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  Hark leaned in the doorway, too ashamed to follow her, the night air cooling his cheeks. He looked at the stars for the first time since he had been in the wood with her, and they had seemed to watch. Madden was right, they were beautiful, but they were cold, and silent.

  He tried to eat but couldn’t. He dug inside the trunk for more blankets, to warm Madden up when she came home, and found the bottle of Guller’s toadstool tea. The smell of it made his stomach turn, and he remembered how strange the world had seemed when he’d drunk from it, how the sounds dimmed or echoed, and the wood lost its familiar pattern in ripples. If he had wanted to believe in magic, he could have, then. But magic was dishonesty, and Guller was a liar, even if Madden enjoyed the lie. It could not be real.

  He took the bottle outside, ready to empty it on to the ground, but the sound of a kite’s whistle reached him and turned his blood icy. He threw the bottle into the grass and ran.

  It was easy to find the clearing, though the light from the moon was not pearly as it had been before. There was a rustle in the undergrowth nearby, and he called, ‘Madden,’ only for the wood to fall silent. Then he saw her, lying beneath the low branches of an elder bush. She was smiling, but when he shook her, she would not wake. There was a kite skin tucked beneath her head.

  Madden had still not woken by the time Hark reached the house, his arms roaring from carrying her, his heart thudding as he ran and scrambled down the hill. When he had laid her in the chair, he wet her lips with whisky, then poured from the cup into each of their mouths. Her eyelids did not even flicker. He nested her in blankets, whispered her name, then yelled it. The beat of blood where he touched her neck was steady, her breath quiet but sure.

  ‘What have you done?’ he asked her, and then turned the question on himself, over and over, all through the night.

  When dawn came, he hoped the light might stir Madden, but still she slept. He called her, and shook her, in vain. It was to Guller’s house he hurried first.

  ‘Tell me how to bring her back,’ he shouted, as he pushed the door and fell into the room. It stank of decay, and feathers shifted across the floor in the draught. A magpie shrieked above his head. Guller stood at his table, cleaning a bird’s skull. He looked at Hark as he spat again on a cloth and dabbed at the bone.

  ‘You can’t do that,’ he said, his voice singsong like a child’s.

  ‘Then you do it,’ said Hark.

  Guller shook his head and smiled. ‘Not me, neither. She’s gone.’

  ‘She’s not dead. She’s only asleep.’ Hark stepped closer to the table, where the bones and innards of a large bird were spread in stained heaps.

  ‘She was sure, you know. You should be glad for her,’ Guller said, his round marble eyes holding Hark’s gaze. ‘Bliss.’

  Hark reached out and dashed the bird skull from Guller’s hand. It skittered across the floor in pieces.

  ‘Careful,’ Guller said.

  ‘If she doesn’t wake, if she dies, you’ve killed her. Poisoned her, with that drink of toadstools, and with lies dressed up as magic.’

  ‘But she lives.’ Guller moved away from the table to peer up at the sky through the rimed window. ‘It’s only that she’s no need for a body now. When it grows cold, it will make no difference to her. Bliss,’ he repeated. ‘Wouldn’t you wish her that?’

  ‘I’ll tell everyone what you’ve done. Her mother, all the village,’ Hark said.

  Guller opened his arms, as if in belated welcome. ‘Spread the word,’ he said. ‘I’m the only one who can give them stars, all that joy, on high. Elders, youngsters, all kinds come.’

  ‘Not to die.’

  ‘No, but sometimes to stay, up there. Old Winfrid Plait, she chose it. And you know Ervet? Her father, Berry.’ Guller grinned, his eyes rolling before they fixed on Hark, sidelong. ‘I can make you see why Madden wanted it. The price is only small,’ and he jingled the coins in his pocket.

  ‘A low price?’ Hark yelled. He kicked at the table and the bird bones shuddered. ‘She’s given up her life.’

  ‘No, no,’ Guller said, and he laughed. ‘Try it. You’ll see.’

