Firesong (21 page)

‘Slow down, sirs, slow down. Did I say I wouldn’t buy? I have to think of my reputation, that’s all. Would you have me the laughing stock of the market place? I can give you an excellent price, but’ – he lowered his voice – ‘you must swear to keep it to yourselves, or you’ll shame me before my own people. And good sirs’ – he dropped his voice to a whisper – ‘I wouldn’t have my wife know it, she does so love a hard bargain. Let’s say fifty crowns, and here’s my hand on it.’

‘Eighty,’ said Bowman.

‘Ah, youth is cruel. What does he care, sir? What does he know of married life? You have a married look, sir. You know how a man must keep his respect before his wife or he’s done for, and might as well live in the dog kennel and eat scraps. Sixty crowns.’

This with a sidelong glance at Bowman.

‘Eighty,’ said Bowman. ‘It’s a fair price.’

‘A fair price, but not a manly price. There’s nothing about fairness lets a man walk tall. Is there victory in fairness? Is there the envy of men and the love of women? No, sir, no. Fairness is for boys and bachelors. Seventy crowns.’

‘Eighty,’ said Bowman.

‘Eighty, then!’ cried the trader with real tears in his eyes. ‘Eighty crowns, and may the Morah rot your pockets. So take your money, and if you meet my wife, it’s eighteen, you hear me? Eighteen I gave you, and if you say more, I’m a ruined man. So I’ll send my boy for the wagon right away, shall I?’

Hanno and Bowman returned with the money, greatly amused. Scooch and Lunki undertook to go provisioning. The others unloaded the wagon and divided the goods into packs of varying sizes, to be carried on their backs over the mountains. The firewood was tied up in bundles, and the bundles were strung together to be hung over the horses’ flanks. Miko Mimilith and Tanner Amos set about constructing a litter in the shape of a long triangle, on which Ira Hath could be drawn up the mountain paths behind one of the horses.

The excitement of the market place infected the Manth people too, and as they huddled round their own fire they exchanged theories on what form the coming crisis would take. The talk of fire in the sky became confused in their minds with the Manth prophecy of the wind on fire, and shortly they began to predict that they would all be burned alive, quite possibly that very night. At this the little Marish girls burst into tears, and Ira Hath had to be called, to promise them they would wake unharmed in the morning.

Bowman and Kestrel stayed away from the main group, each for their own reasons. Kestrel had discovered that for all the chill of the night, the silver pendant she wore round her neck was warm, warmer than her own body. When she held it and pressed it to her chest, it hummed softly, and gave her feelings she didn’t know how to name. She tried to explain it to Bowman.

‘It’s like there’s something moving just behind me, but when I turn to look, I see nothing. Or I hear a sound, only when I listen, I can’t hear it any more.’

‘Like nothing’s happening, but something’s about to happen.’

‘Yes. Exactly that.’

‘Kess, I think he’s here.’

‘The one who’s coming for you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Can you feel him?’

‘Ever since I went with pa to sell the wagon. Like a touch on my shoulder.’

They reached out their hands and clasped them together, as if some outside force was threatening to part them. The press of palm to palm calmed them both.

‘I think maybe I have to go and look for him.’

‘No, Bo. Don’t.’ She gripped his hand very tight. ‘I don’t want everything to be over.’

As Kestrel said this, Bowman felt a sudden cold wash of memories splash over him, and knew they were her memories. Memories of the two of them in the days before they could speak or walk, sitting side by side on the kitchen floor in Aramanth, rocking at the same pace. Memories of being curled up in the same bed, smelling the same smells, dreaming the same dream. Memories of their first day in school, when they had held hands from the moment they went in to the moment they came out. Memories of the feel of a soft face on your own face, and not knowing where one ends and the other begins.

My other my self.

He jumped up, breaking the contact between them. So long as he was so close to Kestrel, he would never go, and he knew he must go. However much it hurt his sister, however much it hurt himself, this was what he was born to do.

‘I have to find him, Kess.’

Without waiting for an answer, he hurried away.

Late though it was, he found the market place still thronging with people, and bright with the lights of their lanterns and fires. The traders had mostly closed their stalls for the night, but in their place had come another sort of salesman, each of whom had taken a pitch standing on a box or a chair or a ladder, from which vantage point they shouted their wares to the crowd.

