Page 63 of The Changeling

The thought of anyone finding the dead baby in the chimney vault made me sick. I imagined it again and again, the horror, the anguish, the investigation, the interrogation, the punishment. I woke panting, slick with sweat, flames licking at the edges of my consciousness.

The queen’s quarters were searched thoroughly, and the floors were washed with water in which rosemary was steeped, but no mouse was found and the smell lingered. I felt with a shudder that it hung about me, a miasma of betrayal and death.

I picked a great bunch of fresh herbs and put it by the cradle, so that my brother would have sweet airs blowing over him. He was awake, looking about him with frowning dark eyes. He looked like me, I thought. Small and delicate with crookit legs, which the doctor kept tightly swaddled to a wooden board in the hope of straightening them.

‘Fearn,’ I whispered. ‘I am your sister.’

Fearn for the alder. I tried to remember all that Nan had written in her cunning book about the tree. The shields of warriors were made from alder, and it was burned to make charcoal for the forging of weapons or the manufacture of gunpowder. Because it did not rot when wet, alder was also used to make the posts for bridges, and so it was thought to connect the worlds of the living and the dead. When cut, its flesh turned red as blood.

What did it mean, that our mother, the faery queen, had given him such a name? Why did it fill me with such foreboding?

His arms were wrapped close to his body, so I could not hold his tiny hand. But I gently stroked the soft curve of his cheek with one finger.

A glimpse of a terrifying future. Screaming faces, blood and fire and smoke. I recoiled, sinking down onto my stool. I had seen this future before, when I had told the queen she would have a son that would rule the whole land.

But how could that be? Her son was dead.

At that moment the queen came in with a rustle of silken skirts. ‘Is my little man awake? Look at him! Was there ever a more beautiful boy?’ She picked him up and kissed him, smiling at me over his head. With an effort, I smiled back and crept out, feeling just awful.

Mary loved him just as much as if he was her own child. If she knew the truth, would she still love him?

Why no’? a small voice said inside me. You were no’ born of Mam’s blood, and she still loved you.

Something seemed to break inside me. I found myself walking up and down my tiny cupboard of a room, sobbing. I’m sorry, Mam, I’m so sorry. I didna understand. I’m sorry I was so cruel.

It took me a long time to compose myself. When Mistress Gowland came in search of me, I told her through the door of my room that I was sick.

‘It’s no wonder, with the heat and the horrible stench,’ she answered. ‘Rest up, Caitlín, I’ll have one of the maids bring you up a healing tisane.’

‘Lemon balm,’ I said, ‘and ginger.’

‘Och aye, I ken,’ she said, with a smile in her voice.

I lay and thought of home. I had bound my mother so she could no longer force me against my will. I could do whatever I wanted now. I could leave the queen’s service and go home to Monzie. My heart shrank at the thought. Nan said I had broken Mam’s heart. Perhaps she would be cold to me; perhaps she could never forgive me for the way I had spoken to her, for the years I had stayed hidden and silent, not letting her know if I was even alive. Perhaps Sorcha would hate me too. What kind of sister had I been?

Worst of all, if I went back to Monzie, I might see Robbie and that I could not bear. Perhaps he was already married off to some fine lady. I imagined having to go to church and see him there with his wife, pretending he had never lain with me. I imagined trying to find work, and no-one hiring me, because everyone knew I had seduced the laird’s son.

Besides, I felt such loyalty and remorse towards the queen. She had saved me. In return, I had bewitched her into an ill-fated marriage, and smuggled a faery changeling into the castle. I could not confess my crimes without being accused of being a witch, but I could try to make amends to her.

At least if I stayed at court, I would see my brother grow up. Perhaps I could even guard him from the dark future I foresaw for him.

I would just have to be very, very careful that no-one guessed my secrets.

By August, the stench was intolerable.

The king left the court and returned to his father’s castle near Glasgow, saying the smell made him sick to his stomach. It was whispered that it was not the stink that made him ill, but syphilis. The strange red rash Henry had tried to conceal with face powder had spread all over his body, his page said, and his mouth and cock suppurated with sores.

Mary made arrangements for the prince to be transferred to Stirling Castle. I watched as my brother was carried out in the arms of his nurse, tightly swaddled and bound to a board, then placed into a wicker carrier and secured in a horse litter, the curtains drawn close about him.

He screamed in protest. I wanted to unbind his limbs, let him lie in the garden and kick his little legs, let the sunshine warm and strengthen them as it had done mine. But I had no right. I had to stand by and do nothing, as his guard of five hundred musketeers formed up around him and escorted him out of the castle gates.

I could not look at the queen when I brought her supper.

She drew her fine brows together. ‘What troubles you, Caitlín?’

‘It’s naught, madam.’

‘I can see it’s not naught. Have I displeased you in some way?’