A Day of Fallen Night (The Roots of Chaos)

Langarth lay some way south of Drouthwick Castle – too far to go ahorse, given how little time Wulf could spare. Instead, he parted with a fistful of hacksilver and climbed aboard a riverboat.

The sun floated like a yolk in skimmed milk. As he glided a hand through the cool water, he thought of Glorian Berethnet.

The Saint’s Marvel was real. The princess did resemble her mother, with her green eyes and long black hair, though hers had a forelock, parted down the middle. Glorian was also broader in the beam, generous where the queen was slim. Still, the likeness between the two was uncanny – both as pale as candles, exactly the same height.

Sly of the king to not remind Wulf they had met. How had he forgotten those long summers at Glowan Castle?

Of course, as soon as he had seen her, it had started to come back. He remembered now, as the boat slid under a fortified bridge – remembered her splashing him in the fountain, her peals of laughter. How they had run through the flower maze from different ends, trying to beat each other to the middle. They had been the same height then.

The bare, stern peaks of the Fells gradually shallowed into the greener hills of the Lakes. A brisk wind crimped the river. It was late in the day by the time the barge slid into Hallow Lake, where the two upper branches of the Lithsom joined before flowing to the sea.

On its east shore stood the old lake port of Marcott-on-Hallow. Voices clamoured, smallpipes played, and a crier roared from the market boss, almost drowned out by the clatter of carts piled with trout and roach and greased ropes of lamprey. Wulf shielded his eyes against the glister of the lake, so deep and blue it was almost black, though lower than it had been in years past.

The sun was beaten bloody by the time he found an inn. The room was cramped, but at least the straw was free of lice. He rose at cockcrow to hire a horse and rode from the town.

A bier road threaded across the misted peaks of the province, joining the settlements to the sanctuaries, so the recent dead might be taken for burial. By noon, the long thread of trampled grass had led him to Witherling Water. Beyond that lake, a wall of primeval forest stretched from east to west, from shore to shore, all the way across Inys.

The haithwood.

The sight of that place sent a chill through most northerners, for it was said a witch had lived there since the days before the Saint. It sent a deeper chill through Wulf. The haithwood was more than an old tale to him.

His rouncey clobbered down to the road, towards the moated estate in the distance, with its tiled roof and stone walls and tall brick chimneys. He dismounted at the gate and walked the horse to the stables, where the Mentish groom was brushing a stallion.

‘Well met, Rik,’ Wulf called.

Riksard turned, the frown on his face clearing after a moment. ‘Master Wulf?’

‘Aye. How are you?’

‘Very well.’ Riksard wiped his brow on his wrist and grinned. Like many Ments, he had ruddy hair. ‘I hardly recognised you. Welcome home. Were we expecting a visit?’

‘No. Is anyone here?’

‘I think the mistress is in the rose garden.’

The rose garden was near the front of the estate. Wulf found his older sister reading on the swinging chair, wrapped in a mantle, snug as an acorn in its cup. He leaned on the gate.

‘Mouse,’ he said.

Mara surfaced from her book. ‘Wulf,’ she said in amazement, closing it. ‘Is that really you?’

‘Unless my twin has wandered from the woods.’

With a laugh, Mara came to him, and Wulf bundled her into his arms. She flung hers around his neck, wrapping him in the scent of the crushed lavender she kept in her pockets.

‘I can’t believe it,’ she said into his cloak. ‘Why didn’t you write to tell us?’

‘There was no time,’ Wulf said, chin on her shoulder. The embrace took him straight back to when she would sit him at her side and tell him stories in the evenings, her warmth making him feel cushioned and safe. ‘And I can’t stay more than a night or two.’

‘Oh, longer, surely.’

‘I wish I could. Is everyone here?’

‘Pa and Roland are resolving a dispute up in Strenley, but they should be back before supper. Father is poring over taxes.’ Mara drew away and framed his face, her hazel eyes shining. ‘Oh, Wulf, look at you. I never thought you’d grow as tall as Roland.’

‘I’m sure I was this tall last time you saw me.’

‘You were a boy last time I saw you.’

Mara looked the same as he remembered, though her hair had grown almost to her waist, strands of it wispy against her plump cheeks. He could hardly believe it had been three years.

‘Sorry to interrupt your reading,’ Wulf said. ‘That looked a cosy spot.’

‘I forgive you.’ Mara retrieved her tome and took his arm. ‘Come. Father will be overjoyed.’

