1. Niamh

Grandmother's hands shake as she chops the herbs, but I do not dare suggest that I perform this task instead. The brew can do little for my grandfather, though it will ease his pain. She needs to do this herself, to hold onto the control she has left over this situation. We do not speak of it, but in our every breath, our every movement, is the knowledge that these are his final hours.

She pours the herbs into boiling water and lets it brew, before releasing a ragged breath. Only then does she turn those sharp eyes on me, now darkened by lack of sleep and crinkled with worry. "You had best call your father."

I nod, wipe my hands on an apron, and take myself outside, small whistle tucked into my pocket. I will not let these tears fall. Not yet.

I wander down the path my grandfather once lovingly shaped and away from the cottage to step into Dreamer's Wood. The silence is no less deafening than usual, as if even Master Grim's life slipping slowly away will not make the birds sing. I find a small clearing, one I know well, and seat myself in the middle of it. Thanking the ancient trees for their guardianship of Dreamer's Wood, I take a deep breath and put the whistle to my lips.

The tune is a mournful one, and I have to blink away a stray tear, but there is no more appropriate song than this. The Farewell, a favourite of my father's and my Aunt Liobhan's, which tells of true love that lasts beyond death. If ever there were two souls bound together in such a way, they must be my grandparents. I cannot sing the words in my current state, but I hope the meaning is clear.

Suddenly my father is here, dressed like the Otherworld prince he used to be. Beneath his long cloak is a leather breastplate, cleverly disguised by ornate embroidery. But his expression is incredibly human, pinched with fear, as he takes my hand and lifts me into a hug.

"Oh, Niamh," he whispers into my hair, a longer version of his own dark curls. "Is he still with us?"

I breathe slowly. "He was when I left the cottage. But he will not remain with us long."

He releases me and emits a strange, low whistle from his lips. A small bird, as silent as the rest of them, emerges from the trees to land on his outstretched palm. He does not need to tell me what to do. With my small paring knife, I cut a single curl from my hair, and my father does the same. These he braids together into a loose ring-like shape. "Bring Liobhan home," he tells the bird, and it flies away with the hair in its beak.

When we return to the cottage, my Uncle Galen is already there. He has visited us more often over the last few weeks. Now his broad shoulders slump forward, his shaved head and fiery red beard no longer a beacon of strength in the face of this. He shifts from the doorway as he sees us, clasps my father's arm for a moment and draws me into a brief embrace. His eyes brim with unshed tears. Aolu, prince of Dalriada and love of Galen's life, sits quietly in the dining room.

I lead my father into the bedroom where Master Grim lies, his long form shaking with each laboured breath. I am not sure that he is conscious until his mouth curves a little as my father sits beside him.

"My boy. My Otherworld boy." He coughs and gasps for air. "Will you sing for me?"

Tears trickle down my father's cheeks as he takes my grandfather's once-strong fingers in his hands. "What would you have me sing?"

Grandfather's eyes flicker in the direction of my grandmother, who sits on the end of the bed. "The Farewell." He reaches a hand toward her and she moves to lie on the bed beside him, her small form dwarfed by his.

But it is not my father who sings. The deep, strong voice of my Aunt Liobhan rings forth from the door of the cottage as she strides in, armed to the teeth and accompanied by her husband Dau.

Will you come with me wherever I go?

Will you stay by me in joy and in woe?

When the sun warms the hills, when the storm stirs the sea,

In shadow and light will you walk on with me?

She cannot have arrived so quickly without the help of an Otherworld portal or two, but our family are not strangers to such methods of travel. After a while, my father joins his voice with hers, a honeyed harmony that floats just below the melody, heartbreakingly beautiful.

The final verse is the hardest. Both my father and my aunt stumble over the words until they fall silent, overcome by tears that cannot be held back much longer.

I raise my voice instead.

I cannot come with you wherever you go.

And I cannot stay by you in joy and in woe,

But I'll be beside you, though gone from your sight,

I'll love you and guard you till we meet in the light.

Not even Dau's eyes are dry as I sing the final refrain and my grandfather's weary eyes fall closed. His chest heaves with one last shallow breath, and then he is still.

