Illustration by Paul Hagwood (Click for larger)
Aelfie was a Greenthumb and the queen’s men hunted her. They hunted all of her kind, few as they were—the songsmiths fled to the Isle of Skye, the starreaders camped deep within the timbers of the Trossachs. Aelfie was neither of these things. Her powers were older, and dead.
Yet still the queen’s men would slay her, for her blood was from a time before their revolution. It did not bend before their discoveries or submit to their new faith of Industry and Science.
Aelfie huddled in a gully near the old Highlander’s Way. The heathered crags of Glen Coe sprawled around her. Moss-coated peat lay like a sponge beneath thorny bracken, thick with water trickling down from the munros above. Across the roadway stood a wayfarers’ public house. Smoke billowed from its chimney, bringing with it the savory aroma of boiled cabbage, onions, leeks, and lamb.
Greenthumbs didn’t need others to find food for them. Aelfie’s mother had taught her how to forage and live from the land. She had taught her much more, too. For thousands of years Greenthumbs had tended the forests and gardens of the isles. But then the revolution had come, spawned from the coffee shops in London and Edinburgh, the universities at Oxford and Glasgow, where men of science dwelled. Aelfie held nothing against these men, nor their discoveries. It wasn’t until the years of the famine, when the fields had withered and half the population died of starvation, that animosity had grown between the children of the forests and the learned men of the cities.
The queen’s government proclaimed in their newspapers that the Greenthumbs had caused the potato fields to wither, the soil to dry and turn to dust. The Greenthumbs wanted an end to progress, the papers said. They wanted trains outlawed and the iron smelters abandoned, to strangle the promise of a greater future.
Aelfie’s mother had called these claims false. But as she’d faded from life, she’d sung Aelfie a song. The song spoke of deep lochs filled with beastly creatures and of mountains that were really sleeping giants, of fisher folk lying with selkies, and of the Green Man. The song spoke of a mystical order to the stars and the land. It spoke of power. Aelfie’s mother had called it the covenant of their people.
Aelfie didn’t know what it meant. She only knew she was tired of being hunted. Hunted without knowing the truth, without knowing which side to believe. She lived her days roaming the glens, not knowing why, or where to go.
She could enter the wayfarers’ house and sit at a table. No one would question her. If she was quiet and just listened, they wouldn’t know her from one of their own. Perhaps she would learn if her people were really so despised. Perhaps she would like living as one of them and decide to give up her life in the forest. Her mother would hate that, but her mother was no longer with her.
Scampering across the roadway, Aelfie pulled her cowl tight around her chestnut locks. She spied a steam carriage in the yard on the far side of the house, a monster of steel and wood, with copper tubes lashed in a lattice across its flank and a charred snout thrusting upward from its roof. A man in a gray suit shoveled coal into its rear hatch. Another lounged against a low fence, fiddling with a chronometer. His arms were sleeved in boiled leather plated in bronze. Aelfie found herself staring. She’d seen such things before, but always a curiosity overcame her to know more, to study every little knob and lever.
The man with the shovel glanced at her, and she hurried inside. The common room of the wayfarers’ house held a trio of long wooden tables. A fire warmed the air from a stone hearth, over which hung the cooking pot. Withered beams sagged so low Aelfie had to duck to clear the threshold. A pair of herdsmen huddled in a corner, highlanders by their brawn and scruff. Their tartan trews were red striped with black and yellow. They’d thrust a dirk into the table between them, an old custom requesting privacy.
Perched before the hearth, like a sow spitted and put to roast, was a red-cheeked Reckoner. His coat and vest were finely woven, as befit a man of her majesty’s employment. A golden chain looped from a pocket at his gut to a button on his chest. A small wooden box lay open on the table next to him. Tiny metal disks atop stems of iron sprouted from its innards like a field of dandelions. He squinted through spectacles of purpled glass at a ledger upon his lap.
Aelfie’s breath caught at the sight of him. Reckoners were not as dangerous as Bailies or Redcoats; they were zealous clerks more than warriors, but a queen’s man always went armed in the Highlands, and he was as like to throw her in shackles as any other hound. It was a Reckoner who’d strung her mother’s brother from a tree. The memory saddened her. Lewvyn had lived among the herdsmen of Dunkeld for years and done nothing to deserve such a fate.
“Well, there’s a lass,” boomed the voice of a southerner. The speaker and his companion were the room’s only other occupants.
