Chapter 8 – La Mémoire des Arbres

"The Memory of Trees"

"Nuadha Airgeadlámh, macBalor, mac Gíallchad, Llaw Eraint. Who is called Finn Fáil, I Challenge you. Prince of Éirinn, Heir of Bathmoora, I Challenge you. Tiarna an Claidheamh Soluis…. I Challenge you."

He was the first to hear it. Every sound, every spoken syllable of his Name in perfect cadence with the heartbeat of the world. He knew where it was coming from and he knew who was speaking it. Her voice came to him easily, welling up from his subconscious along the familiar paths of the Dream they had already shared. He bowed his head, and waited.

She stated her Challenge succinctly, using a simple customary rhyme, letting the threads of the Geas intertwine with it and give it substance.

"A rite of kings is hidden, find it. A wound is bleeding, bind it. Hope was lost, return it."

Nuada tilted his head and listened as the deep, eldritch, magics of the Earth rose up to meet the words and to weigh them against the memories that Ailith no longer possessed. As the Geas was brought into being, the very trees around him bent and swayed with fervor as they recited the Challenge he was to meet.

Oak raised its voice first: "Upon the stone of Lia Fáil has every great king been crowned, for it cries out in joy when the Sovereign returns to his own."

Followed by Birch and Willow in time: "But before it can be revealed, the blessing of ascension you must secure from the only other who might lay claim to the throne. If it is not given, no force may be brought to bear, and you must leave then with this burden of acceptance in payment of the pain that came before."

Then Ash, to add its own distinction: "And back into exile, never to return again."

And Elm, entwined with Mistletoe: "But if it comes with promise in good faith, raise then that which gave you life anew and bring it to the place that She shall name, where a guardian stands before a jumbled corpse, consumed by trees. Fell the guardian, and return what was taken."

Finally, Holly, hidden in the mire: "Do this, and the Name is reborn upon the night she receives you, in the bower beneath the sun."

He breathed slowly, letting his eyes close as the first bonds of the Geas began to form and take hold of his soul; tying his Fate and his desires to the churning cycles of seasons, to the laws and obligations of oath-keeping, and to the whims of the green and wild places of the Earth. He did not resist it, even when it became painful. The commotion around him fell away, from the Corvids and the Hound and his sister, while his mind drifted into meditative silence. From there, he could almost see her again.

Without hesitation, he answered the ultimatum laid before him.

"Mar a deir tú. I accept."

Ailith stood, staring out at the darkness, for longer than she knew.

It was done. The Geas now bound them both in its endlessly twisting, spreading, roots and ropes of chthonian magic. It sunk down into the Earth; churning up old, buried, secrets and awakening things in the deep that had not stirred in an age. The world around her began to rouse and the trees in the park just beyond her vision quaked with new life. But the task was set and all she needed to do now, was wait. Nuada would either meet the Challenge, or he wouldn't. Either way, the world from this moment on would be a very different place for her.

She looked up, somewhat surprised to hear what almost sounded like a distant cacophony of voices calling out to her. In the shadows of artificial lamplight, she could see the hill across the street and, for a moment, she thought she could see the woods starting to… climb it? Small saplings bounding up the grass with playful excitement as older, weightier, grandmother trees ambled behind and admonished them to slow down and find their footing. She wandered forward, a little unsure as to what she would see when her vision became clearer.

Ailith then came to a stunning realization. She remembered this park. It was the same place wherein the agents of B.P.R.D. had first found her and taken her in; after having removed a pair of bodies from…. she gasped…. the trees! The words from her very first conversation with Nuala came back to her.

"There was a man in Rock Creek Park." She had said, forever ago in the library. "He was shot by these two men trying to steal his wallet. His name was Tom, the man who was shot. I remember seeing him lying in the grass, he was bleeding and scared."

Ailith stepped gingerly through the half-open gate and out onto the paved walkway where a weeping cherry tree in full riotous bloom gaily traipsed past her, only to come to a stop when two oak trees reached out to unwrap their roots from a boulder blocking the path.

Her own voice continued in her mind. "I remember walking over to him and telling him not to be afraid, that everything was going to be alright. I'm not sure how I knew he was going to be OK but as I watched, I could see the blood that was spreading on his shirt was stopping, and then it was like it…. reversed, or something. It bled back just as it had come out. His shirt wasn't even stained. I held his head in my hands but he kept telling me to run away, that the men who had shot him would come back. Even stranger, I remember telling him that they wouldn't, that the men with the gun had angered the trees and that they wouldn't be coming back. Not ever."

