by Tom Lloyd
I sighed. The mystery had taken a wider grip. Now madness followed in its footsteps and I feared what more I might learn. But what choice did I have? Could I forget the events surrounding my own mother’s death? Live with this air of oppression and terror into winter and beyond?
‘But perhaps there is,’ said Cebana slowly. ‘Your mother kept a day book for all the years we have been married. She must have written the most inconsequential things in it, so why not this great mystery that had consumed her days for half a year?’
She was of course right, and even in my delicate state I felt a surge of excitement rush through my body. I started towards the door when a wave of dizziness briefly surrounded me. I had to make a grab of Dever’s solid shoulder to prevent a fall. He immediately dropped the letter and took a firm hold while Forel darted over. Together they urged me back while Cebana cried for a chair to be brought up. For a fraction of a second, stars burst darkly in my mind. The motion of being urged back stirred my wits to return and I struggled against the combined strength of my sons to stay upright.
The moment had passed, it was nothing more than the residue of the earlier episode they knew nothing of and I was sure it heralded no serious illness. The combination of stress and days of travelling to my childhood home had unsettled me to be sure, but I was determined not to be slowed by one brief spell of dizziness. My protests were met with considerable argument, but I would not be swayed and the compromise of my sons escorting me there secured my passage to the jumble room.
Outside, the rain had not abated and black clouds raced in over us, spurred on by a furious wind that grew with every minute. The day had been fresh enough, full of promise but lacking in much of a breeze. It was a strange contrast to the strength that had chased us inside and now whistled down chimneys, rattled our shutters and tore at the slates on the roof.
The cool protected calm of the main stairway muted the sounds of the breaking storm, until we ascended to the upper reaches of the house where ancient timber stood in place of stone. Here draughts pounced from every direction and the wood creaked and groaned under the assault. The boys looked at each other in slight alarm, fearful perhaps that the roof might give or be torn off, but I knew Moorview could stand this. By cautious steps we made our way to the jumble room, picking our way through the scattered shreds of my mother’s recorded life.
Forel immediately went to the window and stared out over the moor, but there was little to see in the deluge that assailed us. He stood there for half a minute, his lip pinched white between his teeth. Dever only let go of my arm when he was convinced of my grip on a desk near the window. My balance and strength had returned as we ascended the stair, but Dever had accepted no word of protest. Only then did he set about lighting the lamps of the room, for the light outside was fading fast with the advancing weather.
Presently, we set about gathering handfuls of papers. These were collected up into a single pile and deposited into a box Forel had unearthed from the foot-well of a desk. As we tidied, assembled, investigated and rearranged, no trace of the day book was to be found. Her three writing boxes gave up more letters, some faded and cracked missives from my father, some recent, but not the book we sought. In a drawer I found its various incarnations ranging from last year to before my brother’s death. Older ones yet were stacked in no order behind a pile of musty and moth-eaten material. Enough recorded thoughts to piece together much of my mother’s life, but none of the past year, it seemed.
‘Well, it’s not here,’ declared Forel in exasperation.
He looked up at us from the last drawer. Dust had settled on the hazel of his eyebrows and I exchanged a glance of wearied amusement with Dever. Forel saw it and ran a hand back over his head, sneezing violently at the cloud he disturbed. When that abated there was precious little humour in his face, his eyes were bloodshot and his voice muffled as if hampered by a cold.
‘I’ve had enough of being up here. Let’s get these to somewhere with air and see whether they were the effort.’
He gave his brother an irritable nudge and the burly youth stepped out of Forel’s way before turning to pick up the meagre fruits of our labour.
We returned to find the family room in slightly more order than when we had left. The unmen rose nervously as I entered, but of my family only Sana did any more than raise eyebrows at our return. The little girl rushed over to demand attention and I gathered her up in my arms; not trusting my strength to throw her up in the air as she loved, but the affection still brought a sparkling smile to her doll’s face. Her hair was still loose. As she ran to me, Sana shook the beginnings of a plait from her hair and I knew that I had been an excuse to avoid her sister’s attentions.
