by Roger Taylor
As if listening themselves, the torches dimmed a little, and the yellow glow of the radiant stones became tinged with red and orange.
Despite Arinndier’s succinctness, it proved to be a long telling, and the bringing of food and drink for the latest arrivals proved a timely interruption.
At the end there was a murmur of general satisfac-tion at the news of the defeat and flight of Dan-Tor, but it was Tirke who yielded to temptation.
‘He’s really gone?’ he exclaimed, unable to restrain himself. ‘We’re free of him? That’s… ’ He clenched his fists and looked upwards for inspiration. ‘Incredible… marvellous,’ he produced, rather inadequately. ‘I’m only sorry I missed the battle.’
Arinndier gave him a stern look for this breach of etiquette. ‘Don’t be, Fyordyn,’ he said grimly, pulling his rebuke into the last word. ‘There was no joy in it, and there’ll be others that you won’t miss, I fear. That’s why we’re here. We’re not truly free of him. He’s alive and unhurt and ensconced in Narsindalvak with a large part of his Mathidrin intact. I doubt he intends to stay there long, and I doubt it’s in our interests to leave him there unhindered too long, though what we should do remains to be decided.’
Hawklan lifted his hand to speak. Arinndier ac-knowledged him.
‘We must talk further about these blazing wagons that Dan-Tor used,’ Hawklan said thoughtfully. ‘And the materials that were in the warehouse that Yatsu fired.’
‘Indeed we must,’ Arinndier said. ‘They were terrify-ing. With a little more thought, he could have destroyed us.’ He frowned as he tried to set the thought aside. ‘Still, there are many things we need to discuss in due time, but tell us of your journey now, Hawklan, and your illness and your apparently miraculous recovery.’
Hawklan shrugged apologetically. ‘What happened to me after I struck Oklar and until I was awakened, I haven’t the words to tell. I’m sorry,’ he said, holding out his hands towards Dacu.
It was thus the Goraidin who told the tale of their journey from Eldric’s stronghold and of their strange encounter with the Alphraan and the mysterious awakening of Hawklan. His spare, unadorned, Fyordyn telling forbade interruption, but a deep, almost fearful, silence fell over his audience as he described Hawklan’s brief but terrible battle with the monstrous remnant of Sumeral’s First Coming.
Then he was concluding his tale. Telling how, after leaving the Alphraan’s strange caverns, they had found the gully that had led them safely across the shoulder of the mountain, and how their journey thereafter, though slow, had become gradually easier as they moved south and away from the premature snowfalls.
‘We have the route well mapped now,’ he said casu-ally to Arinndier. ‘But it’ll need a lot of work-roads, bridges and so on-to make it suitable for use by a force of any size.’
He finished his telling with the mysterious and sud-den disappearance of the Alphraan in the last part of the journey-if, as he wondered, disappearance were the correct word for the sudden absence of beings they had never actually seen.
‘They used to join in our conversations, just as if they were with us,’ he said. ‘Then’-he snapped his fingers-‘they were gone. Silent. It was very strange. We’d grown used to this disembodied voice talking to us, but there was nothing until we walked into your… army and that… whatever it was… that great clamour.’
‘It was an ousting of the old, the inflexible, by the new.’ Unbidden, Gulda interrupted the proceedings, though she threw an apologetic glance at Arinndier. ‘Or perhaps, more correctly, it was the ousting of the old by the very ancient.’ She shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter anyway. They’re a people… a race… almost beyond our understanding. We’ll probably never know what happened. In fact I doubt they’d even be able to explain it to us. Suffice it that in some way they’re now whole again and our friends, or at least our allies. Something that hasn’t happened since the beginning of the First Coming.’
‘Hence the singing, the… celebrations… we heard, several hours ride away?’ Arinndier said.
Gulda nodded and Arinndier motioned her to con-tinue. ‘Geadrol protocol demands that the first shall be last, Memsa,’ he said wryly, twitting her gently for her own remark earlier.
Gulda looked at him sideways and the Orthlundyn waited expectantly. But no barb was launched at the Fyordyn lord. Instead, it was launched at them as, very graciously, Gulda said, ‘Thank you, Lord. It’s a refresh-ing change to be amongst people who know how to discourse in an orderly and rational manner.’
Her own telling however, was almost breathtakingly brief: the Orthlundyn had been made ready for war; the Alphraan had interfered, first by causing accidents and then by stealing the labyrinth that guarded the Ar-moury. They had been contacted and confronted.
‘The rest you know,’ she concluded. ‘And the details we can discuss later.’
She ended abruptly and there was a long silence in the room. ‘They sealed the labyrinth?’ Hawklan asked eventually, almost in disbelief.
Gulda nodded. ‘It’s open again now,’ she said almost off-handedly. ‘First thing I checked when I got back. To be honest I’m surprised they’re not here, but… ’ She shrugged, reluctant to speculate on the behaviour of these strange people. ‘The whole thing was very worrying, but it’s been a useful exercise and we’ve learned… ’ She pulled a rueful face. ‘Re-learned, a great deal about our command structures and the logistics involved in moving so many people about.’
