by Roger Taylor
'We might see something from up there,’ Farnor offered, pointing towards it.
Gryss looked at him thoughtfully. ‘Maybe,’ he said. He cast a glance at the others, watching him uneasily after Farnor's suggestion. ‘But it'll be too late to be going much further even if we do.’ He spoke to the watchers. ‘You head back. Start making arrangements for a round-up, and schooling yourselves to the idea of night watches. I'll go to the castle with Garren and these two.’ He nodded at Farnor and Marna. ‘Perhaps we can see something from there.'
There was no dispute and the group divided.
As he trudged slowly up the long slope to the castle, Farnor found himself next to Gryss while Garren and Marna walked ahead.
'What happened?’ Gryss asked bluntly.
'What do you mean?’ Farnor tried.
'What happened when you passed out?'
Farnor shrugged his shoulders and repeated his earlier explanation.
'You were neither winded nor stunned, young Farnor,’ Gryss declared. ‘And even if I didn't have the wits to see that, I've known you since before you were born and I certainly know when you're lying. Now what happened?'
'I don't know,’ Farnor said, after hesitating as long as he dared and taking refuge in a version of the truth. ‘I just remember feeling light-headed. As if I was far away but here at the same time. And then I was waking up with you all round me.'
Gryss looked at him narrowly but did not press his interrogation. Instead, he admitted his ignorance.
'Well,’ he said, ‘you're not cursed with the falling sickness, nor are any of your family. And you're too strong to be overcome by the sun and a little walking.’ He rubbed his chin. ‘And I'd swear you were dreaming. It was almost as if you were awake and just had your eyes closed.'
'I wasn't pretending!’ Farnor exclaimed, heatedly.
Gryss was taken aback at this response. ‘I know,’ he said both reassuringly and apologetically. ‘But I've never seen anything like it before. Can't you remember anything?'
Farnor suddenly wanted to spill out the strange contact he had had with the creature they were hunting, but even as the thought formed he rejected the idea. Besides, as time had passed, the incident had become less vivid in his mind. Perhaps indeed he had only been dreaming.
'No,’ he replied.
Gryss nodded resignedly and seemed to accept this answer as final, though Farnor sensed that in due course the incident would be returned to again. He knew Gryss's persistence and patience of old. For the nonce, however, they walked on in companionable silence until they reached the top of the slope. Garren was sitting on a rocky outcrop waiting for them while Marna was wandering over towards the castle.
'Go on,’ Gryss said to Farnor with a nod in her direction. ‘Have a look while you're here. It's an interesting place and I doubt you'll get much call to come up here in the normal course of events. Your father and I will see if we can spot our predator on its prowl.'
Farnor needed no urging and strode after Marna. Watching him, Gryss turned to Garren and spoke quietly.
'Keep an eye on him,’ he said. ‘I'm not quite sure what happened when he fell over, and he seems to be deliberately keeping something from me.'
Concern then irritation crossed Garren's face and he made as if to call after his son, but Gryss took his arm and directed his gaze back to the valley. ‘No, Garren,’ he said. ‘Leave him. He's no child any more. He can't be forced to do anything he doesn't want to do, at least not without hurting both of you. If he's choosing not to tell us something, then we'll have to trust his judgement. But you just watch him. If he looks like wanting to talk, you look as if you want to listen. Man to man. A friend rather than a father.'
Garren looked unconvinced. ‘He's child enough still,’ he said stiffly. ‘If he's keeping something from you I can get it out of him.'
'No,’ Gryss insisted. ‘Trust me in this, even if you can't trust him. You're too close to him to see what he's become. He's a good son, but you'll find you're dealing with someone near your equal if you try to lord it over him too much now. Besides, it may not be that important.'
Garren grimaced. ‘Well, what's all the fuss about then?’ he said testily. ‘You suddenly telling me how to bring up my own boy.’ Then, almost immediately repenting his manner, he raised an apologetic hand. ‘I'm sorry, that was rude of me,’ he said. ‘I think seeing him go down like that must have upset me more than I thought.’ The look of concern returned. ‘He's not ill, is he?'
