The woman shook her head. "I have never heard the like," she said. "And who, may I ask, are you?"
"Ma" am, I am Duncan of the House of Standish."
"Of Standish House? Then why are you not at Standish House rather than out here in the fen harassing inoffensive dragons?"
"Madam," he said evenly, "I can't imagine how you fail to know, but since you don't, I'll tell you. Your inoffensive dragons are the most bloodthirsty raveners I have ever happened on. Further I will tell you that while we had the right good will to harass them handsomely, it was not we who really did the job. We were too worn out from the crossing of the fen to do it creditably. It was the Wild Huntsman who put the run on them."
They looked at one another, questions in their faces.
"I told you," said one of the others who stood behind the one who had been speaking. "I told you I heard the Huntsman and the baying of his hounds. But you said that I was wrong. You said the Huntsman had not the hardihood to approach this island, to interfere with us and the work that we are doing."
"Your work," said Duncan, "is something in which I have some interest. You are the wailers for the world?"
"Young Standish," said the spokeswoman, "this is something with which you should not concern yourself. The mysteries in which we are engaged is not a subject to be pondered by mortals. It is bad enough that your earthly feet have violated the sacred soil on which you stand."
"And yet," said one of the others, "we are able to forgive you your sacrilege. We extend, symbolically, our hospitality. We have brought you food."
She stepped forward and placed the basket that she carried on the path. The other two set their baskets down beside it.
"You can eat it with no fear," said the one who had first set down the basket. "There is no poison in it. It is wholesome, solid food. There is enough natural misery in this world. We do not need, of ourselves, to compound it further."
"You should be the ones who know," said Duncan, not realizing until he'd said it how ungracious it must sound.
They did not answer him and seemed about to go, but he made a motion asking them to stay.
"One thing," he said. "Have you by any chance, seen from your vantage point upon the island, any evidence of the Horde of Harriers?"
They stared at him in wonder, then one of them said, "This is silly, sisters. Certainly he must know about the Horde. This deep in the Desolated Land, he must be well aware of them. So why don't we answer him?"
"It can do no harm," said the spokeswoman. "There is nothing he, nor anyone, can do. The Horde, Sir Duncan, lies just across the fen, on the western shore, a short distance from this place. They must know that you are coming, for they've formed into a swarm, although why they should swarm for the likes of you is more than I can understand."
"A defensive swarm?" asked Duncan.
The spokeswoman asked sharply, "How do you know about defensive swarms?"
Duncan laughed at her.
"Save your laughter, young man," she told him. "If you cross that stretch of water to face them your laughter will be out of the other corner of your mouth."
"And if we go back," said Duncan, "your precious dragons will be the death of us."
"You're obnoxious and ill-mannered," said one of the three, "to speak thus of friends of ours."
"Friends of yours?"
"Why, most certainly," said one of them. "The dragons are our puppydogs, and without the Horde, through all the centuries, there'd be less misery in the world."
"Less misery…" And then he understood. Not a confessional to ease the pain and supply the comfort, not an exorcism of fear and terror, but a reveling in the misery of the world, rolling happily in the distress and sadness as a dog would roll in carrion.
"Vultures," he said. "She-vultures." And was sick of heart.
Christ, was there anything that was decent left?
Nan, the banshee, keened for the widow in her humble cottage, for the mother who had lost her child, for the old and weary, for the sick, for the abandoned of the world, and whether the keening was of help or not, it was meant to help. Nan and her sister banshees were the mourners for those who had no others who would mourn for them.
But these—the wailers for the world, who walled either by themselves or by a more extensive sisterhood or by means of some infernal machine that made modulated wailing sounds—he caught the vision of some great complicated piece of machinery with someone turning a long and heavy crank to produce the wailing—these used the misery of the world; they sucked it in and funneled it to this place where they wanted it to be, and there they luxuriated in it, there they rolled in it and smeared themselves with it, as a hog would bury itself in repulsive filth.
The three had turned about and were going up the path, and he waved an angry arm at them.
