“He’s older than us,” I said. “And I admit you’re doing quite right to wrestle with the River. I think you’re very clever. I think—” I would have said anything, anything.
Kankredin laughed at me, with his cruel chuckle, and looked at his two mages. “What shall we do?”
“They’re absolute idiots,” hidden death said, but he said it with a sour kind of slyness, meaning something else.
“Exactly,” said Kankredin, agreeing to this something else. “All right,” he said to us. “If you can get back through the net again, you’re free to go. Go and try. I shall enjoy watching you.”
I do not remember going out through the room with the hammocks. I think Kankredin hurled us out on deck, where Hern staggered about.
“You get the boat cast off,” I said to Duck. “I’ll bring Hern.” I thought it would be like Gull all over again.
But Hern is tougher than Gull. As Duck raced down the black decking, Hern pushed me away and dived at the baskets ranged against the side. “You do the other side!” he shouted. He went staggering up the whole row, throwing up the lids. I am still amazed at Hern thinking of the trapped souls. But he must have known what they felt like. I threw back wicker lids on the other side of the ship. The roaring wings of the escaping souls mixed with the angry yells of the mages.
Kankredin’s voice boomed through it all. “Let them be. We shall take vengeance for that.”
The mages left us alone and stood watching as we went down into our boat. I took the tiller. We moved away from the staring eyes of the ship, before all the staring faces of the mages lining the side of it, and two more sitting staring in the soulboat nearby. We felt the jeers in the staring, but there seemed nothing we could do except sail for the net.
I was too shaken to manage the boat well, and the tide was against us. Duck took out an oar to help, but we still drifted crankily sideways. We could see mouth after mouth of the River passing behind the great black net, until the black ship looked small behind us. Then at last we drifted up against the net. A soul or two struggled in it above our heads, and we were just the same, going the opposite way.
Kankredin’s voice boomed across the water. “Go on! Go through the net!” We knew he was playing cat and mouse with us.
“He’ll fetch us back in a minute,” said Hern. “We can’t get through.”
“We can try this,” said Duck. He put the oar away and carefully took out of his shirt the pipes Tanamil had made for him. He saw the way I looked at him. He said, “I’m almost sure Tanamil isn’t one of them. And it’s worth a try even if it’s using their own enchantment against them. Keep us going for the net.”
Duck put the pipes to his mouth and played. His music was nothing like Tanamil’s. It was bold and jerky and full of breath. But he had scarcely played half a tune when I looked up at the net and found its blackness misted over, with mist beyond.
Kankredin’s voice boomed out. “Duck! Stop that silly piping. Stop it!”
Duck faltered and lost the tune. The net swung before me, black and clear. “Go on,” I said. “It works!”
“I can’t,” said Duck. “Not with him shouting at me.”
“Duck! Come here to me!” Kankredin boomed.
Hern looked up. “He’s not shouting at you. Your name’s Mallard. Keep playing, and don’t be a fool. He’s worried stiff we’re getting away.” Hern was right. The two mages in the soulboat were poling towards us as fast as they could go.
Duck played again, fierce and squeaky with haste. His face was red with it. The net turned from black to grey, and then it was not there. We were moving forwards in whiteness. In a moment, as before, there were birds all round us that we could not see. This time we were heartily glad of it. Duck played and played us forwards into whiteness, until at last he had to leave off and lean over, panting. By then the net was behind us some way and the wide sands of the Rivermouth in front.
“You did it!” I said. “How did you know?”
Duck wiped the pipes and put them carefully away. “Everything goes away like that quite often when I play,” he said. “I thought I was out of breath the first time. You know, I think I shall be a magician when I grow up. I shall be a better one than Kankredin.”
“Hey! Tanaqui! Look where you’re sailing!” said Hern.
He was a little late saying it. I was looking at Duck. We ran deep aground in a reed flat with our keel down, and we stuck. This was how we came to be captured by our own people. Maybe it was Kankredin’s malice. I am sure it was my fault for leaving the One in his fire.
