The Witch of Glenaster (18 page)

The howling came sudden and
unexpected as we rose the next morning, and was over almost as soon as it
began; but I think it sent a chill through all of us, and especially Samuel,
whose face was grey, like an invalid’s, and whose eyes seemed to dance in their
sockets, like a frightened animal’s.

Fyn dismounted, and ran a
little way back into the forest, while Griffin and Lukas tried to calm the
horses, who were pawing at the ground with their feet.

“Fyn! What do you see?” cried
Thomas, but the younger man had rounded a bend, and was out of sight.

I felt my heart lurching inside
my ribs, and a sick rushing of blood in my ears, as I sat there, and we waited
for Fyn to return. He seemed to be gone a good while; and I pushed my face
against the canvas at the back of the waggon, peeping my head through the gap,
a mist of early morning rain breezing coolly on my skin.

Then he reappeared, breathing
hard, running back towards us, the others looking at him expectantly, scanning
his face for trouble. He shook his head.

“Couldn’t see anything,” he
gasped, and Griffin handed him his canteen, and he took a deep draught. “But
there are some strange tracks, a little way off into the trees. Could just be
an animal…” He shrugged, drank some more.

“Will would’ve known what they
were,” muttered Joseph, and I saw his hand stray to his dagger, and rest there
a good while. Thomas looked at Fyn, and said nothing. Lukas stood by the
horses, also silent. And Samuel continued to stare, his fingers working at the
air, before he realized what he was doing, and fished them into his pockets.

At last Thomas gave the order
for us to move on. But as we advanced through the forest, we heard more strange
sounds - whispering and rustling and humming - and I saw everyone keep a close
eye on Samuel, especially Joseph.
They fear him
, I thought.

The relentless darkness began
to sap at our will, so that even Magnus and I wearied of talk, and spent most
of the day drifting in and out of sleep. By the day’s end, we were all
exhausted.

Soon after dusk we had come
across an old cabin, about half a mile from the road, with a track leading up
to it. And so we decided to make our camp there for the night, with two people
at a time on watch, and a perimeter marked around the house by torches, driven
roughly into the ground by Lukas and Griffin. The cabin was rudely furnished
inside, and looked as if it had been abandoned on a sudden, for there were
plates and cutlery set out as if for a meal, and the place did not look long
deserted. Thomas found a room with beds, and brought the rugs from the waggon,
and settled my brother and
I
into them.

“You’ll be safe here tonight,”
he said, and then pulled the door to.

Not completely, however. It had
been left open a sliver, and I was able, after a few moments, with my brother
soon fast asleep, to pad over to the door, and listen to what the men were
saying, just across the hallway in the living room.

They were discussing Samuel.

“Where is he?”

“Outside, with Lukas and his
brother. They’re watching him.”

A creak, as someone sat down.

“It’s a bad business, Tom.”

“Nevertheless, it may be
necessary.”

“I cannot think Joseph will
forgive us…”

“If it is to happen, he will
have to be the one to do it.”

The wind sighed. I thought I
heard the howling again, somewhere far off.

“Will he?”

“He may have to. We will have
to spend at least one more night in the forest. We cannot turn back: we know
the Watchers are after us now. And Samuel may be under their spell. Our only
hope is to reach the Meer the day after tomorrow. If we can get to the Green
Cities, we will be safe there for the time being.”

Another pause, and someone lit
a pipe. The smoke swam hazily out through the door, along the hallway, and into
my nostrils, thick and dark. It made me want to retch.

“And what about the girl,
Thomas? And her brother? You insisted on bringing them along, against my better
judgement. I have never questioned your orders before, but I cannot help but
feel she is a bad curse on us. Her home lies to the south. That is where she
belongs. We only have her word on who she is, or where she’s come from.”

I leaned against the frame of
the door, tried to quiet my breathing. But it sounded like a knell in my head.

“No one was forced to come on
this journey,
Griff
. In the end, it is my duty alone.
I only asked the rest of you to join me.”

“And we did so, gladly; for you
have saved each of our lives times beyond count. But this girl…”

“Is under my protection.
There’s an end to it. Besides - I think it was more than chance that brought
her and her brother across my path that day…”

Griffin sighed, and Thomas
laughed a little.

 “I know, I know - you
have no patience with old wives’ tales, and neither do I, except… People said
the Witch was a myth, didn’t they, before she awoke? And the fire-drakes, too.
And who would question their existence now?”

