Once... Tales, Myths and Legends of Faerie

Preface

Mortals cannot perceive the veil unless they are invited to – or extremely gifted. For centuries, Man and Fae have been kept apart, for nothing good ever comes from them mixing. The collection of The Adventures of Saphira the Faery Dog is proof of this.

Still, there are magical creatures that side neither with Man nor Fae.

Dragons are such creatures. They hold the knowledge of both worlds. Some even collect it in the written word, keeping it safe in their lairs.

An inquisitive half-fae once broke into the lair of a dragon known to hoard books. The knowledge she found was too much to keep to herself...

Here are a few tales, myths and legends from Faerie. Some may sound remarkably similar to legends held by mortals, while others are...  well... as otherworldly as the fae themselves.

Queen of Ice

Ice crystals formed on Beira’s bare arms. She smiled in delight and opened her mouth wide. Sleet and wind flew out and froze the landscape. Her cloak fluttered behind her. Where everything had once been green and alive, only ice remained. It took only moments for the green to become brown. Summer had tried valiantly to prevent autumn from claiming the land; for a time, all the plants had thought they could still grow during the mild equinox.

But she wasn’t going to stand back anymore. Winter was hers. Winter was without sympathy. Winter was meant to be filled with ice.

A lynx trying to walk against the ice wind caught her attention. She looked into his eyes and saw the wonder with which he watched her. Beira swallowed. It rarely happened that she wasn’t feared.

‘Come with me,’ she said to the brave cat.

She could hear how he followed her across the frozen moor, through the woods glistening with ice crystals, to her stone cottage that sometimes looked like a castle.

Beira opened the door and the lynx shot past her into the warm room.

Numerous animal-voices greeted her and the new arrival.

‘Go ahead, share the warm milk with him,’ she said to her guests.

She watched how they made space for the lynx at the cauldron into which milk from the Tree of Winter and Life trickled, then sat down in front of the warm hearth, surrounded by all the wild animals who needed her.

Rumour Has It

Jamie MacKinnion purposely walked through the thick foliage reminiscent of a tropical forest. He didn’t care much for Faerie’s new look. Where once everything had the distinct feel of cold Caledonian forests, moors, heaths and mountains, only the Faery Queen’s newest whim stood.

It was infuriating. And it fuelled the rumours making the rounds.

He finally made it to the last patch of heather. Most of the Galno were already waiting.

‘So, what did the queen say?’ the laird of clan Douglas asked without greeting.

Everyone shifted so they could see him.

‘That Faerie is hers to do with as she pleases.’ She actually had a lot more to say on the matter, but the clans didn’t need to hear it. Especially the part where there had been complaints about everything always looking exactly like the Galno – like he – wanted it to.

‘Doesn’t she care how we feel?’

Jamie gritted his teeth. He didn’t want to snap at them. Even if they’d cost him the most important relationship in his life, family came first.

‘Are you sure?’ the laird of the MacGregor clan asked softly. ‘They’re not taking this too well.’

‘And they shouldn’t,’ Jamie replied darkly. ‘All this feuding against her wishes had caused this.’ He gestured around them to the encroaching tropical flowers.

‘Spring, Jamie,’ the Faery Queen had said, ‘isn’t it wonderful? Too long now have we lived in the shadow of autumn. It’s time for a change. All my subjects need it. Showing my full power will remind all of who’s queen.’

‘It’s our way of life. She thinks we’re challenging her authority?’

‘Worse. She thinks that we’re causing the restlessness among others in Faerie.’

The MacGregor looked around worriedly.

Jamie didn’t blame him.

‘It’s time for us to leave Faerie,’ Faolon MacKeltar, laird of clan MacKeltar, said loudly to all the Galno. ‘We can live in the human realm, in Scotia, where moors and heaths are clad in heather, and no fickle queen can change things at a whim!’

Jamie was stricken. He would’ve felt even worse if there had been cheers.

Grumbling came from the crowd.

The sweet scent of wisteria whisked him back a fortnight, when all the trouble began.

‘Was that really necessary?’ Jamie asked the Faery Queen. They were alone in her wisteria-covered bower. The big meeting with important fae was finally over. But he was still seething.

‘Yes. My subjects are restless. Some have even gone to the human realm, feeling that they’d have more control over their own lives there.’

She sighed. Jamie itched to hold her and tell her that everything would be all right. But he had a feeling that, despite their relationship, it wouldn’t be well-received. Besides, she’d questioned his loyalty in front of all the prominent fae.

‘You realise that they’d challenged me to prove your loyalty?’ she asked.

‘Wasn’t that enough?’

‘Apparently not. Jamie, you have to stop the feuding among the clans or there’ll be consequences.’

He watched her, unsure of how to tell her that it was a trap. The Galno would never stop feuding. Not even for her.

Gasps from the crowd pulled him back to the present. The last of the heather turned to cowslip and grass. It stopped at the invisible line separating the Bright and the Dark territories. The Dark Lands were covered in dry grass and eventually snow.

Everyone looked at Jamie. He hoped it was because he was laird of the largest clan and not because they felt he could do something about this final change. It was quite a concession of the Queen to not have turned it into whatever passed as spring flowers in the tropics.

‘I guess I’ll be sending scouts to find us a suitable home,’ the MacGregor said as the yellow flowers turned to red, white and cobalt hyacinths.

Jamie nodded, defeated.

––––––––

Jamie felt a twinge of regret as he left the gathering. Leaving Faerie would change something in him for perpetuity. But the queen and her short-sightedness left him without much choice.

‘MacKinnion.’

Jamie came to a stop. He did not turn to face the other man.

‘Fine. I’ll do all the talking then. You know that others had forced the queen’s hand and yet you didn’t defend her. I don’t know what happened between you two, but I always thought you’d look out for her no matter what.’

Jamie clenched his jaw and stared straight ahead. The Assassin sighed.

‘This new action the Galno want to take will be outright treason. You know this. If you continue in this vein and lead a mass exodus of Galno out of Faerie, there will be war. You have been warned.’

Tears silently flowed down Jamie’s cheeks. His pride had cost him the woman he loved. Now it might even get his people killed.

––––––––

Jamie paced the meeting room in the Galno compound. It had to be clear to other fae that something was up, but he didn’t care. With so many of his people already in the human realm, it was better for the rest of them to stay close together.

More than just the upcoming exodus weighed on him. Though what they were attempting could cost them all their lives, it was the waiting that was getting to him. It had been days since they’ve sent scouts out to find them a new home and they’d had no word.

A chill swept over him and Jamie stopped pacing.

His heart racing, he slipped out of the room, sword drawn.

It was late enough that most in the compound were already asleep. He signalled the guards to alert the others. He knew that something was wrong.

They came upon the MacKeltar, throat slit, and his assassin slipping out of the window, grinning at them.

It felt like time stood still as Jamie watched the blood drip from the other clan laird’s throat. Rattling from the MacKeltar’s throat snapped him out of immobility. He raced to Faolon’s side. Eyes wide, he didn’t quite register what the other fae said before his last breath left him.

‘Father!’

Jamie made way for the MacKeltar’s only son.

‘Search the grounds! The assassin couldn’t have gotten far,’ he ordered the other Galno there.

‘The Assassin killed my father?’

‘No. A Dark Court Knight.’

Though death was a rare occurrence for their kind, it was always a possibility. And it meant a call from either the Dullahans that work for the King of the Dead or a visit from Ankou himself.

Jamie looked around the dark room. Only he, Ian MacKeltar and the late laird