emily_wildes_map_of_the_otherlands_-_heather_fawcett
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Emily Wilde’s Map of the Otherlands is a work of fiction. Names, places, and incidents
either are products of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to
actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2024 by Heather Fawcett
All rights reserved.
Published in the United States by Del Rey, an imprint of Random House, a division of Penguin
Random House LLC, New York.
DEL REY and the CIRCLE colophon are registered trademarks of Penguin Random House LLC.
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Names: Fawcett, Heather (Heather M.), author.
Title: Emily Wilde’s map of the Otherlands: a novel / Heather Fawcett.
Description: New York: Del Rey, 2024. | Series: Emily Wilde; 2
Identifiers: LCCN 2023036750 (print) | LCCN 2023036751 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593500194
(hardcover; acid-free paper) | ISBN 9780593500200 (ebook) | ISBN 9780593724682
(international edition)
Subjects: LCGFT: Magic realist fiction. | Novels.
Classification: LCC PR9199.4.F39 E46 2024 (print) | LCC PR9199.4.F39 (ebook) | DDC 813/.6
—dc23/eng/20230816
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023036750
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2023036751
Ebook ISBN 9780593500200
randomhousebooks.com
Book design by Virginia Norey, adapted for ebook
Floral art by Alexandr Sidorov/stock.adobe.com
Ornamental frame by 100ker/stock.adobe.com
Cover design: Vera Drmanovski
ep_prh_6.2_145871955_c0_r0
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Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
14th September 1910
14th September, Evening
15th September
17th September
20th September
21st September
22nd September
24th September
27th September
2nd October
4th October
5th October
6th October
6th October—Late
7th October
8th October
9th October
10th October
11th October
11th October—Evening
13th October?
?—October
9/10/10
12th October
29th December
By Heather Fawcett
About the Author
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not fit in my briefcase, so I wrapped it in
cloth and wrestled it into an old knapsack I sometimes carry with me on
expeditions. Surprisingly—or perhaps unsurprisingly, as it is a faerie foot—
it is neither dirty nor foul-smelling. It is, of course, long mummified and
would probably be mistaken for a goat’s foot by a casual observer, perhaps
an unlikely offering excavated from the tomb of some ancient pharaoh.
While it does not smell bad, since bringing the foot into my office I have at
odd moments caught the scent of wildflowers and crushed grass carried on
a little breeze whose source I cannot trace.
I gazed at my now-bulging knapsack, feeling entirely ridiculous. Trust
me when I say that I would rather not cart a foot around campus with me.
But faerie remains, mummified or not, have been known to slip away as the
fancy takes them, and I can only assume that feet are particularly inclined to
such wanderlust. I shall have to keep it with me until its usefulness has been
exhausted. Good grief.
The soft chiming of the grandfather clock alerted me that I was late for
breakfast with Wendell. I know from experience that if I miss our breakfast
appointments he will bring the meal to me himself, in such a quantity that
the entire department will smell of eggs, and then for the rest of the day I
shall have to suffer Professor Thornthwaite sniping at me about his delicate
stomach.
I paused to pin my hair back up—it’s grown far too long, as I’ve spent
the past several weeks descending into one of my obsessive periods, when I
can think of little else beyond the subject of my research. And the question
of Wendell’s door has consumed me more than any other academic mystery
I can remember. My hair is not the only area of my appearance I have
neglected of late—my brown dress is rumpled, and I am not altogether
certain it is clean; I found it in a heap of other questionably laundered items
on the floor of my closet.
“Come, dear,” I said to Shadow. The dog roused himself from his bed by
the oil heater with a yawn, stretching his massive paws. I stopped for a
moment to glance around my office with satisfaction—when I was recently
granted tenure, I also inherited a much more spacious office, now three
doors away from Wendell’s (naturally he has found a way to complain
about this additional twenty feet of distance). The grandfather clock came
with the room, as did the enormous damasked curtains lining the sash
window that overlooks Knight College’s pond—presently dotted with
swans—and the magnificent oak desk with its drawers lined with black
velvet. I added bookshelves, of course, and a ladder to reach the uppermost
volumes, whilst Wendell insisted on cluttering the place up with two
photographs from Hrafnsvik that I did not even know he took, one of me
standing in the snowy garden with Lilja and Margret, the other of a village
scene; a vase of dried flowers that somehow never lose their scent; and the
newly reframed painting of Shadow he commissioned for my twenty-eighth
birthday—all right, I cannot complain about that. My beast looks very
fetching.