“But you are speaking of a
prophecy so old no one even knows who made it. And it says the Witch fears no
one: no man, or woman…”

“Yet it also says that one born
of woman will destroy her. That can only mean a child,
Griff
- a child will destroy the Witch…”

There was a pause, and silence
reigned in the room for a while. Then Griffin said:

“And you think this child - she
is the one to do it…?”

“I don’t know. It sounds like
madness. I only thought, or hoped… Whatever I hoped, we will leave her and her
brother in the Cities, where they’ll be safe. They would die in
Glenaster
.”

“First we have to make it to
the Cities alive. Better pray God is on our side, like it always says He is, in
the Histories…”

Both men laughed quietly, and
were silent after that.

I crept back to bed then, and
pondered what had been said; and when Magnus awoke, and badgered me with sleepy
questions, I shushed him back to sleep. And there I fell myself, soon after, my
eyelids curling over my sight, and into oblivion.

I dreamt of stars.

They floated like birds across
the canvas of the night, now swooping, now blinking, some sparkling, some
plain, but all beautiful to my eye, as it searched the heavens for a light I
recognized, a light that could lead me home.

And then the stars became like
great eyes - unwinking, sorrowful - and I was drawn deeper into their gaze, the
still heartbeat of the dark murmuring in my ear, and soothing away my fears.

And then the eyes seemed to
change, forming themselves into larger shapes - eyes in a face, a face of
blackness staring down at me - and I felt suddenly afraid, and cold, and wanted
to stop looking; but I couldn’t, and they bore into me, relentless, and I saw
that there were two – no,
three
– three eyes, two in the middle of the
face, whose features I could not discern, and the third above them, set crudely
in the forehead…

The Third Eye.

I must have cried out, for
Thomas was immediately in the room, sword drawn, and Magnus was staring dumbly
at me, shook from sleep. But there was no one else there; though when I told
them my dream, the men searched the room and around the cabin, but found
nothing.

The night had been a quiet one,
except for the howling and other sounds in the forest, which I suppose we had
got used to, insofar as we could. Even Samuel had slept, watched closely by
Fyn, who I heard later describing the strange words he had uttered before he
awoke. And all of us were somewhat shaken as we emerged into the light – such
as it was in that dreary place – and, after breakfasting on dry bread, set off
again, back to the road.

Though the horses had rested,
they seemed almost as weary as us, and we found it heavy going as the morning
wilted towards noon, and our progress was slow. I could see Thomas’s face, pale
and tired; he seemed to have aged many years since that night in
Ampar
, when the fire-slaves had attacked, and left his
friend, Will Bowyer, for dead, and maybe Stefano too. My eyes stung when I
thought of the old man.

I thought also of what had
passed between Thomas and Griffin the night before. So there could be no doubt
anymore. They were going to kill the Witch. Did they seek revenge, like me, I wondered?
Since we had met, I had thought, in my childlike way, that Thomas Taper was too
noble, too decent a creature to be driven by such a desire. I laugh now when I
think of my naivety. I knew nothing, and, worse, I cared little for my
ignorance.

It was early in the afternoon
when we came upon the village.

Lukas saw it first, coming to a
dead halt, away ahead, his mount as still as he was,
the
pair of them sniffing drily at the wind. Then he rode on a little way, around a
shallow bend, and when we caught up with him we saw what had caught his
attention; for before us, set in a slight dip in a clearing to one side of the
road, lay the parched remains of a small settlement – a few houses at most –
now razed to the ground by a flame so all-consuming and sudden it seemed the
inhabitants had hardly had time to raise the alarm.

Thomas and Griffin dismounted
from their horses, and led them gingerly towards Lukas, who hadn’t moved.
Joseph had brought the waggon to a stop, and behind us, Fyn came riding up,
looking now ahead, now back, always watchful. Samuel could hardly contain his
anxiety; his twitching and muttering had now grown even worse, and he hardly
even tried to disguise them now. His brother stared straight ahead, his face
unreadable.

Magnus and I peeped out through
the front of the waggon, and what we saw reminded us so much of our own home
that it was hard to bear. For the sight of the village, as it once had been,
was a fearful one.

It was not the buildings
themselves, burned and twisted though they were, that was truly horrifying; nor
was it the carpet of ash that skipped and danced in the wind; nor, even, was it
the dreadful sight of the people – some like withering statues, scorched as
they ran, most others burned where they were, clutching their loved ones
hopelessly; nor, finally, was it the stench, of cooked meat and charcoal, which
filled the air. Worse than all of this - and the realization that this atrocity
had been visited upon these people only recently, perhaps only days ago - was
the terrible, keening, faint but clear
singing
that rose above the
scene, and made us all shiver in the grey half-light of the forest. I thought
again of the guardsman who had appeared at our door, seven years, and a
lifetime, ago, and how he had described the Watchers he had seen on the White
Mountain: their terrible appearance, and the awful, mocking singing of their
voices, murmuring in his head and driving him half-mad. It seemed we had come
to the very edge of reason itself.

