Thorn Boy and Other Dreams of Dark Desire (24 page)

Then, with a
shattering burst of noise, the gates were thrown wide open, causing
the wilting Jadalan to cringe further towards the dirt, hands to
ears, his stomach churning. Loud shouting and laughter, and the
sound of horses’ hooves sounded from within the courtyard. Jadalan
crawled to the side, just in time to avoid being trampled by a
group of riders trotting smartly out into the city. Jadalan
squinted. Shapes blurred before his eyes. He did not know it was
Ashalan himself, setting off for an evening’s hunting in the
forests and fields beyond Ashbrilim’s walls. Dogs swarmed around
the horse’s feet and it happened that one of them was the puppy
with which Jadalan used to play, in those days before the angel
came. Time moves in a strange way between the worlds. Though
Jadalan had been away for many years in angelic terms, only eight
seasons had passed in the land of Cos. If Jadalan had returned a
different way, or on a different day, it might have been that he’d
come back to a place where his family had been dead for years. It
might have been that the city itself had fallen to dust. There was
no way of knowing. He’d been lucky and the dog that he had petted
as a baby recognised his scent, broke away from the pack and
bounded up to him, tail wagging wildly. Before Jadalan could move,
the animal had covered his mouth with affectionate licks, the touch
of love that Variel had warned against, thus effectively destroying
any vestiges of memory that Jadalan had retained of the recent
past. He lay back in the dust with the dog nuzzling his face, eyes
staring vacantly at the sky. Ashalan noticed the commotion and sent
one of his aides to see what the dog was doing.

‘
Why
sire, it is a lad,’ the man said.

Ashalan
dismounted and went to see for himself. It was as if Jadrin himself
lay there, stupidly gazing, but a Jadrin of even finer aspect and
ambience.

‘
The boy
is ill,’ someone said. ‘Perhaps diseased.’

‘
Have
someone take him into the palace,’ Ashalan said.

‘
Is that
wise, sire?’

‘
Have
someone take him into the palace.’ The king’s tone was not to be
argued with.

In this way,
Jadalan returned home, but without the capacity to say who he was
or what had happened to him.

Because of his
beauty, he was taken to the royal apartments, bathed and laid in a
soft bed. Ashalan had even considered that this was some relative
of Jadrin’s come to seek him out, but Jadrin claimed no
recollection of such kin. He watched the boy coolly as the servants
tended to his body. He felt he ought to be angry at the way Ashalan
had brought him in; it was obvious why, and yet, some part of him,
deep within, was drawn to the pale stranger. ‘Perhaps I find him
attractive myself,’ Jadrin thought and yet, it did not feel that
way.When the servants had finished, Jadrin sent them away. He stood
and stared at the boy lying there. ‘Yes, he looks like me,’ he
thought. ‘How odd.’ A vague memory stirred, of a moonlit bathroom
and blood, black in the moonlight, pooling on the floor. Jadrin
shuddered and the boy opened his eyes. They were the colour of
violets.

‘
Who are
you?’ Jadrin asked and the boy struggled to speak. ‘Who are you?
Who are you?’ Jadrin had leaned right over him, his voice filled
with a tremor that could have been fear. Then a whisper: ‘Who are
you?’

The boy
sighed. ‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I am no-one. I am nothing.’

Jadrin found
himself pressed against the far wall, one hand to his mouth. He
dared not think. He dared not hope. Nothing.

Jadalan
recovered slowly, but his mind seemed almost empty. He wandered,
pale and lovely, through the corridors of his parent’s palace, sat
with them to eat, smiled and nodded at their friends, walked in the
gardens with his arm through Jadrin’s, became beloved to them.
Jadrin suspected who he might be, but never voiced his thoughts.
Perhaps Ashalan too had some intimation of the boy’s identity, but
a weird kind of fear kept the king and his consort from discussing
the matter. Jadalan simply was. He was with them and they were fond
of him. People seemed afraid of the boy so Jadrin named him
Ailacumar, which was a deity name, seldom used by the populace, but
which represented the god in his aspect of wandering youth.
Ailacumar hardly ever answered to his name. There seemed within him
a deep and secret sadness. He slept for most of every day and
though he smiled, would never laugh.

