The Endless Knot (33 page)

Bran led, ranging the Ravens on either side of him in the hope that we might raise the trail of the missing scouts. But by dusk we had not seen a single footprint, much less any sign of a trail. We moved with maddening slowness, hacking a halting path through the underbrush with our swords. And despite this exertion, I noticed that the further down the slope we went, the colder it got—so that by the time we began looking for a likely place to camp, we were all wrapped chin to heel in our cloaks, and our breath hung in frosty clouds above our heads.

We made camp under a great gnarled oak beneath whose twisted limbs we found a reasonable clearing. Brushwood was gleaned from round about and heaped into three sizeable piles from which we would feed three good fires. Tegid lit each fire himself, saying, “With three, if one goes out there are always two with which to rekindle it.”

“Are you thinking the fires will fail?” I wondered.

“I am thinking that it is dangerous to be without a fire at night,” was his reply. Accordingly, we appointed men to tend the fires through the night just to make certain they did not falter.

The night passed cold, but uneventful, and we awakened to nothing more sinister than a dull dogged rain. The next day brought no change, nor did those that followed. We pushed through an endless succession of barbed thickets dense as hedge, hauling ourselves over fallen trunks, wading through mud and mire, scrambling over and around great rocks. By day we shambled after one another in a sodden procession; by night we did our best to dry out. With every step the air grew colder so that by the fifth day the rain changed to snow. This did nothing to improve our progress, but the change was welcome nonetheless.

We walked in silence. Scatha, grim-faced and morose, spoke to no one; nor did Tegid have much to say. Cynan and Bran addressed their men in terse, blunt words, and only when necessary. I could find nothing to say to anyone and slogged along as mute and miserable as the rest.

The slope flattened so gradually that we did not realize we had finally left the mound until we came to a slow-moving stream fringed with tall pines and slender birches. “It will be easier going from now on,” Bran observed.

Although we had not been attacked by the sluagh again, I felt a rush of relief wash over me once the mound was left behind. I sensed we had also left behind its preying spirits. We rested under the pines and followed the stream all the next day. The trees were old and the branches high; the undergrowth thinned considerably, which made the going easier. Gradually, the stream widened to become a small, turgid river, which wound between mud-slick banks among the exposed roots of the pines. From time to time, we glimpsed a desultory sun through breaks in the close-grown branches overhead.

As daylight faded in a dull ochre haze, we reached the end of the wood at last and looked out upon a wide valley between two long rock-topped bluffs. Snow covered the valley floor, but the snow was not deep. The river took on new life as it flowed out from the wood over a rocky bed. There were few trees to be seen, so we decided to stay the night at the edge of the wood where we would be assured of fuel for the fires. We spent all the next morning amassing firewood and loading the horses with as much as they could carry. Still, despite a late start, we made fair progress and by day's end had traveled further than we had any day since coming to Tir Aflan.

The sun remained hidden behind a solid mass of low, swarthy clouds for the next few days as we traced a course along the river, stopping only to water the horses and to eat and sleep. The weather continued cold, but the snow fell infrequently, and never for long. We saw neither bird nor beast at any time; neither did we see any track save our own in the thin snow cover.

For all we knew, we were the only people ever to penetrate so far into the Foul Land. This impression lasted for a long while—until we began seeing the ruins.

At first it seemed that the blufftop on the left-hand side of the valley had simply become more ragged with impromptu heaps of stone and jagged, toothy, outcrops. But, as we pushed further down the length of the valley, the bluffs sank lower and closer to the valley floor to reveal the shattered remnants of a wall.

We looked on the ruined wall with the same mixture of dread and fascination we had experienced on encountering the mound. Day succeeded day, and with every step the wall grew higher and more ominous: snaking darkly along the undulating ridgetop above us, gapped where the stone had collapsed and slid down the sheer bluff sides into broken heaps below. On the sixth day we came in sight of the bridge and tower.

