The Sable Moon

by Nancy Springer

  The jaundiced gaze met his, and for a moment Alan’s body went as watery as tears. Hau Ferddas faltered in his hand, and he didn’t notice; all he could see was Trevyn’s fair form, torn and defiled by leering beasts. Then something rock-hard within him pushed the vision aside. Anger surged through him, the sword leaped in his hand, and his head snapped up, shaking off the haze of nightmare. In an instant the wolf leader yapped, and battle was joined.

  Like so many arrows loosed from the same string, the wolves sprang. The sword in Alan’s grasp whistled down at them of its own accord, rendered mighty by its own weight, breaking a lupine neck with its first blow. Chanting harshly, filled with a fierce, bitter joy, Alan raised a pile of dead wolves before him. But the living ones sprang again and again, gleefully, mindlessly, leaping over the bodies of their slain comrades as if they were so much grass.

  Lost in the satisfaction of his own power and revenge, Alan did not notice at first that his men were tiring, flinching wide-eyed from the frenzy of the wolves. Then the man beside him gurgled and fell, borne down by the wolf that had leaped past his wearied stroke. Alan turned and smote, but the blow came too late; the beast had opened the man’s throat.

  “Courage!” Alan shouted to the others. “Ket should come soon.” From his easy seat off to one side, the big wolf panted his pleasure. But in a moment his sneer faded, as Ket and his company burst into view.

  Their horses plunged about and would not charge. So they dismounted and let the steeds bolt, forming a long line of attack on foot. Ket fought with the bow, his favorite weapon. His men used swords or cudgels. Even with swords to front and swords to back, the wolves lost none of their feverish zeal. But their numbers were lessened, and they were forced back. Hemmed in by the press, the leader rose from his place and circled, growling. “Get that one!” Alan shouted, pointing, and Ket aimed his shaft. Then he froze, stunned.

  Wolves poured out of the Forest; wolves, so it seemed, by the hundred. Before Alan could stir his tongue to cry out, they engulfed Ket and his men, as sudden and deadly as a flood. Soldiers fell, screaming, and the few with Alan in the tower stood dumbfounded with shock. His own shield arm hung slack, his magical sword plummeted earthward, and before his very face loomed the grinning countenance of the yellow-eyed leader. Obstinate instinct still stirred in Alan, though hope was gone. Rallying, he cut at his bestial adversary and called on those from whom he had often received succor in the past: “O lian elys liedendes, holme a on, il prier!” [“Oh spirits of those who once lived, come to me, I pray!”] Then he shouted to his men, “Stand! Stand where you are, for your lives’ sake!”

  The presence of the spirits enveloped them instantly, and his command was lost in the uproar that resulted. Wolves and men shrieked, their screams mingling and their paths crossing as they fled into the Forest like demented things. Though the spirits came to Alan as friends in his time of need, the others felt them only as a mind-blackening terror of the unknown. The wolfish leader scuttled away from them like a kicked cur. Ket’s face went as white as death, and he swayed as if he had been struck a mighty blow. “Ket! Stand!” Alan cried, dropped his sword and ran to him, leaping corpses. The spirits had already passed and gone their way. Alan held Ket until his trembling stopped and he raised his head, gasping for air like a drowning man.

  “What wonder is this?” he demanded shakily. “The haunt is miles hence. Has it come to us?”

  “I called the spirits, ay. Are you all right, Ket?”

  “I’ll live,” he sighed.

  “Come, help me, then.” They turned their attention to the bodies that choked the place, checking them one by one. There were no survivors; the wolves had struck straight to the life’s blood of each man. Alan and Ket would not meet each other’s sickened eyes.

  “What about the others?” Ket asked gruffly.

  “We must try to round them up, I dare say.… But look, it is starting to snow.”

  Tiny, hard-edged flakes whizzed past thickly, harried by a biting wind. Already, as Alan spoke, the ground was sprinkled and the trees shrouded with white.

  “The sky was clear this morning,” Ket complained wearily. “Whence came this snow? And whence came those wolves, I wonder? There were none about as we rode; I would swear to that. It’s as if someone conjured them up.”