The woodland everywhere was alive and Ailith's eyes widened in awe. The entire forest was rejoicing! Dancing wildly, roots tearing up from the ground as elms, willows, and ash trees, hundreds of years old, swayed and rolled in their utter elation. Still partially frozen ground was turned over and a scattered mess of snowdrops and crocuses burst out from the soil as leafy buds split through winter-darkened branches to wash the world green.

"But I don't remember why I told him that or what I meant by it. I can only remember that it had something to do with the blood going back, something about blood and trees and the water from tears and something else. The last thing I can remember before here then was a light. There was a light in the trees and it was coming towards us. And then that's it."

Despite herself, Ailith laughed and smiled at the antics playing out before her. It was like a grand performance, a kind of welcoming dance, for a prodigal child they were completely overjoyed to see. Several of the trees even approached, reaching out their lowest branches to touch her hair and then her face. When she responded by running her fingers over their rough edges, they trembled and shook, the sounds of their voices emanating from deep within the heartwood at their centers. She heard them then, she heard and understood everything they said. Not in talk, so much, but in images and tastes and scents carried in on a cool, spring, breeze. Sentences formed out of flowers and pollen, ideas expressed in the insects hiding along the bark, and words tapped out in the rustlings and murmurings of leaves overhead. An ancient and bent oak rambled up to her and, without fear, she stepped into it and wrapped her arms around its knotted base. "Jenny's Has More Leaves." She laughed warmly. "That is your Name, isn't it? It was given to you by a little girl a very long time ago." But then her face fell and she gently laid her cheek against the heaving trunk. "You miss her. You wonder why she didn't come back. I don't know, I wish I did. But you have all these wonderful memories of her, don't you?"

The wood shifted and groaned in sad repose.

"Well, that's all we can do. Keep our memories safe. And then, she's always with you. When you're ready to leave your acorns, you can scatter them in her honor."
She thought on it then and starkly realized that, aside from this place, this set-aside urban park, she had no other real memories than that of Nuada. The times she had snuck into the dim cell to while away an afternoon or spend an evening were what she thought back on when she did any kind of remembering at all; of everything or herself. Unconsciously, her fingers entwined with the carousel necklace she still wore, running the pad of her thumb over the curiously carved initials: ALM. What did it stand for, she wondered? And not for the first time. Were they an indication of her own name? Or something else? Did Nuada know?

Safely ensconced in the protection of the trees, her feet precariously balanced on two large roots that the oak had raised up to carry her, she recalled her favorite image of him. He had been sitting on the floor, in an introspective pose, at the front of his glass cell. More ruminative than contemplative, he had been that way for nearly an hour before she had come upon him. Closing the short distance between the door and the barrier on bare feet, he didn't immediately notice her presence (or if he had, had given no indication of it). As such, she'd had her first real chance to see him unobscured. She had observed then that he was graceful and strong but with a kind of taut rigidity, much like an overdrawn bow poised to loose a fiery arrow before it had burned down too far to the hand. The dark pigmentation around his eyes and mouth, fading outwards into well-pointed ears, made for a more angular profile than she realized he actually had. Highlighted more so, of course, by the deep scarring in the spiral at his temple and the line that traversed the bridge of his nose. She had desperately wanted to touch him at that moment, and, had it not been for some six inches of protective glass, he might have even allowed it. She wanted to feel whether or not his skin was soft and pliant or stony, whether the scar cut deeply or barely at all, and whether or not the smooth, white-blond, locks were unquiet as spider silk or sleek as carded flax.

As she had been pondering all of this, he had, naturally, sensed that he was being watched and had opened his eyes to regard her in turn. When she realized he was staring at her, there was a brief moment where she thought she should be embarrassed. To even apologize for having snuck up on him and then spent the last few minutes silently gawking. But whatever words she might have been scrambling to come up with in the moment died quickly as she met his gaze. She wished she knew what he had been thinking about right then because his expression, his entire demeanor really, was so unexpectedly peaceful. His eyes were a serene kind of golden amber but rather than seeming sad, as they often did, they seemed brightly attentive. In that moment, it had felt as though he was looking straight through her, to some unrealized truth beneath the crackled skin. Glimpsing it moving behind the fissures and breaks all across her face. He had met her eyes and almost smiled. A genuine expression but so very fleeting, filled with reassurance and affection and something that could have almost been mistaken for tenderness. A strange look for the fierce Warrior-Prince of Bathmoora; as though something rather unprecedented had recently occurred to him and, at last, set his heart at ease.

