Second Night (18 page)

He stroked her cheek and touched her hair. She was just a pretty, vulnerable girl at that moment. ‘We're here now,' he said gently. ‘Let's enjoy it for what it is. Don't waste time thinking about Wednesday, or even tomorrow.'

‘But you will be there for my party? You won't forget or find something else to do?'

‘I'll be there for the party.'

‘You promise? I need you to give me your solemn vow!'

‘I'll be there,' he repeated. ‘Like I said, I've got a lot going on right now.'

The moon was already two days before full and her needs and wishes were irrelevant to the task ahead of him. He must prepare himself to endure a whole day sustained only by the clear waters from Brynhilde's Spring before he cast the runes.

It was after midnight when Genista finally got home from work. Bryony had just got in and was sitting at the dressing table. Mirror Girl was helping her to take off her make-up. They both groaned theatrically when Genista came bursting into the bedroom.

‘Urrgh! Will you ever learn to knock?'

‘Come on, into bed and be quick about it,' said Genista briskly. ‘You're going to need your beauty sleep tonight.'

‘What for?'

‘We're going to church tomorrow morning.'

Completely horrified, Bryony yelled, ‘What are you talking about? I've never been to church in my life!'

‘Yes, you have. You were christened and you went to Aunty Sandra's wedding.'

‘When I was six! What was I christened for?'

‘Because everybody is.' Genista opened the wardrobe and rummaged through the clothes. ‘We'll have to get some more stuff. We can't keep turning up looking like a pair of tarts.'

‘Speak for yourself!' Bryony slammed the wardrobe doors shut, putting her back to them and glaring at her mother. ‘I'm not helping you throw yourself at yet another married man. Especially not a stuffy vicar! Sorry!'

‘He's not married!' said her mother triumphantly. ‘He was in the pub all evening, so he's not stuffy either. Ask your granddad. That boy is his nephew and he might be just right for you!'

‘I've already told you vicars are poor, Mother dear! And that means their families are usually poor as well!'

‘Not this time! This vicar's travelled all over the world and his nephew's French!' Genista laid it on the line. ‘Look, I'm giving it until Christmas, Bry, and I would really appreciate you helping me out. We'll never get anywhere going on like we are and this could be my big chance. Don't spoil it for me.'

Mirror Girl shook her head but Bryony wavered. A French boy would make a change from Carl. Mirror Girl was more often wrong than right these days and it would help pass the time while she was waiting for Caz.

‘But we don't know anything about church and stuff like that,' she demured. ‘It might be rubbish.'

‘Then it's about time we found out,' said her mother brightly.

CHAPTER 30

Daisy and John watched the full moon rising over the hills from the kitchen window. It was long past the time when they should have been home, and there was still no sign of Caz. They both knew he had taken the day off school but the coffee maker was untouched and the sugar bowl was still full. It looked like he hadn't drunk a drop all day. John started pacing the floor. Daisy was shaking.

‘The sun's been gone down nearly two hours,' she said desperately. ‘He's never been late before. Something terrible must have happened to him in the forest. We've got to go and look for him.'

‘And what'll we do if he gets back before us and needs helping out?'

Daisy sat down at the table, holding her throbbing head. ‘I don't know! I just don't know!' she wept.

John sat beside her and took her hand. ‘Now listen to me, Dark-eyes,' he said gently. ‘It's no use getting yourself all worked up and panicking. We'll just have to sit it out and wait. The boy's tough and that filly won't let anything happen to him, you'll see.'

‘But we've got to do something! His dinner's spoiling. It won't be fit to eat by the time he gets in!'

John stood up. ‘I'll tell you what we'll do. We'll get these pans and plates and what have you on a tray and I'll take them upstairs to his room. That way he can eat up there in peace and quiet as soon as he gets back and he won't have to worry about cleaning up when he's done.' He loaded the big wooden tray, pointing to the row of saucepans on the back of the hob. ‘Are all these pans to go up?'

Daisy nodded. ‘Leave the big one with the soup. We'll put that out on the table down here with the bread so he can have a quick bite before he goes upstairs.' She dried her eyes and took a large casserole dish out of the oven. ‘This has got to go up too.'

