Children of the Gates (13 page)

What he could do then, Nick had no idea. He did believe that the Herald spoke the truth when warning of danger ahead. His own experience with the drifters and their monsters, real or illusionary, as well as the threat of the saucer people, argued in favor of investigating more closely Avalon and its advantages. Safety, it seemed to Nick, was what they must seek. He had no faith at all in their plan to head downriver. They did not even have weapons to match those of the medieval group that had captured him. Slingshots against swords!

“I believe you, Nicholas.”

He almost started. That pause before Hadlett’s answer had been so prolonged Nick had come to expect the worst.

“Also I believe that what you have learned during your various encounters may be of future service to us all,” the Vicar continued. “I think we shall have to make the best of this shelter until morning, but the sooner we return to the cave and discuss your findings, the better.”

Crocker muttered something in too low a whisper for Nick to catch, even close wedged as they were. But he was sure that the pilot was not in the least convinced. Nick was, however, cheered. If he could depend upon the Vicar’s support he was assured of a hearing.

Outside, the storm was impressive, with an armament of lightning, deafening rolls of thunder, and a curtain of rain. They were damp, but the main pelting of the downpour did not reach them.

Nick wondered about the Herald and his followers, were they now riding the sky through this natural fury? And the saucer people, how did storms affect their flyers? The cave would be dry, and certainly the city a good shelter. The city—

His old half-plan of using the Herald to win a way into the city and learn its secrets without surrendering to the terms of Avalon—Could it be done? He was far from sure, but he longed to try.

And the terms of Avalon— The Herald had saved him in the forest, not by any direct aid, but by stimulating him to save himself. Nick thought about that feat of concentration, and his hand went once more to his belt to finger the hilt of the dagger he had drawn to his aid in such incredible fashion. If one could accomplish that by concentrating—what else might one do?

Hadlett said that his late captors had produced their own hellish monsters to harass them because they expected to see such. Therefore your thoughts had reality beyond your own mind. Those had expected Hell and its inhabitants, so that was what they had to endure and fear. In mankind was the belief in evil stronger that the belief in good, as the Vicar had also said?

If one concentrated just as strongly on believing in paradise here, would that be true? And would it hold? Nick remembered the intense weariness that had closed in on him after he had fought for his freedom. The mind could demand too much from the body. To sustain any illusion for a length of time might exhaust one utterly.

The monsters, Nick decided now, must have been unconscious projection on the part of the drifters. Perhaps, if you continued to expect to see the same thing, you added reality to it, more substance every time it materialized. Would it then sometime become wholly real? That was both a startling and an unpleasant thought. What he had seen in that night of horror must not obtain real life!

Real, unreal, good, evil—The little man he had encountered in the berry patch, the visible-invisible castle, Avalon himself—real, unreal? How did one ever
know?

Nick longed to throw some of these questions at the Vicar. But not with Crocker listening. He would only provide the pilot with more evidence that he was a dangerously unstable person—someone who, whether he had had treasonous dealings with Avalon or not, was better exiled from their company.

Though the great fury of the storm ebbed, the rain continued to fall. Nick and his companions, in spite of their cramped position, dozed away the night until a watery, gray daylight drew them forth. Crocker took the lead, saying little, guiding them on a roundabout way, keeping out of the full embrace of the woods.

Nick wondered if the castle was still visible, but he had no excuse to linger to see. He must remain prudently quiet on such matters pertaining to the People until he was sure he was no longer suspect. If Hadlett had time to think things over he might be brought to consider invasion of the city—

Nick was not prepared to bring the women into any council, though he knew that all three of the English party would have a voice in any decision. To Nick, Margo’s influence on his father had been a brutal shock. She had set up barriers one by one so skillfully that it had been months before Nick was able to realize what had happened. When he knew, it was too late to do anything. Dad was gone, there was a stranger, friendly enough, but still a stranger who spoke with his voice, wore his body— Just as if Margo had manufactured an illusion to serve her purpose. That stranger made an effort now and then. Nick could look back at this moment and understand those advances, tentative and awkward as they had been. But they had meant nothing, because Margo’s illusion made them.

And losing Dad, Nick had sealed off those emotions that had once been a part of him. Sure, he had gone out with girls, but none of them had meant anything. There was always the memory of Margo, of her maneuvering, her skill with Dad, to hold as a shield. Linda was a part of the world in which Margo existed. She, too, was able perhaps to twist someone into what she wanted instead of freely accepting him for what he was.

So Nick wanted now to argue out any decision, not with the women, but with the men whom he believed he could understand. And perhaps in the end he would find more acceptance, he thought wryly, from Jeremiah and Lung. Were animals more straightforward, less devious than men?

They reached the cave as clouds were once more massing, threatening a second downpour. Lady Diana manned the lookout.

“I see you found him. You don’t look too damaged to me, young man.” Her voice was far from welcoming.

