21st October
Normally, I sleep poorly in foreign accommodations, but I surprised myself by resting soundly until Finn’s promised knock came at half seven.
I rose from the straw-stuffed bed that took up nearly the entirety of the little bedroom, shivering in the cold. The only fire was in the main room, and it was down to the embers. I threw a robe over my nightdress and padded to the door with Shadow at my heels.
Finn greeted me with the same formality into which he had retreated yesterday, setting upon the table a tray of bread—still warm despite the chilly walk from the farmhouse—as well as a bowl of some form of quivering yogurt and a disturbingly large hard-boiled egg.
“Goose,” he said when I enquired. “Did you not bank the fire last night?”
I confessed that I had little idea what this signified, and he kindly demonstrated a particular method of stacking the wood and raking the coals within the fireplace that would ensure a long, continuous release of heat as well as easier re-ignition come morning. I thanked him with perhaps an overabundance of enthusiasm, and he smiled with his former warmth.
He enquired after my plans for the day, and I stated my intention to become acquainted with the surrounding terrain.
“Your father informed me in his letters that within the Karrðarskogur can be found a variety of brownies, as well as trooping faeries,” I said. “I understand from my research into the scant accounts of your Folk that the courtly fae are more apt to travel with the snows, from which I gather that sightings of their ilk will be unlikely for some days yet.”
Finn looked astonished. “Did my father use those words?”
“No. Brownies and trooping fae are the two largest subcategories of common fae invented by scholars—your people, I believe, refer to the common fae as ‘little ones’ or ‘wee Folk’ when you make the distinction at all. They are, as you know, usually quite small, child-sized or less.
Brownies are solitary and are generally those faeries who involve themselves in mortal affairs—thefts, minor curses, blessings. Trooping fae travel in groups and keep mostly to their own.”
Finn gave a slow nod. “And I suppose, then, that you have a separate word for the tall ones?”
“Yes, we place all humanlike faeries into the category of courtly fae— you understand, then, that there are two main groupings of Folk, courtly and common. As far as the courtly fae are concerned, there are too many subcategories to list, and I’ve little idea whether any of them will apply to those you call the ‘tall ones.’ ”
“We rarely call them anything,” Finn said. “It’s bad luck.”
“A not uncommon belief. The Maltese are much the same. Though their courtly fae are more troublesome than average, having an unfortunate habit of creeping into houses at night to feast upon slumberers’ vital organs.”
He showed little surprise at this gruesome detail, which puzzled and intrigued me. The Maltese Folk are singularly vicious—on that front, they have no known equals among the fae. What manner of Folk inhabited this forbidding country?
“I’d have thought you’d want to settle in first,” he said, casting a dubious look around the cottage. “Finish your unpacking, buy some provisions. Say hello to the neighbours. You’ll be here a while.”
The last item in this list nearly made me shudder. “Not long at all, from a scholarly perspective,” I said. “My return passage is booked on a freighter departing April the first. I shall be very busy. Some dryadologists spend years in the field.” I added, with the aim of inserting into Finn’s mind a sense of the polite distance I customarily keep between myself and the locals: “And as for the neighbours, doubtless I shall meet them at the tavern tonight.”
Finn’s face broke into a grin. “That you shall. With the harvest done, some folk rarely leave the place. I’ll let Aud know you’ll be there—and Ulfar. That’s her husband, he runs things. He’s a nice enough sort, though a bit of a cold fish. You won’t get many words from him.”
This recommended Ulfar to me far more than Aud, though I did not say so. “And I gather from your father that Aud is the…goði, is she?” I tripped a little over the unfamiliar word, which I understood indicated a sort of village headwoman.
Finn nodded. “These days, it’s a ceremonial thing, but we like to keep the old traditions going. Aud will certainly be able to supply you with stories of the Hidden. And I know she’ll take a fancy to any stories you have of London. We likes tales of the outside world around here.”
“Yes, well, we shall see what the evening brings. My visit may be short, depending on my fatigue after today’s endeavours.”
He did not appear put off. “If you’re wearied, Ulfar’s beer will put you right. Some folk say it’s an acquired taste, but it’ll warm your belly and grease your tongue better than anything the world over.”
I forced a thin smile. I expected him to depart, but he only stood there, gazing at me. I recognized his expression, for I’ve seen it before: that of a man trying unsuccessfully to slot me into one of the categories of womanhood with which he is familiar.
“Where are you from, Professor?” he said with a hint of his former friendliness. I think he is the type who can never keep someone at a
distance for long.
“I live at Cambridge.”
“Yes. But where are your folk?”
I suppressed a sigh. “I grew up in London. My brother lives there still.”
“Oh.” His expression cleared. “You’re an orphan?”