‘You, young man! Yes, you!’

The speaker pointed directly at Bowman.

‘Are you lost? Are you bewildered? Do you find you can’t make sense of half the things people say to you?’

Bowman paused, wondering for a fleeting moment if this could be a coded message addressed to him.

‘Rejoice!’ cried the preacher, encouraged. ‘The day of the stupid people is coming! The stupid will inherit the earth!’

Bowman moved on, and so fell into the ambit of another speaker, who also attempted to engage his attention.

‘Love! Love! The joys of love!’ boomed this second preacher, pointing directly at Bowman. ‘You who walk alone! I know you, sir! You are a man in want of a woman! In that tent are women in want of men! You need never be alone again! The end times are coming, sell all you have, and fill your final days with the joys of love!’

Bowman looked round at the jostling foolish crowds, and decided that the one who was coming for him would not wait for him here. So he left the market place and made for the riverside beyond the village, and walked along it in quietness and solitude. The river was broad and fast-moving, its dark waters eddying round mooring posts, setting tethered boats banging against each other. A moon had risen in the sky, and by its light he could see the line of mountain peaks, high above. It would be a hard climb, but not too long a climb, he calculated; only, he would not be taking part. All this crying about the last days had made him all the surer that soon now he would join the Singer people, and complete his own journey.

Let them live in the stillness and know the flame. They will lose all and give all.

He turned back to retrace his steps. There, approaching him along the river path, between him and the flickering fires of the village, he saw a figure in a hooded robe. Bowman’s heart suddenly began to beat fast.

He directed his steps so they would meet. He could see nothing of the stranger’s face, because the light of the fires and the light of the moon were alike shining from behind. He stopped when they were close, and the stranger came to him.

‘Eighty crowns!’ shrieked a shrill woman’s voice he had heard before. ‘Robbery! I won’t stand for it!’

Bowman was too surprised to respond. The woman shook back her hood to reveal her furious face.

‘No use looking round! There’s no one here but you and me, and I’m here for my money. I knew my man was a fool, but I never knew he was that big a fool.’

By now, Bowman had grasped that this was the wife of the wagon dealer. She was holding out one hand in a menacing way.

‘Take your pox-stained wagon, and give me back my eighty crowns, or I’ll set the dogs on you. Eighty crowns! Am I your mother?’

‘I don’t have the money,’ said Bowman. ‘And it was a fair price.’

He set off back across the village towards the place where the Manth people were camped. He felt angry and cheated. He had come looking for his destiny, not for some petty quarrel over money. The woman followed him, shrieking.

‘Thief! Give me my money back!’

‘Go home, woman! You’ll make your profit.’

‘We’ll see who makes a profit!’

She put her fingers in her mouth and let out a shrill whistle. Distracted by her whistle, Bowman almost bumped into a little round-faced person, coming the other way.

‘I’m so sorry,’ said Bowman, stepping to one side.

Suddenly two very large dogs came hurtling across the snow, heading straight for him.

‘Get him, Slasher! Bite him, Ripper!’ screamed the woman. ‘Thief! Thief!’

Bowman came to a dead stop, concentrated all the powers of his mind, and prepared to withstand the dogs’ attack. Their fangs were showing as they raced towards him, and they were snarling low vicious snarls. But all at once, they turned aside. They trotted over to the little round person, and lay on their backs, panting, and he tickled their tummies.

The trader’s wife was apoplectic.

‘Slasher! Ripper!’

The dogs wriggled on the ground, their jaws lolling open in happy grins. Bowman looked with rather more attention at the unlikely figure patting the dogs.

‘Who are you?’

‘Who would you like me to be?’ he replied.

The trader’s wife came stamping over to her dogs and kicked and beat them to their feet.

‘Up, Slasher! Up, Ripper!’ She shrieked at the round person. ‘What have you done to them? You – you – thing!’

In answer, he looked up and met her eyes. Somehow, without anything seeming to change, he became older. In a deep gentle voice, he said,

‘Lady, what do you want with me?’

‘Oh – oh,’ croaked the trader’s wife, trembling and blushing.

‘Be calm. Be still. Be content.’

He put out one hand and touched her cheek. Then he turned back to Bowman and said in his more usual light high voice, ‘Shall we go?’