I passed several students sunk deep into the armchairs of the dryadology
department common room, an open space beyond the faculty offices that
boasts a cosy fireplace—unlit on this warm September day—as well as an
impressive row of windows taller than several men, with little half-moons
of stained glass at the top, which face the Gothic grandeur of the Library of
Medicine, its proximity the subject of innumerable wry remarks concerning
a dryadologist’s susceptibility to strange injuries. In one corner is a bronze
urn filled with salt—campus legend has it this began as a joke, but many a
whey-faced undergraduate has visited this vessel to stuff their pockets after
sitting through their first lecture on wights. Not that there is much to worry
about, as we do not ordinarily have Folk wandering into the department to
hear what we mortals are saying about them (Wendell excepted). The thick
rugs scattered on the floor must be trodden on with care, for they are lumpy
from the coins stuffed beneath them. Like the salt, this tradition most likely
originated as a humourous diversion rather than any serious design to ward
the Folk away from our halls, and has now largely devolved into a sort of
good-luck ritual, with students pressing a ha’penny into the floor before an
exam or dissertation. (Less superstitious young scholars have also been
known to raid this lowly hoard for pub money.)
Shadow gave a happy grunt when we stepped outside—he is ordinarily a
quiet dog—and plunged into the sunlit grass, snuffling about for snails and
other edibles.
I followed at a more sedate walk, enjoying the sun on my face, as well
as the cool edge to the wind that heralded the coming autumn. Just past the
main dryadology building was the ivy-clad magnificence of the Library of
Dryadology, which overlooks a lawn dotted with trees known in this part of
Britain as faerie favourites, yew and willow. Several students were napping
beneath the largest of these, a great hoary willow believed (erroneously, I’m
afraid) to be the home of a sleeping leprechaun, who will one day awaken
and stuff the pockets of the nearest slumberer he encounters with gold.
I felt a pleasant sense of kinship as I passed into the shadow of that
library. I can hear Wendell mocking me for having familial feelings for a
library, but I don’t care; it’s not as if he reads my personal journals, though
he is not above teasing me for continuing the journalling habit after we left
Ljosland. I seem unable to quit it; I find it greatly helps me organize my
thoughts.
I continued to gaze at the library as the path rounded a corner—
unwisely, as it happened, for I collided with a man walking in the opposite
direction, so forcefully I nearly lost my footing.
“I’m so sorry,” I began, but the man only rudely waved my apology
away. He was holding a great quantity of ribbons in his hands, which he
seemed to be in the process of tying together.
“Have you any more?” he demanded. “These won’t be enough.”
“I’m afraid not,” I replied cautiously. The man was dressed oddly for the
weather, in a long, fur-lined cloak and tremendous boots extending to his
knees. In addition to the ribbons in his hands, he had a long chain of them
looped multiple times round his neck, and more spilling from his pockets.
They were a highly eclectic assemblage, varied in both colour and size.
Between the ribbons and his considerable height, the man had the look of a
maypole given human form. He was perhaps in the latter stages of middle
age, with mostly brown hair a shade or two lighter than his skin, as if
bleached by the elements, and a scraggly white beard.
“They won’t be enough for what?” I enquired.
The man gave me the most inexplicable glare. There was something
familiar about that look that I could not put my finger on, though I was
certain I had never met this strange person before. I felt a shiver glide along
my neck like the brush of a cold fingertip.
“The path is eternal,” he said. “But you mustn’t sleep—I made that
mistake. Turn left at the ghosts with ash in their hair, then left at the
evergreen wood, and straight through the vale where my brother will die. If
you lose your way, you will lose only yourself, but if you lose the path, you
will lose everything you never knew you had.”
I stared at him. The man only looked down at his ribbons with an air of
dismissing me and continued on his way. Of course I turned to see which
direction he went, and was only mildly surprised to find that he had
disappeared.
“Hm!” I grunted. “What do you think of that, my love?”
Shadow, though, had taken little interest in the man; he was presently
eyeing a magpie that had descended to the lawn to yank at a worm. I filed
the encounter away and continued across the leafy campus grounds.
perches on the bank of the River Cam
adjacent to Pendleigh Bridge. It is a fifteen-minute walk from our offices,
and if it were up to me, we would eat somewhere more conveniently
situated, but he is very particular about breakfast and claims that the
Archimedes Café—it adjoins the mathematics department—is the only
place that knows the proper way to poach eggs.
