Nocturne

by Louise Cooper

  “Ah, my little singer of songs. The Mother has touched you with Her gift.” The well-remembered voice, strong despite his years and his failing health, echoed ghostly in Indigo’s mind. “Were you not royal and destined for greater things, what a bard you might have been. Play for me, my singer, my princess. Play for Cushmagar, that he might see again the beauty and the grief of our beloved islands, through your hands.”

  Tears crept between Indigo’s closed eyelids and began to trickle down her cheeks. Her heart seemed to swell, as though it might burst; she felt a choking in her throat, felt her lips form the old man’s name …

  Forth’s soft exclamation and the sound came together, as a cascade of music rippled from the harp and rang out across the bleak moorland. Indigo’s teeth sank hard into her lower lip, and a sound like a sob escaped her as the melody in her mind meshed and merged with the music of her harp. The image of Cushmagar smiled and nodded once more, and an ancient, gnarled hand came up in a quiet gesture that urged and encouraged her.

  “The harp and the pipe, my little singer. Now the harp and the pipe together.” The voice whispered down the corridors of her mind, and even as Cushmagar’s shade stopped speaking, the thin, eldritch thread of a reed-pipe blended with the harp’s melody. Shocked, Indigo opened her eyes, and saw Forth with the pipe raised to his lips, eyes tight shut, oblivious to everything but the music.

  Cushmagar! Her thoughts rioted. You—

  “I’am here, my princess. While you remember me, I will always be with you. Play on, dear one. Play on.”

  Stunned beyond hope of understanding, Indigo clung desperately to the music’s thrall. They had breached the barrier; they had broken the spell of the demon world and imposed their own reality. They must not let it slip from them now!

  And then, through eyes blurred by the tears that she couldn’t control, she saw that the nightscape around them was changing.

  Where there had been nothing but the black, barren moor, a new land was beginning to take form. She glimpsed trees, their leaves quivering as though in a capricious breeze, ghostly as yet but growing stronger and more tangible. She saw the glint of rushing water, and beyond it a vista of tall, aloof crags, black against the sky’s pewter and cloaked with bushes and rocky outcrops. She saw a path, winding up through the crags, glowing faintly as though its phosphorescence was a guide for the traveler …

  Very slowly, still playing with the harp tucked in the crook of her arm, Indigo rose to her feet. As she did so, a breath of cool air blew against her face, and her nostrils flared as they caught a sweet-sour smell, like decaying flowers. Forth, alerted by her movement, opened his eyes; the sharp stiffening of his shoulders confirmed that he too had seen the transformation, but he had the presence of mind to continue piping.

  Decaying flowers … the smell assailed Indigo again; she thought of rank, neglected gardens, old gates rusting and forgotten, and hard on the heels of that image came recollection of the face reflected in the glowing pool. The garden in which that face had appeared had been a thing of beauty; but instinct told Indigo that the loveliness had been only a mask, and that beneath the mask lay corruption.

  Dead flowers, and the sea pounding, eroding the rock, imposing its will … she would break through. She would.

  “Ahh!” Triumph and vindication formed the exclamation, as Indigo saw at last what lay at the end of the path leading up into the crags. A gate of iron scrollwork, tall and narrow, set between two rock faces; beyond the gate the unfocused shifting of leaves in the twilight. And the moorland was fading, the new vista becoming more solid and more real with every moment.

  Forth paused in his playing and said softly, “Mother of All Life …”

  “Don’t stop,” Indigo warned him. “We must hold on to it.” She began to walk forward. The harp made her movements awkward, but she dared not trust this new reality, not yet; if they lost the hold their music had imposed, it might slip away. All around them the changes were intensifying; she could hear the night wind in the trees now, see their dark trunks taking form in a graceful avenue to either side of them. They walked on a smooth sward, no longer entirely black but tinged here and there with green, and leading down to the water she had glimpsed, which had now resolved into a bright, fast-running river.

  “There’s a bridge.” She nodded, unable to point, to where a narrow, rustic span arched over the water to meet the path on the far side.

  Forth took his lips from the pipe briefly. “Our packs—” he said.

  “Gather what you can; but don’t stop playing for longer than you have to. And bring my crossbow—we may need it.” She watched as swiftly he swung one of the three packs over his shoulder together with the two extra waterskins and crossbow and bolts. The doubt in his eyes was being rapidly overtaken by an excitement that matched her own, and, acting on intuition, she began to change the melancholy strains of Cregan’s Farewell to the quicker, harder lilt of Annemora, a walking-song from her homeland’s north-western hills. Forth listened alertly for a moment then followed suit, piping with new confidence as he recognized the tune, which had become a favorite with the Brabazon Fairplayers. Unconsciously falling into step with the tune’s rhythm, they quickened their pace over the sward, and—if she’d paused to consider, Indigo thought later, her blood would have desiccated at the idea of such recklessness—stepped together on to the bridge.

  The span wasn’t a phantasm. Instead, they felt the solid assurance of wood beneath their feet, and heard the tramp of their footfalls vying with the river’s rush as they crossed over the torrent and, light-headed with their triumph, scrambled from the bridge on to the path beyond.