The silence is deafening.

A wise woman is trained to guide people into and out of life, delivering babes and nursing the dying. But my grandmother does not move. Transfixed by grief, she cannot perform these duties. It occurs to me that I am the wise woman here. With the quiet strength I have heard her use before, I say a prayer for my newly departed grandfather as a stray tear rolls down my cheek.

Gradually, each of us leave the bedroom until only my grandmother remains, small body curved around Grim's. This will be hard for her to let go.

In the workroom, Aunt Liobhan is preparing another brew, for those of us who stand around, unsure of what comes next after so deep a loss. Prince Aolu holds Uncle Galen as he sobs loudly, while my father looks like a ghost with his gaunt face and long robe. Liobhan's knife work is sloppier than usual, and I watch Dau take the blade from her hand, gently kiss her fingers, and set about chopping the ingredients himself.

Grandmother does not emerge for several hours, so we keep ourselves busy by cleaning the cottage, before sitting around the dining table to drink the brew.

Prince Aolu speaks first, "I will always remember Grim as the loving father who raised Galen into the wonderful man that he is, and as my father's trusted friend. I have known Grim my whole life, and he was always kind to me."

"He once doubted the existence of the Otherworld," my father's voice is heavy, "but through his love for our mother he came to learn of wondrous clurichauns and fey lords who believe in justice. When Conmael brought me here, Grim took me in as his own. I have never felt any less his child than Liobhan or Galen. His heart was so full of love."

Galen tries to speak, but only a gut-wrenching sound comes out as he attempts to suppress sobs.

"He was the best grandfather I could have asked for," I tell them. "Always gentle and patient, always ready to play with the toys he carved for me or to hear me sing whatever tune I had made up that day. I carry his strength with me."

"When I was a child, I wanted to be just like him." My Aunt Liobhan finds her words. "Everything he could do, I would do, whether it was gardening, chopping firewood, or thatching. He never held me back or told me that a girl should not do those things. I would not be the warrior I am today without him."

Finally, Dau. "Master Grim was the kind of father I wish I had when I was a boy."

I fall into my own father's open arms by the fire. We hold each other, nothing more to say. Aolu and Dau take charge, piecing together a meal from vegetables grown in the garden. Liobhan sits beside Galen, weapons discarded, and pulls out a block of wood and a whittling knife. Together they murmur about angles and the best way to shape a bird's beak. I squeeze my father's hand and take myself over to the corner of the room where his harp sits, the one he has taught me to play since I was small.

This is a new song, one that has been forming in my mind over the last few days, about endings and beginnings. It has no words yet, but I pick out the tune on the harp. Not tricky or technical, but raw with feeling. It is this sound that finally draws my grandmother from the bedroom.

My father puts an arm around her shoulder and finds his words, speaking to her softly. I continue playing the harp, and my grandmother comes to sit by the fire. She watches as a bird does indeed emerge from the block of wood that Liobhan and Galen pass between them.

We all gather around the dining table, bowls of vegetable stew set before us. This is the first meal in this house without my grandfather since before Uncle Galen was born. The enormity of that hangs over us as we eat in silence. Once the meal is finished and Prince Aolu clears away the bowls, my grandmother speaks.

"Thank you. This is exactly how he wanted to go, with all of you around him. Few of us get to choose how we spend our final moments, but I am glad Grim did." She glances around the table at each of us, and her eyes are red. "Who would have thought that two escaped prisoners would become parents and grandparents to such a wonderful group of people?"

Aunt Liobhan takes my grandmother's weathered hand. "You both are so much more than escaped prisoners."

Life at Winterfalls takes on a new rhythm. Now it is my father who chops firewood, and I who tend the garden.

King Oran and Queen Flidais themselves came to Dreamer's Wood for the memorial rite, as did many who live in the Winterfalls settlement. Grandfather was much loved and well respected, a hard worker with a big heart. I was surprised that Grandmother performed the ritual herself, but perhaps I should not have been. She and Aunt Liobhan both have that same inner strength.