As usual, Wendell was easy to locate; his golden hair drew the eye like a
beacon, glinting intermittently as the wind tossed the branches to and fro.
He was seated at our usual table beneath the cherry tree, his elegant frame
folded into a slump with his elbow on the table and his forehead pressed
against his hand. I suppressed a smile.
“Good morning,” I chirped, not bothering to keep the smugness out of
my voice. I had timed it well, for the table had recently been filled; the
bacon and eggs were steaming, as was the coffee in Wendell’s cup.
“Dear Emily,” he said as I sat down, not troubling to lift his head from
his hand but smiling at me slantwise. “You look as if you’ve come from a
wrestling match with one of your books. May I ask who won?”
I ignored this. “Something peculiar happened on the way here,” I said,
and described my encounter with the mysterious ribbons man.
“Perhaps my stepmother has finally decided to send her assassins after
me,” he said in a voice that was more disdainful than anything, as if there
were something unfashionable about the business of assassins.
Of course I didn’t bother pointing out that the stranger had not
mentioned Wendell nor seemed in any way connected to him or his
problems, knowing this would fall on deaf ears, and merely said, “He didn’t
seem very threatening.”
“Perhaps he was a poisoner. Most poisoners are strange, irritable things,
with a great fondness for talking in riddles. It must be all that hunching over
measurements, breathing in fumes.” He eyed his coffee morosely, then
dumped another scoop of sugar in and tossed the whole thing back.
I filled a plate for Shadow with eggs and sausages and set it under the
table, where the dog happily settled himself, then slung the knapsack
casually over the back of my chair. Wendell continued to take no notice of
the powerful faerie artefact I had brought with me to breakfast, which I
found entertaining. “Do you notice that smell?” I said innocently as I again
caught the scent of wildflowers emanating from no particular direction.
“Smell?” He was scratching Shadow’s ears. “Are you trying out a
perfume? If so, I’m afraid it’s been overwhelmed by your usual aroma of
inkwells and libraries.”
“I didn’t mean me,” I said a little too loudly.
“What then? My senses are utterly incapacitated by this damned
headache.”
“I don’t think that’s how it works,” I said, amused. Only a little, though;
he really did look like death. His ordinarily rosy skin had a greyish pallor,
his dark eyes underscored with shadows. He mumbled something
unintelligible as he rubbed his forehead, tangling the golden locks that had
fallen into his eyes. I suppressed the familiar urge to reach out and brush
them back into place.
“I have to say I’ve never understood this annual ritual of poisoning
oneself,” I said. “Where’s the appeal? Shouldn’t a birthday be an enjoyable
affair?”
“I believe mortals wish to blot out the reminder of their inexorably
approaching demise. I just got a bit carried away—bloody Byers and his
drinking games. And then they brought out a cake—or was it two cakes?
Anyway, never again.”
I smiled. Despite Wendell’s habit of complaining of fatigue, sore feet,
and a myriad of other ailments—generally when confronted by the
necessity of hard work—it’s rare to see him in any actual distress, and on
some level I found it gratifying. “I managed to mark my thirtieth—as well
as my thirty-first last month—without drinking myself into stupefaction. It
is possible.”
“You also retired at nine o’clock. Reid, Thornthwaite, and the rest of us
celebrated your birthday longer than you did. Yours is only a different
category of excess, Em.” Something—perhaps a twitch in one of the faerie
foot’s toes—must have finally alerted him to my knapsack, for his bleary
gaze snagged upon it suspiciously. “What have you got in there? And what
is all this smirking about? You’re up to something.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” I said, pressing my lips together to
contain said smirk.
“Have you gotten yourself enchanted again? Must I begin plotting
another rescue?”
I glared. I’m afraid I have not gotten over my resentment of him for
saving me from the snow king’s court in Ljosland earlier this year, and have
made a solemn vow to myself that I shall be the one to rescue him from
whatever faerie trouble we next find ourselves in. Yes, I realize this is
illogical, given that it requires Wendell to end up in some dire circumstance,
which would ideally best be avoided, but there it is. I’m quite determined.
“I’ll explain everything tomorrow,” I said. “For now, let us say that I
have had a breakthrough in my research. I am planning to make a
presentation out of it.”
“A presentation?” He looked amused. “To an audience of one. Can you
not do anything without waving around a pointer and a stack of diagrams?”
“An audience of two, I said. “I suppose I must invite Ariadne, mustn’t
I?”
