"Oh, isn't that lovely!"
The voice is startling, coming as it does from close by, when she had thought herself alone. It comes from a woman standing on the path down from the cliffs, watching her; a tall woman, quite pretty. Her moon-silver hair is dressed in long plaits that sparkle in the sunlight, and her traveling cloak is richly embellished. The woman looks at the Pelydryn in her hands and smiles.
"What a precious thing you have, darling. Wherever did you get that shining bauble?"
The smile is sweet and gentle, the words kind and engaging, but something in the air grates, somehow, like when you rub a cat the wrong way, down to the tingling sparks that pop at the edges of her mind. She clutches the golden sphere to her chest in small fists, somehow not liking the intensity of this foreign gaze upon it.
"It's mine. Mam gave it to me."
Blue eyes gleam—blue eyes like Tad's, but yet not like. Tad's eyes are twinkling and merry and warm, and these are clear and sharp and cool, like ice.
"Of course she did, a lovely gift. Where is your mother? Does she know you are out here alone?"
Alarm. A backward step. Mam and Tad never allow her to go far alone, but Tad is out for the day, as he always is at full moon, and Mam is resting in the cottage, up beyond the dunes and out of sight. And Tad said let her rest, love. She needs it.
"Mam's resting inside. She's tired."
"In the middle of the morning? Is she ill?"
"No. There's a new babe coming. In winter I shall have a sister, but it makes her tired."
The sparks on the air suddenly change to a sharp crackle. It feels like fire but tastes like metal, sharp and tart, mildly unpleasant but also intriguing; there is a kinship in it.
Curiosity burns, overriding suspicion. "Who are you?"
No answer. A long stare. A slow smile.
"Do you like magic, pretty one?"
A welcome, disarming topic. "Oh! Mam teaches me. She's an enchantress, and so shall I be. Watch!"
She sits upon a boulder. The tide pool at its base is cool on her bare feet. She can taste water-magic, sweet and salty together in her mouth. It flows into her hands and she twists them in the air. The water at her feet ripples and bunches itself into shining ridges. They become tendrils and ropes that wind themselves into the air, twisting and turning in a dance.
It's difficult to do for long. She has to think about it hard, and only it, nothing else; not like Mam, who can make water and fire do whatever she pleases just by speaking to them and carelessly gesturing. In a moment it's all splashing back down to the pool. The stranger claps her hands.
"Oh, that is marvelous! So much gift for such a little one; you shall be a great sorceress indeed! Now, tell me –have you ever seen anyone do this?"
She takes up a driftwood twig with a sinuous white hand, and snaps her fingers. The air moves in a familiar fashion, and there is suddenly a tongue of flame flickering bright at the end of the twig. The sense of kinship flares, blossoming into a smile.
"Oh! You are one of us. Are you..."
Mam has always said there are more of them; that perhaps one day the others will find them again. Sometimes she sits on the cliffs for hours, all sad, watching and watching and watching the sea, in case the others come sailing into the world from wherever they are, and when she does that Tad says it's all right, cariad, only Mam misses her family. Go and give her a kiss and she'll remember us again.
"Are you come back from across the sea?"
"Come back?"
"Mam says there are other enchantresses across the sea. They are my aunts. Are you my aunt?"
The ice-blue eyes glitter, and the flushed lips break into a wide and illuminating smile.
"Oh, yes. That is who I am." The beckoning, outstretched hand is white against the moaning darkness of the sea. "What is your name, dear one?"
She hesitates. Tad says to be careful of giving one's name, and never, ever…
"You're not a faery, are you?"
The woman laughs, a lovely, bell-like peal. "Oh, no. But you are right to ask, small one. Shall I prove that I am your aunt? I know your mother's name—the Princess Angharad, though were our island still standing, she would be Queen. And your father is Geraint, a master illusionist and teller of stories. Is it not so?"
She claps her hands in delight. No one knows these, the secret names they only call each other at home. "It is!"