Grim's children did not stay long. Aunt Liobhan and Dau returned to Swan Island the minute the funeral was over, as skilled warriors in high demand. Prince Aolu has a household to run, and Uncle Galen does not like to be far from his side, though he checks in on my grandmother regularly. But my father has not departed on any new mission in the Otherworld since the day I summoned him.

My grandmother continues her work, and I assist her more and more. She rarely strays far from the cottage, except to pick herbs, and I am the one called away to difficult childbeds, to blacksmiths with back pain, to mysterious coughs. I have been well trained, but I fear that Grandmother's reliance on me is more to do with her limited mobility than my own skills.

I carry this troubling thought with me into Dreamer's Wood, basket over my arm for any herbs I gather. Today I must go deep into the heart of the trees, to gather a herb which grows there and to find some stillness for myself. An added incentive is how close this herb is to the small druidic order newly established in Dreamer's Wood.

This forest often scares folk away with its eerie silence, but I find that it helps me to quiet my mind. Once I have walked a sufficient distance among the trees, I set down my basket and sit on a fallen branch. Crossing my legs and closing my eyes, I breathe deeply and slowly. I centre my mind on the stillness of this place and listen to the silence. I let it become part of me, slipping into my mind until there is no space for roiling thoughts. My thoughts are nothing and I am an empty void.

Who am I? Niamh of Winterfalls. A healer, a musician. A daughter and a granddaughter.

No. Who am I? I am one with the forest. The trees breathe out and I breath them in.

Good. Who am I? A motherless child become a woman. Forger of my own path.

Who am I? Niamh of Winterfalls. Niamh of the Otherworld. I tread a path between two worlds, like my father before me.

When I open my eyes, Biróg is here. She stands a few paces away, leaning against a tree. Her yellow hair is braided back from her face in the style of the druids, and she wears a long blue robe that brushes the earth as she steps toward me.

Despite my meditative state, a small smile creases my lips. "I thought I might find you if I came this way. In search of a very specific herb, of course. What brings you here?"

Biróg's eyes take on a mischievous glint. "I thought to consult the local wise woman on a matter of herblore, but it appears she has come to me."

"I am flattered. It is my grandmother who is the wise woman; I am only the apprentice."

"Shall I help you gather this herb?" Biróg asks, and I nod.

There is no explicit rule among this order of druids that novices cannot have friends outside of their studies, but what began as a chance meeting and an animated conversation has become something deeper than what feels strictly allowed. Biróg knows too many of my secrets, and she has danced the line of which tales are public knowledge and which only a druid should hear.

Luckily, there is plenty of this herb in bloom, though each of us is careful not to take too much, and to whisper words of thanks as we pick it. Soon my basket is nearly full, and we sit ourselves down on the branch again.

"I heard about your grandfather," she says. "It pained me not to be there for his funeral rite, but only one druid need go, and I was not chosen, novice as I am. How are you faring?"

I take a deep breath. "Grandmother is heartbroken, though she won't let it show. She keeps on with her work, and I help her. Father remains here and I expect he will for a while. She needs him, though neither of them will admit it."

"What about you?"

"I… I am here because I have not had time for myself to come to terms with his passing." I meet her clear blue eyes, which always seem to see right through any pretense. "I feel… untethered. Grandfather was such a grounding presence. I know I will manage without him, but I can feel the pull to flow downstream. Who am I, now that he is gone? How much has he shaped me?"

Biróg nods gravely. "Deep and worthy questions. Surely his influence on you does not end with his death. He continues to be part of your becoming."

"But who am I becoming?"

"Ah, here the current twists and turns. There are many ways this question could take you, but down which stream will you swim?"

I lay my head in my hands. "I wonder… how different I would be if I knew my mother."

Druid though she is, Biróg takes my hand. "That way lies danger but also discovery. You should ask your father."

"He does not like to speak of her. But he will, for me." I sit up straight in an attempt to shake this uneasy feeling. "Tell me, how are your studies? How many more forbidden stories do you know than me now?"

"At least a hundred." She releases my hand but allows herself a smirk. "What do you know about the dobhar-chú?"

"That my father has seen one and lived," I smirk back at her.

She raises her eyebrows a fraction, as much surprise as a druid is permitted. "Surely we must compare tales and decide whose is best. I'll start."