Emily Wilde's Compendium of Lost Tales

Margret and Lilja want to accompany Emily to Ljosland, but she knows her task is best achieved alone. However, Shadow insists on coming along. Bidding everyone goodbye, Emily heads to the mountain known in its English translation as The Bones. She camps at its base for the night and reads through Wendell’s letters. Each letter tries to entice Emily home with the prospect of a scientific discovery, such as the hag-headed deer of his realm, which she has always wanted to see, or entreaties of love. Suppressing a smile at Wendell’s obvious attempts at manipulation, Emily goes to sleep. The next morning, she begins climbing the mountain, which she has chosen because it is the coldest, most inhospitable place nearby. Emily hopes that it therefore qualifies as a “winterland.” Emily needs to be in a winterland to access Poe’s door in Ljosland in Norway. She climbs the snowy slope, clutching the key Poe gave her. She slips, but instead of falling on her face, she finds herself in the familiar landscape of Ljosland, close to Poe’s tree. Poe runs out to greet her.

Poe sends Emily off through his tree to the forest of Kyrroarskogur where the tree of the Hidden King—monarch of the hidden Folk—is located. The Hidden King’s tree has shed all its leaves and is white, with its trunk split. Over its twisted branches is a ring of starry, greenish sky. Emily sets up camp a short distance away at the tree’s foot, makes a fire, and goes to bed.

The winter king does not show up the next day. Emily decides she will leave the desolate place tomorrow, as she can hear strange voices emanating from the tree. The Hidden King has been imprisoned in this tree for centuries, and Emily imagines the tree still carries some dark enchantment. Since the king was told Emily is dead, he probably thinks her call for him is a trick and is ignoring her.

Emily awakens in her tent the next morning with a sick feeling of foreboding. When she comes out, the Hidden King is standing next to the tent, a sword in his hand. Emily asks the king if he is here to kill her, and he gravely confirms her fear. When Emily asks the king why he wants to slay her, the king replies that she fled his court and floated the lie that she was dead. Emily lies to the king that she did not want to leave him. Another prince took her away and carried her to his green realm. She has now escaped that realm and come to the winter king. She needs his help to summon the Veil so she can rescue the other prince’s enemy, his stepmother. Once the stepmother overthrows the prince, Emily shall return to the Hidden King and wed him.

Convinced by Emily’s story, the Hidden King sheaths his sword. He apologizes that he can no longer marry Emily as he has wed someone else. However, he prizes Emily’s loyalty to him and will summon the Veil for her. Though Emily is likely to perish within seconds in the Veil, he cannot deny a mortal like her the chance to prove her heroism. The king gives Emily an icy kiss, bids her goodbye, and with an economical gesture, summons a whirling pillar of darkness that parts the grove. Emily steps in, Shadow by her heels.

Inside the veil, Emily is nearly blinded by a cold, stinging sandstorm of ashes. Emily manages to make Shadow sniff a handkerchief that belonged to Arna so he can trace her scent, and the two slowly move forward in an icy, dry wind. The glamor which makes him resemble a dog gone, Shadow grows to twice his size, and Emily climbs onto his back. He begins to run till they reach a pillar of rock on top of which is a curled-up Arna. Emily calls to Arna, but suddenly is surrounded by the unseen creatures that haunt the Veil. Shadow fights them as Arna jumps down. A creature bites off a hank of Arna’s hair just as she and Emily mount Shadow. Shadow runs through the wasteland till they emerge in the Hidden King’s forest.

An exhausted Emily builds a fire, sets up her tent, and falls asleep. Arna joins her in the tent at some point in the night, driven inside by the cold. The next morning, they leave for Poe’s tree. Near Poe’s grove, Emily notes that Arna is coated with ashes and asks her if she wants to bathe in the hot spring nearby. After Arna has scrubbed herself, she asks Emily if her visit to the Veil was a test set for her by Wendell. Emily tells the queen the truth. Arna assures Emily that she is done with vengeance. Having spent time in the Veil, all she wants is a small green patch of land and water for herself. She is ready to willingly abdicate the throne for her stepson. Emily cannot bring herself to trust Arna’s words, but she doesn’t reveal her misgivings. Arna and Emily arrive in Corbann, Arna scandalized that there hasn’t been a formal wedding feast in Emily’s honor.

