22nd November
I thought long and hard about throwing all that into the fire. Well, all right, not that long and hard; Wendell’s account is helpful, I admit, and in fact put about a dozen research questions into my head—not least of which regards the ability of faerie monarchs to manipulate time—but no doubt he would only smirk if I posed them to him and make some joke about bibliographies. As much as it infuriates me when anyone else so much as touches my journal, let alone has the gall to fill it with their perfect handwriting (for of course his handwriting is beautiful, even when composed in a horse-drawn sleigh), I am not going to let my pet peeves take precedence over scholarship.
I slept most of the way back to Hrafnsvik, which astonished me. During one of my few waking moments, Wendell explained that I had allowed myself to take part in a powerful enchantment—the making of the sword— and as I had no magic myself, the enchantment had instead absorbed much of my mortal strength, and it would take time for that to recover. This fascinating statement immediately filled me with questions: Is that what Deirdre did, sacrificing her own strength for her faerie husband’s sake, and is that why she died shortly thereafter? By what alchemy does mortal strength contribute to faerie magic, and is it only the courtly fae who have access to this? But I was asleep again before I could ask him.
Once we returned to the cottage, I tumbled into bed and slept for another night and a morning, and when I awoke, I felt whole again.
“Wendell?” I called. I don’t know why I did so—I was on the edge of sleep still, and for some reason the quietness of the cottage alarmed me. But he came into the room, smiling smugly.
“I have been up for hours,” he said, which I did not for a second believe.
“Shall I send for breakfast?”
“Oh, yes.”
He had already eaten, but that did not stop him from helping himself to the food brought by Finn and Krystjan—hearty dark bread, smoked fish, goose eggs, a variety of cheeses, and blueberries that had been canned fresh in syrup, which they had mixed into oatmeal and yogurt and piled with toasted sugar. It was a more elaborate breakfast than any we’d been served before, and even stranger, both Finn and Krystjan delivered it. Bambleby invited them jovially to dine with us, an overture that was immediately accepted. This suited me well, as I was able to eat in peace while Bambleby entertained himself with directing his charms at two willing recipients, both of whom were full of questions regarding our exploits. Lilja and Margret, I learned, had been safely delivered by Wendell to Lilja’s family home, and were both in good cheer; Lilja’s parents were beside themselves with relief and gratitude, while Lilja’s younger siblings were enthralled by the strange but lovely scar upon Margret’s forehead. I was more than content that Bambleby had absorbed the initial onslaught of praise, which no doubt factored into his present high spirits. He answered Finn and Krystjan’s questions elaborately, and somehow a wolf pack and a fearsome ice storm found their way into our journey to the Hidden Ones’ fair, as if the tale was in need of embellishment. The men hung on his every word, which I was used to, but there was something in the way they hesitated in their speech, as if every word directed at Bambleby needed to be carefully selected, and the way Finn cast nervous looks at Krystjan whenever his natural abrasiveness came through—that was entirely new.
“They know about you,” I said bluntly after Finn and Krystjan finally departed. “The whole village?”
He helped himself to more yogurt. “Lilja and Margret are clever girls, but even so, you would not need much cleverness to put two and two together after what they saw.”
I drummed my fingers on the table. “It’s inconvenient. The villagers will see you as some sort of faerie godmother now. You get little work done
already without them accosting you night and day for favours.”
The smile slipped from his face. “Do you think they will?”
“I have no idea. The Ljoslanders do not have the kindest associations with the courtly fae, so perhaps that will dim their expectations of you.
Could you not have taken the girls’ memories?”
He gazed at me in disbelief. “You wish that I had addled their minds, after what they went through? Oh, Em.”
“Not entirely addled,” I said defensively. “But you could have taken the memory of what they saw in that valley.”
“It doesn’t work that way.”
“How does it work, then?” I leaned forward eagerly.
“I haven’t the faintest idea. I’ve never bothered mucking about in mortals’ minds.”
I slumped back with a sigh. “You are no help whatsoever.”