“No.” This was not the first time someone has assumed that about me. I suppose people are often looking for a way to explain me, and a childhood of neglect or deprivation is as good as any. In truth, my parents are perfectly ordinary and perfectly alive, though we are not close. They have never known what to make of me. When I read every book in my grandfather’s
library—I must have been eight or so—and came to them with certain thorny passages memorized, I had expected my mother and father to offer clarity—instead, they had stared at me as if I had suddenly become very far away. I never knew my grandfather—he had no interest in children, nor anything else besides his society of amateur folklorists—but after he died, and we inherited his house and possessions, his books became my best friends. There was something about the stories bound between those covers, and the myriad species of Folk weaving in and out of them, each one a mystery begging to be solved. I suppose most children fall in love with faeries at some point, but my fascination was never about magic or the granting of wishes. The Folk were of another world, with its own rules and customs—and to a child who always felt ill-suited to her own world, the lure was irresistible.
“I have been at Cambridge since I was fifteen,” I said. “That is when I began my studies. It is home to me, more than any other.”
“I see,” he said, though I could tell that he didn’t at all.
After Finn departed, I unpacked the rest of my things, which, as I had expected, took but a moment—I brought only four dresses and some books.
The familiar smell of Cambridge’s Library of Dryadology wafted out with them, and I felt a shiver of yearning for that musty, ancient place, a haven of quiet and solitude in which I have whiled away many hours.
I glanced around the little cottage, which still smelled of sheep and was a home to many a cobweb-laying spider, but I’ve little patience for housework and soon gave up the idea. A house is merely a roof over one’s head, and this one would serve me adequately as it was.
Shadow and I finished our breakfast (I gave him most of the goose egg), and I filled my canteen with stream water and tucked it into my backpack along with the rest of the bread, my box camera, a measuring tape, and my notebook. Thus prepared for a day in the field, I turned my attention to banking the fire per Finn’s instructions.
I raked the poker through the embers, then stopped. I pushed aside the husk of a log, reached within, and drew out Bambleby’s letter. I blew at the ash and skimmed the elegant cursive. It was entirely unscathed.
I added wood to the fire, stoking the flames, and tossed the letter back in. It did not catch. The fire coughed smoke, as if the letter were an unpleasant obstacle lodged in its throat.
“Damn you,” I muttered, narrowing my eyes at the heavy stationery staring insouciantly back at me from the flames. “Am I supposed to keep the bloody thing under my pillow?”
I should, I suppose, mention here that I am perhaps ninety-five percent certain that Wendell Bambleby is not human.
This is not the product of mere professional disdain; Bambleby’s impossible letter is not my first piece of evidence regarding his true nature.
My suspicions were aroused at our initial meeting some years ago, when I noticed the sundry ways in which he avoided the metal objects in the room, including by feigning righthandedness so as to avoid contact with wedding rings (the Folk are, to a one, left-handed). Yet he could not avoid metal entirely, the event including a dinner, which invariably involved cutlery, sauce boats, and the like, and he mastered the discomfort well enough, which indicated that either my suspicions were unfounded or that he is of royal ancestry—they are the only Folk able to bear the touch of such human workings.
Lest I appear credulous, I can attest that this was not enough to convince me. Upon subsequent encounters, I noted sundry suspect qualities, among them his manner of speaking. Bambleby is supposedly born in County Leane and raised in Dublin, and while I am no scholar of the Irish accents, I am expert in the tongue of the Folk, which is but one with many dialects, yet possessing a certain resonance and timbre that is universal, and which I hear whispers of in Bambleby’s voice in occasional, unguarded moments.
We have spent a significant amount of time in each other’s company.
If he is Folk, he likely lives among us in exile, a not uncommon fate to befall the aristocracy of the Irish fae—their kind rarely goes without a murderous uncle or power-mad regent for long. There are plenty of tales of exiled Folk; their powers are sometimes said to be restricted by an enchantment cast by the exiling monarch, which would explain Bambleby’s need to resign himself to an existence among us lowly mortals. His choice
of profession may be part of some fae design I cannot guess at, or it may be a natural expression of Bambleby’s nature, that he should set his sights upon acquiring external affirmations of self-expertise.
It remains possible that I am wrong. A scholar must always be ready to admit this. None of my colleagues seem to share my suspicions, which gives me pause, not even the venerable Treharne, who has been doing fieldwork for so long he likes to joke that the common fae no longer hide themselves away when he comes, seeing little difference between him and some old, lumpen piece of furniture. And for all the stories of exiled Folk, it’s not as if any have been discovered in our midst. Which lends itself to one of two conclusions: either such Folk are exceptionally skilled at camouflage or the stories are false.
I removed the letter, still wholly unburnt, and tore it to shreds, which I folded into the ashes. Then I put Bambleby from my mind, twisted my hair into a knot atop my head (from which it would begin its escape almost immediately), and threw on my coat.
The loveliness of the view outside stopped me in my tracks. The mountain fell away before me, a carpet of green made greener by the luminous dawn staining the clouds with pinks and golds. The mountains themselves were lightly ensnowed, though there was no threat of a sequel in that cerulean canopy. Within the hinterlands of the prospect heaved the great beast of the sea with its patchy pelt of ice floes.