Langarth had stood for centuries. A former priory, it had sixty rooms, all built around a courtyard that housed a damson tree. As the gloom enfolded him, Wulf drew its familiar smells into his chest: oak and dried herbs, the meadowsweet the servants used to scent the halls.

‘How have you fared?’ he asked his sister, patting the pale, beringed hand at his elbow. ‘Since your last letter.’

‘Much the same. Helping Father with the estate, courtesy visits about the province, helping at the almshouse now and then. There’s little else to do for a middle child of noble birth, except to make a gainful marriage – which, as you know, has never appealed to me.’

‘You ought to find some pursuit you enjoy. Roland has none of our freedoms.’

‘Do you propose I become a brave Northern warrior, too?’ she asked him lightly. ‘Unless I can count or scribe away the king’s enemies, I fear I wouldn’t be much use to him.’

‘Go to court. The queen must have room for a well-reared lady in her household,’ Wulf said. ‘If not, the Royal Chancery or the Exchequer would have you. You shouldn’t hide your talents, Mara.’

‘Not court. Too many ways to disgrace oneself.’ Mara added, ‘I did think of offering my services to Lady Marian. You know Queen Sabran granted her lands in the Lakes.’ He nodded. ‘I went to see her in the summer. She was not at all what I expected.’

‘What did you expect?’

‘A nervous halfwit, from what I’d heard of her reign. She did strike me as too gentle to make a strong queen, but as a private person, I rather liked her. She was gracious and attentive, and had a certain dry humour. Her companion is dead now, as are most of her ladies. I wondered if she might find a secretary useful. Befrith Castle is close enough to Langarth.’

‘Have you told Father this idea?’

‘Not yet. I’ll ask him once you’ve returned to Hróth.’ Mara pressed his arm. ‘Today, I only want to hear about you.’

Lord Edrick, Baron Glenn of Langarth, was hunched over a parchment in the larger of his two studies. His seat faced a bay window of leaded forest glass, adorned with the crest of his barony: a proud alder tree growing in a steep vale, encircled by sedge.

‘Father.’ Mara bent to kiss his head. ‘We have a visitor.’

‘Visitor.’ His voice was weary. ‘Saint, I must have forgotten. I promised I’d call at Bowen Hoath.’

‘This guest won’t mind.’

Wulf breathed in to steady himself. With a crinkled brow, Lord Edrick turned in his seat.

He looked older. Of course he did. His hair was silver now, trimmed at the shoulders, and more lines scored his olive skin. Otherwise, he was still hale and lean.

‘Wulfert?’ He stood up, his grey eyes wide as thimbles. ‘Surely this can’t be my son.’

Wulf bowed with a broad smile. ‘Father.’

Lord Edrick strode to him. Warmth flooded Wulf as his father crushed him to his chest.

‘By the Saint. King Bardholt’s sent us a grown man.’ Lord Edrick held Wulf by the shoulders, taking him in. ‘Ah, Roland will be furious. You remember how proud he was of being taller than you both.’

‘Aye, I remember him threatening to hammer me into the ground like a tent pole,’ Wulf said drily.

‘From the look of you, you could threaten worse. Now, tell me, how long can you stay?’

‘Only a few days, Father, forgive me. His Grace will sail for Hróth before the week is out.’

‘Then we must make the most of it, before you disappear again and come back with your first grey hairs.’ Lord Edrick wrapped one arm around Wulf and the other around Mara, drawing them close. ‘I really must visit one of the tenants – but let’s walk there together, shall we, the three of us? You need some good Inysh air in your chest, Wulfert.’

****

The tenant was an old knight who lived near a grouse moor, three miles from Langarth. Wulf took in the sights of autumn in the Lakes, a province aglow with tawny leaves and coppered light.

As they walked, he described the splendour of Hróth. The emerald ice that sparkled in its farthest reaches. The glowing curtains that marbled the sky. The nightless summers, and the waterfalls that froze to scrunched linen, staying that way for most of the year.

‘It sounds like a dream world.’ Mara skirted a puddle. ‘I can see why you seldom come back to Inys.’

‘Inys has its own beauty,’ Wulf said. ‘Not so strange or sweeping, perhaps, but richer. There’s a bonny softness to it.’ He breathed in the smell of sodden grass. ‘I’ve missed autumn. I miss spring, too – the scents, the colours. One can grow tired of smelling snow.’

‘Snow has a smell?’

