The Moon of Gomrath (7 page)

Colin set his teeth, and walked faster. Footstep. Echo. Footstep. Echo. Footstep. Echo.
Footstep. Echo.
He breathed again. Nerves! Nothing but – pad, pad, pad. Colin spun round. Did any shadow move?

“Who's there?” he shouted.

“Air! Air! Air!” said the hill.

“I – I can see you, you know!”

“Ho! Ho! Ho!”

It says much for Colin that he did not run. The panic was close, but he thrust it down and forced his brain to reason. How far to Macclesfield? Four miles? No point in running, then. He slowly turned, and began to walk. And although he could not go ten paces without looking back, he drew steadily away from Shining Tor. He saw nothing. But the footsteps that were never quite echoes stayed with him.

After half an hour Colin was beginning to think that he would perhaps reach the town, for whatever was following him seemed content to follow: it never shortened the distance between them. Then, approaching a sharp corner, Colin heard something that stopped him dead. It was a new sound, and it came from in front: hoofs – the sound of a horse walking slowly.

He looked behind him. Still nothing. But he could not go back. And away from the road there was too much unknown. Yet why should he be afraid of this new sound? Colin was at such a pitch that he was afraid of his own voice. He could make no decision: he was caught.

His eyes were fixed on the road where it licked out of
sight like a black tongue. The gentle clop of the hoofs seemed to go on for ever. The road would always be empty—

It was a black horse, and its rider was cloaked and wore a wide-brimmed hat.

“Albanac!”

Colin staggered forward, laughing. A touch of reality – even such reality – and the scene had changed. Colin saw himself in perspective. It was a fine night of full moon among peaceful hills, and Susan was waiting for him to bring the Mothan. From the time he had left the Beacon till now he had been on another plane of existence: it had been too much for his imagination.

“Albanac!”

“Colin! I thought you would be somewhere on the road. Have you the Mothan?”

“Yes!”

“Come, then. We'll be away to Susan.”

Albanac reached down and lifted Colin into the saddle before him, and turned the horse towards Macclesfield.

“Why, Colin, you are wet and trembling. Is anything amiss?”

“No. It's just that it's all been a bit unsettling. I've had quite a time!”

“Ay, so I see.”

As he said this, the horse turned its head and looked back along the road. It snorted, and its ears flattened to its skull.

Albanac twisted in the saddle. Colin, half enfolded in the cloak, could not see the road behind, but he felt Albanac's body stiffen, and heard the breath hiss through his teeth. Then the reins slapped the high neck, and the horse leapt away with all the tempest of its fairy blood, and the speed of its going drove questions back into Colin's throat, and the night filled his ears, and the cloak cracked in the wind.

Nor did Albanac stop until they came to the Riddings, and they looked down upon Highmost Redmanhey, timber and plaster magpied by the moon, and the lamp in the window of the room where Susan lay.

“Why is there a light?” said Colin.

“All is well,” said Albanac. “Cadellin waits for us.”

The little room was crowded. When Colin opened the door Bess cried, “Oh, wheer have you been? You shouldner have—”

“That'll do, lass,” said Gowther gently. “Did you get what you went for, Colin?”

“Yes.”

“And are you all reet?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that's all as matters. Let's see what's to be done, then.”

Colin took the flower and leaves from his pouch.

“You have run well,” said Uthecar. “It is the Mothan. Give it to your sister.”

“Here you are,” said Colin, and handed the Mothan to Cadellin. But the wizard shook his head.

“No, Colin. This is the Old Magic: it will not bend to my mind. Let Uthecar take it: he is better skilled in this lore.”

“Nay, Cadellin Silverbrow,” said the dwarf. “It will not hear me. Mine is not the need. It is through Colin that it moves. Do you fold the flower within the leaves and put them in her mouth.”

Colin went to the bed. He folded the Mothan tightly and opened Susan's jaws with his finger just enough to work the pellet past her teeth. Then he stood back, and for everyone the silence was like a band of steel about the head. Three minutes went by: nothing happened.

“This is daft,” said Bess.

“Quiet!” said Uthecar hoarsely.

