The Forbidden Land Read online

  ‘But why? What have ye done?’

  ‘Naught! Well, no’ much. I punched my cousin right in her smirking mouth, but she deserved it. The slyest, sickliest, most double-faced sow ye’ve ever met! Ye should’ve seen it, Jay. She went head over heels and smashed a vase and all the court ladies screeched like hens in a whirlwind. It was grand!’

  ‘And they locked ye up for that?’

  ‘Aye, is it no’ unjust?’

  ‘Well, happen banprionnsachan are no’ supposed to punch each other,’ Jay said rather uncertainly.

  ‘As if I care a jot for that! I’ve never met anyone who more deserved a good pummelling than Brangaine. They should be thanking me instead o’ locking me up and trying to make me apologise. Jay, I hate it here. Naught ever happens and they want me to learn to sew seams and sit with my hands folded and listen to the hens quack …’

  ‘I think it’s ducks that quack, no’ hens.’

  ‘Who cares? I just want to get away from here and have adventures. Can I no’ go away with ye? I’d love to travel about with the jongleurs and perform and sing songs. I bet ye have adventures all the time!’

  ‘We’ve had a few,’ Jay agreed with a smile in his voice. ‘But that’s why we’re here, Finn—to ask if we can take ye wi’ us …’

  Just then they heard the door behind them open. Music and laughter spilled out with the blaze of light. Finn looked about frantically, then opened the lid of a chest and leapt inside. Jay turned as the handsome young jongleur looked out, his guitar in his hand.

  ‘Jay, what do ye do? Why are ye out here all alone?’

  ‘Sorry, Dide—I’m just coming.’

  ‘Are ye no’ well?’

  ‘Nay, I be grand. I’ll be along in a wee bit.’

  Dide nodded his head, though he looked puzzled still. He shut the door again and Jay looked round for Finn, who was peering out from the chest, which she had opened just a crack. ‘We’ll talk again later,’ he whispered, and went back into the great hall.

  Finn clambered out of the chest, her cheeks burning hot with excitement. Jay had come to take her away!

  Anxiety suddenly chilled her. If only she had not angered her mother! Gwyneth might well forbid her to go. Happen I’d best apologise to Brangaine now and get it over and done with, she thought.

  She walked back into the noisy hall with her heart pounding and her palms prickling with sweat, making her way through the crowd towards the high table. Her appearance caused the court to murmur in surprise, but her mother did not notice, leaning her cheek on her hand and staring without seeing into the depths of her wine glass.

  Finn was struck by how wan her mother looked, with shadows under her beautiful green eyes and in the hollows of her cheeks. She knelt by her side and seized her limply hanging hand in hers, saying sincerely, ‘I be sorry, mam! I do no’ mean to trouble ye so!’

  Gwyneth started upright, knocking over her glass. ‘Fionnghal! How ye startled me! Where have ye been? We’ve been searching for ye everywhere. I was sure ye must’ve fallen to your death.’

  ‘Nay, I would no’ fall,’ Finn said indignantly, then tried to soften her tone, saying, ‘I’m just grand, mam, as ye can see. I’m sorry to have worried ye and I’m sorry I punched Brangaine, though indeed she deserved it!’

  Gwyneth was mopping up the spilt wine with her napkin. She said distractedly, ‘What am I to do with ye, so wild and reckless ye are?’

  Finn opened her mouth to cry, ‘Let me go with the jongleurs,’ then swallowed her words. After a moment’s hesitation she said meekly, ‘I do no’ ken, mam. I’m sorry ye think me wild; I do no’ mean to be. Happen it’s because I’m used to having to look out for myself and being able to do whatever I want to do. I never kent I was a banprionnsa, ye must ken.’

  ‘Aye,’ her mother replied wearily, looking down at her stained napkin. ‘And I must admit ye were impetuous as a wee lassie too, always getting into mischief.’ She sighed and crumpled the napkin up. ‘Still, ye shall rule Rurach one day and ye must learn some sense. Ye canna be hitting out at anyone ye dislike, or sitting down to judgement in a torn and stained kirtle. Ye shall be lady o’ the MacRuraich clan, ye ken.’

  Finn again had to bite back rebellious words. She bowed her head and said nothing.