  But Hark was already out of the door, spitting the stench of the house from his mouth.

  If it’s a lie, she will wake, he told himself, as he hurried back home, wincing at the sun that dazzled his tired eyes. If I keep her warm, feed her, give her drink, she’ll come round. But the blackberries he mashed for Madden only lay on her tongue, and the milk he poured trickled from her lips.

  He searched the kite skin, which he’d carried home with Madden, for clues to undo the spell. When he nudged Madden’s white stone from inside the kite’s head, a slip of paper fell out with it. On it was scratched a drawing of a tree with two thick branches. It was the one they used to climb when they were still children, and Madden would dare Hark to leap from its crook.

  Holding the kite skin in his hands, he felt the power in the wings, the urge to fly, even though it was empty. He could not go back to Guller. He could not tell his brothers. Then he remembered Murnon the shepherd.

  Hark found Murnon up at the edge of the sheep field, sitting in a nook in the stone wall. Cloud hung low now, above the hill, and no birdsong disturbed the air. The shepherd nodded as Hark left the path to join him.

  ‘Not as foolish as they seem, those goings-on with Guller,’ he said, before Hark even asked his question. He shifted and made room for him to sit on the wall.

  ‘Why do you do it?’ asked Hark.

  Murnon pointed behind with his thumb at the huddle of sheep in the field. ‘I’m glad enough to do my work, but I know my flock so well, there’s nothing to keep my mind from turning black, often. The kites, they’re my relief. Show me there’s more, when I see only gloom in life.’

  ‘More?’

  ‘Something greater. Real joy, and joy that harms nobody to take. Guller means no ill, and folk need some comfort.’

  Hark shook his head. ‘But it’s not real. It’s just toadstool dreaming.’

  ‘A dream’s as real as life, for the dreamer. What’s the difference?’

  Hark thought about the house, all the mending and patching he’d done. That was real, solid. It was all for Madden, for their life together. ‘If you really think that, why haven’t you done what Winfrid did?’

  ‘And your Madden.’

  Hark’s throat tightened.

  ‘My brother, Firwit,’ said Murnon. ‘He’d be as useless as half a horse on his own. I do the flock, see, and when it comes to it, the slaughter, the meat. Firwit handles the skins. Same in the house. Left to it, he’d not know what to do. I can bear it, long as I can get to the woods at night.’

  ‘I wanted to share, too. With Madden,’ Hark said.

  Murnon nodded. ‘Well. She wanted her freedom.’

  Hark bent forward, his face pressed into his hands, his palms hot and wet. He felt Murnon grip his shoulder, as he had in the wood.

  ‘You can scorn an old man’s opinion if you want, but I’d go up, once, with the kites. You might feel better. You might even forgive her.’

  All the rest of that long day and night, Hark sat with Madden, or paced the house, finding tasks that needed doing, then seeing the pointlessness of doing them. He didn’t want to leave her, but neither did he want to be there when the last life went from her body. The only comfort he could find, in the end, was that she was not suffering with him. It was hard to keep hold of this thought. It sank over and over into the deep black well.

  Finally, worn out with fidgeting, he spoke to Murnon and agreed to come to the wood the next night. He found the bottle of brown tea lying in the grass and drank from it, standing before Madden, to show her he was doing what she had wanted. Then he waited for the world to begin to ripple, tucked the kite skin under his arm and wandered over the darkening hill, under the blinking eyes of the stars.

  By the time he greeted Murnon and Guller, the wood had become a whispering maze, and he followed them with halting steps between black trunks th
at loomed, the reaching fingers of bramble tripping his feet. The stars that crowded above the clearing were sparking, now that the moon had waned to a sliver. Hark wanted to vomit, but held his stomach, willing the tea to help work Guller’s spell. He willed it to conjure Madden, bold and joyous, before it was all over with.

  He could not make out Guller’s features as he tied the cord at his waist. He seemed to grin and frown, go from kind to scornful. Hark heard Guller’s words as if from within his own head.