The tower sat on a bare hump of rock at a place where the valley narrowed. The remains of a double row of demolished columns stumbled across the valley floor and river to the facing bluff opposite. We proceeded to the huge round segments lying half-buried in the ground—like the sawn trunks of megalithic trees—sinking into the land under their own bulk and an enormous weight of years. Here we halted.

At some time in the ancient past, the river must have been a roaring torrent spanned by a great bridge—a feat for giants. And guarding the bridge at one end, a bleak, brooding tower. The same questions were on every man's mind: who had raised the tower? What lay beyond the wall? What did they keep out? Curiosity grew too much to resist. We halted and made camp among the half-sunken columns. And then Cynan, Tegid, the Ravens, and I scaled the bluff side.

The tower was stone, comprised of three sections raised in stepped ranks. There were odd round windows, like empty eye sockets staring out across to the other side. At ground level was a single entrance with a gate and door unlike any I had ever seen: round, like the windows; and the door was a great wheel made of stone, not wood, banded with iron around its rim and set into a wide groove. The surface of the gate and door were covered with carved symbols which were now too weathered to comprehend. The remains of a stone-flagged road issued from the gate and ended where the bridge had once joined the bluff. Judging from the width of the road, the bridge would have been wide enough for horsemen riding four abreast.

The wall joined the tower level with its first rank, easily three times a man's height. There was no way in, except through the round gate, and there was apparently no way to budge the great stone door. But Alun and Garanaw grew inquisitive and began examining the gate. It was not long before they put their shoulders to it, and between the two of them got it to move.

“It will roll,” cried Alun. “Help us clear the groove.”

The track in which the stone rolled was choked with rock debris. In no time, with the help of Emyr, Drustwn, and Niall, they succeeded in removing the grit and stone. And then they turned their attention to the door itself. The five Ravens gave a mighty heave and pushed. To everyone's amazement the stone rumbled easily aside, revealing a darkened chamber beyond.

After warily poking their heads inside, they reported that they could see nothing. “We need torches,” Tegid advised, and at a nod from their chief, Emyr and Niall scrambled back down the cliff to fetch a bundle each. We waited impatiently while Tegid set about lighting them. But soon the torches were kindled and distributed and, with pulses pounding, we passed through the imposing gate and into the strange tower.

24
T
HE
H
IGH
T
OWER

C
autiously, shoulders hunched, walking on the balls of our feet, prowling like thieves desperate not to wake the sleeping occupants, we entered the dark tower.

The air was damp and smelled of earth and wet stone like that inside a cave. Gradually, however, as our eyes became adjusted to the fluttering light, we began to pick out individual features in the darkness.

We stood in a single large chamber, two or three times larger, for all I could tell, than any king's great hall. There was a single row of stone pillars through the center of the room supporting the floor above. Huge iron rings were fixed in the pillars at various heights.

“Here!” called Drustwn from a little way ahead. “Look here!”

In a jumbled heap, as if tossed aside in a moment's wrath, were a score of bronze chariots, their wheels warped and poles bent or broken, the metal green with age. The high, circular sides of the chariots appeared to be wicker, but were in fact triangular strips of bronze woven together, immensely strong for their weight.

Lying a little apart from the chariots was a small pyramid of large discs, stacked one atop another. And beside this, a pile of oversized axeheads—unusual in that they consisted of a short stout blade on one side balanced by a blunt spike on the other. There must have been several hundred of these and as many discs, which, on closer inspection, turned out to be bronze shields.

Bran pulled one of the shields from the stack, causing a dusty avalanche. He lifted the round device by the rim and held it before him; it was huge, much larger than any the men of Albion used, and plain. Its only markings appeared on the center boss: a few curious symbols worked in raised bronze around the simple image of a peculiar thick-bodied serpent.

“Whoever carried this was a stronger man than me,” Bran remarked, replacing the shield and retrieving his torch.

We continued our examination but, aside from a neat row of short, heavy bronze thrusting spears, we found nothing else in the lower chamber and took our search up a flight of stone steps to the next level.