Ailith sighed. It was a happy memory but potentially filled with terrible false promise. The role of the Sovereignty Goddess in the Great Hunt was well documented throughout old Celtic history and it wasn't always a pleasant one. A Sacred High King only ever became Sacred High King in one way, and that was along the Threefold Path. He must promise to enforce the buada (Gaelic: prerogatives), he must honor the geasa, however many, and finally, he must lay with the goddess during the banais ríghe, the so-called Wedding Feast of Kingship wherein he would be espoused to the land, and mated to the goddess in a rite called the feis.

She frowned. One of the most famously lurid instances of this rite involved an early Medieval King-To-Be, Cenél Conaill, having sexual congress with the goddess following the Hunt, in this case a White Mare he referred to as the 'horse goddess,' before killing and cooking her to be served to the attendant nobles during the feast.

'Horse-goddess,' indeed, she sniffed.

But either way, it was the feis that officially ended the Hunt and it was the feis that would begin Nuada's guardianship over the kingdoms of the Fae and his right to absolute fealty, should he complete the Challenge as presented. Nuala had also said as much, though not in quite as specific terminology. Thankfully, Ailith was not under the impression that Nuada had any intention of ever trying to actually kill her. Or eat her. But there was the rest to consider. Was she ready for all this? She tugged at her necklace pensively.

Something snapped. Suddenly, Ailith shouted out an incoherent noise and nearly fell off her perch in the roots of the great oak. There was a Word, a new Word, where there hadn't been one before and it came rushing out at her as through cresting an oceanic wave. It crossed through the palm of her hand and bit a wound into her mind. She startled and grabbed back onto the tree, which immediately summoned more branches to shelter and steady her. She looked down at her necklace with consternation; as though the metal had insultingly attacked her without cause. But she almost tore it off when she realized that the carved letters were beginning to glow. The 'A' brighter than any other; it's blue-orange gleam cutting the lines deeper into the soft metal as the Word came to her again.

"Ardrí."

It was not a Word she knew. Was this a Name? Why was it emanating from her pendant?

The trees became restless, careening and bending about in a concerned and agitated way; the canopy swooping and sighing as though caught in the winds of an oncoming storm. As they did, the glimmer faded back and the tiny horse, anchored by its pole…or was it speared by a lance?...turned around and around again until the letters were once again hidden behind the worn filigree and musical notes. Ailith took a second to regain her center before placing her hand against the aging oak to calm it, mumbling comforting words to the angry matriarch.

"It alright." She whispered. "It's alright. I promise you. Yes, yes, I don't know what that was either but it's gone now. It's gone and it is just us. I don't know what it means just yet but I'll figure it out. You don't need to be angry about any of this. It's how things are going to be, I think. Because this is the time. I feel that. It is the time for us just as much as it is the time for you."

The trees were not convinced and relayed their unease in chittering birdsong. Ailith smiled and replied. "Spring has come, don't you see? True Spring. And you must not fret. Nuada will not hurt me. He is as much a part of this rhythm as we are and if he is able to rise above himself at last, and keep his promises, then it will be a better world for everyone. I'll make sure of that."

The old oak moaned and dipped its considerable crown.

"But, now I need to ask something of you. Of all of you. Because, you see, I seem to have lost my memories. I don't know where I am supposed to go now or what I am supposed to do, but I know it's something important. I think there was a time when I knew these things, but it's gone now. Can you reach back through your rings and show me what I am missing? Can you be my memory?"

A raucous din arose among the forest as the trees each began to speak all at once. The eldest oak was the first to respond by pulling them all deeper into the thicket and retreating, with Ailith, into the furthest part of the wooded oasis. After which a weeping willow came trundling up to inform the gathering that the Geas had been confirmed and that it was time to bring the Unicorn to the appointed place. Beech then approached, admonishing them all to take things in their proper order and not be rushing about as squirrels. Ailith hardly had to wonder what exactly this meant as the grove took its time to settle and began the tale she had been dreading to hear. These, then, were the memories that had first come to her in the Dream by the fireplace.

Ailith listened intently as the trees told her the story of whence she had come. Listened in silence as the lady bugs and mayflies wove the tale of a Hunt gone terribly wrong in the centuries before this one. Listened as slugs and cicadas explained how a human had fraudulently taken the place of the rightful Huntsman. How the Huntsman had been murdered and consigned to the bog with his throat cut and then the Unicorn slaughtered. How crowds had cheered as she was torn apart by butcher's knives and her horn severed and paraded about as a trophy of her gruesome end. She listened to the lichen and ivies as they sobbed through the worst of the injustices meted out against the Fae as they attempted, and failed, to reclaim the body of their stolen Queen afterwards. They recounted, again and again, how heroes had sworn to quests to retrieve the alicorn until so much time had passed that it was lost to rumor and speculation. And then, to myth. It was the butterflies, however, that truly broke her heart as they gently recounted the sorrows of a Kingdom that then witnessed the end of its noble houses, the destruction of its sacred places, and the annihilation of its people; all chewed into fodder by the jaws of the great Industrial Revolutions that followed. The trees had remained burdened with these memories since that time and now offered up all they knew with the hope that their suffering had been for the greatest good. When they finished their tale, Ailith didn't bother to dry the tears that flowed freely down her cheeks and onto the roots and ground below. That's what she had remembered. Something about blood. Something about tears. And this was it.

