Graynelore (19 page)

‘This is all very well and good. But we still have a problem,’ said Wily Cockatrice. ‘A Ring of Eight…A Ring…of Eight…Our numbers still do not add up.’ The ancient crone was walking her fingers playfully through the air, as a young babbie might have done. ‘I hesitate to say this, only I will say it all the same…There is
one
other path we could choose to take, if
some
among us were but willing to step upon it.’ She gave Norda, and then I, a very odd, calculating look. It was an expression I could not interpret. ‘A Ring…of Eight…’ she repeated, slowly.

We all knew the detail. It was clear enough. It needed no debate.

‘I can see no fresh path?’ I said, curious of her meaning.

Wily Cockatrice ignored my comment, to ask an unusual question of her own. ‘Among our gathered company, we are both young and old, yet is our age of any consequence to us?’

‘No. I suppose not,’ I said. ‘We are all equally weary of this trail. Yet we all still have our beating hearts!’ I shifted uncomfortably, uncertain of where this conversation was leading us. ‘I do not see your point?’

‘Well, Rogrig, for the sake of our argument, would you think that an infant might suffice to finally complete our gathering?’

‘Look around you,’ I said, suddenly perplexed. ‘With respect, I see only old age and foolish youth. I see only us seven! There is no infant here! Nor is there any expectant mother about to whelp a fey pup!’

Wily Cockatrice’s odd expression did not change at my outburst, unless it intensified. She looked again, directly at me, and then directly at Norda Elfwych.

Of all things, I felt myself redden, as if in embarrassment; something I had not done since a babbie, caught by my mother with a hand inside the wrong purse.

I had been slow to catch on, but I saw her meaning at last, and I saw the implication of it…So too did my greater company; the gigant, and the elder-man, and Dogsbeard. Even my Lowly Crows…They were, all of them, suddenly shy of Norda and I, casting their eyes upon the ground, unwilling to face us.

Had we been brought to this? I wanted another way. I wanted the shadows to tell me what to do. Inside my head a host of vague ghost-voices murmured together. Each voice added a single extra note to their song, and yet it was always a perfect harmony, even as a new voice joined in and made it perfect again. But their murmuring song was only an echo from a far distant past. It gave me no answers I was willing to take. I tried to listen, instead, to a new voice among them. But it was a weak, hollow note; a desperate cry from the gigant added to the general noise. The only true sound was coming from another place entirely. And it was not fey at all, but the distant clatter of hooves: horses coming at a gallop. Gaining ground and upon all sides. If the faerie in me sensed the approach, so too did the instincts of the man.

I let it go, for the matter in hand.

‘I have no such desire for this woman!’ I said, flatly, turning physically upon Wily Cockatrice. ‘If this is your true meaning? She…She is an Elfwych! My constant enemy! She…We…We are allied to this task before us. Nothing more!’

Wily Cockatrice stood her ground, refusing to listen to my protestation. While Norda Elfwych looked blankly on, both outwardly and inwardly silent; unwilling, as yet, to partake of the argument.

‘What? I think the man protests just a little too loudly!’ said the crone. ‘Upon Graynelore! Am I to believe this fighting man has – how might I put this? – never used his
sword
upon a Riding to his own advantage?’ She paused. ‘Do the cocks not crow, then?’

‘Eh? But this is ludicrous, distasteful – both! And why lay this upon me…upon us?’ I turned to Norda. ‘I mean you no discourtesy, only…you have seen enough pain, and your strength fails. You are little better than a weedling. I would not dishonour—’

‘What then?’ exclaimed Wily Cockatrice, cutting through my words. ‘I
see
…I see no other likely match. The bird does not lie down with the man. Or would you leave such an arduous, unwelcoming, task to this youth here, or perhaps, to this old man? I fear the one has not yet acquired what the other has already lost.’

Both Wood-shanks and Dogsbeard took a deliberate step away from us, ignoring the crone’s slight, neither of them wanting to be drawn into the debate. Licentious too, turned aside, would not look upon us. He only rubbed his great hand upon his worried head, as if to soothe away his discomfort. (Certainly, he was not named for the man!)