The round windows in the center of each of the four walls allowed some light to enter the large, square room, the floor of which was littered with helmets and war caps—high crowned and rising to a slight point at the top, all of bronze, and all with a bronze serpent coiled around the rim, its flat head raised upon the brow. Alun picked one up and set it on his head, but it was made for a man twice his size. There were perhaps two hundred or more of these serpent-crested helmets scattered on the floor, but nothing else in the room.

On the floor above we discovered a great stone table set with huge bowls of silver and bronze, with one gold vessel among them. The silver was black and the bronze green, but the gold was good as the day it was made; it gleamed dully in the light of our torches. Also on the table were three piles of coins in the rotted remains of leather bags. The coins were silver and gold. The silver coins were little more than black lumps, but the gold shone bright. We took up some of these and looked at them.

“Here is their king,” said Tegid, holding a coin before his eyes. “I cannot read his name.”

The coin showed the image of a man as if etched by a precocious child. The man clasped a short spear in one hand and a spiked ax in the other. He was bareheaded, and his hair was long, curling down to his shoulders; he wore beard and moustache almost as long. His chest was bare—he bore no torc or other ornament—but he wore what appeared to be striped breecs or leggings, and tall boots on his feet. Words in strange letters clustered like wasps around his head, but they were impossible to read.

We each took a handful of the coins to show the others, and Cynan took the gold bowl. “For Tángwen, when I see her,” he said.

Beside the table stood a large iron tripod bearing a huge bronze cauldron. Beneath the cauldron was a ring of fire-blackened stones, and inside it the baked, brick-hard shards of the last meal. But the outside of the cauldron was what caught my eye. The surface was alive with activity: warriors in chariots charged around the bottom of the cauldron, lofting spears, long hair trailing in the wind; on the next tier above, narrow-eyed men on horses galloped, brandishing swords and spears; above these were ranks of warriors on foot, shoulder to shoulder, bearing round shields and helmets such as we had seen in the lower chamber; on the highest tier a number of winged men were running, or perhaps flying, and each bore a serpent in his right hand and a leafy branch in his left. The rim of the cauldron was a scaly serpent with its tail in its mouth.

“The Men of the Serpent,” Tegid said, indicating the warriors.

“Do you know of them?”

“Their tale is remembered among the Derwyddi but, like the song of Tir Aflan, we do not sing it.” I thought he would not say more but, gazing at the cauldron, he continued, “It is said that the Serpent awoke and with a mighty war host subdued the land. When there were no more enemies to conquer, the Serpent Men fell into disputes and warring among themselves. They destroyed all they had built, and when the last of them died, the Serpent crawled back into the underworld to sleep until awakened again.”

“What awakens it?” I asked.

“Very great evil,” was his only reply.

Strewn about the room were objects of everyday use: more cups and bowls; many short, bone-handled swords fused to their scabbards; a few round shields; a collection of small pots, flasks, and boxes carved of a soft reddish stone—all of them empty; several long, curved spoon-shaped ladles and long-handled forks for getting meat and broth from the cauldron; numerous axeheads; knives of various sizes; a mask of bronze showing the glowering face of a bearded warrior with a great flowing moustache, elaborately curled hair, and a serpent helmet on his head, his mouth open in full cry; four very tall lampstands, one in each corner, bearing stone-carved oil lamps.

Underneath one of the shields, Emyr found a curious object—a circlet of small shieldlike discs linked together around a protruding conical horn. Turning it this way and that, he announced, “I think it is a crown.” Like most of the other objects we had seen, it was made of bronze and, when he put it on his head, it was shown to have been made for a much larger head.

“
Mo anam,
” muttered Cynan, trying the crown himself, “but these serpent men were giants.”

“Look at this!” called Garanaw, holding his torch to the far wall.

We crossed to where he stood and saw a painting on the wall. It was well done, and no doubt brightly colored at one time. And though the colors had faded to an almost uniform gray-brown, leering out at us was the face of a serpent man, fleshy lips curved in a mocking smile, pale reptilian eyes staring with frozen mirth, his mouth open and forked tongue extended. A mass of coiled curls wreathed the face, and below the chin it was still possible to make out the winged torso and a raised hand grasping a black serpent that coiled around the arm.