I am now at the back hem of my rugcoat. All I have space to say is that we are at a stand. Gull is still a clay figure. Robin is ill. I am afraid she will die. I sit with her in the old mill across from Shelling, with no help from my gloomy brothers. Even if Robin were well enough for us to run away, Zwitt would have us killed if he found us on our own. It is a bad thing to wish to run away from our own King, but I wish I could. Instead all I can do is weave and hope for understanding. The meaning of our journey is now in this rugcoat. I am Tanaqui, and I end my weaving.
PART TWO
The Second Coat
I AM TANAQUI. I must begin on a second rugcoat because understanding has come to me at last, and maybe I no longer need to blame myself.
My dream of my mother came to me again the night I finished the first coat. It troubled me. Why should my mother tell me to think? What should I think about except that I have wronged the One twice now? I started the first coat because of this dream, but when the dream came again, I began to suspect that my weaving was not enough. I am glad Uncle Kestrel brought me all my yarn, even that which was under the broken part of the roof. I still feel bitter about that. Zwitt need not have broken our house. But the wool has dried out now, and I think there is enough of every colour to make another coat.
I will tell first how I wronged the One again. We were caught while we stuck on the mudbank because we had still not grasped the nature of the mud there. Hern jumped overboard to push us off and sank in it beyond his knees. He was so weak after our meeting with Kankredin that he could hardly struggle back into the boat, and he was very angry with me. I told him that it was because I had made them leave the One in his fire.
“Don’t talk such nonsense!” Hern said. “It doesn’t mean you have to steer straight into a mudbank.”
We tried rocking the boat to loose it. The water trickled from the mud continually and held the keel fast. We should have seen from that that the mud was getting firmer, but we did not. We were too taken up with looking anxiously at the mist where the soulnet stood, thinking Kankredin was bound to follow us. No mages came. I think Kankredin had decided we were not worth the trouble. But we were taken completely by surprise when men of our own people came running over the mud from behind us and dragged us out of the boat, thinking we were Heathens.
We screamed that we were not Heathens, but they did not believe us and dragged us away a full mile over the mud and sand. All the while, they were saying things like “I look forward to hearing these squeal,” and “I’m going to take it out on these for Litha. I’ll make it long and sweet.” I think we were all crying by the time they pushed us over the sand dune and into a camp of some size. We were desperate by then that they should know we were not Heathens.
Someone who saw us being brought in said, “You had a bit of luck, didn’t you? I’ll put you all down for a reward. Bring them along, and let’s see what we can make of them.”
They pushed us into a clear space where a great tree lay, dead and silver. The man who had spoken sat on this tree, and many others – the way our people do – came crowding from the tents to look. I heard someone call, “Come on, Jay! Heathens for lunch!”
The man who had hold of me – his name is Sard and I still do not like him – shook me and said, “Now you behave. This is the King. King, understand? He eats you Heathen for breakfast, he does.”
I could hardly credit it, but it was indeed our King. I was nearly
too awed to look at him. This was not, like Kars Adon, a boy and a Heathen. This was a true King. I took a quick look from under my hair. I saw a small plump man of about middle age. At one time, I think, he has been quite stout, but he lost flesh in the wars, they say. His face is still chubby, however, with a pout to the lips and a humorous twist to it. There were bags under his eyes, and his eyes looked bright and dark, twinkling upon the bags.
“Where were they?” our King said to Sard.
“Run aground on Carne Bank, Majesty,” Sard replied, grinning. “I thought even Heathens had more sense.”
Our King looked at us. “Where are you from? Where is your clan and how many are you?”
Hern stood with his head down, glowering at our King. “We’re not Heathens,” he said. Then Duck and I began to clamour at our King, trying to convince him we were not Heathens in every way we knew.
