seventeen

what wisdom do you want from a death-marked girl? i can say only this: in the end i

learned that the water was in me. it was a ghost that could not be exorcised. but a guest,

even uninvited, must be attended to. you make up a bed for them. you pour from your

best bottle of wine. if you can learn to love that which despises you, that which terrifies

you, you can dance on the shore and play in the waves again, like you did when you were

young. before the ocean is friend or foe, it simply is. and so are you.

from angharad by angharad myrddin (née blackmar), 191 ad

it took some time, of course, for effy and preston to compile and index the letters, to copy the

pages of angharad’s diary using the wheezing mimeograph in laleston, and for preston to write it

all up on the old typewriter that laleston’s chief librarian grudgingly permitted them to use. they

had spent two weeks in laleston, and had now been away from caer-isel more than a month.

preston had a cigarette in his mouth while he worked, smoke curling out the window of their

hotel room. sometimes he got up to pace, mussing his already mussed hair, muttering about

omniscient narration and melodrama. effy understood all the theory only vaguely, but she offered

insight where she could.

she felt, as did preston, that she understood angharad on a level that was almost inarticulable:

it was as primal and unconscious as her lungs pumping and her heart beating.

“why don’t you take a break?” effy offered as she perched on the edge of the hotel bed, mug

of coffee in hand. “i can write for a while.”

“you don’t have to.” he had told her, at the beginning, that he thought it might be difficult for

her. to read all the words, to write in such a stilted, formal manner about a life that so neatly

mirrored her own.

“i want to,” effy said. she handed him her coffee. “i want it to be finished. i want it all to be

done.”

what she meant was that she wanted it all tied up neatly. no more questions, no more

doubting. no more scolding about how what she knew and what she believed weren’t real.

preston frowned. “i don’t think scholarship is ever really done,” he said. “if anything, this is

only the beginning. academics and tabloid journalists alike are going to be hounding us, hounding

her. there are going to be a hundred papers, even books, arguing against our thesis. not to

mention the sleeper museum . . . are you ready for all that?”

it didn’t make her happy. but effy knew he was right.

she nodded as she slipped into the seat he had vacated. “yes,” she said. “let’s just get it all

down.” seeing the look of alarm on preston’s face, she added, “not all of it. but the parts the

academics will believe.”

if she and preston published a paper arguing for the literal existence of the fairy king, they

would be laughed out of the university. effy accepted that. it was enough—for now—that she and

angharad knew the truth.

and of course, though she had seen the fairy king, preston had not. effy knew he believed

her, in his own way, in a way that didn’t compromise his cynicism. she wasn’t exactly sure how

he made sense of it in his head. there was plenty to believe in—ianto’s possession, the details in

angharad’s diary — but there was plenty to doubt, as well. ianto’s demise could have been

ordinary. and effy had never heard the bells. there was a small prickle of grief when she thought

about it, how perhaps she and preston would never quite see eye to eye.

but he believed her fear, her grief, her desire. that had to be enough.

two weeks later, they had a finished draft. the title page bore both of their names in bold,

unequivocal black lettering: euphemia sayre and preston héloury. her true name, stark against

the white paper. if there was anything to attach her true name to, it was this. her true name held so

much sorrow and suffering, but it also held strength. hope. the yearning to make the old saint’s

name mean something new.

effy picked the title. uncovering angharad: an inquiry into the authorship of major works

attributed to emrys myrddin.

angharad had rented an apartment nearby in laleston, with flowers in the window boxes and a

view of the bustling street below. from every room you could hear horns blaring and cars braking,

people shouting. it was not a quiet apartment. effy sensed that angharad had known enough

silence to last the rest of her life.

she and effy sat together, right by the large windows that let in the deep golden light of late

afternoon. angharad’s silver hair had been cut; it was no longer the gossamer, slightly wild locks

of a young maiden. it was a bit severe, the cut, like that of a schoolteacher or a governess,

someone with quiet authority. effy liked it.

“preston says that they’ll come to you,” she said. “as soon as our thesis is out there—reporters

and scholars will start hounding you.”

“let them come. i have spent long enough being silent.”

“they’ll press you. they could be cruel.”