Another long silence. Colin thought he was going to collapse. His legs were trembling with the effort of
concentration.

“Listen!” said Albanac.

Far away, and, if anywhere, above them, they heard a faint baying, and the deep winding of a horn. The baying grew nearer, and now there was the jingling of harness. The horn sounded again: it was just outside the window. And Susan opened her eyes.

She stared wildly about her, as though she had been woken in the middle of a dream. Then she sat up, and pulled a face, and put her hand to her mouth. But Uthecar sprang across the room and hit Susan hard between the shoulder blades with the flat of his hand.

“Swallow it!”

Susan could not help herself. She hiccupped under the blow, and the Mothan was gone. Then Susan leapt out of bed. She ran to the window and threw it open so recklessly that the lamp was knocked into the yard below and exploded in a glare of paraffin. Susan leant out of the window, and Colin blundered across the darkened room and grabbed her by the shoulders, for she seemed intent on something that made her forget danger.

“Celemon!” she cried. “Celemon! Stay for me!”

Colin pulled her back over the sill – then clutched the frame to save himself from falling, for the shock of what he saw in the sky above the farm took his legs from
under him.

He could not say if they were stars, or what they were. The sky was a haze of moonlight, and in the haze it seemed as though the stars had formed new constellations, constellations that moved, had life, and took the shape and spangled outline of nine young women on horseback, gigantic, filling the heavens. They milled round above the farm, hawks on hand, and among them pranced hounds with glittering eyes and jewelled collars. The riders wore short tunics, and their hair gleamed along the sky. Then the horn sounded again, the horses reared and flared over the plain, and the night poured shooting-stars into the western sea.

Only Colin had seen this. As he turned back to the room Bess appeared in the doorway with a lamp. Susan stood facing the window, tears on her cheek. But when light filled the room she relaxed, and sighed.

“How is it with you, Susan?” said Cadellin.

She looked at him. “Cadellin. Bess. Gowther. Uthecar. Colin. Albanac. Oh! Then what was that? I'd forgotten you.”

“Sit on the bed,” said Cadellin. “Tell us what you know of these past days. But first, Mistress Mossock, will you bring Susan food and drink? It is all she needs to secure her now.”

This was soon done, and while she ate, Susan told her story. She spoke hesitantly, as though trying to describe something to herself as much as to anyone else.

“I remember falling into water,” she said, “and everything went black: I held my breath until the pain made me let go, but just then the water rushed away from me in the dark, and – well – although the darkness was the same, I was somewhere else, floating – nowhere in particular, just backwards and forwards and round in nothing. You know how when you're in bed at night you can imagine the bed's tilted sideways, or the room's sliding about? It was like that.

“That wasn't too bad, but I didn't like the noises. There were squeakings and gratings going on all round me – voices – no, not quite voices; they were just confused sounds; but they came from throats. Some were near and others far away. This went on for a long time, and I didn't like it. But I wasn't frightened or worried about what was going to happen to me – though I'm frightened now when I think of it! I didn't like being where I was, but at the same time I couldn't think of anywhere else that I wanted to be. And then all at once I felt a hand catch hold of my wrist and pull me upwards. There was a light, and I heard someone shouting – I think now it was Albanac – and I started to move faster
than ever; so fast that I was dizzy, and the light got brighter and brighter, and it made no difference when I shut my eyes. Then I began to slow down, and the glare didn't hurt so much, and I could see the outline of the hand that was holding me. And then I seemed to break through a skin of light, and I was lying in shallow water at the edge of a sea, and standing over me was a woman, dressed in red and white, and we were holding each other's wrist and our bracelets were linked together – and Cadellin! I've just realised! Hers was the same as mine – the one Angharad gave me!”

“Ay, it would be,” said the wizard quietly. “No matter: go on.”

“Well, she undid her bracelet and slipped it out of mine, and we walked along the beach, and she said her name was Celemon and we were going to Caer Rigor. I didn't feel there was any need to ask questions: I accepted everything as it came, like you do in a dream.

