by Brian Bates
I looked at him in surprise. ‘All of them?’
He nodded and, eager to begin, I stripped off my clothes and heaped them in a pile on the grass.
‘Shoes, too,’ he instructed.
I unstrapped my shoes and added them to the heap.
‘Close your eyes,’ Wulf said softly.
I stood on the grass between the shelter and the river, in the space lit by the two wildfires, and closed my eyes.
‘You are at the centre of a web of power which extends to all worlds.’ Wulf’s voice came from behind me now. ‘The dwarf has granted you the power to travel along those fibres to the far reaches of the web: the world of the spirits. Your fibres are passing right through your body, strong as welded spears. Stand quite still and you will feel them vibrating pulling and pushing your body.’
I stood absolutely motionless, but I could feel nothing unusual. Occasionally Wulf adjusted my stance, lifting an arm further from my body, slightly changing the crook of my elbow, pulling my shoulders lower.
‘Soon you will be able to feel the fibres trembling,’ he whispered.
My skin tingled slightly, but I felt nothing that might be trembling fibres.
‘Wulf, I cannot feel a thing,’ I confessed at last.
‘Keep still. Keep your body aware,’ he replied softly. ‘It will happen.’
I could hear the crackle and spit of the fires and a distant owl hooting somewhere in the forest. The night air was warm and a sudden light breeze stroked my bare skin. Suddenly, to my surprise, I heard Wulf chuckling.
‘The breeze you feel is the trembling of your fibres,’ he said quietly.
I was awe-struck. The breeze took on a totally new significance and almost immediately I realized that it was coming not from one direction, but was swirling around all sides of my body at once.
‘Do not be fooled by the gentleness of the fibres,’ Wulf murmured. ‘Every day we adapt and adjust to the caresses without being aware of it. We listen to them, feel them, have our thoughts and moods changed by them. And although the fibres usually speak in a whisper, never forget that they can rage and, in a twinkling can tear you apart.’
I was fascinated by the lilting quality of Wulf s voice; it seemed to fade in and out, along with the gentle gusts of breeze.
‘Now wait for a stronger pull,’ Wulf said. ‘Keep your eyes closed and wait for a pull along a fibre. When you feel it, follow it.’
The breeze ruffled my hair and the sensation was exquisite, as if each hair was moving separately. Suddenly a very different sensation replaced it; I felt firm pressure in the small of my back and for a moment I thought Wulf had pushed me. But then I heard his distant voice.
‘Keep your eyes closed. Follow the pull of the fibres.’
I stood still for a moment, confused that I had felt a push whereas Wulf repeatedly referred to my being pulled along a fibre. I did not know whether the push was the kind of signal I was expected to feel. Then a sharp tug pulled me from the waist and I started walking across the grass. My eyes were tightly shut, but I could tell by the brightness on my eyelids that I had walked between the two wildfires, in a diagonal direction up the slope. Although I could not see where I was going I walked quite rapidly with an uncanny sense of confidence, exactly as if Wulf were guiding me by pulling on my belt from the front. I slowed momentarily, wondering whether to look.
‘Keep walking’ Wulf hissed, and I was startled to hear that he sounded as if he were at least ten paces behind me.
I sailed over the bumpy grass, propelled by the breeze and pulled from the front, and then the direction changed; the breeze gusted strongly from my left side and I was pulled from the right. Excitedly, I began to sidestep to the right.
‘Keep the strength of the fibres in the middle of your back,’ Wulf said, from somewhere in front of me.
I walked in rapid bursts of small steps and found that by making fine adjustments to my posture and direction, I could keep the strength of the fibres at my back. It was exhilarating I felt that I had given up control over my movement and that the fibres were guiding me, taking care of me.
Abruptly the breeze died down and whispered contentedly in the grass. The pulling sensation disappeared. I stood motionless, eyes still closed and heard Wulf trotting to my side.
‘Open your eyes,’ he instructed.