“i have nothing to hide,” she said. “and who do i have left to embarrass? my son is dead. my

father will be soon. my sisters and i haven’t spoken in decades. there’s no story to memorize, no

lines that need repeating. there’s only the truth.”

the truth. effy nodded. in the street below, a cart rattled past, wheels knocking against the

pavement. “and what about marlowe? preston says he may try to sue . . .”

“he can try. greenebough has nothing left to take from me. and i never signed anything; only

emrys did. the secret was so precious that there was no contract, no paper trail, nothing bearing

my name.”

someone shouted in the road. “have you set your accounts in order?” effy asked.

“wetherell has,” angharad replied. “marlowe still owes me royalties from emrys’s other

works. that’s in my husband’s will. you don’t have to worry so much about me, effy. i know i’m

an old woman now, but i’m not looking for peace. i’ve spent my whole life fighting, even if no

one knew about it. the daily battles i waged in the privacy of that house, making sure the

mountain ash was blooming and the iron on the doors held fast . . . if i can survive that, i can

survive journalists and academics.”

“i wish i had fought.” effy surprised herself by saying it. the words had leaped out of her

throat, unbidden. “i know i beat him in the end, but for so many years all i could do was run and

hide. i just sat there and let the water pour in around me. i didn’t know that i could fight back. i

didn’t know how to do anything but wait to drown.”

“oh no, effy. that’s not what i meant at all. you don’t have to take up a sword. survival is

bravery, too.”

as if she could tell effy was going to cry, angharad laid a soft hand over hers. effy wiped at a

few burgeoning tears and said, “there’s something else.”

angharad arched a brow, and effy reached into her bag. she pulled out her old and battered

copy of the book, its pages dog-eared and water-stained, its spine cracked from so many openings.

the cover still bore that dead man’s name, but effy opened the book to the page that held the

first line.

i was a girl when he came for me, beautiful and treacherous, and i was a crown of pale gold

in his black hair.

effy held it out to her. “will you sign it for me?”

without words, angharad took it. she scrawled her name forcefully on the page in black ink.

when she was finished, she said in a low voice, almost like a confession, “i’ve waited so long to

do that.”

“this way i’ll always remember,” effy said. “i’ll always know. a lighthouse, like you said.”

“i know you have to leave now,” angharad said, dabbing at her face. “but effy, you can

always come back. it’s safe here. i’m growing rowan berries in the window boxes. you know

what they say about old habits.”

they both cried a little together, after that. angharad’s green eyes were shining and bright.

like two lighthouse beacons stretching over dark water, telling her there was safe harbor ahead.

there was so much to do when at last they returned to caer-isel. preston fretted a bit over all the

coursework he had missed, but effy had no such concerns. her life in caer-isel had been so small,

so wretched and run-down, it had been easy to slip through the cracks. she had left it all behind so

quickly, escaped through its crumbling walls.

now she wanted to tear it down to the foundation. she wanted to start anew.

rhia performed exaggerated shock when she saw effy, even mimed swooning. “thank the

saints,” she said. “you’re back now. i thought you might’ve turned into a fish after all.”

“no gills or fins,” effy said. “but you were right about the bottom hundred. it’s a strange

place. it changes you in other ways.”

rhia frowned, looking her up and down. “you do seem different. i can’t put my finger on it.

maybe it’s your hair. no offense, but have you brushed it at all since you left?”

“barely,” effy said with a small smile.

“well, since you didn’t have the decency to call, i’m going to have to throw together a very

last-minute welcome-home party. it won’t be up to my usual standards. i apologize in advance.”

“oh no,” said effy.

“oh yes,” said rhia.

effy set her trunk on the floor and hung up her coat. “and how are the spiders?”

rhia let out a long, exhausted breath. “the war is at a stalemate, for now. thank the saints.

generations have lived and died in your absence.”

effy laughed. she began the work of unpacking, as rhia went on about all that she had missed.

effy rolled up her thick sweaters and woolen socks and stuffed them in the drawer, letting rhia’s

voice fade a little into the background. she touched her copy of angharad, gently running her

fingers over the well-worn spine.

then she tucked it under her pillow. old habits.

“hey,” effy said. “can i invite someone to the party?”

rhia’s brows shot up. “but of course. who is it?”

“he’s someone you’ve never met before. i think you’ll like him, though.” effy paused,

considering. “he’s a bit smug, until you get to know him. very pedantic. very smart.”