We gawped dumbly for a while,
but then Lukas turned his horse, and trotted back along the muddy track to
Thomas, and the two of them, and Griffin, spoke together. Then Griffin
signalled to Joseph, and to Fyn, and we were on our way again, the waggon
sliding through the moss and mud past the village, where I saw one of the dead
standing with his arm outstretched, as if entreating us from beyond the grave.
We ignored him, and carried on.

The singing, though, continued,
and Samuel’s condition deteriorated to such an extent that more than once we had
to stop to calm him down, and on one occasion he vomited copiously by the side
of the road, and had to be helped up by his brother.

“What’s wrong with him?”
whispered Magnus to me. “Is he dying?”

“I don’t know, little one,” I
said, pulling gently at the hair that now grew long and unkempt over his eyes.
“Thomas says we’ll be able to get help for him soon.” But I felt the emptiness
of these words even as I uttered them. I knew – we all knew – that Samuel was
beyond human aid.

The singing drifted with us through
the air as we travelled along, and there was a subtle change in pitch with the
passing of the hours which suggested it was growing nearer. Certainly
everything else pointed that way: Samuel’s behaviour, of course, but also the
increasing unrest of the horses, and the sense that the forest, dark enough
even at the height of day, was getting darker still as we passed through it.

Thomas had assured us we were
over halfway through by now, and would be crossing the River Meer by late
morning of the following day; but I feared something terrible would befall us
before then, and Magnus and I huddled closer together in the back of the
waggon. There was still another night to get through.

As evening came, we made camp a
little way from the road, screened from it by thick fir trees, but able to see
if anyone was passing along it. Thomas and Griffin took first watch, sometimes
talking, but mostly silent; and the singing feasted on our ears and worried at
our minds.

Joseph was always watching his
brother, and when he fell asleep Fyn took over, and while he watched he
whittled anxiously at a stick, till it was shaved to nothing. I waltzed in and
out of sleep, my brother beside me, gathering what warmth we could from the
blankets in the waggon, and the remains of the fire.

It was well past midnight and
into the early hours, when a cry came from outside, not far from where we lay.
I had struggled to the front of the waggon before I was even fully awake, and
as my eyes regained their focus I caught a glimpse of something - a figure -
running past the fire, which blinked as his shape fell across it. I wriggled
into my boots and trousers, my toes still numb with cold as I clambered, hardly
thinking, from the waggon, and out into the clearing.

My first sight was of Fyn, stood
in profile, the fire casting a dancing shadow over his face, and in his hand a
sword. He did not notice me at first, but seemed to be listening; and when he
did turn and see me, did not order me back into the waggon as I had expected
but simply stared at me a moment, saying quietly:

“Esther, it’s you. I think I
have killed Samuel.”

And he turned his face back
towards the road.

After a moment, Lukas and
Griffin came striding towards us, and Lukas put a hand on Fyn’s shoulder when
he saw him.

“Esther,” said Griffin,
surprised. “What are you doing out of bed?” I shifted in my unlaced shoes.

“I heard a noise,” I said. “At
first I thought it was in my dream, but…”

“It was not in your dream,”
said another voice, and I realized it belonged to Thomas, who had now appeared
close behind the other men. He turned to Lukas, and asked, nodding to Fyn: “Is
he all right?”

Lukas looked hard at the
younger man, nodded, yes; and I saw Thomas relax a little.

“Give him some whisky,” he
said. Lukas nodded again, sat Fyn down,
gave
him the
drink. Griffin rubbed his face absently.

“Did you see him?” he asked
Thomas, who was saddling up his horse.

“He won’t get far,” Thomas
replied. “He was bleeding heavily.”

He climbed on to his horse,
moved out towards the road.

“Are you sure that’s wise?”
asked Lukas, without looking up from tending to Fyn.

“I have to be sure,” replied
Thomas. “For Joseph’s sake.” And he ducked beneath the branches, and was soon
lost in the darkness.

“Where
is
Joseph?” I
asked, after a few moments. Fyn turned his sad eyes on me.

“The Watchers took him,” he
said. And then he started to weep, and I turned my face away, lest he felt
humiliated to have a young girl witness his grief. And we stood together for
long minutes, silent, the fierce moon decorating the branches above our heads.
And suddenly I noticed what was missing.

The singing had stopped.