  ‘You’ve put something of yours inside the skin?’

  ‘My handkerchief.’

  ‘Use that. Put yourself inside the kite. Let it take you up. I’ll keep you tethered, here, till it’s time to return.’

  Hark did not tell Guller that his handkerchief was wrapped around Madden’s white stone.

  He closed his eyes and listened for the whistling. The thin, quivering sound washed away all thought. There were just the feather tips in his fingers, the wing shadows wheeling, somewhere, everywhere, the call to rise. The kite skin spread wider, the secret beat of its wings thrummed through his arms, and the clearing was gone, closed into the wood below him.

  It was true. He hadn’t words for anything then, but afterwards he had to call it bliss. A sweetness familiar and new, a delight with no shape. How long he flew, drinking in the pleasure of starlight, he didn’t know. In the last moment, as he felt himself falling, the tether pulling him down to earth, he heard Madden’s voice, close in his ear and then fading far above. Stay, she said.

  Hark sat up, was sick into the dead leaves, and lay back down. The trees bent over him, but more kindly now. Murnon and Guller murmured somewhere nearby. He lay, waiting for Madden, for her voice, some trace, but there was nothing after all.

  After he had taken Madden’s note to the Lightfoot house, Hark carried her body back across the hill to the woods. Clouds were wadded thick above him, and the night whispers of the trees had faded to a familiar hush. He chose a place where no hunters would walk, where the beech leaves lay deep, and their red-brown glow suggested warmth to him. He laid Madden down.

  ‘I know now,’ he said, as he tucked more leaves around her. ‘I still think you’re wrong, but why would you listen to me?’ He sat beside her, with her white stone in his hand. He waited a long time there in the greying dusk, letting go his last hope, before he set off home again.

  He could see the whitewashed house as he crossed the hill, half-made and empty, gleaming as the world around it faded. He dreaded the dark night in his bed, and worse, the plain light of morning. As he came closer, he saw a shadow lying across the stone step at his door. He stared down at the kite skin, wings folded beneath it, the head tucked down into the empty breast. He picked it up and carried it inside.

  ‘Girls are all down.’ Firwit points to where Orta and the others are brandishing their bows, beginning their wagers on whose kiss each will get. ‘Boys’ll be up in the tunnels now. Never did see the Gorse Mother when I was young.’

  But Hark is not listening. The sky above their heads is showing the first stars. He gazes up and wonders how many turns they’ve made through the dark while he has watched them and thought of Madden. How many times he has set out for the woods with the kite skin, only to turn back home.

  He takes up a torch, and waits with the other men and women of Neverness. The door of the day is nearly shut, but this is the hinge of the year itself. The boys and girls have been paired up, a kiss for each arrow shot deep in the gorse. They lead each other off into the night, or sit shyly by the bonfire under Firwit’s watchful eye.

  The line of flame begins its march, with Hark taking last place. The hill is black. The only light flows orange from the torches now. As the villagers spread out around the gorse, there is a whisper along the row on the seaward side. Gorse Mother. Gold Mother. Gill Skerry does not join in the chant.

  The torches lean in closer, their flames swooping in the wind. The first licks take. Soon the headland of Neverness is crackling, spitting fire into the sky, as cheers go up through the scented smoke.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  To each and every one below, a great big thank you for the role you played in making this book spring into existence. If I haven’t repaid you yet, I hope I will get the chance:

  Alison MacLeod, my fantastic PhD supervisor, teacher and mentor.

  All the wonderful writers who have taught me at Arvon and Ty Newydd courses, especially Jane Feaver, Helen Oyeyemi, Jon McGregor, Tania Hershman, Sara Maitland and David Constantine; and Kevin Crossley-Holland, who told me I could do it.

  Alexa von Hirschberg, my clear-eyed, passionate editor, and all the people at Bloomsbury who have made this book beautiful, including Alexandra Pringle, Imogen Denny, Marigold Atkey, Callum Kenny, Francesca Sturiale, David Mann and Sarah-Jane Forder.