The trader’s wife had fallen completely silent, her eyes fixed on the strange figure who had touched her cheek. Bowman for his part realised now that this small, soft creature must be the messenger for whom he had been waiting.

‘The Singer people sent you to find me?’

‘Of course.’

‘Are we to go tonight?’

‘We’re to go now. We have very little time.’

‘May I say goodbye to my people?’

‘Of course. Then we must go.’ He added softly to himself, ‘Bounce on, Jumper.’

Bowman and Jumper walked back to the Manth camp in silence. Bowman’s mind was racing with a confusion of thoughts. The moment had come, but without grandeur or certainty. This messenger who hopped along beside him had no aura of power, no dignity. Even Dogface the one-eyed hermit had inspired more respect. This little creature’s voice slithered, so that one moment he sounded like a boy, the next like a girl.

As they reached the encampment, Bowman said to Jumper,

‘Wait here. I’ll be with you soon.’

The truth was, he was ashamed of Jumper. Now at this heart-wrenching moment, when he was to bid farewell to all who loved him, he did not want a small round-faced man-woman making his departure look ludicrous.

Jumper stopped obediently, and waited in the shadows. Bowman went on to the group beneath the dark trees, where his mother was sitting. His father was here, and both his sisters.

He knelt by his mother’s side. She looked up, and saw his intention clearly in his face.

‘So it has come then, my Bo.’

‘It’s come,’ he said.

‘They wait for you?’

‘Yes.’

She nodded, unsurprised. Pinto started to cry.

‘Don’t leave us, Bo. Let them take someone else.’

Bowman kissed her and whispered to her,

‘You have to look after ma and pa. You have to be strong. Don’t cry.’

So Pinto tried her best to stop crying. She hugged him very tight.

‘You’ll come back to us again, won’t you? I’ll see you again?’

‘I don’t know,’ he said gently. ‘The thing I have to do may take a long time.’

‘You’ve always been there, Bo. You have to always be there.’

‘Love Pinpin.’

‘Love Bo.’

They hugged the way they used to when she was little, and for once she didn’t mind that he used her baby name. Then he let her go, and she went into Hanno’s waiting arms.

Bowman knelt before his father and kissed his cheek.

‘You understand, pa.’

Hanno stroked Pinto and looked at Bowman with a sad smile.

‘Yes. I understand.’

Bowman saw Kestrel watching him, her eyes burning. He would say goodbye to her last of all.

He kissed his mother, feeling how thin she had become.

‘I may never –’

‘Yes, yes,’ she cut in, impatient. ‘We do what we have to do. Time for you to go, so go.’

It was a flash of the old Ira Hath, who had shouted at laughing crowds, ‘O unhappy people!’ He hugged her, grateful for her brisk spirit.

‘Goodbye, ma.’

She smiled for him again, and he knew she was proud of him. He rose, and sought out Mumpo. An awkward silence was settling over the marchers, as they realised a solemn moment of parting was upon them.

‘Dear friend. We’ve been through hard times together.’

‘Let me come with you, Bo. I’m much stronger now.’

‘That’s why you must stay. Be a son to my parents, a brother to my sisters. Look after them for me.’

‘For as long as I live.’

They embraced, and Bowman turned at last, with a heavy heart, to find Kestrel. This was one farewell he did not know how to make. She had taken herself off to the river’s edge.

‘Kess –’

‘No! Don’t say it!’ She turned and flung the words at him, in a fury of passionate feeling. ‘I don’t want your goodbyes! I won’t listen!’

‘But Kess –’

‘Where is this Singer who’s come for you? Take me to him!’

‘But Kess –’

‘If you go, I go too!’

‘You don’t understand. Where I’m going – what I have to do – Kess, there’s no coming back.’

‘Where is he?’

Her sharp eyes now discerned Jumper, standing waiting quietly where Bowman had left him. She ran to him. Bowman followed.

‘Is it you?’ Kestrel demanded of Jumper, looking him up and down. ‘Have you come from the Singer people?’

‘Yes,’ said Jumper.

‘Well, look at this!’

She pulled out the silver voice that she had rescued from the wind singer, that had hung on a string round her neck ever since.

‘Feel it! Feel its warmth! That’s more than my warmth! That’s more than the heat of my body!’