  The barrier was broken. In crossing the bridge they had cracked the outer shell of illusion, and passed through into a deeper level of the demon world. There might be more such barriers to overcome, more shells to break; but whatever happened now, Indigo knew in her bones that this new landscape wouldn’t shiver and fade and vanish. The moor and its emptiness were gone for good.

  Tentatively, she began to damp the sound of the harp, slowing her fingers, softening the notes with the heels of her hands. As the sound faded she watched her surroundings, holding her breath tautly in case her intuition should be wrong; but the river and the crags and the path remained, and at last Indigo allowed the harp to fall silent. For a few moments the notes of Forth’s pipe rose reedy and eldritch above the river’s bright noise; then he, too, ceased playing, and in the comparative silence they looked at each other.

  A snort of laughter from Forth abruptly released them both from the thrall.

  “Goddess preserve us—we’ve done it! Indigo, we’ve done it!” Careless of her harp’s safety he covered the ground between them in one stride and flung his arms around her, crushing her in a bear-hug. Indigo laughed too, and hugged him in return as best she could; he kissed her cheek, then in a rush of emotion tried to find her mouth with his lips. Quickly she turned her head aside, and they broke apart in a confusion of exclamation and further laughter. Yet although the embrace was innocent enough, and she had been able to draw back without causing offence or hurt, Indigo knew that it would have taken only the smallest encouragement to tip the balance, in Forth’s mind, between comradeship and something far more complex.

  You know, don’t you, that Forth’s in love with you? Esty’s sharp, sly words at the poolside came back to her. She did know it: she’d known it for a long time, long before the shadow of Bruhome fell across her happy hiatus. Amid the cheerful chaos of the Brabazons’ communal life it had been easy to evade the issue and any tensions it might otherwise have created; but here the situation was altogether different. So far she had had no need to keep Forth at arm’s length; she only hoped that, without Esty’s presence to stand between them, Forth’s attitude would not begin to change.

  She pushed the thought hastily away: for the moment there were other and more immediate matters to concern them both. They stood at the foot of a winding track that zigzagged its way up the clifflike crags, th
rough the stands of scrubby bushes and stunted trees which clung to the rock faces, on and up to the distant gate, which from here was invisible amid the overhanging tangle.

  Forth was eyeing the path. “It looks an easy enough climb,” he said. “More of a walk, really.” His gaze roamed to the rock faces on either side of the track. “Funny: it reminds me of somewhere, though I can’t quite place it … oh, but I can!” He snapped his fingers as memory came. “Do you remember that abandoned quarry on the edge of the fells, before we reached Bruhome? Where the stone had been cut away like steps, and the shrub had grown back and greened the cliffs over?”

  “Yes.” Now Indigo, too, saw the peculiar resemblance. The quarry rocks had been pale where these were black, and the trees a spectacular blend of green and autumnal gold instead of the dour near black of the foliage clothing these cliffs. But otherwise, they might have been gazing at the selfsame landscape.

  Except, she reminded herself, for the path, and the wrought-iron gate that waited mysteriously at the path’s end.

  She returned her harp to its bag and took the crossbow and the two spare waterskins from Forth, settling them on her back. Forth was staring at the path again, and as they readied themselves to begin the climb, he said, “What do you think we’ll find up there?”

  Indigo shook her head. “I don’t want to speculate.” She smiled at him, but a little grimly. “We both know the power of illusion, after all. I’m going to think only of finding Esty—and, I pray, the others.”

  Forth didn’t comment. They were both haunted by the memory of the sleepwalking woman’s grotesque end, and dreaded that, entranced and helpless as she was, Chari might suffer the same fate. But, perhaps superstitiously, neither wanted to voice the fears they shared, and the subject was carefully avoided as, sobered now after the first flush of their success, they set off up the twisting, uneven track.

  As Forth had predicted, the climb wasn’t arduous. Indeed, the meandering progress of the path meant that the incline was relatively gentle, and as they ascended Indigo was struck by the wealth of minute detail which seemed to exist here, in acute contrast with the unnatural barrenness of the moor. Small stones and twigs and dust littered the path; random clumps of seeding grasses and even the occasional wild flower grew wherever a gap in the bushes granted them room. And, for the first time since leaving the real world, the night air was stirred by natural breezes that chilled her skin. This level of the demon dimension might be as illusory as the last, but here it seemed that the illusions at least bore a closer resemblance to reality. Only one incongruity struck a discordant note: there were no creatures abroad, no small, busy rustlings in the undergrowth; nothing to suggest the presence of any sentient life other than their own.

  They continued to ascend, not talking but simply peering about them with a mixture of fascination and wary caution. Looking back briefly, Indigo was surprised to see that they’d already climbed a considerable way; the river was a pale and phosphorescent ribbon far below them, inaudible now, and the trees and the sward beyond had merged into a blur of darkness. The effect was eerie and oddly captivating, and she stood gazing down, until Forth, who had gone on ahead and vanished round a sharp bend in the path, gave a sudden shout that made her start and turn.