  Her mother said, ‘Well, if ye are willing to make a formal apology to your cousin and promise me to try and mind your manners in the future, I suppose ye can stay and watch the rest o’ the show. It was a shame ye had to miss so much. I ken ye find Castle Rurach very dull.’

  Finn knew her mother was hoping she would deny this but she could not, since it was true. So she simply nodded and sat down next to her mother. They sat in silence for a long while, watching the antics of the cluricaun, who pranced about before them, turning head over heels and kicking his furry legs in a high-spirited jig.

  Then Enit sang again, accompanied this time only by Jay and his viola. The candles were sinking low and shadows gathered in the corners, twisting and flowing like dancing ghosts.

  ‘I wish, I wish, I wish in vain,

  I wish I were a maid again;

  A maid again I never will be,

  Till apples grow on an orange tree,

  Aye, till apples grow on an orange tree.

  Now there’s a tavern in the town

  Where my love sits himself down;

  He calls another lassie to his knee

  And tells her the tale he once told me,

  Aye, tells her the tale he once told me.

  I wish, I wish my babe was born

  An’ smiling on yon nurse’s knee;

  An’ I myself were dead and gone,

  Wi’ green, green grass growing over me,

  Aye, wi’ green, green grass growing over me.’

  The viola caught up the melancholy refrain and swept down in a cascade of low, thrilling notes. The hairs rose on Finn’s arms and a little shiver ran down her spine. She glanced at her mother, wanting to share her pleasure in the beauty of the music. To her dismay she saw tears sliding down her mother’s cheeks. She touched her sleeve awkwardly, saying, ‘What is it, mam?’

  ‘It’s naught,’ Gwyneth said abruptly, trying to wipe away her tears without anyone noticing. ‘I miss your father. I wish he were here and safe. I wish there was peace.’

  ‘Happen there will be peace soon,’ Finn said. ‘Lachlan the Winged will prevail!’

  ‘Peace?’ Gwyneth said harshly. ‘There has never been peace, as long as I can remember. If it is no’ rebellion in the provinces it is the blaygird murdering Fairgean. There will never be peace, as long as a seafaery still lives.’

  Finn was troubled. ‘Lachlan and Iseult will sweep them away again,’ she replied stoutly. ‘No-one can fight like they can.’

  ‘We thought there would be peace forever after Jaspar the Ensorcelled won the Battle o’ the Strand. Look what happened to him, enchanted by a Fairge witch and sucked dry o’ his life till he was naught but a dry husk o’ a man. Ye forget I was born in Siantan, my bairn. My people have fought the Fairgean for hundreds o’ years. They never forget and they never forgive. As long as there are Fairgean in the seas, we shall never be at peace.’

  ‘Lachlan and Iseult will sweep them away again,’ Finn said stoutly. ‘He will raise the Lodestar and they’ll be sucked down into a whirlpool and drowned, and we can all be comfortable again.’

  ‘Comfortable wi’ the deaths o’ a thousand seafaeries on our conscience?’ a melodious voice rang out. Finn and Gwyneth looked up, startled. The hunched figure of Enit Silverthroat sat before them in her chair, supported on one side by Dide and on the other by Jay, both looking uncomfortable. The little cluricaun was pressed close against her knee, his ears swivelling anxiously, his wizened little face miserable.

  ‘The Rìgh has repealed the Decree against the Faeries, remember?’ Enit said softly. ‘It is against the law o’ the land to talk o’ destroying those o’ faerykind.’

  ‘Surely that does no’ include the Fairgean?’ Gwyneth
was astonished. ‘Ye canna mean the Rìgh does no’ intend to take action against those black-bluided sea demons? For the past ten years they have laid waste to my country, killing any living thing that fell into their slimy webbed hands. They have caused such pain and heartbreak …’ Her voice cracked.

  ‘Wha’ do ye think we have caused the Fairgean?’ Enit said, the quiver of absolute conviction in her voice. ‘The Carraigean made it a fashion to wear their scaled skins, for Eà’s sake! The cliffs o’ Siantan and Carraig had been their homes for thousands o’ years and yet when our ancestors came here, they drove them off, causing their children to drown or freeze to death in the icy seas.’

  Gwyneth stood up, her face frozen into an expression of distant politeness. ‘I see ye canna have spent much time in my country. If ye had, ye would have seen the terrible toll the Fairgean raids have had on the Siantans.’