‘We have a word for it. Skethra – a scent that washes the air clean.’

‘And you’re still close to the other housecarls?’ Lord Edrick asked. ‘They treat you kindly?’

Wulf paused before he said, ‘Aye, Father.’

Almost true. One particular housecarl despised him, but that would only worry his family.

‘You have a Hróthi accent now, you know,’ Mara remarked. Her cheeks were rosy with cold. ‘I could hear it coming like the tide last you were here. Now it’s set deep as the ice.’

Wulf chuckled and shook his head. ‘Most Hróthi know me for an offcomer as soon as I open my mouth.’

‘Och, you’re no offcomer there. You’ve been striding on that snow since you were nine.’

‘We’re very proud of you, Wulf,’ Lord Edrick told him. ‘Whether you’re here or in Hróth.’

‘Thank you, Father.’

Lord Edrick was not long with his tenant. It was still late in the afternoon by the time they returned to the estate, shivering and caked with mud. By then, the housekeeper had prepared Wulf’s old room. He touched the mark scratched into the doorframe, left by a former occupant of Langarth – a tiny circle, lines streaming from the top.

He, Mara and Roland had puzzled over it for years. They had found other scratchings by the hearths, the windows, the doors. Though they were clearly heathen, Lord Edrick had never had them removed. They are part of Langarth as much as we are, he had told them, and erasing the past won’t make us saints, children.

Wulf only meant to lie down, to remember how it felt to sleep close to his family, but he fell into a doze and dreamed his childhood dream, the one that took him deep into the woods. He was searching for someone, though he knew not who, and no matter how long and hard he looked, or how loud he shouted, no one answered. He ran and ran, weeping with fear, until the trees widened into a clearing, where the ground smelled of blood. He could hear bees humming somewhere close – always there, never seen.

‘Wulf?’

He snapped awake, still hearing them. Mara was sitting on the edge of the bed.

‘Supper is ready.’ His sister touched his shoulder. ‘Were you dreaming?’

‘No.’ He rubbed his eyes. ‘Are Pa and Roland back?’

‘Close.’ She had changed into a gown of olive wool, which brought out the green in her eyes. ‘What troubles you?’

Even when they were bairns, she had always known. ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘I’ll come down.’

They walked to the Great Hall. Wulf had always loved its understated beauty. He and Mara sat at the table, which was piled with food he had craved since his last visit: dock pudding and sausage, a stew of yearling lamb, damsons from the courtyard tree, flat pastry cakes, and apple pie served with white cheese from Rathdun Sanctuary. The servants were pouring elderberry wine when two men trudged through the arched doorway.

Lord Mansell Shore was the only southerner in the family, born near the coast of the Fens. He was stout as a kettle, with one dark eye and one grey. A horseshoe moustache grew from his brown face, grizzled where his receding curls were still black, for the most part.

Seeing Wulf, he stopped. ‘Son?’

With a grin, Wulf said, ‘Pa.’

Lord Mansell let out a rich laugh and opened his arms. Wulf stepped into them, smiling so much his cheeks ached. In the doorway, Roland laid down his gloves.

‘The cub returns,’ he said, and clapped Wulf on the back. ‘Good to see you, Wulfy.’

‘And you, Rollo.’

Roland now looked the part of heir apparent to the barony. He was broad in the shoulder and chest, nonchalantly handsome. The chestnut hair he shared with Mara was from their mother, Lady Rosa Glenn. She and her companion had been killed by thieves when Roland was four, and Mara just two – an act of violence that had shaken the queendom.

Lord Edrick had adopted his niece and nephew, who had grown up seeing him as their father. He had married Lord Mansell, and Wulf had made them a family of five, all gathered into Langarth.

‘This is a welcome surprise.’ Lord Mansell removed his cloak. ‘What brings you home, Wulf?’

‘Lady Glorian’s commendation.’

‘Ah, of course.’

‘We hear some republicans haunted the feast,’ Roland said to Wulf. ‘What did you make of the heathen Carmenti?’

‘Braw clothes, jewels, a grand retinue. Elected monarchs, to my eye.’

‘And yet, the people can decide. Quite the distinction,’ Lord Edrick said. As they all took their seats, he looked kindly at his companion. ‘Any luck resolving your dispute, love?’

‘If only. It will drag on for centuries at this rate.’ Rolling his eyes, Lord Mansell sank into his chair and motioned to one of the servants, who filled his cup. ‘Sir Armund Crottle. I’ve never seen one man so fixated on anything as he is on that Saint-forsaken path.’

