The Shadow of Malabron (14 page)

“I think so,” Will said cautiously.

“You
think
so?” echoed one of the other novices, a girl named Maeve. “How can you not know?” Just then the bells at the Gathering House sounded the hour and Rowen’s friends hurried off to their lesson, much to Will’s relief.

Next they visited the smithy, a cave-like structure of black stone at the rear of the college, its air acrid and roiling from the forge fire. Through the smoke they could see a bearded man in a black apron working at an anvil, hammering at a red-hot bar of metal. Near him a boy not much older than Will, polished a breastplate. Rowen explained that knights-in-training were apprenticed for a time to the armourer. In this way they learned the lore and craft of weapons, and helped to make their own armour and their first sword.

“But they don’t wear armour,” Will said.

“They do in battle,” Rowen said. “The forges have been working day and night lately. It’s not a good sign.”

They watched for a while as the boy set down the breastplate and then took up a mallet and tapped away at the pieces of a steel gauntlet, smoothing and shaping the thin metal. Sweat dripped from his forehead and his face was contorted into a grimace of concentration.

“Galen will be going out soon on his first quest,” Rowen said as they moved on, a hint of envy in her voice.

“By himself?”

“He’ll be apprenticed to a knight, until he’s earned his spurs and can ride out on his own. That’s what I’ll be doing in a few years, if all goes well.”

When they returned to the toyshop for the midday meal, Pendrake was there. He thought it would be a good idea for Will to get some training in defending himself before they left the city. Will agreed, eager to try out a sword.

And so Will and Rowen spent part of each day at Appleyard with Finn. On the first day they waited for him in the sparring ground, a circular field ringed with colourful banners strung from tall poles. When the young man appeared he bowed slightly to them, his face expressionless. He had brought several wooden practice swords that he called bevins. Much of Will’s eagerness vanished when he saw them.

Finn handed Will one of the bevins and showed him how to stand and hold the weapon. They sparred several times, and while Finn carefully pointed out what Will needed to learn, he never smiled or said anything encouraging. Each time they began again, Finn would repeat his instruction about how to stand and hold the sword. After a while Will grew impatient.

“I understand all about
that
part,” he said finally.

In an instant, with a movement too quick for Will to follow, the bevin was out of his hand and in Finn’s, the point of the wooden blade at Will’s neck.

“How about this part?” Finn said coldly.

Will said nothing. He glanced at Rowen out of the corner of his eye and felt his face redden.

Finn handed back the bevin.

“In combat you always have two weapons,” he said. “Yours, and your opponent’s. Learn to use them both and you’ll never be unarmed. Let’s start again.”

Will threw down the bevin.

“This is a waste of time,” he said. “Where I come from we have better weapons than this.”

Finn picked up the sword.

“My family came from Elsewhere too,” he said. “A long time ago. Here in the Bourne we know about the powerful weapons of the Untold, but we’ve learned to be careful about what we use to protect ourselves. There are creatures here that cannot be harmed by anything that doesn’t belong in their own stories. And we’ve found that some tools, no matter how helpful they seem at first, always end up serving the Dark Powers.”

“Did anyone in your family ever go back to Elsewhere?”

“Not that I know of. When you’ve lived here a long time, you become more like one of the storyfolk, I think. It’s very rare that one of them can cross over into the Untold. Some who try lose their way and are snared by the Night King, or choose to serve him because they believe he alone holds the keys to all doors in and out of Story. That lie has tempted many Wayfarers.”

As he spoke these last words, Finn looked searchingly into Will’s eyes.
He’s wondering if I’ll be one of those
, Will thought. He was about to answer Finn’s look with angry words, but they died in his throat. He didn’t know any better than Finn what was going to happen to him.

Finn held out the bevin.

“Again,” he said.

On the evening before their departure, the toymaker met Will, Rowen and Finn in his workshop. He swept aside the clutter on his work desk and unrolled a large parchment map, placing tea cups and stones at the corners to keep it flat.

“This is the task, and the danger, that lies before us,” Pendrake said, his hand on the map. “Will is setting out in search of a way home, and we are pledged to help him. Will’s gifts as a Wayfarer may lead him to the Green Court. We will do nothing to hinder this, if it happens, yet at the same time we must go warily, to elude any pursuers.”

It was the map that Rowen had shown Will earlier. The travellers gathered round it and discussed the merits of the various roads they might take. It became clear to Will that no matter what direction they set out in, they would eventually come to lands where friendly folk were few and far between, and one could never be sure what lay round the next bend. Once, these ungoverned and little-known regions were considered one of the Bourne’s best defences, but over the years foul and malevolent things had crept slowly into them and made their dwelling there.

They talked about returning to the Wood, which stretched north-east from the city to the River Arrow, the Bourne’s eastern boundary. This was the place where Will had crossed into the Realm, and so it seemed the likeliest direction to begin a search for the way back. Moth had reported to Pendrake that there was no longer any sign of the fetches or the mirrors. But as the toymaker reminded everyone, the fetches likely could not have set the trap of the mirrors themselves. They were shadowbeings that moved only under the power of someone or something else sent by the Night King. Going into the Wood might mean walking straight into the greatest danger.

They considered going west, through the great forest of Eldark to the lands beyond. The ancient land of the Hidden Folk, before their exile, was in the west.

Finn looked at the vast forest spreading across most of the western half of the map and shook his head.

“There are scouts and knights-errant who know these woods far better than I do,” he said.

