The Widow and the King

by John Dickinson

  Below his feet, on the narrow shore, lay the last stone. In the living world, Ambrose remembered, it had fallen some fifty feet from the thorny cliff-top to the poolside. He had seen it from his shelter among the thorns. It had fallen close to the point where Mother had disappeared into the water.

  She stood on the edge of the pit, looking down.

  ‘He is aware of us, Orcrim,’ she said in a low voice. ‘Don't falter.’

  Orcrim glowered at the black water. Then leaning out, he spat. Ambrose watched the flecks of white drift downwards to settle like snow upon the surface, and disappear. There was a rasp of iron as Orcrim's sword came free.

  ‘The Moon is High,’ he said in a loud voice to the Company.

  ‘Hah, Tarceny!’ called several voices.

  ‘Under-craft Prevails!’ roared Orcrim.

  ‘Hah, Tarceny!’ cried the riders.

  ‘Iron of Tarceny!’

  ‘Ho!’

  Swords drew in a clatter of steel. The long blades wavered in the hands of the fighters like thorn-fronds in a thicket. No one spoke. They waited.

  Nothing moved in the pool, or among the rocks around it.

  XVII

  Stone and Steel

  ll right,’ said Orcrim at length. ‘If he's going to give us space, we'll use it. Get the rig and the levers – Hob has them – and we'll hitch the pulling-teams to … to this one here.’ His boot struck one of the stones. ‘That looks the kindest …’

  Sophia had stayed with the horses. She saw the group on the lip of the pool break up. Men came and unfastened freshly cut lengths of stout wood from their saddles. Endor and another man dragged Hob's rig forward to the lip of the pool. Ambrose appeared at her elbow.

  ‘And Watch for Who Comes,’ he said.

  ‘Watch for Who Comes, indeed,’ said the woman on the far side of him. ‘Where did you learn that?’

  ‘Sophia and I looked at a scroll in Develin. It had Trant on it. Sophia,’ he said, ‘this is my mother.’

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  His mother, whom Sophia had thought of all her life as the Whore of Tarceny. But there was no space to think about that now. There was no space to think of anything until the enemy who had destroyed Chawlin had himself been destroyed. That was what mattered. The pulling-horses would have something to do with it. She would not let go of their bridles until it was done.

  Her arm still ached and throbbed within its dark bandage, as it had done through all the long march. It looked and felt as if blood was still seeping into the cloth. But if she called attention to it they would only make her sit down. She pushed the pain and the sickness to one side again, and let the fingers of her good arm open and close on the bridle to remind herself that this was all real. This was not a dream, despite the world of stones in which she stood – despite the awful, awful figure of the weeping woman she had seen, and the horror that had curled around her heart as she had looked away.

  Or if it was a dream, it was a dream that would be endless; and there was still something that must be done.

  ‘Develin was a good place,’ she heard the woman murmur. ‘I'm glad you went there.’

  ‘They suffered for it.’ That was Ambrose again.

  ‘That is another reason why we have come.’

  Sophia opened her hand upon the bridle, and closed it again. The horse blew warmly on her knuckles, like the breath of a lover who lived and lay close.

  Hob came up the line of horses. ‘We've hobbled most of them,’ he said. ‘Those that will take it. But I'm not going near him.’ He jerked his head at Aun's war-horse, which towered near them at one end of the line. ‘Unless Lackmere comes back to do it. And I don't think he's going to. You'll have to keep him quiet. If he goes, they'll all want to.’

  ‘I'll do my best,’ said Ambrose.

  Hob turned to the pulling-teams.

  ‘You sit down,’ he said to Sophia. ‘Never handle horses with an arm like that.’

  ‘You can't take both teams,’ Sophia snapped.

  ‘My lady can do it. Sit down.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Michael's Knees … !’

  ‘She can help me, Hob,’ said the woman.

  ‘I've barely touched a horse in ten years.’

  Hob gave up. He took the head of the team on her right.

  Strange how quickly they obeyed, even though they had hated her! And no doubt she could have managed the horses by herself with ease. But she would let Sophia help her.

  ‘Thank you,’ Sophia whispered.

  They watched the men at the rim of the pool.