“Did you expect I might be?” Nick could not resist countering. He had respect for her sturdy abilities, but he could not honestly like her.

“The thought occurred to us, yes. Adrian, you are soaked. You must have a hot drink, shed those shoes of yours at once. Luckily Maude has just finished stitching up a new pair. Linda,” she called down into the cave. “Come here, girl. They’re back safe, and they have your boy!”

Nick stiffened. He was not Linda’s boy! What claim had she made on him to these others? But when she did appear in Lady Diana’s place, Lady Diana herself laying hands on the Vicar to urge him on into shelter, Linda did not look directly at Nick, nor did she speak to him.

He let Crocker pass him, wanting to say something in denial of any claim she had advanced. That this was perhaps not the time or the place for that, Nick was uneasily aware, yet he was pressed to do it.

“You’re not hurt?” Her voice was cool, he might have been an acquaintance about whom she was inquiring for politeness’ sake.

“No.” His wrists were still ridged and sore but one could not claim those as real hurts.

“You were lucky,” she observed, still remote.

“I suppose so.” He might not be hurt, but he had certainly brought back problems that might cause more trouble than physical wounds.

“You know what they think.” A light nod of her head clarified who “they” might be. “They believe that you may have made a deal with this Herald. You sneaked out—without telling anyone—after you were warned. And you seem to know things—”

“Know things?”

“What you said about Jeremiah and Lung.”

“You told them that?” He had been right in not trusting her.

“Naturally. When they started to wonder what had become of you. Believe it or not, they were concerned. They are good people.”

“You are trying to warn me, aren’t you?” he asked.

“To let them alone! If you’ve made some deal, live with it. Don’t involve them.”

“Thanks for the advice and the vote of confidence!” Nick exploded and swung down into the entrance of the cave. But why had he expected any other response? This was a typical Margo trick, one he had met many times in the past. He had been put in the wrong before his case had even been heard.

13

But they did not cross-question him at once. Hadlett was the center of attention, concern for him blotting out all else, though Jean brought Nick a bowl of hot soup, which he ate greedily. She, of course, made more of a fuss over Crocker, though Nick believed she tried to make those attentions not too obvious.

Nick was back safely, something he would have given much to achieve last night, or earlier yesterday. Now—he did not know. Though the others were within touching distance if he wished, he felt curiously detached.

But he had made no bargain. Unless—unless in following the Herald’s hint he had somehow crossed a line between the old life and a new. Nick put down the empty bowl, studied his hands as they rested on his knees.

They were scratched, dirty, stained with berry juice. The rest of him was probably in keeping. But he was human still and not a creature of the People.

He was still hungry. But knowing the state of their supplies, Nick did not ask for more. As he leaned over to pick up the bowl again, he saw Jeremiah. The cat had appeared out of nowhere after the fashion of felines, and sat watching Nick with probing intentness that could disconcert a human at times.

Nick stared back. There was some reason for the cat’s singling him out, he guessed. What did Jeremiah want of him? If the cat could communicate, he was not trying now. Nick disliked that cool stare, but he refused to let it ruffle him.

“How much, Jeremiah,” he asked in a whisper, “do you really know?”

On Nick’s knee, beside his hand, there was a shimmer as if the air took on substance in a small whirlpool of energy. It thickened, held so for a moment, then vanished. But it had been there, and Nick knew he had in that moment seen a mouse.

Jeremiah! The cat could somehow use the same energy that Nick had tapped to free himself in the woods to materialize a representation of his most common prey. He was astounded. That an animal could—

Answering his astonishment came a cold thrust of near anger. Jeremiah’s ears were flattened to his head, his eyes slitted.

“Animal? Who is an animal?”

The words did not form as such in Nick’s mind, but some impulse brought them to the surface there. Indeed—who was an animal? In this place where all the old certainties had been swept away, could anyone make claims that could not be overturned?

Another idea came to him. Could—could Jeremiah’s species (Nick tried to avoid “animal” and after all humans were animals, too) accept the Herald’s terms? Was Jeremiah now a part of Avalon even though he stayed with Mrs. Clapp and the others?

Once more that swirl of air that was not air, the swift formation and disappearance of an object Nick had only an instant to sight—an apple! Then Jeremiah was—What? A spy?

Nick dismissed that at once. A guard? Against them? For them?

Jeremiah yawned, arose, and, with a flirt of his tail tip, which was firm dismissal of the whole subject, he stalked off.

“Now then.” Mrs. Clapp came away from where she had settled Hadlett by the fire, his feet rubbed dry and newly fashioned moccasins on them. She stood over Nick, one of the handleless clay cups in her hand. An aromatic steam arose from it. “You drink this up! It’ll roast the chill out. We want no lung fever hittin’.”