"You see? Who would know this but your own family? Now then, lovely, your name."
"Eilonwy. Daughter of Angharad, Daughter of Regat, Daughter of Mererid, Dau-"
"You needn't name them all."
She breathes a sigh of relief.
"Are you the aunt I'm named for?"
"Indeed, no. Your aunt Eilwen is over the sea yet. But if you will help me, perhaps we can bring her back. Think how happy your mother will be to see us all! Come with me and we shall make a great magic."
"Where are we going?"
"To a wonderful place. A secret place."
"I'm not to leave the beach, or go beyond the rocks."
"Of course! But that only means you shouldn't go alone. Your parents have taken you beyond those places, haven't they?"
"Sometimes we go to the village. And before we were here we went with the camp, everywhere. Will you take me back to the camp?"
"Why? Did you like it there?"
"There were other children there to play with. Tad told us all stories every night, and we sang and danced."
"Indeed, then we shall go back to them!"
They are walking past the rocks, and then around them, and into the next shallow beach. Tad doesn't ever let her take this path alone. But her aunt is with her. It must be all right.
"Why did you go across the sea? Mam says you were gone before I was born."
"Think what a lovely surprise it will be for her to see me again."
Her aunt walks fast, faster than even Tad with his long legs. She skips to keep up. They round a corner, into a small cove. A moored boat sits upon the water surface. A bulky, plain-faced man lounges inside it.
She stops. Something is wrong. Mam is calling her. She can hear her voice, carried on the wind.
Her aunt pulls gently at her hand.
"Come, child. We must get in the boat. Only for a little way."
"I can't. I must go back."
"Oh, but the surprise-"
The voice is calling, calling, rising, urgent.
"I don't want it. I must go back. Mam's calling me. Let go!"
It isn't just calling. It's a scream. She's afraid, and Mam is never, ever afraid.
And then she can't hear those screams over her own, because her aunt won't let her go, and she bites and kicks and flails. The woman picks her up and mutters sounds that aren't words but they make things happen; they make the light from the sky seem dim and far away as if at the end of a tunnel, and the screams sound farther and farther away and then there's no light, just cold and darkness.
Eilonwy opened her eyes.
For a moment she could not make sense of anything. Everything hurt. Her shoulder throbbed with pain and her head ached. She lay sprawled on a hard surface, and realized quickly that it was unpleasantly wet and cold, and moved up and down in a fair way to make her dizzy. Sounds untangled themselves and became the splash of water against wood, the rhythmic creak of oars in motion.
A boat. She was in a boat. But hadn't that been a dream? She had dreamed of being dragged into a boat, and waking up on the water. It was not a good dream, and it was not a good waking.
Her mind slipped in and out of lucidity, as a star slips in and out from behind the clouds that pass.
She wakes up, a little, enough to feel herself cradled in arms, but they are strange arms, a strange smell, like roses and metal and magic. The boat bobs up and down on a choppy sea.
"Faster," the woman's voice says. It's not sweet anymore; it's urgent and harsh and dangerous. "We must get back to land before her mother realizes she's on the water."
"Goin' as fast as I can. If you'd silenced the brat sooner she'd have less to follow."
"I do not pay you for your counsel. Just your labor and your boat."
"Fair enow'. How'd ye get her so quiet-like, anyway? Wish I could shut my kids down so easy. When they were that age they could make a racket you could hear clear to Mona."
No answer. The rower sniffs.
"Ye ain't gonna hurt her, is ye? I'm a decent man. I don't hold wi' harmin' no wee lass."
"She is not your concern. But no. She is priceless to me, and if any seeks to harm her…" The voice grows dark, and cold as ice. "It will be his last act."
"But ye took her from her Mam. I heard the screamin'. That's a bad business, that is."
"It had to be done. Her mother does not trust me. She would have fought, and none of us would ever have left that cove again. Now she will follow, and in fear for her child she will be forced to see reason. In the end I will have them both."