I looked directly in front of me and saw that I was standing on the very edge of the river. The fibres had stopped just before I stepped off the bank into the water.
Wulf directed me back towards the fires. ‘Now that you are able to heed the trembling of your fibres, the next step is to learn to leap along your fibres. Once you can do that, you will be able to leap into the sky, and journey with your guardian to the spirit-world.’
Wulf moved our clothes to the back of the clearing then scooped up a large pile of dark green leaves and dropped them on to the flames. The two wildfires hissed and glowered and great clouds of green and orange smoke poured through the vegetation and billowed across the clearing. The area was plunged into darkness as the flames struggled beneath the leaves and the pouring columns of smoke reminded me of the steaming cauldrons I had seen in the Underworld.
‘Follow me,’ Wulf ordered, backing away from the fires. At the edge of the clearing he hesitated for a moment, then launched himself towards the flames, sprinting at least twenty paces and then leaping at such a height over the fires that he completely disappeared into the clouds of smoke. He seemed to have cleared both wildfires with his jump, but I could no longer see or hear him from where I stood. I even thought that he might have landed in the trees beyond the fires, though that hardly seemed credible.
Then I heard Wulf calling to me to jump.
I backed away from the fires towards the spot from which he had begun his run. Some of the leaves on the wildfire nearest to me sagged into the flames and dense smoke crackled and swirled into the night air. I ran towards the fire as fast as I could, slammed my left foot hard on the ground and leapt into the smoke with my eyes tightly shut. For a brief instant I sailed through the air, then opened my eyes the moment my leading foot hit the ground. My bare feet skidded across the grass and I slammed on to my back perilously close to the river.
Wulf helped me to my feet and wordlessly led me back towards the fires.
‘Jump along your fibres,’ he admonished, lining me up about thirty paces from the nearest fire. ‘Wait until you see a fibre shimmering above the fire, then project your body along it.’
I closed my eyes and waited, but nothing appeared. I could feel the breeze on my bare skin, but no pulling sensation from the stomach. After a time I admitted to Wulf that I could not see anything that looked like a fibre. Perhaps the fall had upset me. I felt that it was useless to continue, for we would be waiting in vain for the rest of the night.
‘Try again,’ he insisted. ‘Close your eyes and look for the fibres in the blackness.’
Sighing in resignation, I shut my eyes tightly. Almost immediately I glimpsed a shining line of light shooting away from me over the fire like a silver rainbow. I felt sure that I would lose the image if I opened my eyes, so I stood absolutely still and watched the fibre in the darkness of my eyelids. It pulsed like a beating heart and I thought I could feel it tugging me near my navel. Suddenly a breath of wind whipped across my chest and something pulled me forward on to my toes. I opened my eyes and the fibre glowed red, clearly visible, arcing high through the clouds of smoke. Without hesitation I sprinted hard towards the flames, bounded upwards on the fibre and shot over the wildfires as if carried by a stormy wind high above the smoke-belching leaves. Then I dropped like a stone and landed in a crumpled heap. I rolled on to my back just in time to see Wulf sailing over me and disappearing into the shrubbery beyond the edge of the clearing.
I was getting shakily to my feet when Wulf bounded to my side. He put an arm around my waist and led me slowly back into the clearing. ‘You are doing well, Brand,’ he said excitedly. ‘But you lost concentration.
You must keep your whole being focused on the fibres—keep them in your vision all the time. This is no task for a mind that flickers like a candle.’
Wulf drew me to the back of the clearing pointed towards the fire and then ruffled my hair playfully.
‘Right over the fires into the trees!’ he chuckled.
I closed my eyes.
This time I had waited only a short time when I suddenly staggered forward, sucked by a swirling wind that cut cold across my stomach; then I ran towards the nearest fire with long bouncing steps. Just before I reached the fire a fibre appeared before me like an incandescent rope reaching from my body into the sky and I rose effortlessly from the ground. As I plunged through the smoke I thought I glimpsed at eye level the high branches of surrounding trees, then I hit the ground at tremendous speed. This time I absorbed the shock by bending my legs on impact. When I looked around in the darkness, I realized that I was sitting in a small patch of fern, by the edge of the clearing and at least ten paces from the second fire.
