A Day of Fallen Night (The Roots of Chaos)

Deep in the barrow, all was quiet. Wulf waited inside with Sabran, watching as she dozed against his thighs. She slept with her legs tucked up, as she must have in the womb.

It was spring, but inside the false hill, winter clung. He had moved his cloak to cover Sabran. For hours, he had not thought of anything but her. Not the light that came from his hand, or the comet. Just the child he had never expected.

Daylight strained into the barrow through a smokehole. By that faint glow, Wulf drank in the sight of his newborn daughter, so he would remember every snuffle, every feature. He ghosted a thumb over her cheeks, her threads of hair, her ears. Best of all were her delicate black lashes, strokes of the finest brush.

Sabran slept like a small bear, lips apart, breathing from her belly. ‘Aye,’ Wulf murmured, giving her a gentle pat. ‘Must be a tiring affair. Born at the end of the world.’

It was the first time he had spoken, and his voice made her stir. She paddled her feet against his middle.

‘Hello,’ he said.

Sabran made a little sound. He looked into her eyes, green as withy leaves.

‘Where did you come from?’ he asked her. ‘Who is it you all look like, hm?’

She wrinkled her brow.

‘You’ll be all right, you know. I wasn’t raised by my birthfather, either. He died a long time ago. I turned out reasonably well.’ Wulf tucked a fold of his cloak under her chin. ‘Now, I don’t know if the Prince of Yscalin will love you, but don’t fuss, wee one. Others will.’

Glorian must have managed to feed her, between giving birth and inspiring the troops. Her belly was warm and swollen. He leaned in closer, so he could hear her tiny breaths.

‘I suppose I’d better tell you something about me. While we have time,’ he murmured. ‘I was born in a bonny valley in the South, to a kind warrior and a man the birds trusted – birds that sang him to his doom, which only the bees saw. I was stolen over sand and sea, deep into a louring wood, where a wolf carried me away from a witch to a man who loved me like his own. I fled from my past to the eversnow, where the sky ripples with light. I stood on a white ship that burned, but I didn’t, because I had a secret in my blood.

‘We’ve something special in us, you and me,’ he told her. ‘Sabran Melim Berethnet, you are descended from a man who built a kingdom on a lie. He told the world he had vanquished a monster, but in truth, it was a great princess who did it. Her name was Cleolind. She built a house to guard the truth – not for glory, Sabran, but because the truth matters. You will be the first Berethnet queen who has that truth within her.

‘It’s just an ember. Less than that. It’s more a candle, I suppose, a light you’ll never feel or see. You might not be the one who tells it – but it will live in you, all your days, and keep you very warm.’ He placed a fingertip on her breastbone. ‘Just here.’

She peered up at him. Wulf smiled at her, a tear seeping down his cheek.

‘You are a secret, like my mother. Like our sisters. Like me.’ He kissed her soft head. ‘And I love you.’

Sabran yawned with a squeak like a mouse, heedless of it all. Wulf shook with the sudden force of his tears. He pressed her to his heart, and he willed her, in some small and hidden chamber of her own, to remember how his love had wrapped her. How his voice had sounded, here in the strange womb of the barrow.

And he prayed, not to the Saint, but to the Mother. He prayed no bees would haunt her dreams – that instead, she would whisper her secrets to them, tell them of the memory of him. He prayed her days rang with laughter and song.

He stayed that way until he heard the hooves coming towards the barrow, crying of victory.

****

Cenning Moor had erupted into cheers. All across Inys, the people were emerging from their hideouts, to stand in the sun without fear of the fire.

Only the Queen of Inys still wept. She held herself inside her cave, alone for the first time in years. A silver thread had unravelled within her, and with it, the voice in her dream disappeared.