"Filthy bitches," he said, but he said it underneath his breath, for it would do no good to yell at them—no harm, perhaps, but no good, either—and they were not the ones he should be concerned about. They were filth that one passed by, filth that one stepped around and tried not to notice. His concern lay beyond this island.
He stepped forward swiftly and, lifting the baskets one by one, hurled them out into the waters of the fen.
"We gag upon your hospitality," he told, between clenched teeth, the women walking up the path. "We need no crusts of bread you toss to us. We damn you all to Hell."
Then he turned about and went down the path. Scratch and Conrad were sitting side by side upon the ledge on which they'd slept.
"Where are the others?" he asked.
"The hermit and the witch have gone to bring in Beauty's pack," said Scratch. "They spotted it. It had been floating in the water and came to shore just down the beach. There may be something in it still fit to eat."
"How are you feeling?" Duncan asked Conrad.
The big man grinned at him. "The fever's gone. The arm feels better. Some of the swelling's down and the pain is not as bad."
"Milady," said Scratch, "went off in that direction." He made a thumb to show the way she'd gone. "She said something about spying out the land. Before I woke you up. She has been gone for quite some time."
Duncan looked at the sky. The sun was halfway down from noon. They had slept a good part of the daylight hours away.
"You stay here," he said. "When the others come in keep them here as well. I'll go and find Diane. That way, you said."
The demon nodded, grinning.
"If there's anything to eat," said Duncan, "eat it. We must be on our way. We have no time to lose."
"M" lord," said Conrad, "you plan to beard the Horde?"
"There's nothing else to do," said Duncan. "We have no other choice. We can't go back and we can't stay here. This island is an abomination."
Conrad grinned wolfishly. "I shall be close beside you when we go in," he said. "I need but one arm to swing a club."
"And I as well," said Scratch. "Snoopy was right in what he said in giving me the pitchfork. Appropriate, he said. And it is that. It fits my hands as if it had been made for me."
"I'll see you soon," said Duncan.
He found Diane on a small headland that overlooked the fen, back the way they'd come. She was sitting on a small rocky upthrust and turned her head when she heard his step behind her.
"Is it time to go?" she asked.
"Almost," he said. "In just a little while."
"I don't know," she said. "This facing of the Horde…"
"There's something I must tell you," he said. "Something I must show you. I should have long ago."
He put his hand into the pouch at his belt, took out the talisman and held it out to her.
She drew her breath in sharply, put out a hand toward it and then threw back the hand.
"Wulfert" s?" she asked.
He nodded.
"How did you get it? Why didn't you tell me?"
"Because I was afraid," said Duncan. "Afraid that you might claim it. I had need of it, you see."
&n
bsp; "Need of it?"
"Against the Horde," he said. "That was the purpose for which Wulfert made it."
"But Cuthbert said…"
"Cuthbert was wrong. It has protected us against the Horde from the day I found it. They have sent their minions against us, but with a few exceptions, no members of the Horde have come against us. They have kept well away from us."
She put out both her hands and took it from him, turning it slowly, the embedded jewels blazing as the sunlight caught them.
"So beautiful," she said. "Where did you find it?"
"In Wulfert's tomb," he told her. "Conrad hid me in the tomb after I was knocked out in the garden fight. Where we first met, remember?"
"What a strange thing to do," she said. "To hide you in a tomb."
"Conrad sometimes does strange things. They usually are effective."
"And you found it there by accident?"
"When I came to I was lying on it and it was uncomfortable. I thought it was a rock someone had chucked into the tomb. At first I had meant to give it to you, if we found you again. But then, when it became apparent…"
"I understand," she said. "And now you think you can use it against the Horde. Perhaps destroy them?"
"I'm gambling on it," Duncan said. "I think so. It is apparent something has been protecting us. It must be the talisman. I think we have a weapon feared by the Horde. Why else would they swarm against us?"
"So Wulfert was right all along," she said. "The others all were wrong. They threw him out when he was right."
