Shadowfell by Juliet Marillier Page A

meagre shelter of a rock shelf and moved on before dawn. I had learned a lesson. There would be no seeking a bed in any habitation of men.
    By the next night I had reached the waterfall the Good Folk had called the Maiden’s Tears. It was as they had described it: a splashing, exuberant beck cascading over mossy rocks. White-bellied fish swam in the darkness of the still pool above, and when I lowered my line into the water, the faint moonlight seemed to draw them to the hook. I muttered thanks to the gods for this bounty, killed the fish quickly, and enjoyed my best supper since Flint’s lumpy porridge. There was neither sight nor sound of the urisk, of whom the Good Folk had spoken such a dire warning. I had heard of such beings before; Grandmother had said they were the loneliest creatures in all Alban, and always lived beneath waterfalls.
    I wrapped myself in Flint’s cloak, pulling the folds up over my ears, and fell asleep with the coals of my cooking fire glowing warm red-gold in the soft shadows and the wash of the water soothing me.
    In the darkness of midnight a piercing cry sliced through my head, jolting me wide awake. Against every instinct, I made myself hold still. The wailing went on and on, setting my teeth on edge and chilling my blood. There were no words in it, but I felt the creature’s grief, its profound loneliness, its longing for a hand of friendship.
    Do not speak to him, for if you do he will follow you on your journey. He will never let go. There had been no need for the Good Folk to warn me. I had known this wisdom since I was a child of three. Farral and I used to play a game of urisk, taking turns to emerge from hiding, wailing and reaching out clinging hands, while whoever was the victim tried to stay still and silent. Now, with the real creature crying within a few paces of my camp site, I trembled as I lay huddled in the cloak. I must not move; I could not speak the words of comfort I longed to offer. It’s all right. When I pass this way, I will visit you. I will stay a little while and talk to you. It would have been so easy to help, so simple a thing, but I could not. Give an urisk any encouragement at all, and it would be with you every moment until the day you died, clinging, twining, hanging about your shoulders, slipping into bed next to you, a chilly, vaporous, constant companion. If I tried to help the being, it would follow me. And any creature that followed me would not only put me at greater risk from the Enforcers, but would be at risk itself.
    Humankind and Good Folk were forbidden, under king’s law, to speak together, to be in the same place together, even to set eyes on each other. This law had long puzzled me. My brother had told me Keldec feared magic; but that couldn’t be true, for the only place where magic was allowed was at his court, among his inner circle.
    I slept no more, but lay silent with the urisk’s voice, now shrunk to a pitiful weeping, filling my mind with sad memories, a parade of loss and grief, from the small sorrows of a child – a favourite toy lost, a hurtful remark by a friend – to the deaths of all my dear ones, each in turn. I thought of that good chieftain Dunchan of Silverwater and his brave wife. I thought of the folk who had died under the harsh blows of the Cull, in Darkwater and in hundreds of other settlements like it. For a little, as the crying went on, I felt something close to despair. It was a long journey. I did not really know if the place Farral had spoken of existed. I would have to cross the mountains, and the leaves were already turning to red and gold. I was, in truth, only a wee lassie, as the Good Folk had said. This was foolish. It was impossible . . .
    A tear welled in my eye, falling to lose itself in the wool of Flint’s cloak, and I caught myself up sharply. Just hold on until dawn , I told myself. For in the tales, when the sun rose, the urisk faded. Hold still , I ordered myself. Keep silent. And,