“She would be put out if you didn’t.”
I stabbed my knife into the butter and applied it to my toast in
unnecessarily sharp strokes. Ariadne is my brothers eldest daughter. She
arrived at Cambridge for the summer term with a deep-rooted love for
dryadology, which my brother, unsurprisingly, has added to the extensive
list of items he holds against me. Only nineteen, she is easily the brightest
student I have ever taught, with an impressive alacrity for getting what she
wants, whether it be a research assistantship, after-hours tutoring, or access
to the faculty-only section of the Library of Dryadology, where we keep our
rarest texts, half of which are enchanted. I’m afraid that her habit of
reminding me how frequently she writes to Thomas has more to do with
this than her powers of persuasion; much as I tell myself I could hardly care
less about my brothers opinion of me—he is a full twelve years my senior,
and my opposite in every way—I cannot help picturing his frowning face
whenever she mentions their correspondence, and would, on the whole,
prefer not to provide him with additional points for his list.
“Is this about my door?” A youthful hope enlivened Wendell’s drawn
face.
“Of course,” I said. “I only regret it’s taken this long to develop a
workable theory. But I’ll reveal all tomorrow. I have a few more details to
pin down—and anyway you have two lectures this afternoon.”
“Don’t remind me.” He buried his forehead in his hand again. “After I
get through them—if I get through them—I am going home and burying
myself in pillows until this bloody pounding ceases.”
I nudged the bowl of oranges in his direction. He seemed to have eaten
little, which is unlike him. He took one, peeled it, then gazed at it a moment
before setting it aside.
“Here,” I said, handing him my buttered toast. He was able to force this
down, at least, and it seemed to settle his stomach somewhat, enough to
tackle the eggs I spooned onto his plate.
“Where would I be without you, Em?” he said.
“Probably still flailing about in Germany, looking for your door,” I said.
“Meanwhile, I would be sleeping more soundly without a marriage proposal
from a faerie king dangling over my head.”
“It would cease to dangle if you accepted.” He rested his hand over mine
and teasingly ran his thumb over my knuckles. “Shall I write you an essay
on the subject? I can provide an extensive list of reasons to acquiesce.”
“I can imagine,” I said drily. A slow shiver travelled up my arm. “And
what would be the first? That I shall enjoy an eternity of clean floors and
dust-free bookshelves, as well as a constant refrain of nagging to pick up
after myself?”
“Ah, no. It would be that our marriage would stop you from charging off
into the wilderness in search of other faerie kings to marry, without first
checking if they are made of ice.”
I made a grab for his coffee cup—I did not actually intend to empty it
into his lap, though I could not be blamed if my hand had happened to slip
—but he had already snatched it away, a motion too quick for my mortal
reflexes to counter.
“That is unfair,” I complained, but he only laughed at me.
We have fallen into this pattern of jesting over his marriage proposal,
though it is clear he is no less serious about it, as he has informed me more
times than I care to count. For my part, I wish I could see the whole thing in
a humourous light—I have indeed lost sleep over it. My stomach is in knots
even as I write these words, and in general I prefer to avoid thinking about
the whole business so as not to be sent into a minor panic. It is in part, I
suppose, that the thought of marrying anyone makes me wish to retreat to
the nearest library and hide myself among the stacks; marriage has always
struck me as a pointless business, at best a distraction from my work and at
worst a very large distraction from my work coupled with a lifetime of
tedious social obligations.
But I am also keenly aware that I should have refused Wendell long ago,
and that allowing him to hope like this is cruel. I do not wish to be cruel to
Wendell; the thought gives rise to a strange and unpleasant sensation, as if
the air is being squeezed from my body. But the reality is that one would
have to be an utter idiot to marry one of the Folk. There are perhaps a
handful of stories in which such a union ends well and a mountain of them
in which it ends in madness or an untimely and unpleasant death.
I am also, of course, constantly aware of the ridiculousness of my being
the object of a marriage offering by a faerie monarch.
“Give me a hint at least,” he said after we had spent several minutes
attending to our food.
“Not until you’ve made a start on that essay.”
“Much as I appreciate that you cannot stop thinking of marrying me,” he
said, “I was referring to this breakthrough of yours. Have you narrowed
down the possible locations of my door?”
“Ah.” I put my crêpe down. “Yes. Although, as my research points to
many possible locations, it would be more accurate to say that I have landed
upon one that seems particularly promising. How familiar are you with the
work of Danielle de Grey?”