‘What is all that?’ asked Cebana.
I let Sana back down to the floor, giving her a pat on the backside to send her back to Daen’s reach, and then went to sit beside my wife.
‘We couldn’t find the book, but these are all her recent letters so they should tell us something at least.’ I paused, and looked over to Forel who had yet to sit as he cleared his head at a window. ‘Forel, could you ring for a servant please?’
He nodded and reached over to the bell-pull, which quickly brought the man I’d overheard in the kitchen. He looked more than a little apprehensive and sagged with relief when I just asked him to bring Madam Haparl. The housekeeper hobbled in, determination etched into her face as the servant hovered on her elbow. The unmen again jumped up at the arrival, this time to offer his seat, which, with a glance toward me, was accepted gratefully.
‘My Lord Suzerain?’ she whispered once settled, her voice hardly rising above the crackle of the fire.
‘My mother’s day book,’ I replied. ‘Do you know where it would be?’
‘It isn’t in her jumble room? I thought I’d took all her papers up and locked them in—’
‘You locked the door?’ Forel interjected. ‘It was open when I went up the first time.’
‘But it can’t have been! I had the only key.’
‘It was open, I’m sure of it. Did no one borrow the key at all?’
‘No one, though Emila asked what I had put up there.’
‘Emila?’ said I, not recognising the name.
‘She arrived just after your last visit here my Lord. She’d been in service as a lady’s maid over in Coloch. She’d been put out after bearing the count’s bastard daughter.’ Madam Harpal paused to catch her breath, the trio of sentences enough to tire but not defeat her. ‘She’d been staying with her uncle, Master Tinen of the inn, when your mother decided to take her on. Her baby had died of fever you see, your mother took pity. She said I was growing too weak to help her, and none of the girls here had the training or sense to be a lady’s maid.’
‘Where is she now?’
‘Back at the village I suppose. She wasn’t a house-servant so she left when your mother died. Awful upset she was, they were as close as I’d ever seen with your mother.’
The lamps flickered as a renewed burst of wind howled down the chimney and the shutters rattled and clacked on the window frames. I looked over to the doors that led out onto the terrace as bursts of lightning shone through the gaps in the shutters. The companion thunder roared so deep and loud that Moorview itself seemed to reel from the fury. Carana, whose back was to the window, gave a start of alarm at the furious crash. With the strengthened wind blowing in off the moor we could hear the drum of rain against the shutters themselves.
‘So Emila must have stolen the book.’ Daen paused from running a brush through Sana’s hair, looking up first to Madam Haparl and then over at me.
‘Why would she?’ countered the housekeeper. ‘Emila and the countess were as close as can be. If she had wanted some reminder, the whole staff could testify of her devotion. No one would deny she was deserving of some trifle to remember the countess by and a day book is hardly valuable.’
‘I believe it was precisely her devotion that led her to steal the book,’ I declared, rather bold
ly perhaps but I was sure it was near enough to the truth. ‘I think what is recorded in that book led to my mother’s death, collected from her letters.’
‘Letters?’ questioned Madam Haparl, but as I opened my mouth to answer her Forel jumped in.
‘But what about the original letters? Did she take them too?’
‘Damn the letters!’ I bellowed. Jumping to my feet I felt a renewed vigour rush through my body. ‘I want that day book and I’ll find it in the village!’
As those words hung in the air, time hesitated; suspended in a fearful pose. Then the storm breached Moorview. With an infernal howl the wind tore open the shutters covering the terrace door. The heavy wooden shutters were flung against the stone walls and held fast by the wind, two furious heartbeats of lightning illuminating the paved terrace beyond.
Then with one great head-splitting crash they were slammed back in. The glass they had once protected shattered under the impact and hurled shards across the room as a shadow of darkness leapt into the house. The wind snarled the fire into submission, overturned or extinguished lamps and whipped around my terrified family. An inrush of darkness enveloped the room, flowing thick over the flames from the spilled lamps.