She opened the door to the turret staircase that connected the kitchen with the upper levels of the house.

‘Can you manage all that heavy weight by yourself?' she asked anxiously as John picked up the tray.

‘I'm all right,' he said. ‘Now you stay down here and watch out for him. I'll be back in a jiffy. Then we'll get our coats on and have a look through the garden and the orchard in case he's closer to home than we think he is.'

‘That's a good idea. I've got to do something or else I'm going to go mad. He can't have been meaning to stay out so long. Something must have happened to him.'

Daisy was right on both counts. Caz
had
meant to be back for supper, and something
had
happened that had never happened before. The rune casting was void. Worse, one of the rune staves had vanished.

The day had gone surprisingly well until sunset. He had turned the horses out in the paddock at dawn for a few hours grazing and brought them in midmorning, leaving their hay nets stuffed full and more wedges stacked on the straw in each of the loose boxes. He spent the remaining daylight hours with Kyri at Thunderslea, drinking copious jugfuls of the sparkling water from the spring to soothe the spasms that grew in intensity as sunset drew near. Despite their ferocity, that even the healing waters could not finally allay, he had waited until the last of the twilight was in the sky in the west and the tree stretched its great branches towards the rising moon before he cast the runes.

It would have been a good casting, the best he had achieved for two years. Nine of the staves had landed uppermost inside the inner circle scratched in the earth among the leaves. One of the two blank runes, symbolising the Runes of the Deathless yet to be won, had fallen exactly in the centre where the diagonal lines crossed. It was only when he was counting the runes back into the bag, that he realised the second of the blank staves was missing.

Breathing in wracking, laboured gasps and by now almost blind with agony, he crawled on his hands and knees around the roots of the great tree, feeling among the leaves for the lost rune. If he failed to find it, the staves themselves would be void and would have to be destroyed. The precious little wooden counters, that had cost him so much effort and blood to attain, would be consigned to the flames.

The cramping in his guts reached new levels of intensity as he searched through the fallen leaves, turning them over one by one, but there was no sign of the rune. His whole body was shaking. His lungs were vibrating against his ribs. Searing spasms wracked his stomach and bowels. He could feel his back contorting, his throat was on fire and the thirst was unbearable. The sweat was soaking his clothing, running into his boots and dripping from his hair. If he closed his eyes, even for a second, his head swam and everything began to disintegrate around him.

Terrified that he was going to disappear along with the missing stave, he willed himself to concentrate on keeping his eyes open and his mind clear to go beyond the fear and the pain.

‘Heartbiter!'

The old beggar woman's voice shouted from somewhere high up in the tree. Caz raised his head. A face with glittering eyes was staring down at him through the branches – a face that was neither young nor old, neither obviously male nor definitely feminine. He knew he would never forget the eyes.

His voice was a cracked whisper. ‘How do you know my name?'

The face snaked around him on a long coiled neck. ‘How do
you
know your name?' The mouth opened, screaming into his pain-amplified hearing, ‘Heartbiter! Heartbiter!'

His fingers touched the spear. He gripped the shaft, feeling the welcome heat of it welding the great weapon into his hand. Turning, he lunged at the gaping mouth. The face shattered. A myriad identical faces swarmed around him. A thousand voices shouted. ‘Heartbiter! Heartbiter!'

Hands dragged at his cloak. Fingers twisted themselves into his hair. Fists pounded his body… his head… his face.

The spear ignited. Frenzied, he fought back. ‘Stinking spooks!'

No pain. No fear. I am Heartbiter! The spooks killed Bryn. The spooks killed Bryn. The spooks killed Bryn!

The old tree shuddered. Fire scorched the ancient trunk. The lower boughs were burning. A forked and flickering serpent-tongue took Caz by the neck, throttling him and still he fought, thrusting the spear into the screaming faces, until a black mist swam before his eyes and he fell to his knees. But it was not to be his hour of defeat. Dark wings beat over him. A shining beak and razor talons tore at the evil tongue until its grip was released and the faces fell back, wailing.