  Around the fallen stone the two tripods stood, and a cross-bar had been lashed between them. Two small things dangled from it – the pulleys from Aclete. Half a dozen men clustered around the rig, stooping to work the ends of their levers beneath the stone. The rest – no more than another half-dozen – were spaced around them in a wide half-circle, at the edge of the pit and on either side, facing out with weapons in their hands. They had put on their helmets. Their frail shapes were clear against the sky, flanked by the stones that had stood for centuries.

  ‘Steady, friend,’ she heard Ambrose say to Stefan.

  The endless, dreary moaning of the place throbbed in the back of her mind. She wondered if the horses could hear it too.

  As she watched, one of the armoured figures picked up the big banner. He stood there for a moment, speaking with the men on the levers in words she could not hear. Then he lifted the banner, and swung it in a big figure-ofeight so that folds opened and the maimed Moon of Tarceny flew clear on the black cloth.

  ‘Slowly now,’ grunted Hob, and he began to walk backwards, leading both his horses.

  Sophia had never led a pulling-team in her life, or controlled horses from the ground at all. But she spoke to her horse and tugged at its bridle. It hesitated. So did the horse of the woman beside her. Sophia's horse was the leader.

  She pulled again, more firmly. Come on, you.

  It came. They both came.

  ‘Slowly!’ said Hob.

  For a few paces they were moving freely. Then she heard the flat jingle of the chains clinking taut, and the creak of rope. The horses halted, straining in their harness.

  ‘Hah-sa,’ grunted Hob to his team.

  ‘Hah-sa!’

  Sophia saw her leader put one more foot down, and then lift it again. They were not moving.

  ‘Right, back!’ said Hob, who must have seen a signal from the rig. He put his hand on the chest of his leader. His team backed. Sophia's team copied them. The ropes and harness were slack again.

  ‘Is that all they are going to do?’ she heard Ambrose say.

  ‘Little by little is the way,’ the woman said. ‘When I did this before, I had my hillmen camp by the stone we were raising – it was much bigger than this, but there was only one of it. They dug and they lifted for four days, until it was done …’

  Four days!

  Four days for one stone. There were eight to lift, and one of them was down by the edge of the pool.

  Ambrose must have been thinking the same thing.

  ‘We can't last,’ he said. ‘Not for days in this place. And he may not even be inside the ring.’

  ‘No. Most probably he is not. It would be too much to expect to catch him the same way twice. But his powers come from the pool, and must return there, and so must he. And no, I do not expect Orcrim to lift and haul for days without rest. We are showing the enemy that we have the means. If he does nothing, in the end his powers will be trapped again.’

  ‘What will he do?’

  ‘He will not do nothing.’

  They waited. The men at the pit loitered around the stone, easing in small boulders to wedge it or to lever against. Sophia's team stood with their heads down. The ceaseless deep humming of the place ached in her head.

  The banner waved once more.

  ‘Hah-sa!’ said Hob to his horses.

  ‘Hah-sa!’ she said, and brought hers into a shambling walk. The
pulling-teams leaned into their harness. The tackle creaked. Looking up, Sophia saw the slight shift of the rig as it took the strain. The men around the stone had thrown their weight on their levers. One man was moving among them, rolling small boulders into the space beneath the stone. The banner swung again.

  ‘Back!’ said Hob. They backed teams and the ropes dropped. The lever-men rose, and rested.

  ‘Under-craft prevails,’ said Hob.

  ‘Inch by inch.’ They did it again.

  And again.

  Sophia could see the stone had risen, now, and was propped at a low angle from the ground. The further it came up, she thought, the less easy it must be to find purchase for the levers. The pull of the team would matter more.

  ‘If it goes as well as this for another hour, I will take us into the day again,’ the woman said. ‘We can camp, keep watch, and go back to it when you are all rested …’

  There was a cry from the poolside.

  One of the sentries was standing on the skyline, pointing with his blade at something down in the pit. There was horror and loathing in his voice. Other shouts sounded among the men. Orcrim was bellowing, gesticulating. Men left the levers and hurried to the cliff edge. Swords wavered against the colourless sky.

  ‘Now Michael guard us!’ said the woman.