  My aunt Isobel Simonds, whose wonderful imagination and skill created the illustrations that grace these pages.

  Lucy Luck, my agent-with-aplomb.

  Cathy Galvin and everyone at the Word Factory.

  All my critique-group comrades past and present at the North London Writers’ Group, my own Short Story Critique Group, and at the Brick Lane bookshop.

  All the other writers who have read and commented and cheered me on; I can’t name you all here, but especially Lily Dunn.

  Adam Marek, for reading and supporting tirelessly, thank you.

  My whole creative and inspiring family, believers in making; who are kind about my make-believe.

  My mother, who believes in fairies: this book is for you because I can’t thank you enough.

  All the editors who commissioned, or selected for publication, versions of some of the tales that make up this book: Ra Page of Comma Press for commissioning ‘Tether’ for Thought X: Fiction and Hypotheticals and ‘Thunder Cracks’ for Spindles; Jan Fortune of Cinnamon Press for selecting ‘Sticks are for Fire’ for Journey Planner and Other Stories and Poems and ‘Mawkin’ (which formed the basis for ‘Fishskin, Hareskin’) for Patria; Deborah McMenamy of Labello Press for selecting ‘The Neverness Ox-men’ for Gem Street; the editors at Glint journal for publishing ‘Earth is Not for Eating’; everyone at the Mechanics’ Institute Review for including ‘Kite’ in issue 12; Hilary Mantel and David Rogers for selecting ‘Water Bull Bride’ for What Lies Beneath; the Costa Short Story Prize (and all those who voted) for making ‘Fishskin, Hareskin’ a winner, and commissioning the beautiful audio version on the Costa website.

  Lastly, the entire Isle of Man, a place of gorse-scented inspiration and fantastic folk tales.

  A NOTE ON THE AUTHOR

  Zoe Gilbert is the winner of the Costa Short Story Award 2014. Her work has appeared in anthologies from Comma, Cinnamon, Labello and Pankhearst presses, and has been published in journals including The Stinging Fly, Mechanics’ Institute Review, Bohemyth, Lighthouse and the British Fantasy Society Journal. She has taken part in writing projects in China and South Korea for the British Council and was commissioned by Microsoft to create a short story book in collaboration with graphic artist Isabel Greenberg. She is completing a PhD in Fiction and Creative Writing at the University of Chichester, focusing on folk tales in contemporary fiction. She co-hosts the Short Story Club at the Word Factory and is the co-founder of London Lit Lab, providing creative writing courses for Londoners. She lives on a hill in South London.

  First published in Great Britain 2018

  This electronic edition published in 2018 by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc

  © Zoe Gilbert, 2018

  Map and illustrations © Isobel Simonds, 2018

  Zoe Gilbert has asserted her right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as author of this work.

  Every reasonable effort has been made to trace copyright holders of material reproduced in this book, but if any have been inadvertently overlooked the publishers would be glad to hear from them. For legal purposes the acknowledgements constitute an extension of this copyright page.

  This is a work of
fiction. Names and characters are the product of the author’s imagination and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  The following chapters were previously published, in slightly different forms, elsewhere: ‘Earth is Not for Eating’ in Glint (Glint Literary Journal, 2014); ‘Tether’ in Thought X (Comma Press, 2017); ‘Thunder Cracks’ in Spindles (Comma Press, 2016); ‘Sticks are for Fire’ in Journey Planner and Other Stories and Poems (Cinnamon Press, 2014); ‘Fishskin, Hareskin’, originally called ‘Mawkin’, in Patria and Other Stories (Cinnamon Press, 2015); ‘The Neverness Ox-men’ in Gem Street (Labello Press, 2012); ‘Kite’ in Mechanics’ Institute Review (Issue 12, Autumn 2012); ‘Water Bull Bride’ in What Lies Beneath (Kingston University Press, 2015).

  All rights reserved. You may not copy, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (including without limitation electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, printing, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages

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  eISBN 978 1 4088 8437 9

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