The Shining One

by Steadfast-Bright-Star

In which Magnus, a young farmhand, finds himself in the Unseelie Court, home to the darkest and cruellest of all the faeries, and falls for the charms of Sindre, its beguiling king. As time goes by, he becomes more and more enthralled by the king and forgets the most important lesson of the old stories: never trust a faerie. Bday gift, so friend's preferred human names used. DenNor

"Come over the water, come over
And leave all your sorrows behind
I am the shining one of the forest
And your heart and your soul are mine."

Magnus stirred in his half-sleep at the sound of his mother's low, sweet singing. The fire was cool and red, the coals curdling to grey with ash, and the faint light gilded his sister's hair as his mother's gentle hands worked to braid it. His father leaned forward in his seat by the hearth and stabbed at the fireplace, causing a fresh burst of sparks to rise. His mother tied off his sister's long plait and beckoned her next daughter to take up the position. Magnus cursed his short boy's haircut as he watched the attention she lavished on his sisters, a verse of the song for each of them. Beside him, one of his brothers turned over and accidentally elbowed him in the back, and the flames and his mother's lovely hands became blurred by his pained tears.

"Come over the water, come over
My darling, I wait here for you
I am the shining one of the forest
And I swear my love to be true."

"Mama," said Magnus, sitting up in bed and dislodging two of his brothers, "who is the shining one?"

She turned to him and smiled, her hands never faltering as they crossed the strands of his sister's hair over and over. "Aren't you asleep yet, little one?" she asked softly.

Magnus shook his head. "Tell me the story!" he persisted.

His mother hushed him and turned back to gaze into the fire. "It's a very old song, my sweet," she replied, "and a very old story. My grandmother told it to me one day when I was only a little older than you are now…" She finished the plait and the third sister came to kneel in front of her."

"Tell us, mama." echoed his twin, Mathilde, a girl with freckles and brass-gold hair just like his.

His mother smiled again. "A young man was going to fetch water from the river one day," she began, her musical voice drawing out the words. "He left early in the morning, and his wife warned him to be out of the faerie forest before sunset, because to do otherwise would be asking for trouble. Anyway, he kissed her goodbye and began to walk to the river, and soon he was deep in the forest where the water was as pure as the morning dew. He dipped his bucket for the first time, then the second, and then on the third go he heard a beautiful voice whispering to him from the other side of the stream."

"Was it a pretty lady?" asked Mathilde, enthralled.

"The story doesn't say," their mother replied. "I suppose it must have been a lady – a faerie queen, maybe, or a princess. Anyway, the voice said 'come here', and the young man was terrified. He called out 'who are you?' but there was no answer. Again the voice said 'come here', and again he called out, and again there was no answer. Just then, he looked up and saw that it was already sunset, even though he had not been away from home more than an hour or two, and so it should still have been morning. Then he began to feel afraid, and remembered his wife's warning. 'I am waiting for you' said the voice, and this time he did not ask any questions. He stood up tall and straight and said loudly and clearly, 'you will have to wait forever, for I will never cross the river for you'."

"But the lady said she loved him!" Magnus protested. "She wouldn't want to hurt him."

His mother shook her head. "That's just the song, my love. And even if she had said it, it would have been a lie. Faeries love nobody but themselves, and their own pleasure. But please, no more interruptions," Now it was Mathilde's turn to have her hair braided, and she gleefully took up the position, squirming with the excitement of hearing the story. "Where was I?" their mother murmured to herself. "Ah! So the young man told the faerie, the shining one, that he would not go over to her, for he was afraid that he would never return from his journey. And so he fetched the water and went home and never went to the forest again as long as he lived. And from that day on, his crops were poor and his house cold, and his children grew sickly and some died as babes-in-arms, for the faerie lady never let him forget his disobedience."

Magnus shivered with delicious terror. How awful, he thought, for the man to be cursed all his life for a single act, and for the faerie lady to be so vengeful, for he knew that they never forgave those who angered them, and their memories stretched back to the beginning of time. He burrowed into the nest of blankets that covered the bed in winter and closed his eyes, drifting off to sleep as his mother began to sing the last verse of the song.