“We joined the others who were waiting for us on a rocky headland, and we rode out above the sea towards Caer Rigor, and everyone was excited and talked of home. Then suddenly there was this bitter taste in my mouth and all the others had it, too, and no matter how hard we rode, we couldn't move forward. Celemon said we must turn back, so we did, and then I felt dizzy again,
and the taste in my mouth got worse until I thought I was going to be sick, and I couldn't keep my balance, and I fell from the horse, over and over into the sea, or fog, or whatever it was. I was falling for hours, and then I hit something hard. I'd closed my eyes to stop myself from being sick, and when I opened them I was here.

“But where is Celemon? Shan't I see her again?”

“I do not doubt it,” said the wizard. “Some day you will meet, and ride over the sea to Caer Rigor, and there will be no bitterness to draw you back. But everything in its time. And now you must rest.”

They left Susan with Bess and went downstairs to the kitchen.

Colin was light-headed with exhaustion and bewilderment, and on the way downstairs his attempt to describe what he had seen when he had pulled Susan from the window was lost on all but Cadellin, who seemed to take it all as confirmation of his own thoughts.

“Caer Rigor,” said the wizard. “Caer Rigor. Oh, we are in deep water now. Caer Rigor. It is well you found the Mothan when you did, Colin, for once there, neither the High nor the Old Magic would have brought her back.

Three times the fulness of Prydwen we went into it:

Except seven, none returned from Caer Rigor.

“That is how it is remembered in song. Ay, it is not often the Old Magic does so much good.”

“What do you mean?” said Colin. “It's not Black Magic, is it? Please explain! And what happened to Sue?”

“It is difficult,” said the wizard. “I would rather leave it till we have rested. But if you are bent on this, then I must tell you – though at the end you may understand less than you do now.

“No, Colin, the Old Magic is not evil: but it has a will of its own. It may work to your need, but not to your command. And again, there are memories about the Old Magic that wake when it moves. They, too, are not evil of themselves, but they are fickle, and wrong for these times.”

“It is indeed so,” said Albanac. “The Hunter was on the road.”

“You saw him?” said Cadellin sharply.

“I saw him. He came down with Colin from his bed on Shining Tor. He would want to know who had roused him.”

“What?” said Colin. “Who's this? On the road? I heard someone following me, or I thought I did, but when I met you it all seemed so silly.”

“Ay, well, perhaps it was.”

“Yes, but what are you talking about?”

“An old memory,” said the wizard. “No harm came of it, so no more need be said now. Let me try to explain what Susan has just told us. That is what may affect us all.”

“Surely to goodness you dunner reckon much on that!” said Gowther. “It was nobbut a dream! She said so herself.”

“She said it was
like
a dream,” said Cadellin. “I wish I could dismiss it so: but it is truth, and I suspect there is even more than she remembers.

“The Brollachan thrust her from the one level of the world that men are born to, down into the darkness and unformed life that is called Abred by wizards. From there she was lifted to the Threshold of the Summer Stars, as far beyond this world of yours as Abred is below: and few have ever gone so far, fewer still returned, and none at all unchanged.

“She has ridden with the Shining Ones, the Daughters of the Moon, and they came with her from behind the north wind. Now she is here. But the Shining Ones did not leave Susan of choice, for through her they may wake their power in the world – the Old Magic, which has long been gone from here. It is a magic beyond our guidance: it is magic of the heart, not of the head: it can be felt, but
not known: and in that I see no good.

“And Susan was not prey of the Brollachan by chance. Vengeance was there, too.

“She was saved, and is protected, only by the Mark of Fohla – her blessing and her curse. For it guards her against the evil that would crush her, and it leads her ever further from the ways of human life. The more she wears it, the more need there is to do so. And it is too late now to take it off.

“Is that not enough, without calling the Old Magic from its sleep? I should be lighter in my heart if I knew that what you have quickened this night could as easily be laid to rest.”

Colin lay awake, the day and night racing through his head, long after the wizard had gone. So much was unanswered, so much not understood, so much had been achieved – in spite of himself, he felt: he had been only a tool. But Susan was safe, Susan was – Colin sat up in bed. Beneath the open window he had heard a soft, familiar sound. Pad, pad, pad, pad, pad. He jumped out of bed and crept to the window.