Gryss sat down on the rock next to the farmer. ‘No,’ he said, wilfully using his healer's authority. ‘I'm sure he isn't ...'
There was an implication in his voice. Garren waited, then voiced it himself.
'But?'
Doubt came into the old man's eyes. ‘There's a strangeness in the air, Garren,’ he said. ‘I've sensed it ever since Farnor brought the news back about the sheep. And it seems to have been growing worse as the day's passed.'
Garren frowned, unsettled by this down-to-earth elder talking almost like Yonas the Teller. ‘What do you mean—strangeness?’ he asked.
Gryss gesticulated vaguely. ‘There's the extent of the damage that's been done to the sheep for one thing,’ he said. ‘I've never seen anything quite so bad before. And the dogs. They've scented something they really don't want to meet.'
'They're not stupid,’ Garren said. ‘They can probably tell better than we can that it's more than one dog and that they're wild to boot. A chase and a kill is one thing. Risking getting hurt is another.'
Gryss shook his head. ‘That would make them nervous, cautious. But you've been watching them. They grew quieter and quieter as we moved on, and when they smelled that fur ...’ He turned to Garren, his eyes piercing underneath his scruffy hair. ‘They were really frightened. Half a chance and they'd have been back down the valley at the run.'
Under the old man's gaze, Garren could not disagree.
'And it's not a pack, it's one animal,’ Gryss added definitively as he turned back to look out over the valley.
Garren stared at him in surprise. ‘You're very certain all of a sudden,’ he said.
'I'm very certain after some reflection,’ Gryss corrected. ‘I've been thinking about the size of the wounds in that sheep, and the way some of the big bones had been broken. It's one animal, and it's big.'
Still there was a hint of some unspoken concern in his voice that disturbed Garren.
'And?’ he ventured, almost in spite of himself.
Gryss frowned, as if wrinkling his forehead would squeeze an answer out of his troublesome thoughts.
'And there's Rannick,’ he went on. ‘What was he doing so far up the valley the other day? And why did he go beyond? And where is he now?'
Garren shrugged. ‘You said yourself he's irresponsible,’ he offered. ‘Besides he knew Farnor would tell us.'
'I said he was bad,’ Gryss corrected again. ‘And Farnor or not, it's still out of character for him not to tell us. For one thing, he enjoys bringing bad news and for another hunting is one of the few things he does with anything approaching enthusiasm.'
'He's no great loss,’ Garren said dismissively.
'Maybe,’ Gryss replied, half to himself. He fell silent and the sounds of the valley filled the warm air around the two men. Then he held out his hands and, looking at them, he seemed to reach a decision.
'But it's just one more ... strangeness,’ he said.
The word unsettled Garren once more.
Gryss went on, purposeful now. ‘Farnor was holding that piece of fur when he fell over, and when I took it from him it gave me the shudders. For an instant I felt something bad ... evil, almost.'
He appeared almost relieved, having spoken the words.
'I felt nothing,’ Garren said, after an awkward silence.
'It was only a brief impression, but it was very strong,’ Gryss said, adding, as if to a nervous patient, ‘I get similar flashes of certainty sometimes when I'm healing. I've always found it worthwh
ile to pay heed to them.'
The descent into explanation eased the tension that Garren had felt building within him, and, almost incongruously, he smiled. ‘What are you trying to say?’ he asked.
'I'm not sure,’ Gryss said. ‘I just have a feeling that there's a lot more to this sheep-worrier than meets the eye and that we'll have to be both craftier and more careful if we're going to catch it. Much more careful.'
The words that Gryss had spoken a few days ago, when Farnor had first brought the news, returned to Garren. ‘Don't send him out alone again, and don't go out alone yourself.’ For a moment he touched on the depths of Gryss's unease.
Wordless and indefinable though it might have been, it chilled him.