Variel came to
earth in the middle of a forest. He crouched shuddering, beneath
the branches of a giant oak, his gossamer angelic robes torn to
shreds, his amber skin bruised and scratched. For a while, he could
not remember who or what he was, why he was there or where he had
come from. The earth claimed him. Stupid with terror, senseless to
a degree even more than Jadalan had been, he was unaware of urine
pooling beneath him, melting the last of his clothing. He had come
to earth and its coarseness claimed him instantly, as if resentful
of his aetheric origins. Learn reality, She said. Feel pain and
fear; piss yourself. By nightfall, under the softer caress of the
moon, Variel stumbled painfully along a forest track. The ground
beneath his feet tore his flesh, even the light of the moon burned
him. He was unprepared for a visit to Earth. Lailahel was
experienced and knew what precautions to take, how to modify his
form. Variel was virgin and ingenuous and the Earth mocked him.

Eventually, he
found shelter in a byre at the edge of the forest. Lights burned in
a farmer’s cottage nearby, but he was too terror-stricken to seek
aid there. Animals moved patiently in the musty darkness and he lay
down in the hay, shivering himself to sleep. There were no thoughts
of Jadalan, not even any thoughts of home, just a bewildered and
helpless vacuum in his mind. All he desired was rest and
warmth.

In the
morning, the farmer’s daughter came to milk the cows in there and
found him. She ran shrieking to the cottage. ‘There’s a dead person
in the byre, papa!’

The farmer,
his sons and his wife hurried out to see. They thought he was a
girl at first, until they carried him back to the cottage and saw
the finely formed organ between his legs. The farmer’s wife made a
sign to protect herself from spirits. ‘It’s a man-woman,’ she said.
‘A faery messenger.’

‘
We must
put it back where we found it,’ one of the sons said to his father.
‘Its people will come for it.’

‘
It’s
near dead,’ said the daughter. ‘I’ll fetch a blanket.’

As the family
debated what to do with their unearthly visitor, Variel groaned and
writhed and opened his golden eyes. The family gasped as one, which
under other circumstances would have been comical. Variel put his
hands over his face and made a terrible sound of despair. Bravely,
the daughter went and wrapped the blanket round his shoulders.

‘
Who are
you?’ asked the mother.

Variel stared
up at them helplessly. Their odour, their physical strength, their
animal forms virtually made him feel sick. He shook his head and
closed his eyes, hot tears squeezing between his lids.

‘
Are you
of the faery?’ asked the farmer, gruffly.

Variel shook
his head. He could not speak.

‘
Obvious
what this creature is,’ said one of the sons proudly. ‘A freak.
Probably from one of the travelling fairs. Probably got lost, and
separated from its people. Is that right, stranger?’

Variel could
sense these people desperately wanted answers about him. He was
weary, sick and afraid. He nodded his head. It seemed the best
thing to do. And they accepted that.

The farmer’s
daughter’s name was Phoebe. A kind-hearted soul, she took Variel
into her care, nursing his constantly solidifying physical form
back into health. Variel simply lay on a low cot in Phoebe’s room,
staring at the far wall for three days, watching the sunlight and
the moonlight cycle and slide and feeling himself change, become
clay. He lay there thinking about what his angelic father had told
him and how all those words were becoming truth. He was conscious
of the heaviness of his body, the unweildy solidity of his flesh.
He could smell himself beginning to emanate the animal odours of
humankind. He could feel all that was magical about himself
draining away.

On the morning
of the fourth day, Phoebe woke before dawn as usual to attend to
her chores and then, as sunlight burned away the grey, came to
bring Variel a bowl of cereal foamy with warmed milk. Previously,
Variel had been unable to stomach more than a mouthful, so Phoebe
was rightfully surprised as she watched her unearthly charge
heartily consume half of the bowl before clutching his stomach
with a groan. ‘You feel better today then,’ she said, eyes round as
coins. Variel had not spoken to her yet. She had to sit down when
he said,

‘
Yes. In
a way, I think so.’

What a strange
voice this person had. ‘What are you?’ Phoebe asked. ‘What is your
name? Where do you come from?’