“well, you’re painting quite a picture.” rhia flopped onto effy’s bed, a scheming smile on her

face. “i can’t wait to torment him.”

effy could easily imagine it. “be careful. he’s a very stubborn arguer.”

after that, it was another week before effy and preston were able to present their thesis to the

dean. effy had only met dean fogg once, when he’d given her permission to go to hiraeth, and he

had not changed at all in the weeks since. he was a narrow man with blindingly white hair and no

smile lines. his expansive office had a sitting area with five armchairs gathered around a coffee

table, and his assistant served them tea and biscuits in clinking silver dishes.

master gosse, preston’s adviser, was also present. he was dean fogg’s opposite in many

respects: short and broad where the dean was tall and thin, with an ebullient mustache and

maniacally curling black hair. he stood rather than sat, and refused the tea and biscuits. his dark

eyes were leaping swiftly from one thing to the next, like a kitten following a stuffed bird on a

stick.

the first few moments progressed in silence. dean fogg sipped his tea. he held a copy of their

thesis on his lap. preston bounced his leg, an anxious tic, and effy’s fingers curled and uncurled

against her thigh. master gosse paced, a bit preston-like. his brisk footsteps against the wood

floor were the only sound in the room.

at last, dean fogg set down his teacup and said, “i think it’s rather good.”

effy almost let out a highly inappropriate laugh of relief. she clapped a hand over her mouth to

stop it from coming out, while preston said, “i know the theory and criticism sections could use

some work. we could have cited more sources, delved deeper into alternative theories. but as a

whole, do you think the argument is there?”

“well, there’s certainly an argument. and, of course, you’ve furnished it with evidence that no

other academic has any access to, presently . . . this diary and these letters. i suspect there’s quite a

bit more than what made it into your paper. but it won’t mean much until they’re widely

released.”

“what?” effy managed. “what do you mean, ‘widely released’?”

“any thesis needs to be vetted, my dear,” master gosse said. he had stopped pacing. “you can

make an argument based on your interpretation of the evidence, but if no one else has read the

evidence—well, it’s just mythmaking, at that point. no one has any reason to believe you.”

preston nodded. “i know it seems a bit counterintuitive. but we’ll have to give everyone else a

chance to read the letters and the diary before we can prove our thesis is correct.”

effy glanced over at the chair beside her, the empty fifth seat in the office. it felt conspicuously

empty. it felt as though it should have been occupied by angharad. she remembered angharad’s

fixed determination when she had spoken of these potential inquiries. if she were here, she would

say again: let them come.

“so let’s say we do release it all,” effy said slowly. “we’re going to war with every other

academic, aren’t we?”

“oh, not just academics,” master gosse said. “tabloid journalists, the sleeper museum, the

myrddin estate, greenebough publishing . . . they all have a vested interest in preserving

myrddin’s legacy. the southerners will riot, which will cause the llyrian government to go into a

panicked frenzy. personally, i expect them to sue the university. they might even sue you.”

preston made a nervous sound. dean fogg frowned. “the university has ample legal counsel,”

he said. “but this mention of ‘we’ perturbs me, euphemia. you are not, to be blunt, an academic.

you are not a literary scholar. you are a first-year architecture student—”

“with all due respect, sir,” preston cut in, “this paper is as much effy’s as it is mine. it

couldn’t have been written without her. we wouldn’t have found the diary or letters if not for her.

and she’s more brilliant than any of my colleagues at the literature college, so if you’re planning

on trying to leave her out of this somehow, i’m more than happy to take my paper elsewhere. to a

tabloid journalist, perhaps?”

dean fogg’s thin lips thinned further. “you make a very sorry scholar yourself, mr. héloury,

if you would leave this discovery to a newspaper gossip column.”

“it’s not my first choice,” said preston, “or else we would be in the offices of the llyrian times

right now instead, meeting with their editor in chief. but if you object to effy’s inclusion, well,

that’s just what i’ll have to do.”

effy gave him a grateful smile as she rubbed the abrupt end of her ring finger.

“you’ve always been such a stubborn lad.” master gosse looked amused. “i never thought

you would try and extort the university, though. good on you.” he seemed to mean it genuinely.

dean fogg gave a disgusted snort. “how do you think it will look for the university to publish

a groundbreaking thesis with a woman’s name on the cover sheet? there’s never been a woman at

the literature college before. it’s unprecedented.”