“Ah, let her be,” said the man’s companion. He smiled at Aelfie with kindly eyes. Both men were city folk, but neither was richly dressed. The starched shirt of the kindly man spoke of an office, while the tattered coat of the boorish man spoke of travel. She ducked her head in greeting and sat at the end of their bench, close to the door. Her gaze flickered to the Reckoner, but the queen’s man was intent on the book before him and did not stir.
The southerner leered at her chest. “You from Invercoe? Talard here is looking for land to purchase and a comely wife to settle down with.”
“Welsh stone is what I said, Harrington.” Talard smirked. “His lord of Invercallie requires a hundred ton to beautify the Fern Tower.”
Harrington waved a dismissive hand. “Eh, his lordship will have his stone. The steam hammers of Swansea will sing their thundering tune, and the stone will be on the Great Northern Rail within a fortnight.” He leaned toward Aelfie. “Have you ever seen these contraptions of James Nasmyth’s? Powerful enough to topple mountains, they are.” When Aelfie shook her head, he patted her arm and took a gulp from his ale.
“The ‘ol Colossus of Roads would’ve liked to make use of them back in his day,” said Talard. Aelfie knew that name. Thomas Telford had built the great Caledonian canal that linked the east coast with the west. He’d invented ways of melding stone with iron plate, built bridges and aqueducts and roadways, altering the very face of the High- and Lowlands. Her mother had called him an enemy of their people.
“To be sure,” Harrington agreed.
Talard took a draught of his own, then blotted his lips with a kerchief. “Have you heard of the work done near the Ross of Mull? They say Thomas Stevenson, of the lighthouse Stevensons, is using stardust to fuel the lamp. A thousand times as powerful as those gas pumps of John Wigham.”
“Lofty, that man is. He’s got patronage from lairds all over the Empire.” Harrington put a finger to the side of his nose. “Guess it pays to wear a cloak and mask in the right company.”
“Ah, I don’t believe it,” said Talard. “All this talk of dark fraternities sprouting up all over London.”
Aelfie blinked. “He’s using stardust?” Her mother had told her of the vapors their cousin starreaders inhaled as they foretold the fates of men. Could this Stevenson have learned their secrets? She wondered if such a man would scorn her presence or greet her with sympathy. Surely there were men of science who dismissed the queen’s newspapers in favor of their own deductions. Wasn’t that the very heart of their revolution?
“Dust of the Aether, harvested by giant balloons launched high into the heavens,” said Talard.
“Meteorology’s Stevenson’s true passion,” said Harrington. “He doesn’t deny it. He’s even got that society he founded looking at building an observatory atop Ben Nevis.”
“The giants will knock it down if the winds don’t first.” Aelfie jumped. She hadn’t heard the woman approach. The master of the house was a stunted crone whose curved spine shortened her even further. Wispy gray hair fell to her waist. Grease and blood stained her apron. “There’s lamb in the pot. A cup for three pence, and a pint of ale for three more.”
Aelfie dug into her pocket and pressed the bits into the woman’s hand. The crone’s wrinkled brow furrowed, and Aelfie’s gut lurched as she realized her mistake. One of the silver coins was embossed with the head of James VII of Scotland. An old coin from an outlaw king.
“Tsk, I canna take this, lassie.” Aelfie’s cheeks flushed, and her head rushed. She had to snatch the coin quick, before Talard and Harrington saw it. Then she could flee into the forests and not look back. There would be no questions if she ran fast enough.
She reached out, but the crone jerked and the coins spilled to the ground, plinking across the stone. Talard lurched to his feet, while Harrington exclaimed. Aelfie scrambled to the floor, scraping her hands along the stone to scoop up the silver. She’d just reclaimed the last when a command came from the hearth. “Bring that here.”
Aelfie raised her head. The Reckoner studied her from behind his purple lenses. She froze for only a heartbeat before leaping for the door.
But one of the Reckoner’s men, the one sleeved in plates of bronze, blocked the threshold. His backhanded swipe sent her reeling to the floor, her head ringing and jaw pulsing in agony.
“Now, I dare say,” stammered Harrington.
“Most untoward,” said the Reckoner. “But you’ll find I have little love for the queen’s enemies.” He stood and beckoned for his man to bring Aelfie closer.
Harrington’s eyes grew large. “Yes, yes. Well, I think we can all agree on that count.”
The room spun. Aelfie tried to struggle, but her arms were pinned and her legs wobbled as she was drug toward the Reckoner. “My name is Glover,” he said. “I work for her majesty. If you are a loyal subject, I will apologize on behalf of my man, Wat, and will make restitution. But I do not believe either will be needed.” He grabbed Aelfie by the chin. “I can see the fell glint of the fairy folk in your eyes.”
