said Odran. “They’ll have to find another path. Then we go back an’ look for them.”

  “Why don’t we go back and look for them now?” I asked. “We can find another path too.”

  “Because if we dinnae find the same alternative path they find, they’ll be comin’ to find oos an’ we’ll be goin’ back to find them an’ never the twain shall meet,” explained Odran, with infuriating reason
ableness.

  “I strongly dislike every aspect of this plan,” I said, somewhat grumpily , I must confess.

  “Well at least you’re hiding it well,” commented Klassje.

  “Are you happy to leave your fop behind?”

  “Don’t call him that,” said Klassje, sternly. “And yes. Why not?

  He can look after himself and I’ll see him again tomorrow. We’re not that clingy as a couple and I’m surprised you and Bryn are.”

  We were not of course. The truth, that I could not bring myself to voice—and would certainly not have done so in front of Klassje

  —was that I was worried about Bryn being alone with the frog. I trusted Bryn, but the frog was another matter. Although he was now courting one of my closest friends, I still worried he entertained feelings for my tempest which he would act on, if given the chance. And a night alone together gave them just such a chance.

  A part of me—the sensible part to which I do listen from time to time—said: what of it? If he tries anything with her, then she

  will administer a kick that will have him singing soprano for the rest of his days . That was the sort of woman my Bryn was and was one of the reasons I loved her as I did. But there was that other part of me, the part that had grown since my time with Gaia, the part that allowed those nightly dreams of my past to plague me.

  That part of me said Chevalier was more the man she deserved than I was and that she would one day realize that.

  That was clearly nonsense; no one deserved a man like Dureau Chevalier—it would be a terrible thing to inflict upon a woman.

  But the principle still troubled me. It was the idea that Bryn might one day wake up and see me for what I really was; the monster who had stalked the streets of Chester and a hundred other cities besides. What if Bryn saw me as I was now starting to see myself?

  Perhaps that would even be for the best. Perhaps she deserved someone other than me. If not Chevalier then someone else who could be the husband, and more importantly the father, whom she and our little lost girl deserved.

  It would be nice to say that all I was worried about was the French Fae living up to the lecherous stereotype of his countrymen, but my paranoia was not really about Bryn or even about the fop; it was about me. It was not really about whether Bryn realized she was too good for me; it was about me thinking that I was not good enough for her. That I was not good enough for our child. I wanted my little girl to have the best of everything, and did not that start with a good father?