A momentary silence descended as all sound was sucked from the room. Bursts of blinding light seared through my eyelids as I cowered before the gale. A jolt of pain seemed to echo through the house and through my feet I felt it struck, once, twice – the hammer-blows of thunder detonating about my ears.
I crouched lower, then felt the page of a letter slap up into my face and all fear faded. Peering through the sudden gloom of the family room I saw my family similarly huddled. The doors to the terrace had been torn from their hinges and my mother’s papers thrashed in the intruding squall.
I jumped to my feet, running the few paces to where Cebana and Daen had been sitting. My wife was now sprawled over her two daughters, Sana enveloped in a protective cocoon. At my touch Cebana recoiled as if stung, but then the wild look in her eye receded and she ran questing hands over her precious child. Stepping back, I looked for the others. Forel was at his other sister’s side. I could see blood on Carana’s face, a black stain in the weak moonlight. As he raised a hand to touch it she slapped him away. Looking back down, Cebana hugged Sana tight to her chest and I knew there had been no injury to the frailest of us.
As I checked, Dever was up and unhurt, I saw the ruin of the door as the long brass hinge swung in the continuing wind. With each gust, a pattern of raindrops spattered further into the room. I was suddenly struck by the notion that this was no natural occurrence, that some other agency had vented its rage upon us. My thoughts turned to whatever daemon had hunted my mother and the next image in my mind was that of the defenceless village a few miles away.
I ran for the door, unable to brook any delay though my daughter was bleeding and my family in chaos. I had been taken by some consuming mania: by the thought of that innocent girl, unaware of what monstrous visitation was surging through the night towards her. And perhaps she was not the only one in peril. Perhaps the rage of this unnatural storm would be vented upon them all and I had placed so many lives in danger with that one declaration of intent.
I ran through the house past the terrified faces of the servants and, amid shouts from all directions, barrelled my way to the stable-side door. Throwing back the bolts I tore it open to be greeted by the fullness of night’s fury, a gust of wind driving me back while the sky itself cackled and spat.
As the drapes of the room came alive I readied myself to sally out. Even as I stood there I saw slates fly and smash on the cobbled yard. With painfully slow steps I managed to get a few yards out into the stable courtyard, before an unexpected change in the wind’s direction launched me headlong at the stable. I fought my way inside the door to be greeted with terrified whinnies from the inhabitants. As I slammed it shut again I saw Berin emerge from a stall, as afraid as the horses but still doing his best to calm them.
‘Berin, saddle my horse for me, I must get to the village!’
Berin stood stock still, shaking his head with wild eyes fixed upon me.
‘Do it man! Have you gone deaf?’ It was unfair of me to vent my anger upon him, but at least it seemed to return Berin to his senses.
‘Can’t sir!’ he barked nervously in reply. ‘He’ll throw you.’
I stopped, curses jostling on my tongue but before any could escape I realised the truth in his words.
‘Then saddle Toramin, he’s battle-trained, he’ll cope with the storm.’
Berin stared back at me for a moment but made no further argument. He hefted Dever’s great saddle in one hand while the other gathered the reins from a peg opposite. Those he passed to me, his fear of the raging storm now forgotten as he studied the flaring nostrils of the hunter. Though Toramin was battle-trained, any sudden movement might still panic him as the wind howled overhead. As it was, the horse was perfectly placid while the saddle and reins were fitted and in a matter of minutes I was astride as Berin laboured open the stable door.
I nearly lost control as we left the stable. A great shard of lightning cleaved the sky and my steed reared in surprise. Instead of kicking and bucking to dislodge the weight, Toramin merely circled and backed away from the booming peals of thunder echoing around the landscape. It did not take me long to guide him round to the drive and then we were off, the horse more than willing to sprint away from the moor.