He gestured, and Wat locked her arms behind her back. Glover searched within a leather satchel, pulling out a long syringe and a vial of clear liquid. Aelfie squirmed but couldn’t free herself. She heard the crone’s wheezing and Harrington’s heavy breath behind her. She glanced at the highlanders and saw that the dirk had disappeared. Both men watched intently, hands folded with their cloaks. One nodded slightly when she met his gaze.
The old ways, Aelfie thought, for the little good it did her. But she would not dishonor her mother by cowering. She stared back at the Reckoner with a snarl on her lips. “I am a Greenthumb, blood of the Fey.”
“So we shall see.” Glover filled the syringe and tapped the needle. “This serum turns emerald when mixed with human blood. Let us see what it does with yours.” Wat forced one of her arms forward. “Regrettably, I’m not sure of the exact location of your veins.”
A bead of flame raced across her wrist as Wat’s knife cut into her. Aelfie sucked in her breath but refused to scream, even as her blood welled and dripped to the floor. The Reckoner dipped the tip of the syringe into the flow and sucked up a half-dram.
The serum turned black.
“Most curious,” said the queen’s man.
Lore told of Greenthumbs calling wolves and bears and other beasts to their aid. Aelfie held no such power, but she willed with all her might for something to happen, to remember some tale of her mother’s that would lend her aid. But only fragments and half-formed images flitted through her mind.
Glover tossed the syringe into the hearth and repacked his things. “We’ll bring her to magistrate,” he told Wat. “His lordship can decide the manner of her execution.”
Aelfie howled and kicked and scraped. Her blood sprayed from her wrist as she tried to claw her way from Wat’s grasp. Glover danced out of her reach, a look of disgust upon his face. She could see drops of her blood coating his glasses and chin. Then something hard crashed into her skull. Vomit escaped her lips as blackness took her.
When she woke, her hands were bound behind her. She sat inside the steam carriage on a bench of red velvet, opposite Glover. The carriage bounced and shuddered over every rock. Its engine popped and sputtered. The stench of burning coal hung thick in the tiny compartment.
Outside, the gnarled crags rolled slowly past as they trundled south. Creeping toward her doom, she knew. She had to escape. There would be no hope for her once they reached the city. Too many of the queen’s men were quartered there. Aelfie pulled against her bonds, and a searing pain flared as the rope met where Wat’s blade had slashed. She grimaced, her eye’s watering.
Glover stared at her. “Your kind are ever strange. Would that I could study you further.” His calm demeanor enraged Aelfie further. He did not see her as a threat, only a curiosity.
“What kind of creature preys upon an innocent child?” she spat. The venom on her tongue came from deep within. She thought again of Lewvyn and of the song that was the covenant of her people. The power it spoke of was kinder than the malice shown by the queen’s hounds. Its harmony sang of healing, not killing. Of compassion, not cruelty.
“Innocent? Oh, I think not. A wolf who savages a farmer can claim innocence because the beast understands no better morality.” He folded his hands in his lap and shifted his seat as the carriage lurched. “But your kind do understand. Fey have always been crafty fiends. Crafty and wicked.”
Her head swam and her wrists burned, yet Aelfie tugged again against the rope. This time her hands slid further apart. “Reckoners thieve from the land, herding away folk who’ve lived in the glens and about the lochs for thousands of years. You topple the forests and burn the fields. Deer cannot graze, fish are poisoned in the waters.”
“The New Clearances are a necessity. The freed land will be farmed using new techniques, providing an abundance of food.”
“For those in the cities, to the south. What of the highlanders? Do their clans not need food to eat? Where is the land they would tend?” Aelfie tugged harder and felt her wrists grow slick as her wound reopened.
“Their need has been spent, much like the time of your people. It is sad, but extinction is a part of nature.” Glover’s eyes turned cold and hard. “All life must progress or fade away.”
Pain blossomed in waves as the rope slid back and forth along her flesh, but this time Aelfie held her face stern. She opened herself to the burning. Her mother had taught her ways of singing the hurt away. Chants to focus the mind. Tender melodies to sooth a restless spirit. A thought flitted to her, unformed, yet urgent. Her mother had taught her many things: salves to cure inflammation and poultices to stave off infection. And she’d taught her how to sear a wound closed with an unction. An unction of crushed petals and blood.