“I don’t wish to be of help.” Bambleby lifted his eyes to the ceiling. “I wish to finish off our paper and use it to dazzle the brilliant minds at ICODEF into a magnanimous stupor. Then I wish to take their money and use it to hire an army of students and equipment with which we will find a door back to my kingdom. Speaking of which, I believe we have quite enough material to complete our draft, don’t you think?”
My spirits rose at that. “More than enough.”
“There is also this,” he said, springing from his chair with a grin. When he returned, it was with the white cloak the faerie had given me draped over his arm.
I stared at it. In the light of the cabin, its unnaturalness was heightened —the fur looked less like hair and more like blades of frost. “Did you do something to it?”
“God, no. I’d rather stuff my mattress with snow than tailor any garment of theirs. Not that it couldn’t use it.” He examined the cloak critically. “I’ve been keeping it outside, for it melts a little indoors. But if we pack it in ice —”
“We could display it at the conference.” My head spun. We had collected an artefact of a species of faerie that had never been studied before. One
that said faerie in every stitch and crease. It was nothing short of a triumph.
He smiled at me. “Precisely.”
He went and put the coat back in the cold, then brought me one of his own notebooks, leather-bound with pages that crinkled smartly and had lavender crumbled into them (of course). To my astonishment, it contained a draft of the abstract and an outline in his irritating handwriting.
“Did you think I would leave you to do all the work?” he said in response to my look.
“Of course I did.” I skimmed through the outline and added my own notes here and there. It wasn’t bad at all. But then, Bambleby has been published before, dozens of times; I suppose I’d just always assumed that his students did everything for him.
“You haven’t included anything about your encounter with the snow prince,” I said. “If that’s what he was.”
“What would I say? That I fought and killed him with a sword forged from tears? I wish to raise eyebrows at ICODEF, but not for that reason.”
I didn’t reply. In truth, I didn’t like thinking back to that scene by the cave. I was used to recording stories of the Folk—I had not expected to become one, had never wished to. I was supposed to remain comfortably outside the stories with my pen and my notebook. I could tell it didn’t bother Wendell in the least, and why would it? He was a story; he had proven that when he had taken the impossible ice sword and driven back our enemy with the ease of breathing, his blade flashing too quickly for me to follow it. I’d had no idea he was capable of something like that—magic, yes. Displays of physical skill, the sort of skill that requires training and effort? No. Since that night, I feel as if the ground has altered slightly beneath the two of us, as if I cannot see him from precisely the same angle I used to.
“You still haven’t explained yourself, by the way,” he said, picking at a loose thread on his jumper. “How did you know to pull that sword out of the snow? Sometimes, Em, you are so terrifyingly competent in your dealings with the Folk that I begin to suspect you are a magician.”
I snorted. “One doesn’t need magic if one knows enough stories.” I examined him. “Do you have any doubts about all this? What if the scholarly community learns what you are? Most will fear and distrust you.
A select few may try to have you shot and stuffed like one of Davidson’s brownies.”
He leaned his chair on its back legs. “Nobody at Cambridge will believe it, in the unlikely event that any of them find out what Hrafnsvik thinks of me. Just in case, I’ll get out in front of the whole thing when I return, and tell them that our guileless villagefolk were so impressed by our success in the field that they thought us both faeries. That will get a laugh at ICODEF.
Most of our tenured colleagues rarely require much convincing as to the gullibility of the peasantry. You know that, Em—remember the trouble you had giving co-author credit to that Welsh shepherd for your paper on faerie mounds? Your peer reviewers wouldn’t let it go to print.”
I remembered very well, and thought he was probably right. So what was I worried about? And why was I worried? Surely it was of little importance to me if Bambleby’s secret got out. But he was my friend, and I thought he was handling the issue far too lightly.
We were interrupted by a knock at the door. It was one of Aud’s sons with a delivery of dried wildflowers, polished shells, and a colourful array of mushrooms that must have taken days of labour to retrieve. Bambleby accepted it perfunctorily and closed the door in the young man’s face.
“What on earth am I to do with this?” he muttered, setting the basket down on the table with a clink. “Open an apothecary?”
“They don’t know what you want,” I said, smothering laughter. “They only know what they give to their own Folk in exchange for their services.
