Page 37 of The Wicked Lies of Habren Faire

y caneri

(THE CANARY)

On the other side of the door, the roar of the ocean ceases.

The only light comes from a forgotten, flickering lantern, which I nearly kick over—the soldier’s, perhaps?

I pick up the dying lamp and hold it aloft, illuminating a dark hole in the ground dangerously close to my feet and an ancient spiral staircase creeping into the abyss.

The only way left to go is down.

My footsteps echo impossibly loud on the old, wet stone, the silence otherwise impenetrable, and the light barely illuminates two paces in front of me. The stairs feel endless, my legs burning when I finally reach the bottom.

The subterranean level is tiny, tight, and the walls are painted with blue whorls and figures I can hardly make out.

I squint into the dim halo cast by my lamp and begin to illuminate a great mural, one part at a time.

I get glimpses of ghostly, knife-eared fairies, painted beasts and gnarled faces that stare, empty-eyed, from the stone.

A rush of air hits my back and a great crescendo of tumbling rocks breaks the quiet, and I whip around.

The wall behind me has entirely crumbled, revealing a huge recess carved deep into the cliffs.

I step into the jaw of the cave. Cold air creeps, insect-like, around me. The tunnel ahead is damp and narrow and reeks of mildew.

I expected fear to hit me like a slap, but it doesn’t. I stand and listen.

Nothing.

Y Lle Tywyll is as silent as the graves with which it shares the deep earth.

I move forward slowly, one hand on the wall. The echo of my boots on the rock carries for miles—whatever’s in here with me must know it by now.

The tunnel has to end eventually—only it doesn’t. The glow of the lantern is struggling to pierce the dark, and my eyes never adapt. Worryingly, with every step I take deeper into the cave, the fainter my lamp grows.

“Please,” I whisper as the flame flickers within the ornate glass.

A sharp noise shatters the quiet, and I almost drop the lantern. I turn frantically, searching for the source. I must be going mad, because that sounded like birdsong.

My light finally stutters through its final moments and dies in my hands.

“No, no, no.” I tap the glass furiously, but no last gasp of an ember flares to relieve the total blackness around me.

There is another shriek of birdsong. I snap toward it, and there, through a crack in the wall some way ahead, is a light as faint and faraway as a dream.

I wedge myself into the small gap, every part of my body scraping against the coal. I wriggle along with one hand outstretched until I reach the end of the crevice and pull myself out.

I come face-to-face with a Davy lamp set atop a small crate.

I snatch it up, grateful to whatever sorry soul left it there, and fiddle with the knob.

The flame burns higher, revealing a birdcage that sits at eye level, its bars rusted and damp.

Within it is the skeleton of a canary. Patches of flesh and yellow feathers cling to odd bones, and I’m certain it’s dead, until it cocks its little head and looks right at me.

I yelp and fall back against the cave wall, and it’s only then that I see where I am.

It’s not a natural cave. The walls are black and purposeful, propped up by beams of wood, iron and steel, and along them run ropes to guide a path through well-navigated shafts. Crates and tools lie abandoned in piles, with helmets and clothes nearby. Tracks, half hidden by dirt, run just past me.

It’s a mine.

Mines face pressure from every side. The earth doesn’t want to be cut into.

It fights to fill the chasms we create, and the tunnel floors rise every year, like a body trying to close a gaping wound.

To make this mine—perhaps every mine—tunnels have been cut into Gwlad Y Tylwyth Teg itself.

Support beams have been forced into Eu gwlad’s ground and iron tools have split its skin.

I think I know, now, why Neirin’s land is rotting.

It’s the very earth trying to reject the mine’s poison from its bloodstream.

The canary chirps again and I glance down. It hops from foot to foot.

You gonna let me out, then? It’s an old man’s gruff, smoke-bothered voice, and it feels like it’s being piped straight into my mind.

“Is that you?” I ask the bird aloud.

Clearly. Let me out.

I kneel down again and try not to grimace at the sight of the rotten canary.

“Have you seen a girl with red hair lately?”

The bird shakes its remaining feathers. Let me out and I’ll tell you.

“I could just leave you.” I brace myself to stand.

Fine! Fine, yeah, I saw her. She headed in deep, said she’d let me out when she comes back. I’m guessing she’s dead.

“She isn’t,” I snap, then nod to the cart tracks running away from us. “What’s down there?”

How am I meant to know? It cocks its head. I’ve been in this cage.

“What are you doing here?”

Christ, you’re from long ago. The canary’s little face takes on an expression of absolute irritation.

Miners bring us down to look for bad air.

Must have started after your time. We fly on, and if we go quiet, the humans go no further.

I flew through a crack in the wall one day, woke up in a new cage. No one came to let me out.

“If I let you out, will you fly ahead and tell me if there’s danger?”

It rolls its head, looks at me as if I’m dim. Lady, that’s all I’m good for.

“Don’t do anything stupid,” I say, and unlatch the door.