“it’s an absurd, archaic precedent,” preston said. “it should embarrass the university.”

“watch yourself, héloury,” dean fogg said.

effy looked around the room again. angharad had been here before: three men arguing over

her work, laying a framework for her future. she had been silenced then.

but effy would not be silent now.

“this thesis is a story about a young woman who was taken advantage of by powerful men,”

she said. “she was bartered like a head of cattle, traded by men who tried to claim her work as

their own. how do you think it will look for the university to do precisely the same thing? if we do

hand over the thesis, and you publish it without my name, i’ll go straight to the offices of the

llyrian times and tell them yet another story about men using young women. if that’s the sort of

legacy you want for yourself as dean.”

it was impressive how quickly dean fogg’s face turned red, then purple. effy had determined,

upon further inspection, that the thick white hair was in fact a wig, and in his shock it slipped

incrementally to one side.

he took a decorous sip of tea, as if to calm himself, and then said, “so you would have me

admit you as a student of the literature college? there’s no other way to justify it, the name of

some obscure architecture student on the title page.”

effy’s breath caught a little bit in her throat, but after a moment she was able to answer. “yes,”

she said. “i’ll be the first woman in the literature college, but not the last.”

dean fogg nearly choked on his tea, but master gosse gave a delighted chortle. “oh, i like

this,” he said. “the university will finally be catching up to the times . . . and it will make a good

story, won’t it? a story in which the university is a beacon of progressivism, and its dean a fierce

but benevolent advocate for the rights of women.”

yet something stuck in effy like a splinter. her mouth had gone dry, and she had to swallow

hard before she could manage to speak.

“you can’t tell the story unless you fire him,” she said, voice wavering.

“fire who?” dean fogg demanded.

she drew a breath. “master corbenic.”

and then dean fogg laughed, a hacking sound of disbelief. “now, you listen to me,

euphemia,” he said. “master corbenic is a tenured professor. he’s esteemed in his field, and a

personal friend of mine. if you think we’re going to fire him at your behest, because of some

schoolgirl’s grudge—”

“‘some schoolgirl’?” effy’s voice suddenly became hard, her blood running hot in her veins.

she had just interrupted the dean of the whole university, but she didn’t even care. “that’s all

angharad was, too. a girl. unless you fire him, you’ll never see a page of these letters.”

there was a long silence, during which effy’s heart pounded so loudly she could scarcely hear

anything else, and during which master gosse looked quickly and eagerly between the two of

them, as if waiting to see who would flinch first.

preston’s jaw was set, his hand moving to grip the edge of her armchair.

it was too late to save angharad. perhaps it was too late to save herself. but it was not too late

for another girl who might wander into master corbenic’s office and sit down obliviously in that

green chair.

“i will consider it,” dean fogg said at last, every word wrenched out through gritted teeth.

“we have a great deal more to discuss, as it is. if it puts your mind at ease, once you are officially

enrolled at the literature college, you will never have to see master corbenic again.”

once upon a time, she would have taken that as enough of a victory. she would have left,

escaped that awful stuffy room and just hoped that she would never have to catch a glimpse of

master corbenic in the halls. but that could not be guaranteed, and she was not going to enter any

more slippery, slanted bargains with men who believed themselves to be beyond burden or blame.

effy got to her feet. she had done enough sitting.

“no,” she said. “it’s not enough. and i’m not bluffing. if you don’t fire him, i’ll tell the whole

country. i’ll tell the whole world.”

dean fogg just stared at her, his eyes turned to angry slits. a mere month ago she would have

shrunk under his gaze, her mind slipping out of her and her body following, fleeing the room as

quickly as she could.

but she had faced down the fairy king in all his eldritch power. she had made him crumble

into a handful of dust. this battle was easy by comparison.

“all right,” he said. his voice was a low snarl. “i’ll acquiesce to your terms, ludicrous as they

are.”

master gosse chuckled. “i enjoy this girl, fogg. i look forward to instructing her.”

preston stood then, too. “we’ll have to speak about a publication schedule, make revisions.

and of course sign the papers to transfer effy from architecture to literature.”

