The Mammoth Book of Irish Romance (35 page)

Sinead wearied of this verbal battle. “What is it you want from me?” she asked resignedly.

“How tiresome these ordinary folk are, are they not?” he addressed himself to his companion.

“Have we not already stated our purpose? Is it not clear to anyone with eyes and ears what the Fae folk want, what we enjoy above al else?”

His sister rushed forwards. “Pay no mind to my brother, little one; he is simply in love with his own wit. He means no harm by it.”

When the words were spoken in that lilting, musical voice Sinead found that she could almost believe them.
Almost.

“Never mind the false kindness. Simply tel me what it is you ask – or rather what you demand, for I’ve no doubt it wil soon enough come down to that.”

The golden brow knit and the rosebud shaped lips puckered into a pout. “You see, brother? You see how you have offended her? And now she wil never come wil ingly to the dance.” Her companion glowered. “What matters it whether she is wil ing or not? She has entered the ring. She is in our power.”

Sinead swal owed, for she knew his words were nothing but truth, whether he intended malice or not – and obviously he did.

“I don’t understand,” she answered, feigning ignorance to buy herself more time. “What is this about a dance?”

“How simple-minded you mortals are.” The male sneered at her. “Do not pretend ignorance.

There can be no man, woman or child alive who does not know of the faery dance, the endless, eternal dance of bliss in which we pause only during the light of day to gain new partners.”

“Of which you are now one,” his sister cut in. As she spoke, she shifted oddly, as if to cover something with her skirts.

Sinead’s attention was drawn downwards where, for the first time, she noticed an appal ing sight. The feet of the Fae were bare despite their other finery. And what feet they were! Battered and bloody, bruised and swol en, they were the feet of immortal beings who spent every night of their lives dancing heedlessly, madly away under the light of the moon, no more able to stop themselves than the ant could stop its toil or the seasons could cease their turning.

“Your feet,” Sinead gasped, with mingled sympathy and horror.

The male seemed annoyed that she had noticed the single flaw to their otherwise beautiful persons. “Never mind that, it is nothing.” His tone was dismissive. “The pain is scarcely felt when one becomes caught up in the rapture of the dance.”

“That is so,” his sister agreed.

Sinead’s eyes widened. “You are mad. Both of you.”

The male simply smiled; the female nodded pleasantly. “But, of course.” Sinead shuddered. “I . . . I think I’d better be going now.”

“But you cannot,” the female answered. “Once a mortal has entered the ring it is physical y impossible for them to depart, unless we wil it.”

“Let me guess. The law of the Sídhe?”

“Exactly so,” answered the male.

Sinead sighed. “I’ve told you my mother needs me – she needs this joyflower. What wil it take for you to agree to let me take it to her?”

“There is nothing that can be given in exchange for a human life. I’m sure you wil agree,” answered the male faery coyly.

For the first time that day Sinead felt the backs of her eyes prickle with tears – not tears of fear, but of dismay and frustration.
To have come so far only to be defeated by a witless pair such as
this!

It was in this moment of utter despair that an idea came to her mind. “Suppose we made a bargain?” she offered. “Suppose I swore to return at dawn tomorrow? Would you al ow me this one last night to return to my home? After al , what could possibly be gained by keeping me now against my wil ? I can promise you I’d never cease to hate you for it and I should not dance wel for you at al . It would be an eternity of strife.”

The faeries exchanged looks. Then the female shrugged. “I see no reason why we should not let you go for awhile yet. If you swear to return to us of your own free wil , we wil grant you this last half-day and night of freedom. We wil even grant you the joyflower to carry away.” Her brother looked disgruntled, Sinead noted, but he too gave his assent.

“At dawn on the morrow,” the female said, “the magic wil come for you.” Regretful y, Sinead agreed.

Scarcely had she escaped this second test when she found herself facing a third. The woods at the edge of the meadow were dark and deep and were rumoured to be guarded by fearsome forest creatures who permitted no human to set foot within their boundaries.