"Come over the water, come over
Come over the water to me
I am the shining one of the forest
And my lover I wish you to be."

…

The best and clearest river ran deep in the forest, threading down in glinting silver from the mountains that stood faint and blue with distance above the trees. The water was clean and held a hint of sweetness, and any children who drank it grew healthy and pink-cheeked. It was a hard walk – two hours there and longer back when weighed down with buckets – but the people of the valley were still more than willing to make the journey, stumbling over rocks and unstable ground and plunging into the darkness of the forest. The river was enchanted, some said, the place where faeries came to bathe, and made pure and sweet by their magic. Sometimes, too, someone would crouch to fill their bucket and glimpse a shadow moving through the trees, or hear a rustling among the leaves that sounded almost like laughter.

Magnus and his siblings had often made the journey as children, daring each other to cross the water, singing loud snatches of their mother's old songs, scaring themselves with her stories. And always, always leaving before nightfall, for fear of the things that moved in the shadows – of the faerie mothers, who longed for human children to cherish, and of the cruel lords and ladies of the Unseelie Court, whose power waxed and waned with the coming and going of the winter frosts, and who loved only themselves, and took pleasure in the sufferings of humans. But now, Magnus thought, as he hauled his buckets up the last hill that separated him from the river, he knew better. It was the fear of the wolves that lurked in the forest that made mothers call their children home before dark, and the fear of being forever lost in its dark crevices. Besides all that, his mother had died, and just as time had made him a tall, well-built young man, it had blurred and distorted his memories of her until even her lovely voice was warped and half-forgotten.

The forest held the heavy scent of pines, sweet and damp, and the rushing of the river was audible over the clamour of birds. A wind, sharper than was customary for the season, rose abruptly and disturbed the trees. It carried the warning of frost, and just as suddenly as it had started, it fell away again. Magnus found the glint of sun through the lace of the canopy and, as he knelt beside the water and set his buckets on the ground, he calculated that it was early afternoon. Mathilde had kissed his cheek as she bade him goodbye that morning and reminded him, in the conspiratorial tone in which shared memories are often recalled, to be out of the forest by nightfall. He smiled to himself. He would do the trip home faster than anyone – faster than his older brothers, both long since run away to the army, who had so often raced each other down the treacherous slopes of the forest, their buckets flinging out silvery droplets as they ran.

Magnus dipped his bucket for the first time and the water came swirling into it, glittering silver-white in the weak late-autumn sunshine. The forest was silent, save for the hissing of the torrent, and for a faint movement in the trees in the opposite bank. He shivered as the breeze rose again and, like the touch of a cool hand, caressed his cheek. He dipped the bucket for a second time, and the breeze died away. He plunged it into the water once more.

Come here said a voice that came threading low and calm over the sounds of the forest. The birdsong, Magnus realised, had long since fallen away, and the cold kiss of the wind still lingered on his cheek.

"Who speaks?" he called out, putting down his bucket and getting warily to his feet. He cast a glance behind him, though he knew full well that the voice was speaking from across the water, and saw that the wall of trees seemed darker and denser than before. He realised, with a sickening burst of panic, that he could not remember the old, familiar way home. Down the hill there, he thought, then right, then into the clearing and then… where? The breeze started up again, more insistently now, but underneath it and the sound of the river, the forest was terrifyingly, unnaturally silent. Magnus closed his eyes tried again to trace the route home, but his memory yielded up nothing but darkness.

Come here the voice repeated in the same tone as before.

"Please," Magnus cried out. "Tell me who you are!"

The siren voice came again, weaving its sound into the sound of the river, the sound of the wind, deep and beguiling, drawing him towards the opposite bank which seemed to be glowing amber-bright with twilight. And yet, Magnus thought, faint with terror and confusion, it was only barely afternoon. The voice struck fear into his heart, and yet it tempted him – it was the voice of a man, and Magnus had spent night after night longing for that most forbidden sort of love.

Magnus, the voice said, still calm, yet with a little more force.

Who could it be that knows my name, Magnus wondered. He hoped desperately that it might be one of his brothers playing a trick on him, but in truth the voice belonged to no one he knew. He knows me, he thought, his mind clouded with fear. He knows me.