‘Aren’t you delighted that this is your future?’ Mara asked Roland, who arched an eyebrow and reached for a dish.

‘We all must serve the Saint,’ Lord Edrick told her. ‘Your brother will make a fine baron in time.’ He smiled from the head of the table. ‘Look at this. All of us together again.’

‘Indeed. The full valley.’ Roland raised his cup. ‘To our Wulf.’

They drank. As the candles burned down, Wulf settled into his seat and listened to Lord Mansell recount his dispute, realising how sorely he had missed their company, their voices.

‘We heard strange tidings from the Marshes.’ Lord Mansell finished his mouthful of buttered pease. ‘You know they have a hot pool down there, the Ferndale Stews. According to our dear friend Sir Armund, the water boiled. Five people were bathing at the time.’

‘How dreadful,’ Mara said. ‘Did they live?’

‘One did. The rest died.’

‘Something similar happened in Hróth,’ Wulf recalled. ‘The mudpots close to Mount Dómuth. They steam all year, but before we left, Bardholt heard they started spitting and bubbling like cauldrons, all at once.’

‘Saint. I hope no one was in them.’

Wulf shook his head. ‘We know to stay away. The mud always burns like vice.’

‘Our little brother. Always a step from death, and so calm in his admission of it,’ Roland observed. ‘What could have caused the Inysh pool to turn?’

Lord Mansell grunted. ‘An earthquake or eruption somewhere in the world, perhaps.’ He drained his cup. ‘Unless it’s some omen of Mentish resentment, of course.’

‘Soft, Pa,’ Mara said in an undertone. ‘Rik could hear.’

‘Oh, Saint, let him. The Vatten brought them salvation, and all they can do is sulk.’ Lord Mansell poured them all more wine. ‘But let’s not talk of politics. Wulf, tell us all about your adventures in the North.’

‘Aye. I want to hear about the legendary Regny of Askrdal,’ Roland said. ‘Is it true she once shot a man in the eye when he questioned her skill with a bow?’

‘Nah.’ Wulf sipped his wine. ‘She did, however, give him a solid kick in the pestle, to prove she could hit a small target.’

****

Later, in the middle of the night, he lay sleepless, listening.

When he was young, he had sometimes heard a clicking in the dark of Langarth. Every summer, it would come. Roland had told him he heard the sound, too, and that he knew what made it.

The Lady of the Woods, tapping the windows, trying to reach the children in the house.

No one knew who she was, except that she had walked the isle when it was still known as Inysca. The haithwood was her ancient lair. She saw through the eyes of its birds and beasts, watching for those who neglected their prayers, for they renounced the protection of Halgalant. She would stuff their mouths with clag and drag them deep into the trees.

Tick-tick. Tick-tick.

It was only when Wulf had wet the bed that Lord Edrick sat him on his knee and explained that there were deathwatch beetles in the rafters, so named because all summer long they beat their armoured heads on the wood, driving back the silence in the hours of vigil. They were still doing it now, in autumn.

Wulf turned over, one hand fisted over his ear. He was seven years old and the witch was aprowl, coming to drag him to his doom. The mist on the window was her mildewed breath. All he could hear was her fingernails, thick with dry blood and the loam of the wood.

Tick-tick. Tick-tick.

Wulf forced his eyes open, the hair on his arms prickling. He was not a bairn any longer, and he would not lie in a cold sweat and wait. He would look his old fear in the face.

The candle at his bedside wore a shroud of wax. With a sheet over his shoulders, he lit a fresh one and carried it along the corridor, to a window that gave on to the haithwood.

By the light of the full moon, he beheld them – thrawn and tongueless, ancient as the isle itself. Thousands, myriad thousands of trees, their trunks hollowed by age: hazel and hornbeam, alder and medlar, wicker elm and rowan and yew, birch and beech and brittle willow, blackthorn and spindle and steadfast oak – but no hawthorns, not for centuries. The Saint had ordered them destroyed to end the old ways of the Inyscans, who had once praised hawthorns as their gods, and worshipped with violence and vice.

Wulf held the candle tight. Its glow haunted his countenance, so the glass reflected it, and his features were cast over the trees, giving them eyes. He looked at the haithwood, and the haithwood looked back. Blind and all-seeing. Soulless and eternal and alive.

And he could have sworn he could hear the witch calling: Come back to me, Child of the Woods. Come home.