The Seasons of Salt

Chapter Thirteen

The room was large and high and Sylas did not recognise it. He looked around slowly. The columns were carved into spirals, sheening darkly. Black-gold. But probably not really. There was not enough black-gold in the world to carve those grand columns out of it. They were painted, mayhap. Just pretend.

The windows were right grand though. Tall and chequered with red and yellow, blue and green and clear white panes. The light shone through it, sending sparkles across the floor he stood on, wide and empty stone. He knelt, his fingers scraping against the light it looked so real, as if the coloured lights there by his feet were jewels he could stoop to scoop into his pocket and bring one home for Cissa, and maybe one home for Ma too. They stayed stubbornly upon the floor.

“Pretty, is it not?”

He flinched at the voice behind him, stumbling to his feet. He recognised that voice all too well.

“I’m not telling you nowt, hag,” he spat at the white-haired witch. She laughed, a happy laugh. Kindly.

“Oh, it’s going to be that kind of visit today, is it? Let’s not resort to name-calling,” she said.

“I’m not telling you my name!”

“That was not quite what I meant, young lord.” Her eyes were twinkling. He glowered at her. She was dressed all in white today, just like that long waterfall of hair. It flowed down to her waist in rippling streams, and upon the top she wore a circlet of black rolled bone, frightening and sharp. Her skin was pale and gleaming, like the starlight, and she would have been beautiful, mayhap, if there was not something just a little off about her. Her teeth perched over the edge of her lips, two from the top lip, onyx black, two curving up slightly from the bottom in shimmering ivory,  ready to eat him with if he made but a single mistake.

She walked past him, and the light seemed to follow her as she went. She perched herself upon the edge of the black-gold throne underneath the window like she belonged there. Her white skirts flowed out around her feet in a sharp contrast to the black seat.

She tapped her fingers upon the arm of the chair and they rang out metallically.

“You know,” she said with something like surprise, “I do believe this chair is real metal. I always supposed it was gilded. Such a waste. Do they even know how many swords could have been forged from this much black-gold?”

“Why are you here?” he asked mulishly. He stepped forwards until he was almost in the circle of radiance that hazed around her, like a misty halo around the moon.

“The same reason as you, I suppose.” Her nails clacked on the throne again and Sylas growled, almost like a wild-beast. She laughed.

“The Fae is strong in you tonight, Lord of the Winds,” she said. “Tell me, why do you appear like this? You never used to.”

She waved a hand in his general direction. He looked down at his night-shirt, loose and flapping around his knees. He hugged his arms around himself, glowering all the more. It was his oldest night-shirt, true, but it was comfortable. It had been Jonnah’s before he grew out of it and once, long, long ago, it had been Da’s old undershirt – the rough one he used for training out in the courtyard in. It had been well-washed a hundred or more times since then, but sometimes Sylas fancied he could still smell Da on it could still smell the sweat as he trained to become the best and the strongest and the fastest warrior in Bridgenford and all of the nine counties just like Sylas would be, when he grew up too.

“I just come like this,” he spat. “It’s just what I wear when I sleep. I cannot help it. I do not choose it.”

“You do, my lord. You just do not realise it yet, mayhap. But it was not the clothes I was referring to. Tell me, why do you visit me as a child now?”

“I am a child!”

“Ah. I see. It does get so muddled here sometimes, does it not?”

“What else should I be?”

She beckoned him closer, but he did not come. She sighed a little in regret.

“You used to come to me as a great warrior,” she said softly. “Long, thick blonde hair, Dowse-hair, you used to call it, muscle honed and battle-scarred. Wild and impetuous and romantic. And now you are a boy again.” Her soft eyes looked him up and down again. She seemed a little disappointed.

Sylas blinked at her. “I was a man?”

“You were a Fae,” she whispered, her dark eyes lighting up with mischief. “Or, Fae-kissed, at the very least. But it is not time yet. Soon, mayhap, but not yet.”

Sylas shivered. He took another step back. He did not like the white-haired witch. He did not trust her soft, over-large eyes and gentle, musical voice. More than anything he wished Cissa was here, she always knew what to do.

“Who are you?” he asked. The woman laughed coquettishly. Her white-hair was tossed back against the back of the throne.

“You will not give me your name, but I must give you mine? Come, my lord, that is not gallantry.” She looked around the hall and sighed deeply.

“What do you want from me?” he all but shouted. “Why do you come to me? Why do you bring me here? Why do you want my name? I do not understand!”

She stroked the arm of the throne sadly, her fingers lingering on the cold metal. The little diamonds of coloured light fell amongst her stark white hair as she stood once more, making her seem like a jester or a harlequin though there was nowt funny about her at all. She walked towards him purposefully now, and he stumbled backwards, stumbled out of her reach. She put her hands on his shoulders, stilling him before he could flee, and pressed a kiss to his forehead. It burnt against his skin but he could not move his hands to push her away or to wipe the curse off. He could feel the curve of her teeth against his skin as she pressed her lips against him.

“You have it wrong, my love,” she breathed. “It is you who send for me. When I come for you, you will know why.”

“When?”

“Soon,” she promised and he could not tell if it thrilled or frightened him.

“When is soon?” he demanded in frustration as she started to walk away from him once more.

She stopped but did not turn to face him.

“Time is…strange…in the spirit realms,” she said. “I think we are separated by more than just distance. My soon will not be your soon. I can give you no more than that.”

“You must!”

“Ah, my lord. You were always so impatient. Or you will be, mayhap. I wish you would appear to me as a man full-grown again. It is not the same, talking even to such a charming young child as yourself.”

She turned to face him and her eyes were wet with tears. A horrid thought occurred to him.

“You know me. For real. Not just in the dreams.”

“Yes.”

“Do I know you?”

“Who can say? If you do not yet, then you will.”

“When?” he demanded again. He wished Da was here. Da would make her tell him.

She knelt before him and he shuddered away.

“Tell me your name,” she said quietly.

“No.”

“Then now is not the time,” she said. “The day that you tell me your name will be the day you will know.” She rose to her feet. “Do not summon me again, my lord,” she said. “It is hard enough to bear as it is. Let me remember you as a man. Do not haunt me with the childhood you lost.”

“You’re haunting me!” he yelled after her, “You’re haunting me! You’re the witch! I’m just a boy! Leave me alone! Leave me alone! Leave me!” The darkness overtook him and the dream faded before his shouts did.