I am waiting for you

The voice was no louder, but sharper, more authoritative, and the breeze blew and blew, leaving its frosty kisses all over him.

Come over

The water

To me

Now the voice was beginning to pull at him; now the breeze urged him forwards, tugging his cloak, running its icy hands over his body. He looked back once more, and once more the trees seemed to have shifted position, to have knitted themselves ever closer together. They exuded menace: come any closer, they seemed to say, and our branches will slash you to pieces. The light on the opposite bank glittered even brighter, and Magnus remembered his mother's story, the curse that had befallen the man who had refused the faerie's summons. He could not have such a fate strike his family, not with his mother dead and his father struggling with the farm and Mathilde soon to be married. He cast a final glance over his shoulder, desperate to glimpse the glimmer of a searchlight, although of course no one would be looking for him yet, and took a step into the river. The water reached almost to his waist and numbed him with its coldness, but the breeze rose and sharpened and shrieked in his ear and forced him across like a hand on his back.

Magnus reached the opposite bank soaked, numb, trembling. The breeze dropped to nothing; the amber light flooded through the trees like the last brilliant flash of sun before winter.

Come to me said the siren voice, louder now that he had crossed the river. Magnus took a hesitant step forward, then another, and the trees began to rustle. There was movement out of the corner of his eye; when he turned his head, there was only stillness and a whisper of laughter. He paused, longing to turn back, but drawn ceaselessly forward by fear and temptation. Mathilde, his father, his clutch of younger brothers and sisters – all these gave him reason to run away home, and yet he was compelled to keep going, to follow the beautiful voice into the early-fallen twilight. All at once, a profound sense of coldness settled on his shoulders as he saw shadows moving in the trees ahead.

Come to me the voice repeated, and with it came a faint murmur of music. A melody fluttered out of the trees, sweet and trilling, but whether it was a voice or a high, clear flute, or the two intertwined in impossibly close harmony, he could not tell. Magnus quickened his step – the voice and the music and the syrupy glow of the light worked together to intoxicate him. The further he walked, the louder the music became, the bass strings of a harp slipping in between the notes of the melody. The shadows resolved themselves into laughing figures, and the trees thinned out until he found himself in a clearing.

As soon as Magnus stepped into the clearing, the music vanished, although he saw no musicians, and the figures left off their dancing. He looked around him and saw that they were all coldly beautiful, all human in appearance, but with skin that glowed silver-pale, and dressed in clothes of deepest blue, stitched with silver patterns as intricate as those painted by the winter frosts. They were somehow incorporeal, and wore expressions of arch amusement. Not one dropped their eyes from him; not one spoke; not one offered him a reassuring smile. Again there was the muttering laughter that he had heard in the forest; again, there was the mantle of cold draping itself over him. The Unseelie Court, he realised with sickening despair – the cruellest and most capricious of all the faeries, as loveless and unmerciful as the winter itself. He sensed a presence at the centre of the group, but he dared not look ahead of him.

"Magnus," said the voice that had brought him to the clearing, and at last he managed to direct his gaze towards the speaker. A man, no older than Magnus himself – or so it seemed, for Magnus knew that faerie lives beat to the rhythm of something far deeper and older than the frantic pace of human existence – was sitting on a simple throne of dark wood, patterned with rough carvings and inlaid with silver. His face was half-hidden beneath a dark blue mask, the eyes outlined in the same silver as patterned all the courtiers' clothes; his crown stretched up like a nest of icicles the pale blue of winter skies, and his full lips wore the same look of amusement as all the other faeries. At his feet, a pale-haired boy of two or three was playing bad-temperedly with a pile of stones – when he looked up and saw Magnus, he began to cry. The faerie king leaned forwards and lifted the child onto his knee. "Enough of all that, little one," he said softly, "be quiet now." The boy seemed somehow more solid than the courtiers, and his skin was pink against the silver-white pallor of the faerie king. A changeling, Magnus realised with horror – a human child snatched from his cradle for the faeries to cosset and spoil.

"Are you the Unseelie King?" Magnus asked stupidly, almost speechless with fear, his mind reeling with all the sights of the court.