‘And am I to have no say in this matter?’ said Norda Elfwych, suddenly indignant. Though her voice was a thin trail of words, and she was, obviously, already at something of a loss. ‘Are we simple cattle then? Am I to be mounted like a common fell beast? I have done with whoring for the will of men!’

‘I do understand this is something of an unusual request,’ said Wily Cockatrice, almost contrite. ‘But am I to take it that neither of you is willing? Is that it? Is the idea so abhorrent? Do you both refuse?’

We gave her no answer (unless it was a look of disdain).

‘What have we here?’ It was Lowly Crows who now chose to speak. ‘Surely, this is not a matter of virtue? This does not require your love…not even a blood-tie. Rather, it is something quite different. Indeed, it is a great deal more: a fey match. No common thing! And, I fear, it is a question of our very survival.’

‘What then…a means to an end?’ I asked, angrily. ‘Is there no
other
way?’

‘There is always another way, Rogrig,’ said Lowly Crows. ‘We have waited, patiently, this long…we could always wait a little longer. Does time not take care of everything in the end? Another of our kind
might
just find us out…’

The implication was clear enough.

I took a brief moment to study the big man. It was I who had brought the gigant to us. Wished him to that very spot! And done it badly! Even now, he was party to our company only because of that piece of…of whimsy…that bound him to it. I could see it still, in the faerie-touched man. He might yet remain among us of his own accord. The shadow voices, that faerie cord that tied us all together, hung thickly about us now, but…(Aye! And was this faerie tale ever hanging by a,
but
…)

‘Time? Time moves on, is all,’ I said at last. ‘Men must take care of themselves.’ I fear I was being tricked into losing my own argument. All Graynelore was up in arms. We had been truly fortunate, but could not avoid trouble forever. It was only a question of who would find us out first.

Out of the shade, I heard again the clatter of distant hooves.

‘We are so close now,’ added Wily Cockatrice. ‘And we are none of us immortal beasts! Surely we must, at least, try. Or it may all yet come to nothing.’

‘Life and death, Rogrig…it is a matter of life and death,’ said Lowly Crows. ‘The man goes to war so very easily. How often do you steal the very fruit we are after gathering? Is this such a ponderous task; is it so difficult? What do you say?’

‘I say—’ I stopped myself. There were so many reasons, and yet so few. I wanted to find a better way of explaining myself, when there was none. The image of Notyet came briefly to my mind. I only shut it out. (How often I shut it out!) What more could be said?

Norda Elfwych inclined her head towards me. She regarded me, briefly, through narrowed – almost closed – eyes. She did not speak. There was only her shadow-tongue. It spoke quietly to me, said only this:

I, truly, do not want you, Wishard…

And I do not want you, Elfwych
…
I returned.

At least we both agreed upon something.

There was no more to it. There was no note of ascent. Norda Elfwych stood up and quietly walked out of our company.

I followed after her.

Even now I recall the event to mind reluctantly, and recount it publicly when I would remain silent, only because I fear I must – for want of the truth of my tale and not some poor confection.

We…came upon each other, not as lovers, rather as adversaries or, at best, participants. The place was a deeply shaded vale, chosen so that we might not fully reveal ourselves. She turned me over or I turned her. It matters not which. We brought each other down. The one, pursuer; the other pursued. We fell together, hitting the ground hard enough to bruise our skins. Fingers grasped, then – pawed awkwardly at breeches. I felt myself clumsily manhandled. She lifted her loose skirt, set her cloth aside. She drew herself down upon me and I encouraged it. Only like an animal covering another animal. The best ewe put to the ram. A physical act committed, not desired. Neither stolen but taken all the same. Demanded and given in turn without affection or lust. There was no pleasure taken in that rut.

Perhaps our indifference shocked us both?

We each drew apart as quickly as we had mounted, took up our iron weapons as if we might kill each other, still strangers and enemies.

‘And if…if it should not…take?’ I hardly dared look upon her. She was become so sorely effete. I stared upon the ground, stumbled over the question I would not have asked.