An uncomfortable silence. The rower coughs. "Pretty little thing."
"Yes." It's a hiss. "She will be a beauty, like all her line. Both gift and curse. But I shall ensure that she knows how to use it to her benefit."
Her eyes fly open, and she kicks wildly, taking the woman by surprise. The strange arms loosen for an instant.
"You're not my aunt. You're a liar. Let me go!"
She flings herself to the side of the boat, tries to scramble over it. If she is in the water, Mam will find her; the sea will keep her, will sweep her straight back to her mother's arms in a stream of turquoise light. The man swears, dodging her flailing feet, but the woman is faster, pale hands darting forward to restrain her again, pinning her down, covering her mouth.
She screams against it, writhes like an unearthed worm, but the woman is stronger, so much stronger, and holds her fast, until she is too tired to fight, too exhausted to scream. They are too far now for Mam or Tad to hear her. No one is coming. No one. She slumps to the bottom of the boat, sobbing.
The oarsmen wipes his brow, watching them uneasily. "Can't ye quiet her like ye did before?"
"No. It was necessary for the urgency of the moment. Too much will leave her with no memory of herself, and then she will be of little use to anyone."
The man mutters beneath his breath, barely audible beneath the soft crush of waves against the boat.
A thump and a curse jolted her to awareness. Eilonwy opened her eyes again, and realized that Magg was in the prow, rowing, struggling against a moody, reluctant current.
She lay quietly, her sluggish mind slowly clearing, casting about for any solution for escape. Could she move quickly enough to throw herself over the side of the boat? Perhaps. But she would certainly drown, if they were any distance from shore. It was possible, of course, that drowning was preferable to whatever fate awaited her. But she was reluctant to assume so. While she lived there was always a chance of escape or rescue.
Should she try to sit up? No...they must land sooner or later, and if Magg thought she remained unconscious, he would be less wary. It might be her only chance of getting away from him, assuming she could stand to run. He had not noticed her open eyes. She shut them again. There was nothing to see but the bottom of the boat anyway.
Llyr, her head hurt. She might not be able to sit up anyhow, as dizzy as she was. Her mouth, still full of cloth, was dry enough to burn. Her stomach churned. If she were sick with a gag on it would be horrid; she must not be sick. Think about something else, anything.
Taran and Fflewddur and Gurgi surely would be searching for her. How would they know where she'd gone? A boat left no tracks, and the water no scent for hounds to follow. But Kaw would be watching from the air, would see all that happened with his sharp eyes. Perhaps he watched, even now. She imagined him, soaring above, flying back and dropping onto Taran's shoulder to chatter to him. Taran would be frantic by now, Taran who had angered her with his anxiety, and had been right all the time. Why had he not just told her of the danger he suspected, instead of trying to control her every move? He had known something, clearly, something more than his vague platitudes about an unfamiliar island.
Taran. His face drifted in her mind's eye, a shining comfort, an aching loss. She had been in peril many times in the last few years, but never without him by her side, his companionship and courage a refuge even in the face of death. In every terrifying memory, he had stood, as well as he could, between her and the threat. He would die to protect her.
It was a silent jolt of insight. She had never put it into words, never consciously acknowledged it to herself until now, but she knew it, as surely as she knew the earth would green in spring.
Perhaps it wasn't such a revelation. Fflewddur would do the same, after all, and Coll, and Gwydion, and any man of valor for a woman or child. It was the way of a warrior.
Odd, really, to think of Taran as a warrior, though it would have pleased him that she did so. It was not what came first to mind when she thought of him. It was his laugh as Gurgi tackled him at the door of the cottage. The way he leaned on the pigcote and talked to Hen Wen as though she were a person. The gentleness with which he gathered up a newborn chick, and the light in his eyes when he handed it to her like a shared secret. The grin he flashed her, across rows of turnip leaves, while they weeded the garden. The safe, strong quietness of him, in the evenings, while they sat on the old wall and watched the stars come out over the trees.