There was a ripple of mocking laughter behind him, and the king half-smiled.

"I am." he replied simply.

Magnus struggled to remember all his mother had told him about faeries – all he had listened to as a child, then dismissed as a youth. He knew only of queens, and the occasional prince – never had his mother told him of the faerie king.

"Is there no queen?" he asked.

Again, the laughter; the king's face hardened.

"Of the Seelie Court, yes," he said. "There is no queen here."

"And is she your wife?" asked Magnus.

There was a collective gasp, and the king glared at him.

"She is my enemy and my opposite," he replied sharply. "Come forward, Magnus," he added in the beguiling tone which had tempted Magnus over the river. "Come to me."

Magnus stepped forward and looked up uneasily at the throne, desperate to speak but unable to form the words. A vague memory of how to behave in front of the nobility surfaced in the back of his mind, and he dropped to one knee. They cannot lie his mother's voice whispered in his ear. They can hide the truth, but they cannot lie, and to know a faerie's name is to know them completely.

"Rise, Magnus." the king said solemnly, and Magnus obeyed.

"How do you know me?" he asked. I will have the truth, he thought.

"I watched you," the king replied, his deep voice expressionless. "And in watching you, I came to know you and desire you."

Magnus's face flooded red. Certainly, this king was by far the most beautiful man he had ever seen, but beneath the beauty was a coldness, a hardness, something unknown. He must have lived for thousands of years; he must have loved thousands of men.

"How old are you?" he asked.

"I am as old as the stories that are told of me." the king replied.

"And what is your name?" Magnus continued.

Once more, the mocking laughter rippled through the court; once more, the king's face flashed with steely irritation.

"It is mine." was all he said.

Now the changeling was wriggling, demanding to be let go. An attendant detached himself from the group clustered by the throne, moving as silently and fluidly as mercury.

"Take the child," the king ordered him tersely as he handed the boy over. "Let the girls have him for their games."

The pair vanished into the twilight of the trees beyond the clearing, and the king returned his attention to Magnus.

"Tell me, Magnus," he said gently. "Are you hungry?" Another of the servants held a silver drinking cup, and now he handed it to the king, who proffered it.

Magnus reached to take it, then hesitated. There was something bad about faerie food, something terrible, but then the scent of the drink reached him, and he forgot entirely what it was.

"Yes," he said. "I am."

The king smiled at him. "I don't think you'll have had anything like it before." he said, giving him the cup.

The drink was gloriously sweet – to Magnus, who had never known anything more than frost-bitten fruits and the occasional drizzle of honey, it was almost indescribable. It was spiced with flavours from the most storied, exotic parts of the world, flavours whose names would have rung foreign in his rustic northern ears: cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla. He drained the cup in seconds, and everything suddenly seemed brighter, the colours stronger and deeper. He was no longer cold, and the eyes of the court, though still fixed on him, no longer pricked him with frost. He would never have enough of this sweetness, he thought – this nectar would never satisfy him, for he would always desire more. The music began again, the same melody as before, and the terrifying silence began to melt into murmurs of conversation. Magnus found his fear beginning to vanish, and he felt a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

"Is there any more?" he asked, brandishing his empty cup.

The king smiled back at him. "There is as much as you want," he replied. "Anything you ask for here will be yours."

Abruptly, the king stood up from his throne, and once more a hush fell over the court. He was not a tall man, Magnus saw, but he carried himself with such majesty and authority that no one could have doubted his royal status. Magnus wondered how he had come to be king – whether he had been born into the position, or whether he had fought for it.

"Leave us." he commanded, addressing the assembled courtiers, and at once they obeyed, scattering into pairs and groups and disappearing into the trees that glowed richly with the gilded, perpetual light of evening. The servants vanished too, following their masters and mistresses into the forest, and soon the music started up again, muffled by distance, and with it the general merriment that Magnus had stumbled into on his arrival in the clearing. Within a minute or two, he was alone with the king.