Purple bells steeped in burn,
Blood and petal knit flesh in turn
Aelfie heard her mother’s lilting voice, singing the rhyme as she often did when one of the local folk came in need of aid, and a smile came to her lips. She remembered the unction turned black when mixed properly. In small doses, it would tickle and crust. Applied in quantity, and the unction was kin to an acid.
“It was twinflower in the serum.”
Glover nodded. “A simple flower, harvested from the pinewoods of Strathspey. Simple, yet rare.” He reached into his satchel and pulled out the vial. It was almost full. “It likes your blood not.”
“It burns,” Aelfie agreed. The petal and the blood, to sear the flesh. Her eyes narrowed on the vial. Her wrists were slick and almost free. Another painful yank was all she needed.
The Reckoner frowned. His mouth opened, but before he could speak, a rifle-shot cracked, echoing through the glen. The chimney shrieked, letting out a long hiss of steam, as the carriage jerked to a halt. A thumping sounded on the roof, from the coachman. “Highwaymen in the road,” came a shout.
Glover drew a pistol from beneath his bench and pointed the barrel at her head. “Do not move. Pray these brigands are no kin of yours, or I’ll bury you along with them.” Throwing open the door, he leaned out.
Aelfie’s heart pounded. The memory of her mother’s voice was a soft whisper in her ear, like a gentle breeze through fields of heather. Steeling herself, she yanked and the bonds fell away. Her arms tingled in joy, but she had no mind for them. She lunged for the vial, snatching it from atop the satchel.
Grunts and clacks rang outside, mixed with the shuffling of feet upon the road. The carriage rocked as something slammed into it. Glover turned and cursed. He brought the pistol to bear, but not quick enough. Aelfie smashed the vial into his face.
The serum mixed with the blood trickling along her arm and turned black. Glover tried to shove her, but she drove her fist into his throat. The pistol fired, and her ears rang with a metallic squeal.
She smeared her wrist along his cheeks and jaw. The serum hissed, drinking in the Fey blood. Wisps of smoke rose from the Reckoner’s flesh, and he began to shriek. His hands clawed at his face as his legs thrashed.
“Most curious,” Aelfie said. “A man of science who is not as learned as he thought.” She took up his pistol and cracked it against his skull.
Glover slumped. Aelfie re-cocked the pistol and sprang from the carriage. Beside the road, Wat struggled against two brawny men who were hooded and masked. The coachman lay sprawled across the driver’s seat.
Aelfie hesitated. Her mind screamed for her to run, but her legs were rooted in place. One of the men swiped at Wat with the butt of a rifle. It clanged against Wat’s bronzed arms, and the highwayman staggered back.
The other darted in low, thrusting with a dirk. Wat dodged but stumbled in the bracken, and his assailants set upon him in a flurry that left him motionless.
When they turned to regard Aelfie, she found her pain and fear and rage had gone. She recognized the men before they lifted their masks.
One raised his hand in a calming gesture. “We mean nae harm, lass. Our guid-auntie were a Maid ‘o the Trees, a lady who ken the giants our father said.”
“I know little of giants,” said Aelfie. “But my mother sang of them sleeping amongst the munros. Perhaps your good-aunt could tell me more.”
The highlander shook his head. “Alas, she’s dead of the flux. Still, we couldn’t let one of her kin be bundled away to Edinburgh. The dungeons there are worse than the streets, and them has got a stink and rot not fit for a Campbell, black as they may be.”
“Aye,” said the other. He tugged at his trews, red stripped with black and yellow.
Aelfie glanced up the road, then at the carriage. “How did you get ahead of us?”
Both men laughed. “We ken these lands as we ken our own legs. Nae road of the queen’s is quicker than the trails of a highlander.”
“You put yourself in danger for me,” said Aelfie, as a pang of guilt overcame her. “And I have nothing for you.”
“It is us as should give. We remember the tales of auld days when the Greenthumbs ‘o the Fey tended to our clans and lent magics to our hearth and home.”
Hope welled within Aelfie. The queen’s men would hound her still, and her thirst for answers hadn’t been quenched. But there was truth in the highlander’s words. The respect he gave those of her blood was solid and real, not some memory passed on from time’s past. It gave her purpose, a road to follow. She was a Greenthumb, and she would make her mother, and her mother’s mother, proud.
“We best take to the hills. The Reckoner and his lackeys will wake soon enough, though he has no hounds with noses good enough to flush us from the glen. We’ll be safe enough.”
Aelfie smiled and followed the highlanders, but her mind was already set. She would journey to see the man, Stevenson, with his stardust. Perhaps he would have the knowledge she sought, or perhaps he would want to learn from her. Either way, she was done hiding in the forest.