‘
Take?
Spare yourself your blushes, Wishard,’ she said, without effect. ‘We are fey; a fey match. It already takes…Would you know him, would you know
our
son? Would you feel the babbie’s heart?’

I started. ‘How strange the ways of faerie,’ I said.

‘How
cruel
,’ she said.

The cold air felt only colder for her answer.

We held ourselves where we stood a good while, neither of us willing to console the other, or be the first to turn away.

When, finally, we parted, returned separately to our greater company, it was without another word or comfort. I truly wish it were otherwise. And at this poor ending did I feel
nothing
for this Elfwych, nothing at all? If I did not, I should have done. If only the man’s guilt – I was already trying to bury the memory of what had taken place between us.

Something within our company changed from the moment we all came together again. We each of us felt it. A kind of drawing together…It was a physical thing. A sense of near completion? Perhaps that, perhaps more…It was a quickening. A quickening: of thought, of mind, and of body too. And as the beating heart of the unborn infant grew ever stronger within Norda’s swelling belly, as is the way of faerie, we all sensed the wonder of it. (I needed no reminder of the man’s guilt…that ever brought Notyet to mind.) We also sensed the overwhelming danger. And we understood that the world outside of ourselves was closing in around us because of it. Graynelore was aware of us, and what we had become, and would surely come to destroy us all if it could.

The air was alive. My skin pricked with the frisson of it. Inside my head the shadow-tongues were speaking. Altogether, all at once, in the same moment and yet each one was as clear as if it had spoken alone. More: I suddenly knew what they were trying to tell me, whatever the language, ancient or newly made.

And behind us, rising above the fell, standing far above the horizon, its foothills lost behind a screen of standing mists, was the black-headed mountain: Earthrise. She was calling to us with her own voice: a series of deep, sonorous, and majestic notes. And the ghost-voices, the ageless ones, come out of time, were calling back to her, answering the great mountain in their turn. And if these voices were all inside my head, they were also out there…in the real world.

And what of us, who were, at long last – but for the want of a timely birth – become the Eight? In that moment we were the smallest of men, the most insignificant of creatures…And we each understood in our own way, our state of being was at best an ephemeral, a wholly transient thing…

We were already beginning to move together. None of us were leading, none of us were led. We all knew the path to take, though there was no mark upon the ground. And the voices, our own included, whether real or imaginary, shadow-tongue or ghost, beckoned, coaxed us to it. There was no need to ask where we were heading.

Slowly at first, subtly, then more sharply, the ground under our feet began to rise. No longer the gently rolling turns of the southern fells; instead, the hard, unrelenting, rocky ground that would eventually become the mass of the great black-headed mountains themselves.

Mind, the earth itself was not beyond giving us its own surprise. The unforgiving ground, weathered smooth and grey, became, in places, a sudden vast carpet of black dust. It was impossible to decide what the dust was made of: fine grains of blackened sand, or a loathsome grimy soil, or shards of glass? Or was it some other natural or unnatural material beyond our knowledge? My nose caught the hint of a sharp, bittersweet scent; enough only to tantalize, not define. In all, if anything, it reminded me of a funeral pyre.

Our feet quickly disappeared into it, were swallowed up as we moved. Lowly Crows, who had all this time remained our human companion, transformed herself into the bird and sprang into the air to avoid it. Yet, strangely, the wind, which was beginning to blow strongly, and a turbulent beast, could not seem to lift the dust into the air; as if it was too heavy to shift, or else some other unknown force was holding it in place.

Stranger still was the way the ghost-voices changed their songs as we walked across the dust. Not complaining, rather, they were welcoming us; pleased by our presence there.

In front of me, the gigant lost his footing and stumbled in the dust. He lifted his massive hand to his head, as if he could use it to dampen the noises he could not yet comprehend.

‘We are walking in the tracks of the fey,’ I said, wanting him to understand. ‘This ancient dust is their remnant. They are only trying to guide us. Listen to them. Their voices, echoing down through the long years…Can you not hear them?’

‘What?’

‘Their songs…the songs they are singing?’

Licentious only shook his troubled head. He ran his hand through the black dust, scooped it up and held it to his ear that it might help him to hear more clearly.