  ‘Michael guard us!’ Ambrose repeated, staring at the skyline.

  Behind Sophia one of the hobbled horses was beginning to whinny and struggle at the sounds of alarm. Hob cursed and left the head of his team. Stefan was snorting and shaking his head.

  ‘Steady, friend,’ she heard Ambrose say. ‘Stay by me.’

  A flurry of shouts broke from the hillside above them. The men had grouped in three places at the edge of the pit. As she watched, a man in the middle group stooped and swung his sword at something below them that was hidden from her. Others joined him. Metal rang and rang as if on stone. For a moment something like an arm – an arm of appalling length – reached up from the ground to claw at them. The men yelled and struck again and again.

  ‘They don't feel it!’ a man cried. ‘Damn you, Orcrim, they don't feel it!’

  ‘Turn them!’ Orcrim's voice was shouting. ‘Find the eyes if you can!’

  The other groups were striking now – striking at things she could guess at but could not see.

  ‘Turn them! Turn them!’

  Whatever had attacked the first group must have dropped back out of reach a little way. The men were still looking down, weapons at the ready, as if it were about to come on again. Was it hurt? Was it wounded or just discouraged? She could not hope to know.

  More yells, rising to a scream. The left-hand group was in trouble. One of them was half down. He was flailing at something that dragged at him from below, pulling him over the cliff. Two men had him by the shoulders and were trying to haul him back from the edge. Others were kneeling and hacking at the enemy – whether the same one or more than one Sophia could not see. More men were hurrying up to help.

  Beyond them, at the extreme left-hand edge of the gap in the stones, something moved against the skyline.

  For an instant she saw it – a hooded, crouching thing. It seemed to look towards the struggle at the cliff edge. Then it ducked down from the skyline and her eyes lost it for a moment. She saw it again as it leaped among the rocks. It covered yards in a single jump.

  Her heart lurched. It was so quick!

  ‘There's one over!’ she shouted. ‘To the left! To the left!’ It jumped again, and this time she could hear the thump as it landed. It was coming for the pulling-teams. And another was moving on the skyline beyond it.

  A fighter was running back down the slope. He must have seen the thing and was racing to intercept it. But as she watched, he tripped on the rough ground and fell. The thing paused for an instant, and then leaped on him.

  ‘Help him!’ she screamed, turning to the nearest armed man. ‘Help him.’

  It was Ambrose. He dropped Stefan's rein, and ran.

  ‘No!’ cried Sophia.

  ‘Hob! Hob!’

  Hob had disappeared. She looked wildly around and could not see him.

  Ambrose ran, struggling to free his sword. He heard Sophia shouting. He saw the fallen man beating with his hands at the thing attacking him. He heard the man cry out again as the talons tore into his mail. His own sword came free. Then he was on it.

  Clang!

  His blade rebounded, ringing as if he had hit a boulder or a tree stump. The thing raised its head and reached for him. He jumped back, and stumbled.

  It was about to spring again. He had seen it move like a boulder off a catapult. He lifted his blade between them to show it the hilt, where the pouch with the last white stone still hung. It crouched.

  Now he attacked, striking for head and limb as Chawlin had shown him. Its hood fell as it flailed at the blade. He saw a toad-like face – a thin circlet of gold: eyes that looked horribly as if they had once been a man's. It bellowed with pain and the sound shook his very guts. Something answered it from his left.

  There were two of them!

  He glanced away, then back at the crouching thing. If he let his sword drop it would spring and finish him. He could not fight two. He could not keep his one stone between himself and two attackers.

  The thing leaped, away to his right, landing in a cloud of dust and pebbles. Now it was between him and the horse-lines, between him and help. And the other one was approaching from behind him.

  He whirled and scrambled away, passing the fallen man who still writhed slowly on the ground. His second attacker rose from the stones, groping at him. He saw a long face, horned like a cow, eyes the size of goose-eggs, claws like hooks. He beat at it and it wavered. He tried to dodge around it, to put it between him and the leaping thing. It moved to block him. He scrambled the other way.

  Keep moving! Keep moving!