At such close quarters, his power was overwhelming – his control over his wilful, capricious, passion-driven courtiers; his strength that would only increase as winter deepened and sucked the life out of the land; his incredible, irresistible beauty. Magnus, who had never so much as kissed a man, who had longed to run away to a new life as his brothers had but always, always been stopped by the thought of his father struggling to run the farm alone, found that he desired this king, this faerie, this strange man who belonged to a world that hid itself in the shadows and who was, according to himself, as old as the ancient stories. How he had longed for the forbidden touch; how he had dreamed that someone would come to answer his furtive prayers. But there had been no one until now – until the Unseelie King, king of the darkest and cruellest of all the faerie courts, had called him over the river.

"How long have you wanted me?" he asked, intoxicated by the strangeness of his situation, and made fearless by the knowledge that he was desired.

The king stepped down from his throne so that they were inches apart. Beneath the mask, Magnus saw that his eyes were a blue that was almost black, the colour of the storm-lashed seas that flung themselves against the cliffs as the sky cracked white overhead.

"For the last three winters," he replied. "Since you became a man who could not love a woman. I saw it in you; I sensed that you were different from your brothers."

Magnus frowned in confusion. "I have never…" he began

The king put up a hand to silence him. "I have lived so long, Magnus," he said with a wan smile. "I have learnt how to see these things." He reached forward to cup Magnus's cheek.

"You're so cold." Magnus said, his heart battering his ribs, beating with such force that it thudded in his ears.

The king smiled. "I am winter." he replied.

"You're so beautiful." Magnus said, half-whispering, wondering if he was dreaming, if he would wake to an ash-cold morning and another day's worth of chores on the farm. But already that life was receding from him, and in his memory the faces of his father and siblings were blotted out.

"Come away with me, Magnus." said the king.

He led him to a place outside the clearing where the clustered trees darkened the twilight to the colour of thick amber. The music and laughter of the court was so distant as to be a murmur, the restless muttering of a storm-swollen stream. They kissed each other, and Magnus found himself wanting more and more. As a boy running off to play in the forest, he had always paused at the cottage gate to receive a final warning from his mother – Never trust a faerie; Never linger in the forest; Never eat what they give you, and never fall asleep – but now, as they shed their clothes, as the mask and crown dropped to the ground and turned the king into one of the beautiful young men Magnus had so often desired, the warnings vanished from his mind. They kissed again and again, human warmth against faerie cold, and Magnus almost wept with the wonder of it all. They made love in the eternal half-light, in their own secret place under the trees, and Magnus knew nothing, remembered nothing, understood nothing except this blissful moment, the satisfaction of his desires.

"My name," said the king. "Is Sindre."

"Sindre," Magnus repeated. Sindre. Shining. The Shining One. The name plucked at a memory, at something from his old life, but he could no longer remember what it was. Sindre – had there ever been a more beautiful name for one who desired him, for one who returned all his kisses and whose wintery paleness glowed faintly silver in the evening light? "I love you," he said breathlessly, once it was all over. "I want to stay here forever."

"You can stay here as long as you want," Sindre replied, brushing his cold lips across Magnus's brow. They were curled in each other's arms, faerie and human, hot-blooded life and icy immortality. "I will never make you leave."

…

When Magnus woke, Sindre had vanished from his side, and he had no idea of how many hours had passed. Far off, the music was still playing, and the quality of light was unaltered. Whether it was morning or evening or the depths of midnight was impossible to tell, and as he stood to gather his clothes he felt disorientated, as if he had been pulled outside the flow of time now that he had none of the clockwork movements of the sun to keep him anchored in reality. He dressed quickly, afraid of what might be observing him the shadows, and started off in the direction of the clearing.

He found Sindre on his throne, arrayed as immaculately as before, his head bent in quiet conversation with one of the courtiers, who struck Magnus as some sort of official. He wondered how it was possible to impose order in the faerie court, and how and when battles were fought against the Seelie faeries, who were strongest when the frosts melted away. Sindre looked up as he approached, and beckoned him forward. The courtier dropped briefly to one knee and slipped away to join the festivities.

"Did you sleep well, Magnus?" asked Sindre.

Magnus nodded. "Yes," he replied, burning with desire once more. "Very well."

Sindre smiled, a flicker of satisfaction gracing his lips. "I did so enjoy our time together." he said teasingly.