And yet, the fever-wort grew only within the shadows of the wood and, having committed herself this far, Sinead could hardly turn back.

Besides, she comforted herself, she had already sold her life to the lake folk in exchange for the pitcher of water she now carried against her breast and to the Fae folk in exchange for the joyflower in her belt pouch. What did it matter, in the end, whether it was the lake folk, the Fae, or the dreadful creatures of the forest who eventual y claimed her? Oddly enough, the thought emboldened her.

With a good deal more resolve now than she had possessed earlier in the morning, Sinead entered the shadows of the wood.

She travel ed far, al the way into the heart of the forest, before she at last found a shady little clearing beside a babbling brook, where the fever-wort grew in profusion. Here she gathered as much of the plant as she needed and, tucking it into the little pouch dangling from her belt, set off on her way again.

Relieved at having completed her goal so easily and having met with no interference from the frightful wood creatures, she was eager to leave the forest behind her and to be soon at her mother’s side once more.

Unfortunately, that was not to be. She quickly discovered that she had journeyed so far into the shadowy wood that she could no longer recal the way back out.

Picking her way along the path that looked most familiar, she at length found herself back once more in the exact same shady clearing she had so recently left. In fact, no matter which direction she left this spot in, she continued to return always to the same place. What is this? she asked herself. What mischievous magic is at work here? Am I doomed forever to wonder this gloomy wood?

It was as she again came face to face with the babbling brook after her third attempt to leave the clearing that Sinead first began to sense she was not alone, and perhaps had not been alone this entire time. A tingling feeling tickled its way down her spine; she could feel unseen eyes upon her.

Spinning slowly, searching for her watcher, her eyes abruptly col ided with an unexpected figure.

It was as if it simply appeared from nowhere. One moment there had been nothing but a beam of sunshine slanting down through the treetops to fal across a rotting stump. In the next instant
he
appeared.

He was a great stag of the forest. His graceful body was lithe and muscled beneath his copper-hued hide; massive, spreading antlers towered above his head . . . And yet he was more than that.

What should have been the neck of the stag, widened rather than narrowed, merging into the form of a man’s waist and upper torso. Fine, reddish-hued fur ran up to a broad chest, above which soared bare, muscular shoulders and a head as human as that of any young man she had ever seen . . . Wel , perhaps not quite human. Certainly there were features distinctly human in that face, but there were also traits that could only have come from the stag. His nose was long and narrow, his high chin and cheekbones were dusted with fine hair of the same hue as the deer hide further down his body. Even the longish hair of his head was a deep, rich red to match his hide.

His mouth was wide and pink and possessed of a more generous pair of lips than would seem natural on most people.

But just as with the lake folk, it was this creature’s eyes that made her reassess her impression of its humanity. Those dark, pupil-less eyes were as beastly as the rest of his face was manly.

Sinead could read in them no sign of human emotion or intel igence.

There was no more time for gawking. A sudden stirring of the hairs along the back of her neck warned her of stil more hidden observers. Daring to look away from the stag-man for an instant, she stole a glance over one shoulder.

The motion was met with a fluttering and a scurrying of movement among the branches of the near trees along the boulders edging the brook. Sinead caught only the vague impressions of an owl with the face of a child ducking back among the fal en leaves of an oak and a raccoon with human-appearing hands and feet scuttling behind a fal en log.

She shuddered, imagining how many more equal y strange creatures stil lurked in the shadows.

“You needn’t fear; we mean you no harm – though neither wil we aid you.” Despite having noted his human-like mouth, Sinead was nonetheless startled when the stag spoke in the voice of an ordinary man. Swal owing, she tried to slow the wild thudding of her heart.

Unnerved as she was at being addressed by a half-stag, half-man, a tiny part of her mind was beginning to accept such odd things as being somehow natural on a day as strange as this one.