And she'd never told him. Never said anything of what he made her feel, perhaps because she hadn't really told herself. And maybe it wasn't the sort of thing you knew in words at first, really, but just felt, down deep where the roots of things grow, in darkness and secret, only coming to light at the right time, when it was ready.
But it didn't matter now. He wasn't here, and whatever waited for her at the other end of this journey, she would have to face alone. Tears slid from her shut eyelids, joined the seawater puddled in the bottom of the boat. Who, she wondered distantly, had cried the tears that made up the sea?
The boat crunches upon gravel. The woman lifts her out, sets her on her feet on solid ground. She stands there. She should run. But her feet won't move. The part of her that says run is all shrunk small, somewhere down inside, huddled up like a snail in his shell. She can't run, all hidden in a shell.
She hears the woman talking, and the boatman demanding more gold. The woman says something and the air moves, and there's a sharp sense of sparks flying, and a loud noise of something heavy falling to the ground. She looks back, and there's no man, just a pair of boots sticking out from behind the boat, and the woman walking toward her.
"Come. We must walk a little way."
She cannot speak, cannot move. The boots are still, still, as still as the boat lying upon the sand. The woman bends down, blocking her view of them.
"Eilonwy. Do as I say and you need fear nothing. Do you know why I came for you?"
She stares into the shivery blue of those eyes.
"I am your aunt, come to teach you. One day you shall be an enchantress. More than that: you shall be a great queen. Your parents knew they could not teach you all you need to know. It was they who sent for me."
Lie. They would never send her away with anyone like this. Would they? It's a lie; it must be a lie, a lie; it twists in her chest, hot and anguished. "I want Mam and Tad."
"Of course. And they will come. If you are quick and clever, and learn your lessons well, they will come and live with us. Think how proud of you they will be, then."
Tears spill out, hot. She is frightened, and exhausted, and hungry. "I don't want to live with you. I want Mam."
"If you cry, she won't come. She wants you to be brave. Brave girls don't cry."
But she cannot stop. The woman frowns, and picks her up, and carries her through the trees.
She drifted upon dreams, half-formed images of memory, filled with voices. They must have begun as mere whispers, as murmurings lower than the sounds of the water splashing against the boat sides, a slowly rising chorus that her ears finally separated from the waves, so that she opened her eyes again and knew she no longer dreamt. The voices went on.
They said nothing she recognized. Snatches of phrases, of verses, of song, in words she could not understand—whether another tongue entirely, or too garbled and muddled, as though the speakers were underwater, trying to raise words to her from beneath the waves.
The hair on her neck and arms prickled. What voices could there be, out here among the water and wind? Did Magg hear them as well? If he did, he made no indication. But all the sounds were changing. Water was crashing hard upon something solid, a frothy noise that grew ever nearer, and nearer, and then took on a hollow echo. The boat bumped into something, and Eilonwy froze, her heart hammering a sickening, swift drumbeat against her ribs.
There was a charge on the air, a sharp, tingling smell of magic and metal. She knew it all too well: the signature of the presence that had haunted her dreams for years. Like a bird allowed to roam from its cage, all unaware that its leg was tethered, she had flourished in an illusion of freedom, and now would be drawn back, a captive once more.
Not again. Please, not again.
"Milady," Magg spoke, his voice at its oiliest. "I have done as you commanded."
Eilonwy counted her heartbeats in the silence, holding her breath. The disembodied voices roared in her ears.
"Yes." Achren's voice rose above them. "So you have."
They have walked, and then ridden in a litter on horseback, for days. But the woman no longer pretends to be kind or gentle.
"If you run away again, you shall be tied up."
"I want Mam. Mam. Maaaaam."
"Stop!" The white hand cracks, like the slap of a hooked fish's tail, across her face, and for an instant she does stop, shocked into silence, before the pain sinks past the shock, and she screams harder.