Emily stops by Margret and Lilja’s cottage. She considers their hospitality toward the strange, untrustworthy Arna the clearest proof of their abiding friendship for her. Emily notes that Arna is trembling at the prospect of facing Wendell, which softens her toward the queen. Emily and Arna take the stepping-stone door to Silva Lupi and walk toward the Grove, where Wendell is holding court. A crowd immediately gathers around them at the sight of Arna.

The grove still bears signs of the queen’s curse, some of the trees blackened. Wendell appears to be asleep on the throne, and is wearing his hungry cloak. Emily can tell Wendell is pretending to sleep. She goes up to him and asks for forgiveness for going against his wishes. Wendell opens his eyes and clasps her in a bear hug, asking her to promise she will never leave him again. Emily asks him to let Arna live. Niamh and Taran caution Wendell against granting Emily’s request, given Arna’s vindictive nature and the harm she has done to the realm. At the very least, Arna must be put in a dungeon.

Arna apologizes to Wendell and tells him that all she wants is a small cottage where Folk can visit her so she can teach them what she has learnt from her mistakes. Wendell groans in exasperation at the platitudes. However, since Emily so desires, he grants Arna’s request. Enchantments will be set on Arna so her movements are limited, but she can have her cottage.

Wendell and Emily pay a long overdue visit to Lilja and Marget. Over dinner, Wendell tells the women that Arna has been given a small lakeside cottage, where she has a garden and a cow. Wendell’s spies, such as Snowbell the fox-faerie, bring daily news of the queen. Wendell believes it is only a matter of time before Arna slips back into her old tricks. Emily disagrees with his opinion. As they bicker pleasantly, they are joined by more friends: Niamh, Ariadne, and Farris.

After dinner, Wendell announces that he has a surprise wedding gift for Emily. Unbeknownst to Emily, when she has been away for her research work, Wendell has been showing the arthritic, ageing Shadow to faerie doctors, including the brownies of animal husbandry. The brownies diagnosed Shadow with a congestion in his blood, which they could not cure. The only hope lay in a woman of mixed bogle and courtly Fae, known for collecting Words of Power. This self-styled wordmonger gave Wendell a word for curing a hangover, which when spoken, cleanses the blood. Wendell has been speaking the word to Shadow, and the dog is already stronger. Wendell makes Emily place her hand on Shadow’s chest, and she notices that his heartbeat seems more emphatic. Wendell’s wedding gift to Emily is the Word that will keep Shadow’s illness at bay. The creature will still age, but much more slowly. Ecstatic that her companion will live for a long time, Emily bursts into tears.

Emily and Wendell are in Cambridge at a late hour to return library books Emily borrowed. They chose this hour since it is not crowded, but some scholars are still about and surprised to see the two Faerie monarchs. By now, it is common knowledge that Emily is a queen of Faerie; this has proved a career boon as she has been getting innumerable invitations to conferences on Faerie lore. After this foray to Cambridge, Emily plans to spend months exploring Wendell’s realm. She knows she will always have the haven of the Cambridge library when she wants a break from her adventures. Meanwhile, Wendell is proving the most popular monarch in Faerie in a long time. The common Folk especially love him for his attention to them. Deilah now dotes on Wendell, though he is frequently annoyed by her. Emily has given most of her gowns to Deilah and dresses simply, save a pin of a silver leaf and a bunch of bluebells in her hair. As she bids goodbye to Cambridge, she feels the familiar mix of trepidation and excitement before starting an adventure in the land of Faerie.