Our King leant back and folded his arms, sighing. As we talked, I heard him say humorously to the man who stood behind him, “Why do they all make this fuss, Jay?” It was so clear he was not listening that I stopped talking in despair. Hern and Duck had stopped already. “Finished?” asked our King, twinkling his eyes at us. “Right. Now I don’t like using unpleasant methods with youngsters, but I assure you I shall if you won’t talk. I want to know where your camp is. Who’s your chief, or earl, or whatever you call it? How many Heathen are you? Not that it will help much, as you seem to swarm like vermin, but still – we do what we can. Now tell me, and I may spare your lives.”
“Majesty, we were truly born in Shelling, up the River,” I said. Our King smiled. I cast about for a face that might believe me. All smiled. The man called Jay, who stood behind the King, smiled broadest of all. I knew him. He had only one arm now and his red rugcoat was grey and ragged, but he had smiled like that at Robin, when she stood with her arms all floury. “You came to Shelling,” I said. “You took my father and my brother Gull to the wars. Don’t you remember?”
“You saw me there,” said Hern. “You said I was too young.”
“I went to a lot of places,” the man Jay said, smiling still.
“And you smiled at my sister,” said Duck.
Jay looked at me and choked. “She’s a bit young for me.”
“Not that one, stupid! The other one,” said Hern.
“I do smile at girls,” Jay said, grinning widely. “I’ve even been known to wink at Heathens. They picked this up, Majesty,” he said to our King, “from some poor soul they tormented.”
“They must have done,” our King agreed.
At that I became so frantic that I could think of only one way to convince the King I was no Heathen. “Look,” I said, “I’ll prove we’re not Heathens. Here is one of our Undying.” I dragged the Young One from the front of my shirt and held him towards the King.
Our King twinkled at me. “So you’re a thief too?”
“No, no!” I said. “Heathens don’t have Undying. We have the Lady as well as the Young One.” Duck scowled at me and shook his head, but I went on. “The greatest of our Undying is the One. I can’t show him to you because he’s in his fire at the moment – he always has to go in his fire when the floods go down – but please believe me!”
“A nice story,” said the man Jay.
But our King leant forwards, with a twinkle of interest in his eyes and only the barest smile on his face. I have never known him quite without a smile. “This One of yours,” he said. “What colour is he?”
Hern and Duck both glared at me, but I said, as if I could not stop, “Dark, with glistering specks, but –”
“Shut up, Tanaqui!” said Duck.
“– but he changes each time he goes in his fire,” I said.
Our King gestured to Duck that he was to hold his tongue. Then he leant to me further, and said, “Name me his secret names.”
“They’re secret,” I said. By this time I was horrified, but it was like the rapids at the end of the lake. I had gone too far to stop.
“Come here and name them in my ear,” said our King.
I am ashamed when I weave this, but I did so. I went up to our King – he smelt of sweat and horse and, just a little, of cloves – and I whispered, “He is called Adon and Amil and Oreth.” That is how I wronged the One. But I went on and wronged him further because when the King asked me, I told him the One’s fire was on our island and that Robin was there, unwell, too. And I described which our island was, in spite of the way Hern and Duck looked at me.
Our King sat back and puckered his face towards Jay and the others nearest him. “Well, what do you think?”
“There’s quite a nest of Heathen over there,” one of them said. “It looks like the perfect trap to me.”
“I know,” our King agreed. “But let’s say curiosity killed the King. Or that somebody slipped up in Shelling last autumn. Jay— Oh, I forgot. Can you manage one-handed?”
“Provided the remaining hand’s tied behind my back,” was Jay’s reply.
“Good,” said the King. “Tie your hand up, take ten men and the best boat – and the elder boy, I think – and let him show you the place. Bring back anything you find there.”
“I’m glad you said me,” Hern said. He spoke very rudely because he was angry with me. “I’d have had to ask you to send me if you hadn’t. I’m head of the family, and it has to be me who takes the One out of the fire.”
“Oddly enough, I thought of that,” our King said to him. “And I thought the other two could stay as hostages for your good faith. Move, Jay!”