You could simply tell them you prefer silver.” For this is the customary offering in Ireland, at least for the courtly fae. Almost every species of Folk disdains human metals, yet the Irish fae are unique in their ability to tolerate —and, indeed, to love—silver. It is said that they fill their vast, dark forests with silver mirrors like jewels, which drink in the little sun and starlight that penetrates the boughs and reflect it back at the will of the Folk; it is also said that they use silver to construct fantastical staircases that wind up and
up those vast trunks, and bridges that hang between them like delicate necklaces.
“It doesn’t matter, for I can’t accept any of it,” he said moodily. “I made no agreement with these people. I went on that mad goose chase for you.”
I frowned a little, remembering our strange, one-sided bargain. “Then I shall buy you a fine set of cutlery upon our return,” I said. “As for Aud and the rest, I recommend that you affect a strong predilection for fungi, and declare their debt to you repaid.”
“This is all your fault,” he said. “If we had only pretended to go after those two, like I wanted—”
“Lilja and Margret would be dead or worse,” I said. “Is that what you wanted?”
He took his time in thinking it over. “No, it isn’t. Though I can’t imagine the thought troubles you much, Em. Lilja came by twice to thank you, and will be back again, count on it. I did not bother to tell her that your motives were not kindhearted at all.”
I felt a prickle of disquiet. After all, it was true that I had rescued Lilja and Margret not for their own sakes, but for scholarship. From that perspective, there was nothing to thank me for; indeed, I had as much reason to thank them for getting themselves captured and allowing me the opportunity of witnessing the Hidden Ones’ fair.
I went back to drumming my fingertips. Something was nagging at me. I recognized the sensation, though I knew not what it signified, other than that I was missing something important. There was a pattern here in Hrafnsvik; I could feel the edges of it.
I needed time with my notes.
“Oh, God,” he said. “I know that look. What dreadful imposition is in store for me now?”
Trust Bambleby to think himself always at the centre of my thoughts.
“There is no imposition. I would like you to leave me in peace for a few hours, if that is something within your capabilities.”
“I suppose so,” he said grudgingly, though I was not flattered by his reluctance to leave my side; Bambleby hates to be without company to talk
at. Well, no doubt he would find ready listeners down at the tavern, if he grew bored.
He surprised me, though, when he informed me after breakfast that he intended to go for a stroll.
“I thought you had given up hope of finding your door here,” I said. For so I had assumed, given that he had made only the most cursory of efforts.
“Did I say anything about a door?” he said over his shoulder as he pulled his cloak on.
I groaned. “What is the point in being mysterious now? Are there any secrets of yours I don’t know?”
“Oh, I’d say there are a few outstanding.”
I rolled my eyes and went back to my notes. I couldn’t be bothered with him now. “Well, don’t go harassing poor Poe again. You’re not likely to find such a door in the Karrðars–kogur. The courtly fae of Ljosland move their realm about, yes? But only spatially; they dwell forever in winter. The door you seek must be fixed, given that your own realm is fixed—I say must, though I am speaking in theoretical terms, of course, as I have never encountered such a phenomenon myself, and can only extrapolate from the literature—so it stands to reason that if it is anywhere, it will be in a place of permanent winter. Namely, a glacier or high peak that never loses its snowpack. I should note here, of course, that I think it highly unlikely that a door such as the one you seek is in this country; there is too little affinity between your realm and that of the Hidden Ones. It is most likely to be found in a similar woodland landscape, green and wet with plenty of oak groves to drink in the small magics of the common fae and create spaces for such portals to manifest—if indeed their existence is the result of mere accident or chance. These sorts of rabbit hole doors—back entrances, if you like—are often said to be accidental, in the stories. Northern Europe is the most likely location; perhaps one of the warmer forests of Russia.”
He stood unmoving with his hand on the door, staring at me.
“Yes, I know that’s a lot of conjecture,” I said, misreading the look on his face. “I’ve not had time to give it much thought.”
He smiled at me, his eyes shining a little too brightly in the way they sometimes did. “We are going to make a very good team, Em.”
I snorted to cover the heat rising in my face. “So far, our teamwork seems rather unevenly distributed.”
“I may be of use to you yet, my dear dragon.” He left me, pulling the door shut softly behind him.