  ‘We have just come from Siantan,’ Enit replied softly, her hands trembling on the arms of her chair. ‘Indeed, there is much trouble there: many people homeless and going hungry. I do no’ mean to sound as if I do no’ understand how ye must feel. I ken your mother was killed by marauding Fairgean. All I am saying is that …’

  ‘The Fairgean raped and murdered my mother and my elder sister,’ Gwyneth said in a cold voice. ‘They cut off my brother’s hands and feet, and made him watch. They are the cruellest, most savage and disgusting creatures on the face o’ the earth!’

  ‘Yet did your father no’ launch the most merciless o’ reprisals? Did he no’ have hundreds o’ the sea-faeries captured and put to death in a horrible fashion?’

  ‘They made my brother watch as they gutted my mother and threw her entrails to their blaygird sea serpents!’

  ‘There has been much evil done on all sides,’ Enit replied gently. ‘I ken your childhood was tragic indeed and I understand why ye hate the Fairgean …’

  ‘Yet ye defend them!’ Gwyneth’s voice rang out and many in the riotous crowd heard her voice and turned to glance at her, surprised. She subdued her agitation, gathering up her skirt and inclining her head to the old woman. ‘I am weary and wish to retire. I am sorry ye think me implacable in my hatred for the sea demons. All I can say is that ye obviously do no’ come from near the sea. If ye had seen the years o’ terror and grief that I have seen, ye would agree wi’ me that the only hope for peace in this land is to wipe out the Fairgean once and for all.’

  Enit leant forward as if wishing to say something else.

  Gwyneth held up her hand forbiddingly. ‘I understand ye have messages for me from the Rìgh. I shall take audience with ye in the morning. Goodnight.’ She waited for the old woman to duck her white head in an awkward curtsy before sweeping from the room, her head with its crown of fair plaits held high.

  Finn lowered her eyes, embarrassed. She had never seen her mother so impassioned. Normally Gwyneth was the most gentle and considerate of women, prone to mercy in the judgement hall and kindness to the lowliest of the castle folk. It was like seeing a lamb with two heads to hear her mother talk with such ruthlessness. She heard Jay murmur something to the old woman, then he and Dide lifted the chair and carried her away, the cluricaun following close behind, his tail dragging on the floor.

  Rising to follow her mother, Finn saw her cousin standing against the wall, her blue-grey plaid held close about her, her hand clenched around the MacSian badge pinned to her breast. Conscious of Finn’s gaze, Brangaine bit her lip and dropped her hand, colour rising in her cheeks. For the first time Finn wondered how her cousin felt about inheriting a land in thrall to the Fairgean threat. Siantan was surrounded on three sides by the sea. Its economy relied on trade, shipbuilding and fishing, all of which industries had been destroyed by the rise of the Fairgean over the past ten years. Finn wondered whether Brangaine hated the Fairgean as much as Gwyneth did and wished to annihilate them too. There was no clue in her cousin’s closed face. Finn stroked the soft fur of the elven cat crouched on her shoulder and went thoughtfully to bed.

  The next morning dawned grey and blustery. The servants went about their work with pale faces and wincing eyes. The cook was indisposed and many of the lairds snored still in their rooms, so that the company at the breakfast table was rather thin. When Gwyneth came down from her suite, she too was pale and drawn, with reddened eyelids. Brangaine came with her, and at the sight of her cousin Finn coloured hotly and bit her lip. She came forward swiftly, though, and made her apology in a gruff voice, her cheeks burning. Brangaine brought her hand to her swollen lip self-consciously but accepted the apology with gentle thanks. Gwyneth’s look of approbation was enough to drown out the little sting of resentment Brangaine’s forbearance gave her and Finn gave herself over to daydreams of travelling with the jongleurs and having adventures.

  At last her mother pushed aside her barely touched plate and rose to leave. Finn bounded after her, barely able to contain her excitement, the elven cat at her heels like an ink-black shadow. Brangaine followed at a more decorous pace, her downcast face as usual rather distant, her hands folded before her.

  The jongleurs were already waiting in the drawing room. In their bright shabby clothes, they looked like a flock of storm-tattered exotic birds. They rose as Gwyneth and her retinue came in, bowing with a flourish of their feathered caps. A murmur rose as the court complimented the jongleurs on their performance and exclaimed at some of their tricks and songs.