"As did I." Magnus replied, grinning widely.

Without warning, Sindre seized both his hands and kissed him deeply in front of the whole court. The kiss was soft, though as cold as always, but there was an edge of hardness to it. He is mine, Sindre seemed to be saying to his subjects. And I am your king, and none of you will dare lay a hand on him.

Time passed slowly in this place without time. Magnus tried to keep track of the days, but such a thing was impossible when unknown hours spiralled away from him in sleep, and not even a moment's darkness separated each day from the next. No matter – he was content. He drank the sweet nectar, cup after cup of it, each one delivered up by one of Sindre's shimmering attendants. He danced with Sindre to the wild, trilling music, and with the various ladies of the court, to whom he was an exotic toy – a novelty to punctuate the monotony of their immortal lives. Only the changeling remained immune to his charm, watching him with furious jealousy now that Sindre played with him less and less, all his time taken up by Magnus. Often, Sindre would take him by the hand and lead him again to their secret place, and they would make love and leave him in such a state of bliss that he could barely think, could barely speak except to utter the beloved name. He could not remember who he had been before, or even if he had been before, and after a while such questions ceased to trouble him, his worries washed clear by the nectar and the music and the heavy golden light of the court.

It was after the seventh time of their coupling that Magnus woke and realised that something had changed. As always, Sindre had disappeared, and Magnus realised he had never seen him in sleep. He wondered whether he was unwilling to show himself in such a vulnerable state, or whether immortal creatures such as him had need of such a thing as sleep at all. He had a vision of a small stone-built cottage, a clutch of children running around outside and a man, no longer young, out in the fields to gather the year's meagre crops. His home, he realised – his siblings, his father. How long had he been gone? A week at least, though really it was impossible to tell. The harvest would have to be brought in soon, and his father was too old to manage it alone, and those of his brothers who remained at home were too young to offer anything in the way of help. I will have to go, he thought miserably. I will have to save my family, and leave my Sindre behind.

Once again, he trod the familiar path to the clearing where Sindre held court, and once again a cup of nectar was placed in his hand. As always, he swallowed it down, but this time its sweetness was sticky and overpowering, and clung vilely to the roof of his mouth. He grimaced at the taste, and handed the cup back. The faerie glamour was beginning to fade, he realised – if he turned his head quickly, he could catch a glimpse of the forest as it really was, before the golden twilight rushed in to mask it. It was as if he had outstayed his welcome – as if the magic no longer existed to beguile him.

Sindre was more majestic than Magnus had ever seen him, he realised as he approached. There was nothing different about his outward appearance, but now he seemed almost to radiate cold, and at once Magnus felt the overwhelming reach and strength of his power. Trembling, he took up his position in front of the throne.

"I must go," he said eventually, after a few moments spent scraping together his scraps of courage. He looked up to gauge Sindre's reaction, but there was none, and behind his mask his eyes surveyed the centuries he had seen. "My mother is dead," he continued, though of course Sindre must already have known. "My father is growing old. If I do not help him bring in the harvest, half our crops will lie wasted in the fields, and my brothers and sisters will go hungry all winter."

Sindre watched him without emotion, with the measured understanding of one who had lived for thousands of human lives. He saw in Magnus the fitful flowering of a human lifespan, the blooming of inchoate passions that flickered once or twice and vanished and seemed so frantic, so desperate, so irrational. So strange, these humans, he thought, and so pathetically short-lived. How many young men, Sindre wondered, have stood before me and begged to go home? How many of them know that a handful of hours to me is years upon years to them? But he could not lie – all this power, and he could not shape his lips into anything other than the truth.

"You need not worry about your family." he said calmly.

"But I miss them," Magnus admitted, and his eyes clouded with tears as he imagined their worry for him – the search lanterns beaming wildly through the darkness, the hope, the prayers, and lastly the despair. "I cannot stay here any longer."

"You can only leave once," Sindre warned him. "If you try to return, you will never find this place again, even if you search until you die."

"Never?" Magnus asked weakly.

"Never." Sindre confirmed.

Magnus sighed. "Still," he said resignedly. "I must go."

"Do you know your way back?" Sindre asked.