Wulf ran up and pulled me to my feet. His expression was all the encouragement I needed: I knew that I was now jumping with my fibres.
* * *
I leaped repeatedly through the wildfire smoke, higher each time until, as dawn streaked the sky, Wulf called a halt and I sank to the ground on the riverbank. My eyes streamed with tears from the acrid smoke and I was soaked with sweat from the heat of the fires and the exertion. Yet I could have got up and jumped all day if necessary. I had never before experienced such a sense of physical power and balance and I was totally elated.
I bent over the riverbank and ducked my head in the water, then drank noisily from cupped hands. When I turned back towards the shelter, Wulf was stripping the leafy twigs from several long hazel boughs and then sharpening the end of each bough to a point. He embedded the sharpened end of nine boughs into the turf around one of the wildfires, forming a circle, then bent them over so that the tops met above the fire to form a conical shape. Lashing the ends together with rope, he worked with great rapidity and in short bursts of activity between repeated retreats from the heat and smoke of the fire.
When Wulf had finished, he collected my clothes and draped them over the conical frame. I walked up the slope to join him. He looked at me and winked broadly.
‘It was a good night’s work, Brand. You can now project your body along your fibres and the smoke has purified you. Once your clothes have been purified too, we shall go in search of your guardian spirit. If we are successful in that quest, you will be able to project your shadow-soul along your fibres and journey to the spirit-world.’
I turned and looked across the river at the dawn sky; there were further impossible tasks to perform, but for now I gave thanks for the rising sun beaming golden arrows of light into the retreating darkness. Two nights had passed and I was still alive.
In Search of the Guardians
AT DAYBREAK we left the camp and started walking towards the hills. I felt strong and the miles passed quickly beneath my feet, though my stomach fluttered with fear. I was no longer afraid of encountering the spirits, for that would be necessary if I was to live, but I was terrified of making a terrible error that would destroy all my chances of survival. Wulf had warned me that if I did not heed the messages of the spirits I would never retrieve my soul and that, despite the help from the Underworld smith of sorcery, I could not exist for long with merely a shadow-soul. As I walked, I continually dwelled upon the possibility that I would fail to recognize my guardian spirit or even that I would journey to the spirit-world and somehow still fail to recapture my soul.
I gazed up into the passing trees, trying to rid my mind of anxieties. They did not leave me, but gradually I became aware that it was an entirely different concern that kept my mind spinning the growing intensity of my desire to encounter my guardian spirit and to succeed in my attempt to journey to the spirit-world. As soon as I realized the power of this desire, I knew it to be the true reason for my apprehension. Living under the threat of death had in some way diminished the importance of merely preserving my life at all costs. I needed my guardian spirit to take me to the spirit-world and I needed to journey to the spirit-world to retrieve my soul. But it was the wonderful nature of that adventure that consumed me, not the necessity for survival. I was being offered the opportunity to experience the secrets of Middle-Earth sorcery and I was anxious to seize this chance to the very best of my ability.
Wulf always insisted that we walk in silence, but when we stopped at noon to rest I asked the question that had ridden in my mind since we left the camp.
‘Wulf, how will I know when my guardian spirit has arrived? What will it look like?’
He stretched out on the grass, lying flat on his back. ‘When the guardian spirits manifest themselves to you they could appear in any one of a hundred guises. It could be a worm or a bear, insect or wolf, a mighty oak, even a pebble. And although there will be one guardian spirit for you, it may not necessarily appear alone. You will have to be open to every conceivable possibility.’
My heart sank. Wulf had confirmed my worst fears and I was sure that I would commit a major error and seal my own fate.
After a short silence Wulf’s warm, infectious chuckle broke into my thoughts and he reached over to clap me playfully on the shoulder.