The old oak stretched out a tiny twig to catch the droplets in the air before setting Ailith back down onto the grass. She took a deep breath and smoothed her threadbare clothes into a semblance of normalcy. The trees began to speak again, but this time of something rather more fantastical, and she listened to them intently. But whatever secrets they imparted that night have never been revealed to Mankind, and Ailith never spoke of it again. Instead, she merely nodded in agreement as the trees offered to open the hidden ways, to reveal to her the Trod through this forest, that would allow them to take her to the next place themselves. To the average human, this appeared as little more than a greener path in the grass, a slightly different verdant shade marked by the occasional toadstool signpost, that wound its way alongside the walking paths and into the brush. From here, they would travel across the sea.

"Thank you, my friends." She spoke to them aloud. "Thank you for your remembrance. You are truly the anamnesis of the world. So, let us be off then. We have something to do now, do we not? Take me home. I'm ready. Take me to Temair. Back to the Hill of Tara, where it all began."

"Sister." Nuada turned. "A word."

Nuala clasped her hands before her and looked askance at her brother. "You do not need to tell me." She started. "I heard it."

"Then you know what Ailith has done." He stated, matter-of-factly. "Yes." She answered. "She has made her choice. I fear, to her detriment."

Nuada drew close, but not threateningly. "You know very well already that she will come to no harm by my hand. The Oath of Protection stands."

"I know." The Princess sighed. "That is not what I mean. It is your despair that I fear, brother, not your anger. A Unicorn's heart is love and laughter and light but you turned your back on all those things long ago."

Nuada paused thoughtfully and did not immediately answer. When he did, it was to pose a question.

"Will you walk with me?"

The bustle of the Troll Market filled the air. From beneath the 11th Street Bridge, Nuada had taken the entourage through the tunnels that led under the river, beyond the passages hidden by waterways, and into the outskirts of the Fae settlements surrounding the central bazaar. To Nuala's surprise, she found that he had already established a kind of short-term presence here. In the stately rooms they now occupied, deep beneath the old rainwater drainage system, he maintained a small court of eagerly attendant kith. The Corvid guards patrolled the outer perimeter of the primary lair, the great Hound stayed happily to the main hall to gnaw on bones and scraps the astonished denizens giddily provided, and he had immediately given the Princess her own quarters stunningly arranged with many of the remnants of the Elven Court of Bathmoora.

The servants of the household were the first to express their excitement at seeing Nuala; several rushing in to bow or curtsy and ask her if she needed anything. It then shortly occurred to her that, for many of them, this was not only the first time they had ever seen a member of one of their remaining royal families but it was certainly the first time they had ever seen Prince and Princess, brother and sister, together. As the twins thusly stepped out into the 'streets' of the Market proper, more citizens and subjects gathered around, though they also managed to keep their distance and keep the way clear as their beloved sovereigns made their way past. And then, for the first time in centuries, the siblings began to converse with genial familiarity.

"I know you think me cruel, sister. But I can assure you that I have only the best interests of our people at heart."

"Perhaps that is so. But your way has always been one of wrath. Our people love you, but they also fear you, brother. And with good reason."

"You think this makes me unfit, do you?"

Nuala sighed, but rallied quick enough to offer a gentle smile to a small Halfling girl peering at the two of them in awe from behind her mother's skirts. "You will meet the Challenge, Nuada. Of that, I have no doubt. It is not in your nature to do otherwise. But if you succeed in restoring the Unicorn, I'm afraid that you may be unprepared for what will be truly asked of you."

Somewhat misunderstanding his sister's meaning, Nuada scowled. "The feis need not be harrowing, Nuala. And what I ask is simple. One night, and then, if Ailith wishes nothing more to do with me or of any of the needs of our people, that is her choice. But she will be Queen by right of the Hunt. I will take no other. That is not so much to manage."

"I did not mean to imply that I thought you physically incapable of your duty, brother." The Princess replied. "I mean that…it will not be enough."

Nuada stopped as they arrived in the ornate nave of a space that looked to have once been an ancient cathedral and examined his twin coolly.