* * * *
Marna patted the stone wall and, holding herself close to it, looked up at the ramparts above. Suddenly she gave a little cry and jumped back, lifting her hand protectively.
Farnor, standing some way away, laughed.
'What are you doing?’ he asked.
Marna ignored the condescending taunt in his voice and beckoned him. ‘Come here, come here,’ she ordered. Then, seizing his arm, she dragged him forward and pushed him face first against the wall of the castle.
'Look up, look up!’ she insisted.
A strong arm kept him pressed against the wall, but he managed to turn his head round to give her a look full of suspicion.
'Up! Up!’ Marna said excitedly, pointing. Uneasily, Farnor did as he was told, gazing up the foreshortened perspective of the lichen-stained wall.
After a moment a cloud, brilliant white against the blue sky, passed overhead and began to disappear past the top of the wall. In direct imitation of Marna, Farnor let out a startled cry and jumped backwards as the wall seemed slowly but inexorably to lean forward towards him.
For some time they tested this phenomenon with a relish that was more befitting young people considerably their junior.
'It's so high,’ Marna said in some awe when the game had begun to pall a little. ‘It must be three or four times the height of the inn.'
'Even more than that,’ Farnor said, shading his eyes and squinting up at the battlements. The noise of battle rose around him. Overlain with the ringing tones of Yonas, men surged up unsteady ladders propped giddily against the walls only to be felled or overturned by the castle's valiant defenders. Swaying wooden siege towers were laboured forward under lethal cascades of arrows.
'Let's look at the gate,’ Marna said, cutting the thread of Farnor's burgeoning saga.
As they walked towards it, Farnor felt other impressions making their way through the dramatic clutter of the siege. The stones from which the walls had been built were old and weathered but they were also finely worked and very tightly jointed. He had heard a tale once of a general who had become separated from his army in the heat of battle to find himself trapped inside a walled city by a hastily closed gate. His men, on the outside, had been so enraged and distraught that they had driven spears into the joints of the wall and mounted these impromptu ladders to fall upon the enemy from above and rescue their leader.
Farnor ran his fingers along one of the fine masonry joints and peered again at the towering height above. The idea of such a feat made him shiver.
They moved to the gate. Over it was an arch held solid by an enormous keystone on which was carved an ancient coat of arms. Practicalities began to intrude into his imaginings.
How could they have lifted that? he wondered. Memories came back to him of the stone door lintels that he and his father and no small number of helpers had struggled to lift into position on a simple storehouse for a neighbour. There had been sweat, effort and bad language enough in that to last for a long time. Not to mention a narrow escape for someone's finger on at least one occasion and a crashing collapse on another. At times it had been for him a frightening and desperate affair with the lumbering weight of the stone seeming to have a relentless will of its own.
And as for the towers now soaring above them; they were so high. How could they have been built?
His attention turned to the huge double-leaved gate itself and he ran his hand over the long-seasoned wood. He imagined them crashing open to release a charging column of riders grimly intent on breaking a siege, but at the same time he marvelled at the size of the timbers and the skill with which they had been joined together. Where could trees be found that could provide such timbers? And where the men to hew and shape them? He thought of the rough beams that formed the ceilings and roofs of most of the village houses.
He came to a wicket door. What must this place be like on the inside?
'Impressive, isn't it?'
His father's voice intruded on his thoughts, though not harshly. Farnor turned and smiled. ‘I'd no idea it was so big,’ he said. ‘Whoever built this could have built all our houses and barns, even the inn, in an afternoon.'
Garren laughed. ‘A little longer than that, I suspect. This place probably took many years in the building, maybe several lifetimes, and doubtless it cost more than a few lives.’ He gazed at the battlements and the towers rising beyond them. ‘How are you feeling?’ he asked.
Farnor affected to be looking at the wicket door. ‘I'm fine,’ he replied casually. ‘Does this open?’ He pushed at a brass cover plate behind which was presumably a keyhole.
A hand reached out and restrained him. It was Gryss. ‘Quite possibly,’ he said. ‘But the keyholder, whoever he was, is long gone and entering this place without permission would be treated as an offence against the King's person. Best leave be.'