"Even wizards can be wrong," he said.
"One thing," she said. "Tell me why you're here. What brought you here? What is going on? Why is it so important that you get to Oxenford? You never told me that. Or Cuthbert. Cuthbert would have been interested. He had many friends in Oxenford. He wrote to them and they wrote to him. Over the years he had corresponded with them."
"Well," he said, "there is this manuscript. The story is a long one, but I'll try to tell it quickly."
He told her quickly, condensing it, using as few words as he could.
"This doctor in Oxenford," she said. "The one man in all the world who can authenticate the manuscript. Have you got his name?"
"His name is Wise. Bishop Wise. An old man and not too well. That's why we are in such a hurry. He is old and ill; he may not have too long. His Grace said his sands were running out."
"Duncan," she said in a small voice. "Duncan…"
"Yes? You know the name?"
She nodded. "He was Cuthbert's old friend, his good friend."
"Why, that is fine," he said.
"No, Duncan, it is not. Bishop Wise is dead."
"Dead!"
"Some weeks ago Cuthbert got the word," she told him. "Word his old friend had died. More than likely before you set out from Standish House."
"Oh, my God!" he said, going down on his knees beside her.
A pointless trip, he thought. All of this for nothing. The man who could have authenticated the manuscript dead before they even had set out. Now the manuscript would not be authenticated. Not now. Perhaps never. A hundred years from now there might be another man, or there might never be another man such as Bishop Wise. His Grace would have to wait, Holy Church would have to wait, the Christian world would have to wait for that other man, if there should ever be one.
"Diane," he said, choking. "Diane!"
She reached out and pulled his head into her lap, held him there, as a mother might a child.
"Go ahead and weep," she said. "I'm the only one to see. Tears will do you good."
He did not weep. He could not weep. Rather, bitterness swept in and gripped him, twisting him, rankling his soul. Until now, until this very moment, he realized, he had not known or had not let himself know how much the manuscript had meant to him—not as an abstract thing holding potential good for all the world, but to him personally. To him, Duncan Standish, as a Christian soul, as one who believed, however marginally, that a man named Jesus once had walked the Earth, had said the words He was reported to have said, had performed His miracles, had laughed at wedding feasts, had drunk wine with His brothers, and finally had died upon a Roman cross.
"Duncan," Diane said softly. "Duncan, I mourn as well as you."
He lifted his head and looked at her.
"The talisman," he said.
"We will use the talisman as Wulfert meant it should be used."
"It's all that's left," he said. "At least some good may come out of this journey."
"You have no doubts of the talisman?"
"Yes, there may be doubts. But what more is there to do?"
"Nothing more," she said.
"We may die," he said. "The talisman may not be enough."
"I'll be there," she said. "I'll be there beside you."
"To die with me?"
"If that is how it happens. I don't think it will. Wulfert…"
"You have faith in him?"
"As much faith as you have in your manuscript."
"And after it is over?"
"What do you mean? Once it is over?"
"I'll go back to Standish House. And you?"
"I'll find a place. There are other wizard castles. I'll be welcome."
"Come home with me."
"As your ward? As your mistress?"
"As my wife."
"Duncan, dearest, I have wizard blood."
"And in my veins runs the blood of unscrupulous adventurers, martial monsters, reavers, pirates, the ravishers of cities. Go far enough back and God knows what you'd find."
"But your father. Your father is a lord."
For a moment Duncan envisioned his father, standing tall-tree straight, whiffling out his mustache, his eyes gray as granite and yet with a warmth within them.
"A lord," he said, "and yet a gentleman. He'll love you as a daughter. He never had a daughter. He has no one but me. My mother died years ago. Standish House has waited long for a woman's hand."
"I'll need to think," she said. "One thing I can tell you. I love you very much."