My punishment was that I never saw the One taken out of the fire. The King’s camp was right on the other side of the Rivermouth from our island. Duck and I had to wait two hours for Jay to cross and come back. We sat on a sandbank watching the King’s men bustling in the camp. Their tents are good, in many colours, but the people are few – not more than fifty, all men. It ought to have seemed more warlike than the poor huts of Kars Adon, because there were no women, no rubbish heaps, and no children but Duck and me, but it did not, and never does. It is more as if our King were travelling for a holiday.
While we waited, Duck was so angry with me that he only spoke once. “Did Kankredin’s coat say how we can get Gull back?” he said.
“No,” I said. “It said Gull was coming to him. The net is to catch Gull, and he’s waiting for him before he conquers the country. And it can’t be wrong to tell our own King about the One.”
“If he thinks Gull’s still on his way,” Duck said, “then I was right, and Tanamil isn’t one of his mages. And you know we’re not supposed to talk about the One to anybody.” And he said nothing else.
At last there was a great shout that the boat was coming. Everyone, our King included, went running through the hills of sand to the shore. We ran with them. We were part of the crowd jostling on the shingle, and we helped to pull the boat out of the falling waves. It was large and high. Jay appeared head and shoulders above the gunwale.
“Well?” said the King.
“Everything as described,” said Jay. “This is the list – start unloading. Three cats.” Sweetheart, Rusty and Ratchet were dropped down beside our King. They were ruffled and not pleased. Our King looked at them in amusement. “Ten blankets,” said Jay, and these were dropped on the shore too. “Two sacks, containing cheese, dried fish and onions mostly.” The sacks followed our blankets. “And,” said Jay, “one sick young lady.”
I thought they were going to drop Robin on the shore too. In fact, they lowered her very carefully, and Hern climbed down to make sure she was safe. They had wrapped her in Jay’s rugcoat. She was worse again. She says it was the shock of Jay’s coming, on top of worry about us. I put a blanket round her as she shivered on the pebbles, and she cried because Duck and I were still alive.
“And?” said our King, holding out his hand to Jay. “Nothing else?”
“With her,” Jay said, nodding down at Robin.
It seemed that Hern had no sooner taken the One from his f
ire than he gave him into Robin’s hands. Robin would let nobody near him. I could not think why Hern had done this, until Hern said, “Come and see,” and beckoned Duck over too.
Robin unwrapped her hand from the great folds of Jay’s rugcoat and showed us the One clasped in it. He was gold. He shone all over with a mild orange lustre and seemed to be made of metal. Hern and Robin could understand it no more than we could. Hern said he had found the One shining even more brightly in the ashes of the fire. He had dulled a little in the air since. And, Hern says, there was such naked greed on the faces of Jay and the others that he gave the One to Robin, instinctively as it were, to keep him safe. How he thinks poor Robin would be able to keep the One if somebody twisted her wrist, I do not know. She has Gull to keep too, wrapped in her own rugcoat, and no one knows of him but us four.
Up to this moment Robin has most valiantly fulfilled Hern’s trust. She wrapped the One away when the King came up and refused to let him be seen. A faint pink came into her pale face at having to treat our King so, but she was firm.
“He is not to be bandied about and looked at by everyone,” she said.
“If you all came into my tent and looked at him over supper?” our King suggested. “I could set up a hearth to make him feel more at home.”
Our King was being very polite now, but Robin looked at him severely. She is not used to people making jests all the time, the way our King does. But she agreed.
Our King insisted on a polite and lavish supper. It was a trial to Duck and me, though not to Hern. Hern likes eating and does not care about manners. It was a trial to Robin too, because she was not really well enough, but I was glad she was there. People believe Robin. When she said we were not Heathens, our King assured her it had been an unfortunate mistake.
“May I see the One now?” he asked when we had eaten fish and meat. There was a pause then, before they brought in chickens, eggs and sweetmeats. No wonder our King is chubby.
Robin reluctantly brought out the One and stood him on the table among the King’s fine dishes. He was the finest thing there. Our King put out a hand to him, looked quizzically at Robin, and at last picked him up. We could see the One was heavy. Robin says he weighs twice what he did.
The Spellcoats (UK) Page 12