‘Faerie Dust,’ I said, trying to convince him; still trying to convince myself, perhaps. ‘You know…it is the dust of faeries.’

‘Remember the Beggar Bard’s Tale,’ said Wily Cockatrice. She was breathing heavily, finding it a struggle to walk against the shifting dust. ‘It fell during the great war…at the death of the wizards. When their last battle was at its height, and their doom was at hand, the sky darkened and became full…’ The old crone stood up a moment, drew in several deep gasping breaths before she was refreshed enough to continue. ‘The day disappeared beneath a blanket of night. And then the dust fell. It fell until it covered the whole earth, until there was nothing left to fall and the sky became quite clear again…’

It had always been just a story, just a part of an ancient story…

Briefly, I slipped my hand inside my cloth and touched the stone talisman that was still bound to my wrist by its leather thong.

In the next few steps, we had walked clear of the black dust…Eventually, we crossed over the brow of the rising hill. There, we came upon a shallow dip in the ground. I could see well beyond: it was the beginnings of a great plain. An undulating plateau, rising gently, tilted to the north east, stretching away into the far distance until it touched the foot of the mountains proper. However, between the shallow and the open plain the land was draped with broken trails of ground mist. In places it ran clear and the ground between appeared hard and barren. Elsewhere the mist stood up high, caught between the branches and the trunks of a broad scattering of trees; their grey, vague twisted shapes could so easily have been mistaken for fully grown men mounted upon their hobbs. It was an oddly foreboding landscape.

We had come upon the fringes of The Withering, then.

Around us, close too, the air had grown suddenly incredibly chill, as if the earth had cupped its hands about that shallow spot to hold it there. I was walking upon a stretch of rough grass, not green in colour, but caught stark white where a snap night frost still lingered. The ground there lay ever shaded, in the lea of the hill, where the cool winter sun of the day could bring no warmth.

That was not all of it.

Above us, Lowly Crows wheeled across the sky, and, closely chased by her worried kin, she cried her distress at the sight laid out before her.

This was not only a winter scene, it was a killing field.

There was ice. The grass stood up stiff and white. Only there were dead men too: dead men held within its rigid grasp. Like grotesques, oddly posed, obscenely caught where they had fallen at the moment of their death. Their faces were still deeply lined in pain. Many of them were holding up their arms as if to defend themselves against the final onslaught. Still open mouthed as they gasped their last breath, or else made their death cries. The truth easily read within their frozen eyes. And not one or two or ten men, even. But dead men by the dozens, butchered together with their hobbs. A frozen army…

‘And is this – abhorrence – also an ancient faerie deed?’ The gigant looked between us, one to the next.

I shook my head slowly. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I can see these deaths are newly made; to be measured only by the hours.’ I looked about cautiously, the instincts of the common man, the reiver, rising to the fore. Perhaps there was danger yet about this place, if only I could find it out.

‘How do you know this, Rogrig?’ asked a wary Norda Elfwych. For a moment her hand strayed toward her belly, as if to shield the innocent ears of the unborn infant.

‘There are Wishards lying dead here,’ I said. ‘And more than a few faces I recognize well enough…’

Among them, two at least must be named, if I would shed them no tears: Cloggie-Unthank, and Fibra; who were the Old-man’s younger brothers and would-be possessors of his sorely disputed title. They had been slaughtered, yet their raiment and baggage remained un-pillaged. A spilled sack lay upon the frozen earth between their bodies. Among its scattered contents was a mass of fine embroidered cloth, I knew I had seen before – upon the backs of the Old-man’s Council. These were, no doubt, the brother’s gathered spoils; souvenirs of their own campaign, now abandoned.

I had no desire to dig deeper – for the many tragedies of the scene were clear enough. And I knew one more thing then, and for certain, there was not long left to us now. Whatever path we were set upon, where ever it was leading us, we were almost there.

We passed quickly on; as quickly as our continued feeble disposition would allow us. Among the constant noises inside my head, there was still the clatter of approaching hooves…come louder now, and insistent. They would not be turned aside. The rising tide of war; The Great Riding, could not be avoided forever.