  Alan shot him a startled glance, then shook off the thought; he did not like the notion of such a conjuror. And the present pressed harder. He and Ket loaded themselves with blankets and food from the dead men’s packs. Alan fetched his sword. He regarded the massive, bloody brand in sudden distaste, cleaned it on the snowy ground, and swaddled it.

  “I need a horse just to carry this thing,” he grumbled, cradling it in both arms.

  He and Ket plodded off into the Forest, toward Lee, for some of the men had run that way. They called for them as they walked, and got no answers. Trees looked like ghosts of trees in the snow, and an eerie silence brooded all around. After a while Ket and Alan let their shouts trail away. Ket peered into the wilderness, stopped, and for no reason set arrow to his bow.

  “Do we need to fear those wolves, think ye?”

  “I can’t say.” Alan frowned, bemused. “Animals should not fear the shades of dead men.… I can’t even say why I summoned the spirits, except for sheer, desperate whim. Yet the wolves ran away with plentiful speed, Ket. I fear this snow more right now.”

  In fact, the two of them were already having trouble keeping their course toward Lee. The Forest had turned into a directionless fog of white. Occasional sounds echoed weirdly in the muffled silence. Ket and Alan blundered along blindly, watching for shelter, searching for their comrades, finding neither. The day drew on. They could not tell the hour by the pallid light, but they felt the pressure of time. They had to find a refuge before nightfall.

  “It’ll be a marvel if any of us make it back to Lee,” said Alan starkly.

  Ket gasped by way of answer and raised his bow. Something gray had moved in the dizzying whiteness not far before them. But Alan struck Ket’s arrow into the air with his hand.

  “There’s no malice in that wolf,” he exclaimed. “Look again.”

  She stood facing them not ten feet away, great-bellied with young, her gray fur fluffed softly by the wind, levelly meeting Alan’s gaze. In a moment she came up to him and tugged at the hem of his tunic with her teeth, whining.

  “Galte faer; el rafte,” Alan told her. [“Lead on; I’ll follow.”]

  “What?” Ket demanded. He could not understand the Old Language.

  “She wants us to follow her.” Alan strode after the wolf that bounded away through the drifting snow, swift and supple in spite of her maternal girth.

  “And what if she leads us into a trap?” Ket cried, hurrying after. “If she takes us to the pack?”

  “Would you rather freeze to death in the snow?” Alan shot back over his shoulder. Ket silently panted along behind him, teeth clenched against a sharp reply. “She is a brave and generous creature,” Alan added more gently after a bit. “She will lead us to no harm.”

  They stumbled along through the darkening day, numb from cold and fatigue, straining their dazed eyes for the quick, shadowy form of the female wolf beneath the creaking trees. Sometimes she would dash back and whimper at them, impatient at their slowness. As the light grew worse, she stayed closer to them, whining anxiously. They followed her more by sound than by sight. Night had almost fallen when Ket jerked to a standstill.

  “The haunt,” he whispered. “We’re turned clear around, and gone beyond where we started. I feel the haunt ahead.”

  “I know. Come on!” Alan muttered, and reached out to tug at Ket’s unresponsive arm. “It’s the best of good fortune that she takes us to the haunt, Ket, don’t you see? Nothing evil can reach us there.”

  Ket plunged on a few steps, then stopped, quivering, unable to move. The Forest had gone almost black; only vaguely looming forms could be seen amid the flutter of the snow. Ahead of Alan, the wolf barked sharply
.

  Alan obeyed that urgent summons. He dropped his bundled sword and seized Ket as quickly as he could, lifted him bodily, and slung him over his shoulders. Taken by surprise, Ket gave a startled shout, struggling in Alan’s grasp.

  “Hold still!” Alan wheezed, bent nearly double under his burden, struggling after the wolf. She led him now by walking, doglike, almost at his feet. Their course lay between ancient earthworks and barrows, he dimly sensed, though not with sight. He could feel the bodiless presence of the spirits and feel Ket’s fear, a taut distress that somehow augmented the man’s weight on his back. If only Ket would faint, or even scream.… Alan wondered how much farther he had to stagger.