“of course,” dean fogg said sourly. “my office will be in touch. now, both of you, get out of

my sight.”

effy kept her lips pressed shut until they had left the dean’s office, gone down the hallway, and

burst from the building into the cool afternoon. everything was bright, drenched in sunlight,

making preston squint behind his glasses as he looked at her.

there was a wonderful tightness building in her chest, and at last it bubbled out in a laugh.

“we did it,” she said. “we really did it.”

the promise he had made to her all those weeks ago, that they would write a paper that gained

her admittance to the literature college, that he would stare down dean fogg and fight for her, had

finally been fulfilled. it was the foundation upon which effy could build a new life.

and then, unexpectedly, preston pulled her into an embrace and lifted her into the air. he spun

her around for a brief moment before putting her down again, his cheeks flushed, looking bashful.

effy laughed again. “i thought you weren’t a romantic.”

“i wasn’t,” preston said, cheeks still pink. “until you.”

now he was making her blush. effy cupped his face. “i think we should celebrate.”

when they arrived back at effy’s dormitory, she realized rhia had been underselling herself. for a

last-minute party, there was an impressive selection of liquor, an impressive number of guests, and

even a hand-lettered welcome home sign that had been stuck to the wall using hairpins and a

bit of thread.

rhia dragged effy and preston into the center of the kitchen and immediately barraged him

with questions. effy could only watch in quiet amusement as he stumbled to answer them. this

was not the kind of test that any amount of studying or natural intellect could help him pass.

rhia had borrowed (stolen, she confessed, after two rounds of drinks) a record player from the

music faculty. it turned on and on, needle wearing very gently against the vinyl. when a slow

song came on, preston took effy’s hand. they danced (which was mostly just swaying, as preston,

too, was several drinks deep), her head on his shoulder. when the song ended, she felt only a

twinge of grief.

then preston encountered a fellow literature student, and effy saw him truly in his element for

the first time. he was more patient than she remembered him being, when they’d met that day on

the cliffs. even as the other student argued that “the dreams of a sleeping king” was unfairly

maligned, preston listened, and made his counterarguments without a trace of smugness.

all around her effy could feel walls coming up, rising out of the earth like a tree from its roots.

but they didn’t feel stifling. the architecture of her new life was taking shape, and there were

windows and doors. she did not need to slip through cracks in order to escape. if she wanted to

leave, she could. if she wanted to stay, there were repairs that could be made. the foundation

would be strong. effy was sure of that.

after several hours, preston brought her back to his dorm room.

as soon as they arrived, he fell into bed without even taking his shoes off. effy lay beside him,

eyelids heavy. moonlight was streaming through the window, as clear and bright as the beacon of

a lighthouse.

nighttime was still scary. ordinarily it was when the fairy king would appear as a vague, dark

shape in the corner of her room, his pale hands reaching, his bone crown gleaming. if she did

manage to sleep, master corbenic waited for her there: the glint of his gold watch and the

enormity of his hands. and now her dreams were lurid with images of drowning houses, of the

thrashing, uncaring sea.

and the fairy king, always the fairy king, in ianto’s body or his own. she had defeated him

in hiraeth, but would he ever be gone for good? when she closed her eyes, she could still see him.

his ghost lingered—or at least, the grief and fear did.

preston shifted in his sleep, arms circling her waist. his heart thudded softly against her back,

with a rhythm as constant as the tide. the walls here were strong. they would hold against

anything. there was no need for iron, for rowan berries, for mountain ash.

the danger was real. effy and angharad had both proven that, with their wits and their

mirrors. the danger lived with her; perhaps it had been born with her, if the rest of the stories

about changeling children were to be believed. the danger was as ancient as the world. but if

fairies and monsters were real, so were the women who defeated them.

effy did not have her copy of angharad under the pillow, but she thought of its last lines,

which she knew by heart.

i know you think i am a little girl, and what could a little girl know about eternity? but i do

know this: whether you survive the ocean or you don’t, whether you are lost or whether the

waves deliver you back to the shore—every story is told in the language of water, in

tongues of salt and foam. and the sea, the sea, it whispers the secret of how all things end.

at first the morning was a bit miserable, both of them groggy and preston nursing a headache. the

sun was too bright on their faces. effy pulled a pillow over her head and groaned as preston tried

to urge her out of bed.