  “Indigo! Up here!” He sounded excited, and Indigo hurried after him. Scrambling round the curve and almost missing her footing in her haste, she pulled up sharply as she saw what awaited them less than twenty yards ahead.

  Set into a stone wall that blended almost perfectly with the more natural rock around it was the iron gate. And beyond the gate, like a strange oasis in a desert, lay the garden, with its graceful, sweeping trees and immaculately tended lawns, that she had seen reflected in the pool on the moor.

  Forth murmured softly under his breath; it might have been a prayer or an imprecation. “Look at it,” he said, awed. “It’s hardly credible.” He started to walk the last few paces to the gate, and Indigo followed. Closer to, the scrub cleared to reveal that the path did not in fact end at the wall, but divided, forking away left and right along a broad ledge, finally to disappear round the curve of the cliff. The gate stood precisely at the fork, and Forth, approaching, reached out to touch it with a tentative hand. When nothing untoward happened—the gate didn’t vanish, and didn’t burn him—he took a firmer hold and shook the iron framework gently.

  “It won’t open.” He bent to examine the gate more closely. “There must be a lock of some kind, though I can’t see it. Only a latch, but the latch won’t move.”

  Indigo, too, moved forward to study the gate. It shone with the faint patina of newly-forged metal, as though it had been made and set into place only that day. Another facet of the illusion? She recalled the whiff of decayed flowers that had come to her on the breeze as the moorland faded to reveal this new vista, and gazed more keenly through the gate’s bars at the garden. Tiny flowers glimmered on the smooth lawn, leaves trembled and reflected rippling patterns of light as the trees stirred; it seemed a lovely and peaceful place. But she reminded herself again that perhaps this surface beauty was like a clean dressing that hid a festering wound; purity laid deceptively over utter corruption.

  “I might be able to climb it.” Forth’s voice broke in on her thoughts, and she saw that he had stepped back a pace to look critically at the top of the gate. “There aren’t many footholds, but if you made a back for me I think I could do it. Then I could pull you up after me.”

  Indigo shook her head. “I don’t like the idea, Forth. We don’t know what’s in there; and if we need to climb back in a hurry …”

  “Yes, yes; I take your point. But have you got a better suggestion?”

  She bent to peer at the latch. “Did you bring the lantern?”

  “Yes. It’s attached to my pack.”

  “Let’s try to kindle it. If we have some light we can see if there’s a way of opening the gate.”

  Forth started to say, “But the lantern won’t—” then stopped. “Ah. Of course. This time, it might.”

  “Exactly.” Indigo brought the tinderbox from her belt-pouch, and they crouched over the lantern. Concentrate, she thought, and saw an equally fierce determination in Forth’s eyes. We can do it. We created music: we can create light.

  And Forth yelped with delight as the candle-wick caught and flickered into life. He hastily closed the lantern, and they watched in tense but eager silence as slowly, as though unsure of itself and a little reluctant, the tiny flame grew larger, brighter, and light began to spill through the glass.

  “The flame’s still blue, though,” Indigo said after a few moments.

  “No, it isn’t.” Forth shook his head in empathic denial; the new lamplight made his eyes glint. “It’s whatever we want it to be. And I say we want it to be yellow as any natural candle.” As he spoke, the flame flickered. Then, to Indigo’s surprise and delight, the cold, steel-blue glimmer was replaced by a warmer gold.

  “You see?” Forth grinned at her over the lantern. “We’re learning fast. And I’m beginning to wonder just what else we might achieve if we put our minds to it.” He straightened and turned back to the gate. “Like this, for example. I think we both expected it to be locked; it’s what anyone might anticipate. But the hinges aren’t rusted. Others have gone through before us, or so we believe. So if it opened for them—” He reached out: but before he could touch the gate, Indigo gave a sharp hiss.

  “Forth, wait! Listen!”

  “What is it?”

  “Ssh!” She raised a hand quickly, and stepped closer to him. Her voice was a barely audible whisper as she added, “There’s something moving on the path.”

  Forth tensed and peered into the gloom, listening alertly. For a few moments he heard nothing, and was about to say so when suddenly there came the unmistakable rustle of disturbed leaves. Instantly he reached for his knife; and closing his hand round the hilt he heard the slide of metal on metal as Indigo slid a bolt into her crossbow.

  Silence. The
ir gazes met briefly, tense, fearful. Indigo mentally cursed the lantern, which had suddenly become an enemy rather than a friend; its light intensified the outer darkness, hindering their eyes and blinding them to what might otherwise be visible.

  The bushes rustled again, closer this time, and Indigo realized with an unpleasant shock that more than one creature was approaching, and from more than one direction.

  And then in the dark there were eyes.

  Forth hissed an oath, and caught hold of her arm, drawing her back against the gate. Looking wildly from right to left, Indigo saw what he had already seen: they were all but encircled. Eyes glowed on the path’s forks, on the track they had climbed, among the scrub—there must have been twenty or more of the unknown creatures staring at them, unblinking and feral.

  “The gate!” Forth’s breath was hot against her ear. “It’s our only way of escape. We’ve got to will it to open!”