  Then: “Look,” he whispered. “A light.” Ket gave no answer, though Alan could tell he turned his head to see. Not far ahead, ruddy firelight flickered. The wolf streaked toward it. The haunt lay behind them now, an encircling barrier against any harm, and Ket went limp as a rag with relief. Alan lunged forward, banging against trees, and stumbled through an open doorway. The wolf sat, panting, by the fire, under a low, vaulted roof of unhewn stone. Alan dumped Ket on the ground and straightened himself painfully to look around.

  Firelight showed him a small, musty stone chamber, circular in shape, evidently long disused. Smoke stung his eyes, finding its way reluctantly from the central hearth to window slits. Wreckage of a stone stair led to rubble where an upper room had once been. Snow blew in at the doorless entry. A jumble of deadwood for burning climbed halfway up the bare walls on all sides. Beyond the fire stood a figure, very still.… Alan felt an unexpected leap and tumble of heart. He saw a royal-blue cloak, and he recognized the brooch that fastened it—but the person looked far too small to be his son. A mere slip of a girl confronted him, huddled in the thick cloth. A name floated effortlessly to Alan’s mind.

  “Meg?” he blurted.

  “Ay.” She frowned up at him, as bold as a trapped mouse but not, somehow, uncourteous. “And who’re ye that my friend has brought me instead of dinner?”

  “I—I am Trevyn’s father.” Alan stammered out the name, amazed to find that he could not call himself King, not to her. And why would she believe him anyway? he asked himself hotly. Covered with snow as they were, he and Ket might as well have been a pair of brigands. But Meg gazed into his face and silently nodded.

  “And this is Ket the Red,” Alan added, going to kneel by his companion. “Ket, this is Meg.”

  The poor fellow was sitting up, looking perturbed, his face nearly as pale as the snow. Alan brushed him off, grumbling softly. “Sorry to have hauled you in here like that. I should have stunned you first, but there wasn’t time.”

  Ket rolled his eyes. “I’m as glad not to have a lump on my head.”

  “Can I get ye something to eat?” Meg offered doubtfully. There was not a bit of food in sight. Ket looked at her in dry amusement.

  “Ay, I’m famished. What’s fer supper?”

  “Only a bit of cold fish,” she admitted. “I was expecting Flossie to bring me a rabbit for supper, and she brought me you two instead.”

  Ket and Alan both eyed the wolf. She lay curled by a tangle of firewood opposite the door, her plume of a tail covering her nose, her dark eyes shining over it. Lovely eyes, Alan thought. “We’re grateful,” he said suddenly. “Bring the fish, Meg, and we’ll put something more with it.”

  He and Ket started digging in their packs, scattering blankets in the process. “Such beautiful blankets!” Meg breathed, though they were mostly plain brown. Then she gazed, wide-eyed, as food began to appear.

  As it turned out, no one even touched the fish. They ate fresh bread lightly toasted by the fire, and bits of cheese, and dried apple snits, and sausage that they roasted on sticks until it dripped and sizzled. Alan and Ket fixed a blanket over the gaping doorway with arrows jammed between the stones. Meg sat by the fire, flushed pink from warmth and food and excitement. She had not felt so comfortable and full in weeks, and already she adored Alan, though she stood in awe of him. Her shy smile eased the taut angles of her face. Watching the quiet way her small head rode above her borrowed finery, Alan began to understand how Trevyn might have loved her. She moved with the unschooled poise of all the wild things.

  Ket had heard about Meg and Trevyn at Lee. He felt ready to be fond of her, since she, a country person like himself, had likewise found herself entangled with these mysterious Lauerocs. He also regarded her with something of wonder. “So ye’re Rafe’s runaway!” he exclaimed, sitting at his ease. “And in the haunt! I roamed these parts for more years than I care to remember and never met a man who could brave this haunt, except a certain pair of rogues who became Kings. And now I’ve had to be carried into it. How’d ye ever come here, lass?”

  “I can’t say,” she answered, puzzled. “I just didn’t care, that’s all.… I was cold and tired and disgusted, and I wasn’t going to be tracked down and taken back to Lee, not for anything. People have been snickering at me ever since …” She stopped.

  “Since my son left you,” Alan put in quietly from his side of the fire.