“coffee,” he reminded her in a lofty, plying voice, and at last she threw off the covers, blond

hair plastered to the side of her face.

coffee was a necessity. they went to the drowsy poet and got paper cups, holding them in

two hands as they walked down the street along lake bala, breath coming in white clouds. it was

very cold that morning, but the sunlight was strong, and some of the ice on the lake had melted,

veins of blue water showing between the cracks.

effy tugged her gray coat around herself, the wind raking through her hair. she had forgotten

her ribbon, or perhaps it had gotten lost somewhere over the course of the night. they paused at

one of the lookouts, leaning over the railing to watch the sluggish tide moving ice along the

surface of the lake.

behind them, the white stone buildings of the university cast broad shadows, as huge as the

argantian mountains on the other side.

looking at preston’s homeland across the water made her think of something. “have you told

your mother everything?”

“i called her yesterday, before we went out. she was happy for me, of course, but i think

secretly she was a bit glum. she was a fan of myrddin, too. even though she lives in argant, she’s

still llyrian at heart.”

right when they’d gotten back to caer-isel, effy had gone to the sleeper museum. she told no

one about it, not even preston. she took one of the brochures and walked around the crypt, passing

by the other sleepers, wizened men whose alleged magic kept their bodies from decaying.

at last she had come to myrddin’s glass coffin, and stared at his slumbering face.

it was the first time she had seen it. it was a long and slender face, rather unremarkable,

marred by wrinkles and age spots. when their thesis went to print, effy had wondered, would the

magic vanish with it? would the museum close off the exhibit in shame, would the curators meet

in their smoke-filled rooms and decide, grimacing, to remove his body?

even after everything, the thought had filled her with grief. the truth was very costly at times.

how terrible, to navigate the world without a story to comfort you.

but effy had learned. or at least, she was trying to. better to pen a story of your own. better to

build your own house, with a foundation that was strong, with windows that let in plenty of light.

at least some people, she figured, would always be convinced that emrys myrddin had written

angharad. effy had left the crypt behind, slipping out within a crowd of other visitors, and threw

the brochure in a rubbish bin outside.

now, effy blinked into the wind, the memory leaving her as preston’s face came back into

focus.

“i still think his poetry has some merit,” she said. “‘the mariner’s demise,’ at least.”

“oh, certainly,” preston said. “he wasn’t a terrible writer, even after all this. i don’t know

exactly what his legacy will be. maybe when we’re dead, some other scholars will come along and

rehabilitate his image.”

rehabilitate meant literally to make something livable again. as if myrddin’s legacy were an

old house that they were trying to tear down.

they hadn’t gone to look at the ruin of hiraeth, but effy could imagine it as easily as she had

once imagined the beautiful manor it could have been. the wreck of wood and stone along the

cliffside, the furniture smashed against the rocks, the gabled roof rent in two, its shingles flung off

into the distance. and, of course, the sea, swallowing everything it could reach.

“i can’t decide if i want that.” effy chewed her lip. “i don’t know if i want him to be forgotten

in obscure shame, or for his works to still be appreciated for what they were. the real ones, that is.

a part of me still loves him, i think. the idea of him.”

preston gave her a small smile. “that’s all right,” he said. “you don’t have to know. for what

it’s worth, i’ve stopped believing in objective truth.”

effy laughed softly. “so all this has left its mark on you, too.”

“of course it has. you have.” the wind tousled his already tousled hair, and as he pushed his

glasses up the bridge of his nose, effy was suddenly overwhelmed by affection. a sign of life:

tender, almost anguished, but real. “there’s something i’ve been wanting to ask you.”

just as suddenly, her stomach lurched. “what is it?”

“oh, it’s nothing important,” he said quickly. “don’t look like that. for a while i didn’t know

if it was worth mentioning at all . . . it’s the strangest thing, really. maybe just my imagination.

when we were at hiraeth, and i was sleeping in myrddin’s study, some mornings i would wake

up to the sound of bells outside the window. they sounded like church bells, but of course the

nearest church is miles away, in saltney. once or twice i even went outside to investigate, but i

never saw anything. the sound was coming from down the cliffs, which is impossible, i know. but

i just wanted to ask, to be sure. did you ever hear them, too?”