“That’s indeed so, my lord,” Willow said. “Be glad your own parentage is beyond question. And yours, young man.” She gave Coll a penetrating look and my irrepressible young cousin wilted under it. “Whether or not we can say the same of every man and woman in this hall remains a mystery. So, back to Saorla. In the moment that Mac Dara told her the uncomfortable truth, the girl determined to return to the mortal world and to find the father who had been so wronged. Saorla was disgusted by what Albha had done. It explained everything, she thought—the way she had always felt out of place; her fascination with the idea of a world beyond her own; her distaste for the machinations of folk such as the all-powerful Mac Dara. Saorla decided she would turn her back on the Fair Folk. She would walk away and never return to the Otherworld.

“It was not so easy, of course. Albha got wind of what her daughter intended and pursued her through that realm, using all her considerable power to stop her. But Saorla had not wasted the fifteen years she’d spent growing up amongst the Fair Folk. She’d learned a few tricks of her own. Out through a little wee portal she slipped and away into the human world, and there was no holding her back.”

The tale expanded into a long and dangerous duel between mother and daughter, as time and again Albha tricked Saorla onto the margins of the Otherworld only to be bested at the last moment when Saorla sensed she was in danger and maneuvered her way out again. I could not guess how it would end.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” said Sibeal politely at a certain point. “But the Fair Folk in your stories seem rather different from the ones we know of. This family has had wise advice over the years from the Tuatha De Danann, especially the one we call the Lady of the Forest. They have guided our decisions and helped us with difficult choices. These folk you speak of, Mac Dara and Albha, sound like lesser beings, caught up in their own deceit and selfishness. Is it only at Sevenwaters that the Fair Folk can be wise and good?”