‘You will recognize your guardian spirit, have no doubt,’ he said cheerfully. ‘The guardians are like shadows: visible outside your body, but forming an inexorable link with you. The essence of your guardian spirit already resides with you; that is why you will instantly recognize it when it appears.’
‘The guardian spirit is inside me?’ I was surprised.
‘Everyone has the essence of their guardian spirits within them, but very few people know how to manifest their guardians and how to use them. The secret of the guardian spirits lies in the ability to extend the self beyond the boundaries of the physical body and to shoot along the lines of power into other worlds. The same ability applies to the guardians: if they can be projected into the world outside the body, they make available untold powers, they advise and protect you, they are with you whenever you need them.’
Wulf rolled on to his side, facing me, propped up on one elbow.
‘Your guardian spirit will guide you to the spirit-world and leave you in the correct place, a place where you may begin to seek your soul. But you will journey to the spirit-world using your own power. There will be no protective salves, spearwort drinks or wildfires, and no Wulf to watch over you, for I shall leave you alone on the hills to summon your guardian spirit. You must journey along your fibres of power, projecting your shadow-soul along them just as you jumped along the fibres over the wildfires. But if your guardian spirit arrives, it will help you by journeying with you, perhaps even lending you its physical form. Your guardian spirit is for you alone and it will be with you all of your life. In fact, if you should ever see your guardian spirit leaving you, then you will know that death is imminent.’
I had been hanging on Wulf’s every word, striving to ensure that I missed nothing that might help me succeed in this task; now I tried to question him further, but he placed a forefinger to his lips, then stood and stretched.
‘The time for talking has ended,’ he said, smiling ‘All your questions will be answered when you reach the spirit-world.’
* * *
It was late in the afternoon before Wulf led the way on to a narrow ridge which climbed out of the woods into the bracken-covered hills. Shadows raced up the hillside after us and the sinking sun warmed my back. We stopped at the top of a small rise and Wulf pointed towards the crest of the hill, far above us.
‘There, Brand, at the burial mound of the giants, we will seek your guardian spirit. It is a place of immense power. From within that burial mound, the Wyrd Sisters weave the webs of wyrd.’
I followed his pointing finger and saw for the first time the tip of an enormous burial mound squatting on top of the hill—its grass-covered bulk,
high as a barn, dominating the skyline. Until now the mound had been invisible, hidden by the brow of the hill. I shivered involuntarily.
‘We are heading for that promontory,’ he added, moving his finger to indicate a flat ridge directly beneath the mouth of the mound.
To reach the ridge we had to climb hard, grabbing for foot- and hand-holds and scrambling up escarpments of crumbling chalk rock. When we finally reached the ridge, I crawled away from the edge and lay down to get my breath. Above and behind us loomed the mouth of the burial mound, facing into the valley. All around the small plateau, stiff, stubby fingers of rock-plants rustled in the breeze.
Wulf was crouching at the edge of the ridge, on a rocky spur projecting out from the hillside. He turned and silently gestured for me to join him. I moved cautiously towards him, sat several feet from the edge and inched my way forward onto the rock, settling into a slight depression in the ground which gave me some small sense of security.
The view was breathtaking. The distant hilltops shone with the soft glow of the setting sun and cast deep shadows over the forest stretching out below us. The sun hovered just above the lip of the world and as I looked towards it, the entire landscape shattered into shimmering streaks of light. The effect was exhilarating
‘Brand, when your guardian has arrived, this is the point at which you will leave for your journey to the spirit-world. With your guardian, you must jump off this precipice on a fibre and your shadow-soul will fly.’
Very slowly, I leaned forward and peered over the edge. Below, water seemed to gush from some hidden spring out of the hillside and tumbled, spun and cascaded down the almost sheer cliff to disappear into the gathering shadows of the river valley.
Suddenly I felt dizzy. In panic I gripped the rock with both hands and leaned back, away from the edge. Then I felt Wulf right behind me, holding my shoulders firmly.