'Why is it so big?’ Marna asked.
'Time was when it held a garrison of several hundred men, so my grandfather used to say,’ Gryss replied.
Marna wrinkled her nose in dissatisfaction at this reply. ‘But why so many? In a place like this. At the end of a valley at the end of the Kingdom?'
Gryss waved a schoolmasterly hand. ‘Enough questions. Who am I to question the ways of kings? I shouldn't imagine for one moment that things have always been as quiet and peaceful as they are now. Certainly Yonas is never short of warlike tales to tell.’ The notion seemed to disturb him and he became almost brusque. ‘Anyway, from what I've seen of soldiers and their ilk, consider yourself more than fortunate that the castle is empty and locked.’ He glanced at the sun. ‘Come on. Time we were heading back.'
Marna seemed to be considering pursuing her questions, but Gryss's manner forbade it.
For a while they followed the old castle road back to the village, but it was overgrown with brambles in places and uniformly hard and uneven underfoot. Further, being intended for carts and wagons, it wound too leisurely a way round the contours of the route for the pleasure of the quartet, and very soon they cut off it and began walking across the steep grassland directly towards the village. They spoke little, each pondering the events that had occurred to make the present so radically different from what they might have expected at the outset of the day.
* * * *
Rannick moved cautiously forward. Following the lure of the creature, he had gradually dropped down from his high vantage and now found himself passing through increasingly dense woodland.
The eerie, tenuous contact he had made had been maintained constantly, a mutual anxiety keeping it whole. What part of it was guiding his feet he could not have said, but he knew that he was moving steadily towards his goal.
Occasionally, flutterings of doubt arose, urging caution. What was this creature he was so blithely breaking new ground to find? Judging from the sheep it had taken it was large and powerful, and hadn't he himself lured many animals into his traps with suitably tempting bait? And, should some ill fate befall him, then even assuming that the villagers would notice he was missing and be concerned enough to send out search parties, they would not even think to look for him out here.
But he dismissed such thoughts out of hand. The need of the creature for him was beyond doubt, as was his certainty that he could master it when finally the
y met. And, too, he conceded that there was a desperate recklessness in his behaviour. This creature knew and used the power that he possessed; something he had never known before. True, he had sensed occasional, flickering sparks of contact at times, even when he had been in the village, but these were rare and fleetingly elusive, and could have been nothing more than imagination. But this was not. This was as real and solid as the mountains themselves. This, he knew, was the key to his future greatness and it was better to die contending for that than to shrivel and die like an autumn leaf within the stultifying confines of the valley.
He glanced around. There was little to be seen; the trees obscured almost everything save the sky. But he knew that he was well beyond the castle, and he felt a brief frisson of alarm as childhood memories rose to the surface. He had long grown used to wandering in parts of the valley that were not commonly used by the villagers, such as the far downland where he had met travellers from over the hill, or upland, around the castle, where most of the villagers were almost too afraid to tread.
But here was beyond where even he had trodden before. Here was the region where the caves were said to lie, with their deep, winding tunnels and, so the tales had it, the chambers where lay ancient, evil creatures. Creatures from a time long dead. Creatures that were sleeping until ... until when?
Now?
He ignored the question, but he paused for a moment and looked around again. He was hot, tired and thirsty, but he could not rest. He had an inner momentum that was carrying him forward inexorably. Nothing would stop him now until he had reached ... whatever it was that was calling him.
He shrugged off the discomfort and strode on. There would probably be a stream across his path where he could pause to cool himself and take a drink.
Soon, however, he found that he was moving upwards again. The terrain became steeper and rockier and the trees less dense, then, quite suddenly, he was at the edge of the trees and clambering awkwardly along a scree slope, a sheer rock face looming above him to his right and a view over an unfamiliar tree canopy to his left. Looking back, he could make out the taller towers of the castle rising above a ridge on the far side of the valley. He had come much further than he thought.