“Yes,” Pendrake said, “but those who’ve travelled a place often might not see what is right in front of them.”

He cautioned that when it came to the whereabouts of the Green Court, nothing was certain. There were many tales of wanderers encountering the Hidden Folk in unlikely, far-flung regions. And the forest, for that matter, held many dangers.

The other directions were carefully discussed and considered, but in the end, there was no clear answer to the question of the road they were best to take.

Pendrake noticed Will intent upon the map, his gaze travelling hopelessly over the many strange names.

“Tomorrow,” he said, placing a hand on Will’s shoulder, “we will go to the crossroads, and there a path will be chosen. Until then, let’s not worry over what hasn’t happened yet. Sleep is more important right now than plans. As the Kantar says, you have to walk a road with your feet.”

After Finn had left for Appleyard, the others went back downstairs for bed. Will and Shade said good night to Rowen and the old man at the door of Will’s room. At her own door Rowen paused before going in.

“Thank you, Grandfather,” she said. “For letting me come along. I know you don’t really want me with you…”

Pendrake took off his spectacles and nervously tapped the earpieces together. Then he slipped the spectacles back on again, sighed, and looked into Rowen’s eyes.

“I want you where you’ll be safe, child,” he said softly. “But I don’t know where that is any more. Maybe there are no safe places. Maybe there never have been. And maybe I’ve protected you too much. Though you’ve managed to learn quite a lot about protecting yourself, despite me.”

He looked past her into the room, and she saw his eyes fall on the chest at the end of her bed. She blushed and looked down at the floor.

“Do you think that I could be like … that I could be a great knight-errant someday?”

Pendrake hesitated.

“You will do wondrous things,” he said at last, and there was sadness in his voice. “I’ve always known that.”

Rowen started to say something else, but Pendrake turned and went back up the stairs alone. When he was well away from Rowen he sighed heavily. As he passed the raincabinet he paused and leant towards the door. From within came the faint but steady sound of the downpour that had not ceased for a moment since he had first come to live in this house, so many years ago.

His granddaughter had grown up under the same roof and did not question the rain. It had always been there, just one more unexplained marvel in a house of wonders. She had lived so far without the knowledge that the rain was there for her, to keep her hidden.

And now he was taking her out into the world, perhaps far from home. Deep into the weave of the Kantar, into the next chapter of her own story. With that thought, the toymaker’s heart misgave him. She was not ready. But would he ever feel otherwise? This time had been coming since she was born. He knew that she would have to learn of her inheritance, and that it was right, and he could not prevent it, no matter how much he feared for her. Until now he had thought of that day as far in the future, but with the coming of the boy and all that had happened since, he knew it was now rushing towards them, and that it would soon be here.

He walked away from the raincabinet, went into his workshop and closed the door. Light burned in the windows long into the night.

Finn Madoc set out the travelling clothes he would wear in the morning. His small room was almost bare: it held his bed, a washbasin on a wooden stand, a shelf with a few tattered books. A parchment map hung on one wall. Brass pins dotted it in many places. Markers of all the places he had searched, so far in vain. It had been ten years now, and no word had yet come to Fable of the fate of the missing.

As he stood, gazing at the map, he turned the ring with the green stone on his finger, as if to confirm that it was still there. Each time he set out on a mission for the Errantry, he went in hope that this time he would stumble across some clue, some trace of those he sought. And each time he returned to Appleyard, his hope had lessened, and the Realm seemed an even larger place.

He took up his sword, and went out into the dark corridor of the dormitory. The night sentry nodded to him as he passed through the entryway into the great hall, which was empty. Most of the knights he knew had already left on missions. He would be the only member of the Errantry keeping vigil tonight.

Moonlight streamed into the room from the high windows. There were benches underneath each of the tapestries that pictured the legendary knights of the past. Finn did not take his place under any of these. He went instead to the furthest corner of the hall, where there was a space between the pillars with no tapestry. Here he sat on the bench, laid his sword on the cold stone floor in front of him, and set his hands in his lap. He heaved a sigh, and then went so still that he might have been one more silent figure on a tapestry.

Shade the wolf lay on the rug beside Will’s bed. His eyes were open. He had slept for so long in the dark of the Library that it may be he no longer had any need for sleep. When the boy stirred, or there was some unidentifiable creak or shuffle from somewhere in the house, his ears would twitch, but other than that, and his slow, steady breathing, he did not move. What thoughts wolves have, they generally keep to themselves. Or perhaps anyone who had seen him then would have said that the wolf
was
his thought, and that thought was watchfulness.

T
HEY SET OUT FOR APPLEYARD
before dawn the next day. As they were leaving the house, Pendrake gave Edweth its keys on a great iron ring.

“While I’m gone,” he said to her, “you will not clean my workshop.”

“Of course not, sir,” Edweth said, solemnly shaking her head.

The housekeeper put up a stern front as she bustled about, making sure that Will and Rowen’s packs contained everything they might need, without being too weighty. But as they said their farewells she gave both Rowen and Will a tight hug, and tears brimmed in her eyes. For the first time it occurred to Will that if his journey was successful, he would not be coming back here. He would never see this house, or Edweth, ever again. He had come to appreciate the housekeeper’s gruff good nature, and her cooking.

Finn met them at the doors of the Gathering House. This time he was wearing a long grey coat like the other knights-errant. As usual he had little to say, and only nodded to Will and Rowen without smiling. Will had seen knights coming and going on horseback, and he wondered out loud if that was how they were going to travel.