31
The swarm rested on top of a small ridge, back from the edge of the fen. It was a terrifying sight—black and yet not entirely black, for through it ran strange flickerings, like the distant flaring of heat lightning such as one would see far off, coloring the horizon, on a summer night. At times the swarm seemed to be substantial, a solid ball of black; at other times it appeared curiously flimsy, like a loose ball of yarn, like a soap bubble very close to bursting. It seemed, even when it appeared to be most solid, to be in continual motion, as if the creatures or the things or whatever it might be that made it up, were continually striving to place themselves in more advantageous positions, rearranging themselves, shuffling about to attain a more ideal configuration. Watching it, one at times could see, or imagine he saw, a shape, an individual member of the swarm, although never for long enough to be entirely sure what it might be. And that, thought Duncan, was perhaps as well, for the glimpses that he got were of shapes and structures so horrifying, so far beyond anyone's most outrageous imaginings, that they made the blood run cold.
He spoke to those who clustered about him. "All of you know what we are to do," he said. "I will carry the talisman, holding it high, presenting it. I will walk in front, going slowly. Thus," he said, holding it high so that all could see. In the last rays of the setting sun, the jewels in the talisman caught fire, blazing like a mystic flame with all the colors of a rainbow, but brighter, far brighter than a rainbow.
"And if it doesn't work?" growled Conrad.
"It — must- work," Diane told him coldly.
"It must work," Duncan agreed calmly. "But, on the off-chance that it doesn't, everyone run like hell. Back into the fen, back toward the island."
"If we can run," said Conrad. "I won't run. The hell with running…"
A hand reached up and snatched the talisman out of Duncan's grip.
"Andrew!" Duncan roared, but the hermit was rushing forward
, running toward the swarm, the blazing talisman held high in one hand, his staff flailing in the other, his mouth open and screaming words that were not words at all.
Conrad was raging. "The stupid, show-off son-of-a-bitch!" he howled.
Duncan leaped forward, racing to catch Andrew.
Ahead of him a lightning stroke flared. In its afterglow Duncan saw Andrew stand for a moment, burning in bright flames. Then, as the flames snuffed out, the hermit was a smoking torch of man, a torch a vagrant gust of wind had blown out, with tendrils of greasy smoke streaming from his upraised arms. The talisman was gone and Andrew slowly crumpled, fell in upon himself into a mound of charred and smoking flesh.
Duncan threw himself flat on the ground and the wild, terrible thought ran through him: It had not been Wulfert's talisman, it had not been the talisman that the Horde had feared; it had not been the talisman that had protected them in their long journeying through the Desolated Land. He should have known, he told himself. On the strand the Horde—it must have been the Horde—had used Harold the Reaver to obtain the thing they feared, the one thing they had not dared to try to seize themselves. And they had gotten the talisman, but had left it there upon the strand, as a thing of little value.
The one thing they had not gotten was the manuscript!
The — manuscript-, he thought. The manuscript, for the love of God! It had been the manuscript that the Horde had attempted to destroy, to negate, to obliterate. That had been the purpose of this latest desolation—desolate the northern part of Britain and then, having isolated it, move on Standish Abbey, where the manuscript was housed. But by the time they were ready to move on Standish Abbey, the manuscript, the original manuscript written by the little furtive figure who had scurried about to watch and listen, was no longer there. The Horde seemed much confused, Cuthbert had said, uncertain of itself. And that was it, of course. The manuscript, they had learned or somehow sensed, was no longer where it had been, but was being carried through the very desolation the Horde had brought about.
Little furtive man, little skulking, skittering man—Duncan said to that one who so long ago had lurked, jackal-like, about the company of Jesus, who had never been one of that company nor had tried to be one of them, who had only watched and listened and then had sat huddled, in some hidden corner, to write what he had seen and heard—you did better than you knew. Writing down the words of Jesus exactly as He spoke them, with no variation whatsoever, with no paraphrasing, reporting every gesture, every movement, even the expression on His face. For that, Duncan realized, was the way it had to be. It had to be the truth, it had to be a report of events exactly as they were if it were still, centuries later, to retain the magic, recapture the glory and the power, present the full force of the Man who had spoken.
All Flesh Is Grass and Other Stories Page 81