I set off with a light step, much heartened. I have always loved fieldwork, and I felt that familiar rush of excitement as I contemplated the field in question: before me lay uncharted scientific territory, and I the only explorer for miles. It is in moments like this that I fall in love with my profession all over again.
Shadow ambled along at my side on our way up the mountainside, sniffing at mushrooms or the melting frost. Sheep eyed me with their characteristic look of incurious anxiety. They danced a little at the sight of Shadow, but as he only lumbered contentedly by, his snout more engaged by the earth than the familiar woolly boulders that dotted the fields of his
stomping grounds in the Cambridgeshire countryside, they soon ignored him.
The forest slowly folded me into itself. The trees were not all stunted, and in places they formed a dense, dark canopy over the narrow path.
I spent most of the morning surveying the perimeter, wading in and out of the trees. I noted mushroom rings and unusual moss patterns, the folds in the land where flowers grew thick and the places where they slid from one colour to another, and those trees which seemed darker and cruder than the others, as if they had drunk of a substance other than water. An odd mist billowed from a little hollow cupped within the rugged ground; this I discovered to be a hot spring. Above it, upon a rocky ledge, were several wooden figurines, some half overgrown with moss. There was also a small pile of what I recognized as rock caramels, the salty-sweet Ljosland candies that several of the sailors had favoured.
After taking some photographs, I dipped a hand in the spring and found it pleasantly hot. The temptation arose in my mind, for I had not bathed properly since leaving Cambridge, and I felt the salt of the journey upon me still like a second skin. Yet it was dismissed quickly; I was not about to go frolicking about an unfamiliar country in a state of undress.
A small sound came then from the wood behind me, a sort of pitter- patter not unlike the continual drip of wet from the forest boughs. I was instantly alert, though I gave no sign. Shadow raised his head from the spring to sniff the air, but he knew what was expected of him. He sat himself down and watched me.
Some people think that the Folk announce themselves with bells or song, but the fact is that you will never hear them unless they wish to be heard.
Should you be approached by an animal, you will likely notice the rustle of leaves, the snapping of twigs. Should you be approached by a faerie, you may hear nothing at all, or only the subtlest of variations in the natural soundscape. It takes years for a scholar to master the necessary powers of observation.
Affecting a weary traveller’s appreciation of the view, which did not require much effort, the weather continuing fair, I ran my gaze along the
forest’s edge. I was not surprised to find no evidence of any observer, apart from the chitter of a squirrel and the runic scatter of bird prints.
To continue the pretense, I slid my feet from my boots and dipped them into the spring. I took a few moments to review my mental catalogue of alpine brownies, particularly those who dwell near springs, with an eye to behavioural patterns.
I reached into my backpack, where I keep a variety of trinkets I’ve gathered over the years. But what to choose in this case? Some gifts are favoured by the Folk of different regions, while others give offense. I know of a French dryadologist who was driven mad by his research subjects after presenting them with a loaf of bread that, unbeknownst to him, had begun to mould. Their malice when insulted is nearly as universal as their caprice.
I selected a little porcelain box which held an assortment of Turkish delights. Tastes vary greatly among the Folk, but I know of only one recorded instance of an offering of sweets going awry. I set the box upon the ledge; for good measure, I placed atop it one of my few jewels, a diamond from a necklace I inherited upon my grandmother’s death. Such gifts I reserve only for very special cases—some of the common fae covet jewels; others don’t know what to do with them.
I began to murmur a song.
They are the night and the day, They are the wind and the leaf, They lay the snow upon the rooftop and the frost upon the landing.
They gather up their footprints and carry them on their backs.
What gift is greater than their friendship?
What blade cuts deeper than their enmity?
My translation is clumsy; I’ve no ear for poetry. I sang it in the tongue in which it was composed, that of the Folk, which prosaic scholars simply call Faie. It is a rolling, roundabout speech that takes twice as long to say half as
much in English, with many contrary rules, but there is no lovelier language spoken by mortals anywhere in the world. By some curious quirk—one which has caused much consternation among those adherents to the [*]Hundred Islands Theory—the Folk speak the same language in every country and region where they are known, and though the accents and idioms differ, their dialects are never so variable as to hinder understanding.
I ran through the song twice, which I had learned from a hobgoblin in Somerset, then let my voice fade into the wind. I had performed the necessary introductions, so I put my shoes on and departed.
SKIP NOTES * The theory that each faerie realm exists on an entirely separate physical plane. Folk might travel from one realm to another on rare occasions, but otherwise scholars argue that the realms have historically had little to do with one another. I myself see this as narrow-minded nonsense, yet the theory remains popular among the older generation of dryadologists, those who tend to sit as department heads and write the most heavily referenced textbooks, and thus it will likely be with us for some time.
