Aisling Úllmhara's Arc

Chapter 1 of 6

Aisling Úllmhara wanted the crown of the island's fairy host, and she had nothing to win it with. Once she kept an apple grove between worlds. Bite a fruit, cross a threshold, walk home. Then someone cut the grove down and burned it. Now she stood on a strange island, on the wrong side of everything, watching the host gather for their great Samhain revel. Win their crown, she thought, and she could command the folk who might grow her a new door. The host filled the deck of a dead ship. Its timbers were black with age. Its torn sails hung like old cobwebs, and pale carvings glowed along the hull. The fairy folk crowded the rails, drinking and laughing, waiting to name their queen. Aisling climbed the plank and spoke her claim. The laughter stopped. A horned lord stepped forward. He looked her up and down. "Where is your court?" he asked. "Where is your land, your hall, your people?" "Burned," Aisling said. "But I am Aos Sí still." "You are a stranger with empty hands." He turned to the crowd. "No court, no crown. She owns nothing on this island." The host jeered. Aisling's face went hot. On her old ground she had ruled a grove. Here she was less than a beggar. Then a voice cut through. "She's not alone." Aisling turned. A red-haired woman climbed the plank behind her, a gold cross swinging at her throat. Deirdre Ní Bhriain. They had met once on the road, two women running from what men had taken from them. Deirdre owed her nothing. Yet here she came. "And who are you?" the lord asked. "The bishop's woman," Deirdre said flatly. "That's what they call me. I say I stand with her." Behind Deirdre came a small figure in tattered white, hair drifting like smoke. Moira Wails climbed up, gripping the rail. Aisling knew her too, a banshee who scattered every crowd with her scream. "Hi," Moira said, waving. "Don't panic. I'm working on the whole scary thing." The lord smirked. "Two humans and a banshee. Is this your court?" "It is," Aisling said. "Prove it," he said. "Bind them. If they'll swear to you, the host will hear your claim." Aisling faced her two unlikely followers. "I have no land to give you. No hall. Nothing but a door I mean to build, if you'll help me stand." Deirdre met her eyes. "I want something back too. We help each other." She knelt. Moira dropped down beside her. "I've got nowhere better to be." Her voice wobbled, and one sail cracked down the middle. The lord's smirk fell. Two sworn followers stood where a stranger had stood alone. "Very well," he said, teeth tight. "You have a court now. Small. Ragged. But a court." He raised his voice. "She may compete for the crown." The host went quiet. Aisling had her seat at the revel. Now she had to outshine every rival on the deck.