Magnus nodded. "Clear as anything," he replied. "I forgot for a while, but now I remember."

"You have one more chance to stay," Sindre said at length. "But not once can you return."

"I know," said Magnus. His voice cracked, and his tears overspilled. "Goodbye, my love." he said thickly.

Sindre inclined his head. "Goodbye, Magnus." he replied.

…

As soon as Magnus reached the other side of the river, he looked back the way he had come, but the trees that had blazed with twilight wore the grey light of autumn afternoons, and not a whisper of laughter disturbed the silence. Already, his memories of the Unseelie Court were splitting into half-dreamed fragments, things of tremendous strangeness. His mother's old song sounded in his ears, but he dismissed the thought of it. He had answered the Shining One's summons and crossed the river – surely he had nothing to fear now.

He noticed that his water buckets had gone, but it did not perturb him unduly – the search party must have happened upon them, he supposed, and brought them home to his father, for pragmatism ruled among the local people, and a missing son would not be brought back any quicker if valuable household tools remained missing as well. As he walked, following the route that was once again familiar to him, he called out his siblings' names, straining his ears for a reply. The forest was outwardly unchanged, but there was an undercurrent of subtle strangeness, as though the place was no longer quite the same. All at once, he realised that he was ravenously hungry – as hungry as if he had not eaten for weeks, and as if the faerie nectar had been nothing more than air or water. He reached out and plucked a berry from a bush, but when he placed it in his mouth, it tasted like ash, and lingered sourly on his tongue like dirt. The man who has eaten the food of the faeries will never again take pleasure in human food his mother's voice admonished him. Magnus shook himself. A bad berry, he thought – they were all on the turn at this time of year, and it would probably have been rotten through if he had cared to look before eating. Still, his heart beat a little faster, and he quickened his pace, eager to be back home. A miracle, they would all call it, and he would probably earn himself in the collective memory of the village for his exploits. He smiled at the thought.

At the top of the last hill before the descent towards the cottage, Magnus paused to look out for the plume of smoke from the chimney. Since childhood, it had served as a beacon for him and his siblings, a sign that they had come safely home again, but today, even though the frosts had begun to gild the fallen leaves, there was nothing. He began to feel sick with fear – what if they had all caught some terrible disease? What if they were freezing to death without him to cut the firewood? – and he took the last stretch of the journey at a run. Again he called out to his father, his siblings, and again he was met with silence. The trees thinned out to nothing, and before him, where the family home should have sat reassuringly to meet him, was nothing but a pile of stones. Even the road outside was overgrown with weeds. No one had lived there for years – no one had so much as passed by.

Magnus was seized by an unspeakable emotion, a despair so complete that it stopped up his throat so that he could not even scream. His memories, his mother's stories, flooded into his mind, hammering against his skull with daggers of pain. They live for thousands of years, she had told her captivated children one freezing night, and all our lives would pass in a single one of their days. He had spent so many hours with Sindre, trusted him, believed him without question, but the truth was that he had been beguiled by the faerie glamour. Sindre had not loved him – Magnus had fallen for the Unseelie King, the leader of the darkest, cruellest court of faerie, the spirits of winter and death, indifferent to human misery. Magnus had been tempted by a siren voice, and drunk deeply of the faerie nectar, and been intoxicated by the thought that he was desired. Desired – not once had Sindre said that he loved him.

And, thought Magnus, as he walked among the mossy stones of the house, every hour with him had been a handful of human years. His father's kindly face bloomed unbidden in his memory, Mathilde's smile and freckles, all his brothers and sisters. If I had left the forest within a day, he thought, they would already have lived and died. Sindre had not loved him, had not even shown him any particular kindness. There had been hundreds of other foolish young men like him, forced by the terrifying old stories to cross the river; like as not, there would be hundreds more. Faeries love no one but themselves, and their own pleasure his mother had said that night, when she had told the story of the vengeful Shining One. And now Magnus knew the truth of those words better than anyone. Sindre, the Unseelie King, the majestic, the beautiful, the beguiling, the powerful – he was all these things. He had stolen everything Magnus had ever loved, and given him nothing but a few hours' false pleasure in return.