  ‘I hope ye enjoyed the show, my lady?’ the fire-eater said with a grin, resplendent in a worn crimson doublet and striped hose.

  ‘Indeed I did,’ Gwyneth replied politely. ‘It is rare that we have much entertainment at Castle Rurach these days.’ She sat straight-backed in her velvet-upholstered chair, her pale hair combed into a plait that hung down to her knees. The blue-grey MacSian plaid was draped around her shoulder and pinned with a large, translucent blue jewel. ‘I found the music particularly affecting and only wish my husband could have been here to listen to your songs as well.’

  ‘We caught up wi’ the MacRuraich at Loch Finavon,’ the fire-eater replied, bending his black head so none but those nearest to Gwyneth could hear what he said. ‘I be feared there was no’ much time nor mood for singing.’

  Her green eyes flashed up to meet his. ‘What news o’ my husband?’

  ‘He sends his dearest greetings, my lady, and says they have managed to hold back the Fairgean, though wi’ a very high cost in men. They are sore tested, my lady. The Fairgean do no’ seem to weary, and attack at any time o’ day and night. Again and again they have broken through the palisade across the river. The MacRuraich would be glad o’ some reinforcements.’

  Gwyneth frowned and twisted her fingers together. ‘I have already sent most o’ the castle guard,’ she murmured. ‘Indeed, there is barely a man o’ fighting age left in the entire country. We shall have to see if we can raise some hardy lads from the refugees from the coast.’

  The fire-eater, a rather heavy man with a gold ring in his ear, then brought Gwyneth up to date with many happenings around Eileanan. He told of weddings, births and deaths, lovers’ quarrels and reconciliations, fortunes won and gambled away, estates inherited and dowries given, shipwrecks, bankruptcies and scandals, the killing of ogres and sightings of dragons. Since news was always hard to come by, Gwyneth and her ladies listened eagerly. At last he got up to demonstrate the latest dance step from the royal court at Lucescere, whirling Lady Anne Montgomery around until she was breathless and laughing.

  Under cover of the chatter and music, Enit was carried by her grandson and granddaughter to sit by Gwyneth’s side. Imperious green eyes met unfathomable black ones.

  ‘I have news from the Rìgh,’ the old woman said softly. Gwyneth nodded, her back stiff. ‘There has been much unrest in Tìrsoilleir since they lost the war,’ the jongleur said, with a quick glance round to ensure none were listening. ‘The Keybearer thinks it is time to take a hand in the weaving. They have a plan which they hope will help in the unravelling o’ the Kirk’s
rule.’

  ‘What is that to do wi’ me?’ Gwyneth asked, hostility barely concealed in her voice. ‘As ye have heard, we have our hands full here, with the Fairgean invading the rivers and lochan, and the people rioting for grain in the highlands.’

  ‘Aye, I ken,’ Enit said, her expressive voice warm with sympathy. ‘As I said to ye last night, we have been travelling all through Siantan. We have only just come through the Sgàilean Mountains into Rurach …’

  ‘And what was your business in Siantan?’

  ‘We’re jongleurs, my lady. We’ve been travelling the country, singing the auld songs and telling tales o’ the Bright Wars and the young Righ. It seemed a guid time to remind the countryfolk o’ the grand auld days, when the dragons were our allies and witches were loved. Lachlan the Winged is well aware there are many who still mistrust the Coven and who shelter seekers o’ the Awl.’

  Gwyneth nodded. ‘We have done what we can to stamp out the seekers,’ she replied defensively. ‘There were many in Siantan, and much unrest.’

  ‘Aye, I ken. That is why we were there. The singing o’ auld songs and the telling o’ auld tales can sometimes do what force canna do.’

  Gwyneth brought the plaid closer about her neck as if she was cold. After a moment the old woman went on in a low voice: ‘It is always guid to hear what the countryfolk are muttering about in the corners. We are the ears and the eyes o’ the Rìgh and have always travelled the most dangerous roads for him.’

  ‘I have heard that it was ye who found the Rìgh when he was trapped still in the shape o’ a blackbird, and ye sheltered him and helped him find himself as a man again,’ Finn burst out, her eyes shining. ‘And I heard tell that ye were the true Cripple, the one who masterminded the rebellion against the Ensorcellor!’

  Enit flashed her a look and said very softly, ‘And that is a true tale but no’ one for the common telling, lassie.’