Variel
remembered what Lailahel had told him about humans pelting him with
stones and thinking him a freak. He was unsure of what to say and
merely opened and closed his mouth a few times.

‘
You are
afraid,’ Phoebe said. ‘Don’t be. You are among friends here. We
will not harm you or send you back, if that’s what you’re afraid
of.’

‘
No-one
can send me back,’ Variel said, and told her his name.

Phoebe seemed
content with that for the time being and offered him some of her
youngest brother’s clothes to wear.

The family
gathered for breakfast and, for the first time, Variel joined them.
The kitchen was dark and pungent. Dogs and cats continuously put
their paws onto Variel’s lap where he sat, begging food. Variel was
afraid of them. He was less than an animal in this world, for even
animals knew the way of things here and how to behave. He was also
uncomfortably aware of the curious glances cast his way, disgusted
by the brutish table manners of Phoebe’s male relations. Even
though Phoebe tried to encourage him to drink a glass of apple
juice, he dared put nothing in his mouth, for fear of bringing it
right back onto the table.

At length,
Phoebe’s father pushed his plate away, uttering a resounding belch
of satisfaction and announced, ‘Mother, it is not right that wench,
strange as she is, should be dressed up as a boy. See to her togs
and have Phoebe show her the chicken runs.’

Thus Variel
learned that in this world at least he was destined to be a she,
however odd, and from that moment it was true things became easier
for him.

So Variel
learned the lore and customs of working the land. She found that,
after a while, it came as a natural and enjoyable thing to do. She
did not mind the long hours or the hard toil and found her new
human body became less of a burden as time went on. With Phoebe’s
encouragement, she began to take care of her appearance, and took
joy in the lissom athleticism of her form. Slim as a whip she was,
sinewy as a boy and fast as a hare. She could wrestle with Phoebe’s
brothers and not be bested, she could fell a tree with the heaviest
axe and still be a fey, languid beauty in the lamplight at dinner.
The family came to adore her and could not remember what the days
had been like before the flame of Variel’s presence had come to
warm their home.

Variel could
not believe that the world of men could offer such pleasures as she
now beheld. The miracle of life, the changing banner of the
seasons, delighted her and filled her with awe. As an angelic
being, isolated in the realms of light, she’d had no thought for
the Great Goddess of the Earth. Now, Variel embraced her as did all
the farming families in the community.

One night she
and Phoebe went down to the pool hidden in a sunken spinney in the
farthest paddock. It was the night of the full moon and Phoebe
wanted to bathe naked in the waters to entreat the Goddess for the
powers of attraction. There was a young lad working for a
neighbouring farmer for whom she’d developed a craving. Variel was
happy to comply with her friend’s wishes. Indeed, she looked upon
Phoebe as a sister now. As she sat on the bank of the pool,
watching the farmer’s daughter raise her wet, pale arms to the sky,
Variel reflected on how long she had been in this place and for the
first time was visited by a pang that reminded her of Jadalan. He
seemed a creature of her dreams nowadays, an insubstantial idea
that bore no relation to her life as she now lived it. Her past
life had become similarly unreal. Now she was a young woman, with a
young woman’s needs and feelings, if not possessed utterly of a
young woman’s physical form. This was what the Goddess had decreed
and Variel considered that the Goddess was indeed a benevolent
Being to have so tolerated her on the Earth. It was almost as if
she’d been rewarded. How wrong Lailahel had been and yet, how right
too.

Phoebe came
swimming to the water’s edge. ‘You seem thoughtful, Variel. Are you
all right?’ she asked.

Variel smiled.
‘I was thinking of my father,’ she replied.

‘
Do you
miss him?’ Through veiled remarks made by Variel, Phoebe had
gleaned Variel had been found in such a distraught condition
because of being exiled from home by her angry parent. It was a
subject they rarely discussed, for Phoebe sensed it gave Variel
pain to think about it.

Variel
wrinkled her brow. ‘Miss him? How odd. I never thought of it that
way. I suppose I do, but there’s no point grieving. I’ll never see
him again.’

‘
What
was he like?’ Phoebe asked carefully. From Variel’s dreamy
expression she was thinking the father must have been a wild and
handsome creature.