  The poolside swung into view. They were between him and his friends. For the moment he could face them both, and guard himself with the stone at his hilt. But he was getting further and further away from help. The wounded man was trying to rise, but could not. He could see Mother and Sophia, pointing his way and calling. The horses were milling. He saw Stefan shy, and recover …

  The leaping thing crashed among the rocks to his right and he turned to face it. The horned thing loomed slowly on his left, moving on long limbs like a spider's legs. He saw that it, too, wore a circlet of gold.

  Ando, it said, shrilly, in a voice he remembered.

  Ando, the other said, as deep as a cavern.

  They were crooning to him – maddening burbles, with ill-formed words that he could not understand. He swung the sword to his left to check the horned thing, and back at once to the leaper. It was the leaper he feared most.

  Ando, croaked the creatures, one deep, one shrill. Andooh. He must attack.

  He couldn't do it!

  The horned thing had sidled further to his left. Now he could no longer check them both.

  A man came leaping over the boulders, sword in hand. It was Hob, and he had no helmet. His sword rang on the back of the horned thing, and beat at its face as it turned.

  ‘Ho, there!’ yelled Hob. ‘Tarceny! Help, Help!’

  Again he swung into the attack, and the horned thing backed, groping at him. Talons slithered upon mail. Ambrose jumped to put his back to Hob, facing the other creature with the stone at his hilt. Somewhere men were shouting. They were coming.

  ‘Here, Tarceny! Help!’ cried Hob.

  Ambrose heard a sharp ring of metal, and Hob's desperate curse. His sword must have broken. Ambrose could not turn round. He could not take his eyes off the crouching thing. But the crouching thing had lifted its head. It rolled its eyes at the coming wave of men. For a moment it hung like that. Then it seemed to shake itself, and leaped away along the slope. Ambrose whirled to face the horned thing but it, too, was slithering backwards.

  ‘Round them, get round them,’ came Orcrim's voice. ‘Herd them back ove
r.’ The air was full of mail jingling and the gasps of sweating men. Someone – it must be Endor – came up past Ambrose with his big mace raised. The horned thing was still retreating. Beyond it the crouching thing appeared on the lip of the pool, and dropped downwards, and was gone. The horned thing looked about it at the half-circle of armoured men, and swung its great eyes back to face Ambrose one last time.

  Andooh, it said. Anson.

  On its long limbs it crawled up the slope.

  ‘At it!’ came Orcrim's voice. ‘Herd it over.’

  Ambrose watched it go. Painfully, it seemed, the ancient thing crawled over the lip of the pool like a vast insect creeping into a crevice. Then there was nothing but the band of men leaning over the edge, staring after it as it disappeared from their sight. The creatures had retreated.

  A sharp, heavy blow landed on his ear. Hob had cuffed him.

  ‘Next time you are in a fight, stay among your fellows! And if you can't do that, remember to call for help.’

  ‘Sorry,’ Ambrose mumbled.

  ‘Just remember it. Help – it's a good word. Now give a hand here.’

  He strode toward the wounded man. Others were already standing over him. Aun was there. They were unlacing the helm. It came free. The face under it was pale and heavy with pain. It took Ambrose a moment to recognize him.

  ‘Caw,’ one of the men was saying. ‘Caw, can you hear us?’

  ‘Yes, damn you,’ Caw said, thickly.

  ‘Can you stand?’

  ‘Don't – want to try …’

  The mail had been torn like cloth from one shoulder. It was dark and wet. Blood had no colour in this place.

  ‘Let's get our former mistress up,’ said Orcrim's voice among the men. ‘We need to bring him into the light. Better have the horses, too, and we'll all rest together.’

  ‘Do you think they'll come back?’

  ‘How do I know? If they were called off, then yes, they'll be back. If they just lost their stomach to fight, that may be another matter.’

  Ambrose looked across the barren rocks. The horses in the line seemed to be quieter now. Mother was there, looking his way. Had she seen him in his fight? Of course she had. She and Sophia had called Hob to help him. There was Sophia, still standing at the head of her pullingteam, as if expecting to start work again as soon as the men got back. On the lip of the crest, Hob's rig stood like a low scaffold against the sky. There were men patrolling up there, watching the pool below them. From the way they stood and moved, Ambrose knew that the enemy had disappeared below the surface.