We ran with the spirit of the storm on our heels. Up above, the clouds raced to outstrip us and the night roared approval at our foolish abandon. The smaller flashes of lightning were what lit our path for us, beyond Moorview the land was a dark and forbidding place. Only the good condition of the road kept either of our necks whole and only once did I have to make the hunter leap to avoid a fallen branch lying in our path. Hunched and spiteful hawthorns whipped all about, I felt several times the talons of those trees scrape down my scalp and catch my tunic but nothing would deter me.
Then the road dipped and we charged down into the long sinister straight called Gallows Walk by the local people. The reason for such a name was forgotten even before the battle of Moorview, but never more apt as when I entered the eerie, sheltered avenue overhung by yews and pine. There was a curious calm on the needled floor, for all that the tops of these trees seethed and slashed at the air.
I kept my head down and concentrated on the road ahead, trickles of rain working their way down through my hair and into my eyes. My vision blurred with water and I had to flail at my face to clear it. My clothes were soaked by then and my efforts did nothing more than provide vague respite. I returned my attention to the gloom ahead as a new burst of lightning lit the way ahead, a fork arcing down to strike somewhere off to my right.
Through the fierce light I saw a fragment of what lay ahead. Framed by the trees that arched into a near-tunnel, was a figure. It was motionless, facing me but with no face I could see. All I made out was a gigantic form, clothes flying wildly in the storm though the figure itself was firmly rooted. The face must have been hooded for all I saw was the dancing edges of this spectral image, the centre of the storm as I charged on towards it.
I had no time to reach the storm-clad spirit, nor stop or even think past the terror that wrenched at my heart. As the light drained away into shadows, a blinding pain burst on the side of my head. Stars whirled as I felt myself tossed sideways, a blur of leaves and branches spinning past on eyes before I succumbed.
Blackness flared, then enveloped my mind as the Land receded and there was only silence.
A Grave Understanding
I awoke to Dever’s worried face. I could not tell how long I had been lying there, but the storm had lessened from when my eyes closed.
‘How are you feeling?’
I tried to sit up, planting my elbows underneath me before my strength gave way. I was lying at the foot of a pine. As Forel stood to one side holding our three steeds, Dever lifted me gently until my back was set against
the tree trunk.
‘I feel, ah, in pain,’ I said eventually, raising shaky fingers to my head to probe for a bruise or blood.
I was glad to find a ripe lump under my fingers, but no vital fluids. The pain was an ache rather than the stab I expected if my skull had been cracked.
‘Well perhaps that branch put some sense back into your head,’ snapped Forel from behind his brother. ‘If you’d been paying attention when you left, you might have noticed your ancestral home on fire.’
I looked up in alarm and tried to stand, but Dever placed a hand on my chest and I could not resist.
‘Enough, Forel, that does no good. Calm yourself, Father, the fire’s out and did little real damage. About as much harm as this branch has done to your thick head.’ He raised a broken piece of wood with a cautious smile and held it out for me to see.
‘A branch?’
‘It was lying beside you.’
‘But the man …’ I tried again to sit up, this time with greater success. Dever took my elbow to steady me as I blinked away the sharp bursts of light before my eyes.
‘What man?’
‘The … Oh Gods, the book!’ I struggled with my son until he let me rise, as unsteady as I was, keeping a firm grip on my shoulder when I tried to mount.
‘No more galloping tonight, and certainly not on my bloody horse! The village isn’t far, get on that overfed creature of your own and we’ll walk you there.’
‘No, there’s no time … the girl—’
My protests were cut short by a tone of voice that could have come from my own father, one deserving of the title Lord of Moorview. ‘Quiet! You’re not rushing off anywhere; I’m indulging you in even taking you there. If you insist in putting yourself in any more danger we’ll truss you like a turkey and drag you home. When Mother takes one look at that lump on your head you’ll not leave your bed for a month. Am I understood?’
I mumbled assent, resisting the urge to stare at my feet like a child. Whatever fervour demanded I get to the village, he was no doubt right that I had collapsed enough for one evening. In any case, I had lain on the road long enough for it not to matter. A few more minutes could not help the girl now. In my dazed state I felt cold and distant. I was certain that the maid would be dead, but the realisation could stir no emotion.