She stood over him, in fact between him and the rest who were gathered about the Vicar, while he drank. And he found her gaze as searching as Jeremiah’s had been. Did she know what her cat now was?

“You’re a lucky lad, that indeed you are. With himself an’ Barry out to hunt you.”

Her voice was sharper than Nick had heard it before. He understood that, in her eyes, his late adventure was a disgrace, mainly because it had involved trouble for the Vicar.

“I know.” Nick tried to be meek.

“Knowin’ afterward is not doin’t beforehand. I’m takin’ it on me to say this—we’ve stayed together now for long an’ we’ve managed. Because we think about how what we do is for all of us, not just for one. In this place you can set a foot wrong an’ stir up trouble fast.” The longer she spoke the softer her voice became. “There now, I’ve had my say. You’ll hear it from the others without doubt, but they have a right to such sayin’—they knowin’ all that’s around us here. You—What in the wide world were you doin’ to get that now?”

Her hand caught his, dragging it forward to bring his ridged, raw wrist into the full light.

“Oh, that happened when they tied me up.” Nick tried to free himself from her hold, but she kept the grip with surprising strength.

“Raw that is—an’ you could get a nasty infection. The other one is as bad too. You stay right here ’til I get some o’ my heal powder.”

Nick knew it was futile to protest. He waited and she was quickly back with two large leaves on which was spread a greasy salve.

“Should have us some bandages, but we ain’t got ’em. These leaves work good though. Now hold up your hand, lad—that’s the way.”

She was quick and deft, and Nick soon had two green cuffs about his maltreated wrists. It was not until she had finished he remembered his own first-aid kit in the saddlebags. But already the stuff she had smeared over his abraded skin was drawing out the sting, and he was content with her treatment.

“Now.” Mrs. Clapp tied strings of tough grass tightly enough to keep the wristlets in place. “You keep those on today an’ tonight. Then I’ll have another look at ’em. Should be as good as healed. Those there herbs worked into fat, they’ve got a lot of good in ’em.”

She did not go away, but stood there, her supplies in her hands. There was no sternness in her expression now, rather a concern that made Nick more uncomfortable than her scolding had done.

“You’ve had a bad time—”

He summoned a smile. “You might say I deserved it.”

“Nobody deserves bad, ’less they give it. To my mind you’re not one of those who do. But you’re young, you don’t want to believe what you hear ’til you try it out for yourself—”

“And,” he interrupted, “in that trying I might hurt more than myself next time?”

“That I said an’ meant it.” Mrs. Clapp nodded. “But I’m thinkin’ you’re not a stupid lad. You don’t need no second lesson once the first has been swallowed down.”

“I hope, Mrs. Clapp, that I shall deserve that confidence.”

“Maude!” Lady Diana called, and his nurse hurried back to the group about the Vicar.

Nick sat down once more, his leaf-enfolded wrists before him. They thought that they were safe here, perhaps they were. But with their supplies dwindling they might be forced out. And he had no faith at all in the river plan. He had not seen Stroud since their return and wondered if the Warden still skulked about the site of their raft.

Stroud did not return until evening. And it was with news to dash their faint hope of making use of the river. The land was alive with bands of drifters and the sky with saucers whose crews preyed upon those in the open. The Warden had witnessed the sweeping up of two such parties, one being a squad of men wearing British uniforms of World War I vintage.

“Couldn’t see their badges,” he reported between mouthfuls of the nut-flour cakes Mrs. Clapp had ready for him. “But I remember m’ Dad had him an outfit like that. Just a nipper I was when he had embark-leave the last time. Off to Turkey for the fightin’, he was, an’ reported missin’ in action. We never had no more news of him, though Mum, she up an’ tried to get some word hard enough. They kept tellin’ her after the war was over the Turks’d have to let their prisoners loose. Only after the war was over an’ they did—m’ Dad weren’t one as they had any record of. Lot o’ poor chaps never did get found.

“But I remember how m’ Dad looked—an’ these chaps those saucer tykes netted, they were wearin’ the same sort o’ gear, that I’ll swear to! Could I have gotten close to ’em maybe we might’ve had a chance to get together.” He shook his head.

“This migration and hunting has taken on unusual proportions,” the Vicar observed. “Are the saucer people trying to make a clean sweep of the whole country?”

“Well,” Stroud had finished eating, “there’s that, of course. But I don’t altogether think that’s the right of it, Vicar. We’ve had hunts before, but not like this. It seems to me it’s more like somethin’ else started all these drifters on the move, something up north. They’re comin’ down from that direction an’ they’re not movin’ slow at all, but pretty steady—like something was pressin’ on their tails.

“Anyway, we’d best stay in cover, do we want to stay free. The saucers are takin’ good advantage of all this movin’. To get out on the river in plain sight is as good as askin’ to be caught.”

“Nicholas.” The Vicar summoned the American. “What did Avalon say when he warned you? Remember his exact words if you can.”