  “Ay. They envied us when we were together, and now they are glad to see me saddened. I would rather live among the beasts; they are kinder.” Meg talked to the fire, but in a moment she straightened to meet Alan’s eyes. “What news of Trevyn, Liege?”

  “He’s dead,” said Alan harshly.

  “What!” shouted Ket, and for no reason scrambled to his feet, utterly startled.

  “He’s dead, I say. I dream of his corpse at night.” Alan turned away from them both, tired tears wetting his face. He could not say what had moved him to speak the truth as he perceived it. He had hurt the girl to no purpose, he berated himself. He could have let her hope yet a while.… Still, it felt good, the warm release of tears on his cheeks.

  “Sire.” Meg came to stand before him, facing him. “Have ye seen Gwern about this?”

  “Nay.” Alan found that he did not mind her steady-eyed presence. “Why, lass?”

  “He will know where Trevyn is, or if he is really dead. I am sure of it.”

  Alan grimaced in exasperation. “Gwern, this and Gwern, that! Gwern eats of my food and sings of my sword.… Who is this Gwern, that he knows everything and does nothing?” The King waved his arms in a grand gesture of futility. “I can’t go chasing after a barefoot weathercock, lass! I am likely to have a war to fight.”

  “I’ll go.” She returned sedately to her place by the fire.

  “You’ll go nowhere except back to Lee,” Alan stated, suddenly annoyed. “Your folk are worried about you.”

  She glanced up in genuine surprise at his apparent lack of common sense. “Ye can tell them ye saw me.”

  Ket stiffened and sputtered into his flask, apparently choking on the liquor. Alan choked, too, on nothing but air, though he had not been above running errands in his time. “You have no business traipsing about Isle, putting yourself in danger,” he flared at last. “These are perilous times, Megan! Get home, where you belong!”

  “I belong here as much as anywhere,” Megan flared back. “Who’re ye to tell me where I may or may not go?”

  Caught in another paroxysm, Ket expelled a wheeze that was indeterminate as to emotional color. Alan let out a harried bark, half laugh, half roar of rage.

  “Your King, girl! Just your poor, old King, that’s all. You should obey me, unquestioning!”

  “Drag me to Laueroc, then. Put me in chains.” She glared at him.

  “Halt! Truce! Hold!” Ket jumped to his feet with such an air of desperate command that they both gaped at him. “Ye’re not going anywhere for several days, neither of ye, if I read this storm aright. So take a breath! Alan, where is that big, bloody sword ye’ve latched onto?”

  Alan stared at him a moment, thinking, then began to laugh soundlessly. “I let it drop when I jumped you.… Confound it, I can only just carry so much! Why do you ask, Ket? Do you think I should use it on her?”

  “I asked,” Ket replied poi
ntedly, “to take yer mind off yer spleen. Anger is comfortless in these close quarters.” He turned sternly to the girl. “Meg, tread more lightly, if ye please! We have watched brave men die today.”

  “I am sorry,” she said with no cringing, only cleanest sympathy. “I didn’t know. The wolves?”

  “Ay.” Alan sat down, surprised to find how suddenly and intensely he liked her. “Ket is right; I am out of sorts. I beg pardon for my manner, Meg. But I am still concerned for your safety.”

  “I must go to Gwern,” she said softly, “as the salmon must go to the sea, or the stag to the meadow, safety or no safety. Can ye understand?”

  “I understand many things I don’t like. But I know Trevyn cared for you, as I am beginning to care for you myself. Give him something to return to. He may wish to wed you, for all I know. The young fool.”

  “You just told me he was dead!” Meg cried.

  Alan blinked at her. “For a moment, just now, I thought he was alive,” he whispered, and bowed his head as pain washed over him.

  Ket got up and kicked ashes over the embers of the fire. “Sleep,” he ordered with the succinct authority of the servant. He distributed blankets, giving Meg an extra one. The night was icy cold, even within walls. They lay with their feet to the fire, and close together, for warmth.

  “What place is this?” Alan wondered aloud. A place that had already changed him, he sensed.

  “A sort of a—a mighty ruin.” Meg’s voice floated through the darkness, hushed, like a moth. “The fish live in circular pools rimmed with stone,” she added, after a long pause. “They lie right under the ice. There were a few apples still hanging from the trees when I first came.”