"Let me show you something." He gestured towards the open set of peaked, doubled doors.

Unsure but not unwilling, Nuala entered first and gasped. Before her lay the Vault of the Woodwose; the last remaining structure of an Elven sanctuary built before humans had ever laid eyes on the Emerald Isles; though it had also lain dead and dormant since before either of them had been born. The presiding spirit, a deity Mankind had come to refer to as The Green Man, was also represented here. But rather than being carved of stone or wood, as was typical in human architecture, this being grew fully-formed out of the base of a great tree. A face of roots, leaves, and flowers was clearly visible, some six feet high and four feet across at the forehead; hanging, poised, over the expanse below. Vines sprouted from his mouth and nostrils, and curled outwards in impossibly interlacing lattice-works of knots and filigree. Everywhere else in the room, a great garden had erupted directly out of the stonework, covering the floor in a carpet of moss and creeping white thyme and the walls and ceiling with hanging verbena, wisteria, and hyacinth blossoms. To the Princess's astonishment and delight, butterflies had appeared as well, flitting from flower to flower on gossamer yellow wings.

"Nuada." She quite nearly exclaimed. "How is this possible?"

Nuada crossed the holy space with great care and reverence before approaching the Woodwose. From beneath the thick foliage at its mossy beard he produced a wrapped bundle. It was long and thin, bound in cotton cloth and tied with a strand of ivy. He turned, approached the Princess, and held it out to her.

Nuala hesitated. "What is it?"

"I need you to see."

With delicate fingers, the Princess undid the binding at the top and pulled open the two folded ends of the cloth. She stared down, silently. Battered and broken shards of light played across Nuala's skin and flitted through the garden beyond. As it did, butterflies appeared and disappeared, fluttered their wings and fell still, until it was no longer clear what was light and what was shimmering wings. Until it was clear that the butterflies and the light were one and the same things. The roots at their feet strengthened and crept further into the narthex, the blossoms changed from white to lavender to blue, and the Green Man rumbled to life in the restless branches.

"This." Nuala choked back her lament. "Does not belong to us."

"No." Nuada replied, returning the wrap and binding and replacing the alicorn in the secret space in the alcove. "It does not. And when I return it to its rightful bearer, this…" He indicated the whole of the room and the power contained within it, "…will be returned to our people."

Nuala pressed her hands to her chest in a gesture of anguish. She knew what her brother meant and she knew why he meant it, but she still could not bring herself to see this as anything other than a sacrifice. Sacrificing Ailith on the altar of what could have been.

But to Nuada's surprise, his sister did not voice a refusal. Instead, she seemed to take in all that moved and breathed around her before looking back up at him and meeting his eyes in a defiant stance.

"In the years I have known you," Nuala said, "You have always been capable of profound violence, but I also know you to be capable of equally profound gentleness. If you are to be King, Nuada, then you must reclaim the full measure of your own soul before the crown can be yours."

Nuada clenched his hand, but did not move to protest. "You must rule by the will of a peaceful people." His sister continued emphatically. "Can you do that? Can you set aside the Warrior Prince in Exile? The SilverHand? If you are to become High King, then you must choose a new Name. No more Airgeadlámh, but Finn Fáil, who upholds the laws of fír flaithemon (Gaelic: Ruler's Truth). What say you to that? Will you submit?"

"Is this the condition of your blessing, sister?"

"It is."

"Do you then renounce any claims to the Summer Throne and accept your place in line as the heir and queen of Bathmoora and the people therein?"

"I do."

He eyed her warily at first and then with certainty.

"Then I agree."

"Tada gan iarracht, Nuada (Gaelic: Nothing is done without effort). It will not be enough for you, brother, to undertake this as a mere contest. As a hero's task to be overcome and a prize to be won. What the Unicorn demands of you, what Ailith needs from you, is not your obligation or your disinterest, but your heart. So, in this, you must not only find your way forward, into a new title and a new Name, but backwards, to that which you left behind. Are you prepared to do this?"

Silence then fell between them as Nuada deliberated over all his sister had said and all that she now asked of him. He did take not any of it, not a single word that had passed between them, lightly but what the Princess did not know is that he had been meditating on each of these very things for weeks, deciding at every turn what he was and was not willing to say or do. In a cell. In chains. With a shattered girl and a broken heart as his only counsel.

He met her gaze again, drawing himself decorously up to a dignified posture and meaning every part of the promise he was making. "I am."

"I Name you then, Nuada Neachtain, Tiarna an Dál nAraidi, he who is Maine Mórgor (Gaelic: Of Great Duty)."