"If you call for your mother again, she will never come. I will make it so that she will never find you. Do you understand? Stop it, by the gods, stop crying!"
She's shaken until her teeth rattle, and the white hand rises again; in fear of it she gulps and gasps and fights the sobs, choking them back, swallowing them like rocks so that her throat aches with them and her stomach curdles and she is sick, all over the woman's fine traveling cloak.
Mam holds her and comforts her when she's sick, brings her water and bathes her face and kisses her tears away, but this woman only jerks back, cursing in disgust, and the white hand flies anyway, lands square and sharp across her cheek, even though she's stopped crying. It's mean, spiteful; it's not fair— the unfairness of it burns up her tears, turns them into scalding, angry sparks, flying as she screams, blazing into the bracken around them and instantly setting it alight.
The woman reacts, shouting out words, waving her arms, and magic moves over all, quelling the fire as swiftly as it came. She runs for the last time; the woman chases her, picks her up in her strong grip again and mutters that stream of strange words into her ear. The world goes dark, dark, dark, until the fight and fire are squeezed small inside her, and she cannot remember why she had cried, or anything else, at all.
"I told you she was not to be harmed." The voice was cold and severe, and she knew, with nauseating familiarity, the tone of simpering awe in Magg's voice as he answered. It was how most men spoke to Achren.
"She has come to no true harm, milady. She fought me, as you foretold, and in the struggle to bring her to the boat, she slipped at the riverbank and hit her head on the keel. It knocked her senseless, but she will recover, I am certain. I examined her thoroughly to be sure."
Silence, heavy and dangerous. "I swear it, my Queen," Magg repeated. "I kept my word on every point. She is unspoilt—at least by me."
"What do you mean by that?" A soft hiss.
"Only what I observed, milady, such that raised my suspicions. She came to Mona in the company of a handsome youth—Dallben's pig-keeper, I was told. He watches her like one obsessed and dogs her every step—so diligently that I nearly despaired of getting her away. Once, I observed them speaking together, most fervently. And he did not sleep in his own chamber last night. He was seen moving toward her room, though my informant could not leave his post to verify the destination."
Eilonwy writhed internally, hot with humiliation, as the charge on the air shifted, the tension easing. Achren seldom laughed, but there was a low hum of dark amusement as the boat swayed, as its balance tilted under the weight of her presence. She loomed over Eilonwy, placing a hand on her forehead, where the throbbing ache faded before a comforting flow of warmth. "Well, well," the queen murmured quietly. "Walking in the family footsteps, are we? A namesake worthy of the honor, it seems."
"When we made our arrangement," Magg said petulantly, "I did not think to be taking the leavings of a swineherd."
The steel edge returned to the silken voice. "You are, of course, free to refuse the terms. He would suit my purposes just as well."
"Oh…no, milady," came the instant response. "I make no complaint. I only thought, for the purposes of the ritual, that she must be-"
"Speaking of what you do not know," Achren interrupted coldly, "only proves you a fool. The magic of Llyr is not subject to the offensive conventionalities of men. One fortunate enough to see his goal within his grasp should be thankful enough for that, and stay silent."
Magg muttered something obsequious and affirmative. Eilonwy wanted to shrink away, to escape from that touch and its illusory comfort. Her whole body felt stiff as ice, paralyzed with revulsion.
The velvet voice murmured low, near her ear. "I know you do not sleep."
The stiffness melted, though the revulsion did not. There was no use pretending, never any use; Achren lied too much herself to be fooled by any ruse. Eilonwy opened her eyes, looked upon the face that had stalked her dreams.
Against the overcast, twilight sky, dark with foreboding storm clouds, that white face shone like a livid moon. It looked, for the first time, older, but Achren's eyes still glittered like pale ice shards, and her mouth still smiled that lovely, charming, knife-edged smile.
"Eilonwy. Princess, Daughter of Llyr," she said. "Welcome home."
The chorus of voices sang, a discordant, ancient agreement.