Nick closed his eyes for a moment, summoning memory to provide him with the words Hadlett wanted to hear. He could see Avalon vividly. Now it was as if he could hear the Herald’s emotionless voice so that he need only repeat word for word what the other had said.

“Avalon is no man’s enemy. It is a place of peace and safety. But if one remains without, then comes darkness and ill. This has happened before, the evil lapping at the land. Where it meets Avalon and Tara, Brocéliande and Carnac, then it laps against walls it cannot overflow. But for those without the walls there is peril beyond reckoning. Alternately the evil flows and ebbs. This is a time of the beginning of the flow.”

“Avalon?” Stroud repeated.

“The Herald.” Crocker spoke up and there was silence. Nick knew they looked at him now, but he met no eyes save Hadlett’s.

If the others accused him, and he thought that they did, that was not to be read in the Vicar’s expression.

Stroud got to his feet and moved in until his weather-tanned face was not far from Nick’s.

“You had words with the Herald now, did you?” To the Warden that fact must be of major importance.

“Yes,” Nick replied shortly, adding no explanation.

“You was pally enough to have him give you a warnin’?” Stroud continued. All Crocker’s disbelief was intensified in that red-brown face. The vast moustache bristled with antagonism.

“If you mean, did I accept his offer of safety,” Nick returned, “I did not. However, he saved my life.”

“That’s not the way you told it before,” Crocker cut in. “You got away by yourself—in a way that took some doing, too.”

“He pointed the way.” Nick kept the lid on his temper, but the irritation Crocker could ignite in him threatened his control. “If he had not—”

“It is all a very likely tale,” Crocker snapped. “Let them listen to it—all of it—now. And see what they think of it!”

Hadlett nodded. “Tell them, Nicholas, from the beginning.”

With the Vicar and Crocker listening, Nick could not alter his story, even if he wanted to. Which now he did not, that stubborn streak in him making sure that they must hear it as it happened and then believe or reject him.

Once more he told his adventure in detail from his first sight of Avalon to the meeting with Crocker and the Vicar. He had no more interruptions, but their full attention. As he finished, he waited for the voicing of disbelief, suspicion, complete rejection.

“You—you just thought—and you got that knife?” Stroud opened the examination.

Nick pulled the blade in question from his belt. He had already passed over to Hadlett and Crocker the other weapons dropped when the medieval band went to their unknown fate.

“I have this.”

Stroud snatched it from him, studied it carefully, and then threw it to clatter on the rock floor some distance away.

“There’s your miracle knife,” he said. “Now let’s see you get it back by thinkin’!”

A fair enough test, Nick gave him that. He turned to face the blade. Now he tried to set out of his mind everything but his need for the knife. He must have it—How had he done it before? A hand—a hand to take it up—and then an arm—

Nick concentrated on the need for the hand. But, though his mind ached under the lash of his will, nothing formed in the air. No mist thickened to put forth fingers closing about the hilt. He fought to produce that hand, but it did not come. There was something here that had not been in the clearing, a barrier against which his will fruitlessly beat.

“I can’t do it.” How long he had struggled he did not know. But something here short-circuited all his efforts. “It won’t work this time.”

“Because”—there was triumph in Crocker’s voice—“it never did! That story was a lie from the start, I knew it!”

A hand grabbed Nick’s shoulder with force enough to hurt and swing him around before he could fight back. Then Stroud’s face thrust very close to his.

“You sold out to the Herald! Then you came back to get us. Not openly the way Rita did—you crawlin’ worm!”

Nick tried to dodge the blow. His effort was enough so that Stroud did not knock him out, but sent him reeling, half-dazed—to bring up against the wall. He was dizzy from the force of the punch, only half-aware that Hadlett had stepped between them.

“Sam!” The Vicar’s tone was a command, which the Warden answered with a growl. But he did not try to push past to be at his victim again.

“He sold out, came back to get us,” Stroud said thickly. “You know that, Vicar.”

“You are prejudging, Sam. All of you.” Hadlett spoke not only to the Warden, but to the others who had moved in as if they were ready to join Stroud in whatever vengeance he proposed to take, their faces—ugly. Fear came to life in Nick. He had heard of the hysteria that gripped mobs. Was this the same horror?

“Listen to me carefully, all of you,” Hadlett continued. “This is of the upmost importance—not just to Nicholas and to you because you propose to mete out what you conceive to be justice, but because it may also determine our future.”

He was answered by a sound, not quite words of protest, but certainly expressing that. But they no longer moved forward, and Stroud dropped his ready fist to his side. Now the Vicar half-turned to address Nick.

“When you brought the knife to your aid you were alone?”

“As—as far as I know.” Nick tried to control his voice to steadiness.

“There was no counter power of disbelief there,” Hadlett commented. “But when you tried just now—what did you experience?”