He had forgotten the pain until the white-hot liquid agony of mind-shattering intensity coursed into his returning consciousness. He had forgotten everything except the need to kill, to maim and destroy. He leaned on the spear, taking great gasping breaths and coughing when the smoke, still lingering over the scorched earth and the blackened tree roots, caught at his throat. The filly stood over him, nuzzling around the raised, black wheals on his neck. The last whisper of the battle frenzy that had possessed him threw him onto her back. White moonlight filtering through black branches lit the silent forest paths as she carried him with all speed to the manor house, where John and Daisy were putting on their coats to go out and look for him.

He fell over the step onto the mat when they opened the back door. Heaving himself to his feet and gasping, ‘Get back! You can't help me!' he staggered into the kitchen and bent over the table, putting both hands into the hot soup and scooping it into his mouth. Daisy cried out in horror when she saw him under the light. His face was swollen and black with bruising. The livid marks on his neck were cracked open and bleeding. His clothes were caked with sweat and mud. He stank.

‘What's happened to you, boy?' demanded John.

Caz picked up the heavy saucepan. He put it to his mouth and tried to drink the soup, but his hands shook and he dropped the pan. His stomach churned and he began to vomit. The plate of bread crashed and broke on the floor.

Daisy screamed. ‘What can we do? Tell us what to do!'

‘Let us help you!' shouted John. ‘You've got to let us help you!'

Caz held them off with the spear. ‘You can't help me!' he panted. ‘Get back! Leave me! Go! Get out!'

They backed away. Daisy was sobbing hysterically. He lurched after them and slammed the door. ‘Go!'

John shouted though the keyhole. ‘The supper's upstairs! Get upstairs and eat! We'll see you in the morning! Eat, boy! You must eat!'

Blind instinct sent Caz crawling to the foot of the winding stairway. He heaved himself onto the first step, and then the second, and then the third, dragging the spear behind him. He collapsed, fainting, on the fourth step and had begun to slide backwards when he felt strong arms lifting him. Someone carried him, running lightly up the stairs to the room with the round window under the eaves and threw him on the bed.

‘Thanks Al,' he whispered gratefully.

A well-remembered voice rasped above him. ‘We meet again, my friend, on the threshold of the Shadowed World.'

‘Haldor Vídarsson?'

‘You are pursued but you have done well. You are worthy. Your name is sung in the Hall.'

Caz tried to sit up but strong fingers took him by the neck, pulling his head backwards and forcing open his mouth. He saw luminous eyes. A shining black beak began cramming food down his throat. He swallowed convulsively and screamed for more… gorging and screaming until the hunger was satiated and the pain had drifted somewhere outside of his body where it didn't matter any more. He stretched and sighed, and tumbled into the warm dark of dreamless oblivion.

CHAPTER 31

Neither Daisy nor John slept very much that night. Daisy got up at three-thirty to make them both a cup of hot chocolate and John lit the fire in their bedroom, something unheard of unless one of them was ill, which was thankfully rare. They lay side by side in the bed they had slept in together for nearly fifty years… looking at the flames… not saying a lot… until the alarm went off at six o'clock and it was time to get ready to go to work.

Alan was giving the horses their morning feed when they drove into the stable yard just after seven. Kyri looked out over her door and whickered to them. Daisy presented her daily offering of a carrot sliced lengthways just as Bryn, her mother, had always liked it. The look in the filly's blue-black eyes was encouraging and Daisy took comfort from her presence. The dead weight of premonition lifted from her heart on what she had feared would turn out to be the worst possible day of her life.

‘Have you seen the boy this morning, Al?' asked John.

Alan looked tired. ‘No, not a sign of him. I was up the woods most of the night and never came across him. The filly was in her box when I got back so I thought he must have gone home.' He noticed Daisy's eyes were red. ‘What's going on?'

‘You'd best come into the house and we'll tell you,' said John.

The vomit had dried on the kitchen floor. John picked up the bread and the shattered pieces of china. Daisy raked the fire in the range and put the kettle on to boil while John told Alan what had happened the previous evening.