It opens with a slow creak. The bird rustles, staring its freedom right in the eye. It hesitates, but only for a moment, then shoots from the cage like a firework and races for the tunnel.

I take my Davy lamp and follow.

The shaft is narrow and square, with the kind of precise, jagged walls that come from being blown out with dynamite.

Shining black veins run through it, another branch of the dark artery.

I step along the tracks carefully, bouncing from plank to plank.

Faint wall-mounted lamps line my path and relief fills my lungs.

The chirp of the canary guides me, but my mind is never far from Dad.

He lived in this for us.

He got up in the dark, worked in the dark and came home in the dark, so that we could live in the light.

The canary chirps again, forcing me out of my memories. Its constant cry is a beacon, leading me deeper into the system, until it squawks louder, then cuts off entirely, like the sound was killed in its throat.

That wasn’t bad air.

The lights flicker. The farthest pair of lamps go out. Then the next farthest, and the next, falling like dominoes toward me until, five lights away, it stops.

The dark ahead is a wall. My heart threatens to escape my mouth, and then the scratching starts.

My pulse stops altogether.

It’s nails down a blackboard, creeping toward me. I draw my sword and hold it forward like a knight in a painting.

Five creatures emerge from the shadow one by one.

None stand higher than my hip. Their large, pointed ears are a mockery of the fair folk above the earth, and their noses are pug-like and upturned, nostrils twitching as they breathe deep and try to determine what I am.

They carry mining tools sharpened to precise points and wear overalls fashioned from scraps of miners’ uniforms. They stay at the edge of the shadow, assessing me, and I almost laugh in relief.

They’re only coblynnod, goblins that reside in the mines and help lug the coal up to the light. Helpful creatures, according to the stories.

“Have you seen a redheaded girl lately?” I call to them.

It’s only then that I notice the yellow feathers hanging from the mouth of the largest one. His companion tilts his head to stare at me, and the light of my Davy lamp catches his eyes.

They’re crusted over with coal, and dark veins run deep through their heads, throbbing violently against the thin skin.

One opens his mouth and reveals black, knifepoint teeth and a dead tongue.

I take a step back. They take two forward.

My eyes dart to the wall, to the onyx seam shooting through it. It pulses in time with their veins, tying the mine and the coblynnod together, several parts of one body, acting as one.

The largest one seems to be their leader. He lurches forward.

“Humans always asking for help,” he croaks, gravel in his throat.

“We used to work together,” I say sharply. “That’s what the stories say.”

He tilts his head. “Stories are in the past.”

I put distance between us, but I never turn my back. There are three to my right, two to my left, but none directly in front. I glance down and find the reason.

The cart tracks are made of iron.

No wonder magic has no power here.

I set my lantern down and reach for the hilt of my rapier. With the delicate grip Neirin taught me, I draw it slowly, giving them time to decide I’m not worth it—hoping they back away.

Their leader bares his feather-filled teeth. I don’t wait for another threat.

I jump to the left of the track, putting myself in the path of two other coblynnod. They rush forward, clubs raised, and I flick my sword toward them with a confidence I didn’t know I had.

The coblynnod can’t cross the tracks. They watch impatiently, baying against the iron.

The first coblyn rushes forward, and I send my blade down in an arc. The iron parts his skull like snow under a boot. The coblyn collapses.

The next one swings for my shin with his club.

It connects with a sharp pain that will bruise later, and my leg spasms out at him, catching the little monster off guard.

He stumbles. I swing again with my sword, and his attempt to dodge sends him flying onto the tracks, where he sizzles as he cooks alive and dies in a plume of smoke.

The three remaining coblynnod continue to bay at me from across the iron barrier. I wave my blood-splattered sword at them.

“I’ll let you live if you leave me be!”

“You’ll let us?” croaks the canary eater.

I swing my blade, but they nimbly dodge it.

He barks out a laugh. “You’ll stay down here with the rest of ’em.”

I rush him, but one of the others seizes my wrist, and the third yanks me off the protective tracks.

I lash his face. He screams gutturally and scampers back.

But vengeance is swift. The canary eater stabs at my skirts with his dagger, slicing through to the unprotected skin of my leg. I cry out and fall. My sword slips from my grip and clatters to the floor just out of reach.

The canary eater climbs atop me and scratches my cheek with clawed hands. The second appears over me, holding a pickaxe, ready to bring it down on my head. I roll away, dislodging the canary eater, catching the other coblyn with my injured leg and hurtling us both onto the tracks.

He fries like the other one, his scream ringing in my ears. The canary eater snarls through feather-filled teeth.

I seize the pickaxe, haul myself up. He makes one last lunge.

With a cry, I bring the point down on his skull.

He falls soundlessly onto the iron rail.

With a dull thud, the pickaxe follows. My sword lies discarded near the wall. The lone survivor is creeping toward it.

I’ve no time to do anything, but it doesn’t matter—the instant he grasps the hilt, he jumps away, burned by the iron. He screams and scurries off, disappearing through some crack too small for me even to see.