The steadiness of her voice came as a surprise. “I’m glad to hear you mean me no il , great stag, as I face a mission of great importance and it’s imperative that I carry it out with haste. You see, my mother is gravely il and I mean to brew her a healing potion. I have already col ected the needed fever-wort and was just on my way home when, as you probably saw for yourself, I discovered myself somehow turned about and lost. It’s the oddest thing but no matter which path I chose I found myself drawn again to this same clearing.”

Even as she spoke, she took the opportunity to study the stag-man further and quickly found herself blushing. It was a ridiculous thought to have at such a moment, but she suddenly realized she had never seen a man with his upper body bared before. She was not certain she was seeing one now.

Luckily, he fol owed her words and not her foolish thoughts.

“There is nothing strange in your losing yourself here,” he said, once more surprising her by his casual tone. He sounded much like any handsome young farmer she might have conversed with in the local vil age. “The Sídhe of these woods guard the forest by means of an ancient spel , denying not entrance but exit to any foolish or desperate enough to tread this ground.” Sinead frowned at the implied insult. “By ‘foolish’ I suppose you mean me?” He agreed. “From the moment you stepped into the forest shadows you have doomed yourself to suffer the same fate as those before you – to wander eternal y the twisted pathways of the wood.”

“As you do,” Sinead ventured with sudden understanding. “Were you and these others once human beings like me?”

The stag-man seemed to consider. “Perhaps,” he answered at last. “It is hard to recal a past so distant. For me it has been very long since I walked with human feet upon the earth.” Sinead found that difficult to believe, for his face appeared only a few years older than her own.

But perhaps that was a part of the Sídhe spel – perhaps ones such as he did not age or aged more slowly than most.

She realized he was looking pointedly downwards at her smal feet, encased in shabby boots, and peeking from beneath the edge of her skirt’s ragged hem.

“For you, walking among men and women wil soon become a dim memory as wel . You wil come to accept the wood as your home and to guard it as jealously as we.”

“Never. I would spend my life fighting against the spel . It would be an eternal strife.”

“You wil find soon enough that there is little to fear and nothing to fight, just as you do not now despise your humanity or find it a fate to be striven against. You simply are what you are.” Even as he spoke, he turned away.

“Wait!” Sinead cried after him. “Don’t go, please; I need your help. I cannot live in this terrible forest forever.” At his expression she hastily amended, “I mean, certain as I am that it is a lovely place to cal home, I am needed elsewhere. My mother, remember? She has no one but me to look after her.”

The stag-man shrugged a powerful shoulder. Sinead could not help admiring how it flexed the long muscles of his back.

He said, “If that is the case then I am sorry for you both, but there is nothing I can do. Only those who have already succumbed ful y to the forest magic are capable of escaping its spel , and by then they have lost the desire to do so.”

“By succumbing to the magic . . . ?”

“I mean those who have taken on the beastly forms such as those you see around you. Those who have become as we.”

A tiny flame of hope flickered to life within Sinead’s heart. “Then you, who have already taken your beastly form, know your way past this horrible ensnaring spel that has twisted the path at my feet and made me a prisoner to the wood?”

“We know the proper path out of the forest,” he admitted. “It is visible to us who are no longer spel bound.”

“Show me the way,” Sinead demanded boldly.

The stag-man stared at her with imperturbable eyes. “Why should I do that? It is too late for me. I have given up the human existence. Why should I aid another in escaping the fate that is mine?” Sinead’s temper stirred to life.
How had she ever found him attractive? Heavens, he was a . . .

a beast.
Her voice rose in mingled anger and desperation. “It is
because
you could not escape when you stil possessed the wil that you should help me! Because you were once the prisoner that I am now. Only remember what it was like to possess human compassion, human love and, if you stil have any drop of human emotion within you, aid me in returning home to care for my mother.”

Something flickered briefly in the stag-man’s dark eyes.

She dared to hope her argument had moved him.