Christopher Golden - The Nimble Man

Streams flowed down the hill, from trickle to brook to torrent, and the sound of the water joined with the perfume of the flowers to lend Conan Doyle a peace he had not known since the last time he had stepped inside the King's Door.

Surrounding the hill, the House of the King, were seven clusters of large trees, four to a cluster. In each small copse, the branches of the trees reached out to one another, twining together with such design that Conan Doyle could only ever think of them as braided. The braided branches created a basket in each small copse, sometimes twenty, sometimes thirty, sometimes forty feet in the air. And in its midst, gripped in the same way that the head of her staff gripped the sphere of ice, was a dwelling formed of woven leaves and branches and vines, with flowers sprayed across their roofs.

For nearly ten years they had lived in one of those treetop homes, called Kula-keaine by the Fey. Conan Doyle could still remember Ceridwen's caresses and the way her violet eyes gave off the slightest glow in the darkness when only the rustling of leaves and the songs of the night birds kept them company. As they progressed, Ceridwen resolutely refused to look up at the Kula-keaine where they had made their home, where they shared all of themselves, heart and soul.

They strode along a western path and up a winding set of stairs made from thick roots that protruded from the earth to form steps.

"We're not going to see the King?" Conan Doyle ventured.

Ceridwen did not turn to him when she spoke. "Yes, we are."

He said no more after that, only followed along beside her as she led him around to the western edge of the hill, where the water that came from the bowels of the earth fountained out of a hole in the green and gentle slope and became a rushing river that ran for several hundred yards before disappearing into a cavernous hole in the ground.

A black-cloaked figure knelt at the river's edge beside a pile of cut flowers. He wore a hood to cover his face and the daylight seemed repelled by him, as though a pool of night gathered around him. One by one, with a ritual bow of the head, he dropped the flowers in the rushing water and watched them borne away. Conan Doyle's heart ached to see him, for despite the black mourning clothes and the gathered shadows, he recognized the figure by his stature and carriage and the dignity with which he held his head and moved his hands.

Together Conan Doyle and Ceridwen approached.

"Uncle," the Fey sorceress said.

As though he had not heard, he picked up another flower and dropped it into the river, repeating the motion of his head and muttering quiet words. Only after the flower had disappeared into the gullet of that underground river cavern did he turn. His face was pale and gaunt, but behind a curtain of his long silver hair were eyes alive with fury and grief.

"We have a visitor," Ceridwen said, and there was a softness in her tone that both pleased Conan Doyle and pained him as well.

Conan Doyle sank to one knee. "King Finvarra. Time has passed, but I hope I am still welcome in your Home."

As though floating, the king rose from his spot by the riverside. He drew back his hood and a fond smile creased his face, yet somehow without dismissing the sadness there.

"You have come at a difficult time, Arthur. But I am pleased to see you, nonetheless. There was great disappointment, even bitterness, in the wake of your departure when last we met, yet you are still and always will be welcome in my Home. I only wish you had returned at a time when a celebration would not seem so grotesque."

Still kneeling, Conan Doyle lowered his gaze. "I understand, My Lord. I could not have hoped for such a welcome for a prodigal. You shame me."

A small sound came from Ceridwen, but Conan Doyle ignored it and she said nothing.

"There is no shame in heartbreak, Arthur," King Finvarra said. "It happens with the best of us. You yearned for the world of your birth and my niece would not leave hers. Hearts have been torn asunder by far less. Have you returned under the guidance of your heart?"?Conan Doyle felt his face flush. He looked up, trying not to see the way that Ceridwen turned away at the very same moment.

"My heart has been here since the day I left, My Lord. It has remained among the Fey, in Faerie, and may well be here until I die. But, no, that is not what brings me. I have come with a warning. And, I confess, hoping for some help. Dark power is at work in my world. Terrible omens. Unnatural magic. I don't know what malign intelligence is behind these events, but they have enlisted one of the night tribes to — "

Finvarra stiffened and glanced at Ceridwen, whose eyes narrowed. So taken aback was he by their reaction that he stopped speaking and only studied them expectantly.

The king stared at his niece. "There, perhaps, is our answer."

"What?" Conan Doyle asked. "What is it? What answer?"

Ceridwen's gaze was cold. There were many unformed thoughts and hopes in the back of his mind about his return to Faerie, about Ceridwen herself, but they were extinguished by that one look. There was only war in her eyes now.

"One of the night tribes, you said. Which one?" Ceridwen asked.

"The Corca Duibhne. They have straddled our two worlds for a very long time, but they have never been more than an annoyance. I've never seen them so organized, so focused on — "

"You have my sister to thank," Finvarra said, his gaunt face now cruel and brutal. "For 'tis Morrigan whom the Corca Duibhne now serve."

Conan Doyle pictured the corpses of the Fey where they lay in the King's Garden. One of our own, Ceridwen had said. But even when she had explained that it had been her aunt, Morrigan, he had not put the pieces together.

"But why?" Conan Doyle asked, genuinely mystified. He searched Finvarra's eyes and then looked to Ceridwen. "If Morrigan wanted to rule Faerie, what does she want with my world? What is she planning?"

"You presume that her ambitions are so small as to extend only to ruling in my place," King Finvarra said. "But my sister has danced in shadows for too long. She knows all the secrets of the darkness. You can be certain that whatever she has planned it is not nearly so mundane."

His brows knitted as he turned to Ceridwen. "Arthur has come for help, and he needs it, no question. You will go with him — "

Ceridwen gripped her elemental staff more tightly and shook her head. The flame that burned within the ice sphere at its head blazed brighter and a mist of steam rose from its frozen surface. "Uncle, no!"

A deathly stillness fell over the king. Finvarra stared at her. "We have lived for eons with the philosophy that what happens beyond Faerie is not our concern. But we took Arthur into our Home, and he has requested our aid. Even had he not, we can not allow Morrigan to interfere with the human world. Faerie must be protected. Ritual must be observed. I cannot leave, nor can I send an army into the Blight. The veil between worlds might be forever torn asunder by such an incursion. But you, niece, you shall go as my emissary."

She lowered her head. "Yes, My Lord King."

Finvarra regarded them both. "It appears the fates have conspired to break the stalemate the two of you entered into long ago. Let neither sweetness nor bitterness distract you. If you are not watchful, Morrigan will end up with both your hearts, and she will feed them to her wolves."

The king turned his back on them, then and knelt by the river once more. He raised his hood and in the full light of day the shadows of grief gathered round him. Falling again into the rhythm of ritual, he dropped his hand to the array of cut flowers, lifted one and dropped it into the river, inclining his head as it went along its way. One flower for each of the Fey who had died at Morrigan's hand.