‘And your verdict?’ Hawklan asked.
Gulda paused thoughtfully. Loman found his eyes narrowing in anticipation of some caustic reply, but Gulda just nodded and said, ‘Not bad. There’s plenty of room for improvement, but I think they’ve got the wit to see that for themselves now. Not bad at all.’
‘Good,’ Hawklan acknowledged, smiling at the con-fusion of relief and surprise that Loman was struggling to keep off his face.
Arinndier looked round at the others. Several wanted to speak, but many were also showing distinct signs of weariness. He glanced quickly at Hawklan for approval.
‘We’ve heard enough for tonight, I think,’ he said firmly, pulling himself upright in his chair. ‘Even though we’ve raised more questions than we’ve heard answers. I think it’s going to take us some time to acquaint one another thoroughly with what’s been happening and I see no benefit in going without sleep while we’re doing it.’
Gulda grunted approvingly and soon the group was breaking up noisily. Hawklan took Arinndier’s arm as he rose to leave. ‘First light tomorrow, Arin, we’ll send messengers to Riddin to find out what’s happened to your Queen,’ he said.
Arinndier bowed. ‘Thank you,’ he replied. ‘She’s probably all right. She had a good escort and she’s not without resource as you know, but these early snows… ’ He shrugged helplessly.
Hawklan walked with him to the door. ‘Your people did well, but I grieve for your losses,’ he said.
Arinndier nodded. ‘Your arrow bound him, Hawk-lan, and gave us the chance. Without that… ’
‘It’s of no relevance now,’ Hawklan said, raising a hand. ‘Loman’s arrow. Ethriss’s bow, my… ’ he smiled self-deprecatingly, ‘marksmanship. Many things made the whole, not least the courage and discipline of your men, and it was the whole that tilted the balance and gave us all a little more time. What’s important now is that we use it to the full.’ He motioned to Tirilen, standing nearby. ‘We’ve a great deal to talk about yet. I’m glad you’re here. Tirilen will show you and the others back to your rooms. We’ll talk further tomorrow.’
As he closed the door behind them softly, Hawklan paused. Then he turned and with a gesture further dimmed the torches.
Only Gulda remained in the room. She was sitting by the radiant stones which were now glowing red and, in the reduced light, casting her shadow on to the walls and ceiling like a great, dominating presence. In her characteristic pose, resting her chin on her hands folded over the top of her stick, she seemed the stillest thing in the room.
Hawklan sat down opposite her quietly. Gulda looked up at him and, for an instant, in the light of the dimmed torches and the glowing fire, he saw again a fleeting vision of a powerful woman of great and proud beauty. But as quickly as it had come the image was gone and she was an old woman again.
‘You knew that Dan-Tor was Oklar and didn’t tell me,’ Hawklan said, his voice even.
‘I thought… ’ Gulda began.
‘You knew,’ Hawklan insisted, before she could continue.
Gulda lowered her eyes.
‘You reproach me,’ she said into the firelight.
‘Should I not?’ Hawklan replied.
Gulda was silent for a long time, then, ‘You had Ethriss’s sword and bow, arrows as good as could be made in this time, a fine horse, a stalwart friend… ’
‘Yes, you let Isloman go too,’ Hawklan interrupted. ‘Two men against an elemental force.’
Gulda looked up, her face scornful. ‘Don’t whine, Hawklan,’ she said. Her anger carried through into her voice all the more powerfully because it was command-ing in tone and quite free of the rasping irritation that normally laced her more severe rebukes. ‘Oklar is no elemental force, he’s a mortal man as you are. A flawed mortal man, corrupted by being given too great a power, as perhaps you might have been had you stood too close to Sumeral with your whingeing begging bowl of desires.’
Hawklan’s eyes narrowed in response to Gulda’s biting anger. ‘Don’t quibble, Memsa,’ he said, almost savagely. ‘You understand my meaning well enough. You knew who he was and you let me-us-go without any warning.’
Gulda turned her face towards the glowing stones again.
‘And you’d have me explain?’ she said. There was a strange helplessness in her voice.
Hawklan stared at her, his anger fading. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’d have you explain that and many other things as well. Who you are? How you come to be here? How you know so many things about this Castle, about wars and armies? The list is long.’
Gulda nodded slowly but did not speak for some time. When she did, her voice was quiet.
‘I am what I am, Hawklan,’ she said simply. ‘And I am here because of what I was.’ She looked at him. ‘As are you. As are we all. And how I came to know what I know, you don’t need to know.’
‘Gulda!’ Hawklan made no effort to the keep the exasperation out of his voice.
She held his gaze. ‘Had I told you that Dan-Tor, that dancing twisting tinker who came to torment your little village with his corrupt wares, was Oklar the Uhriel, Sumeral’s first and greatest servant, with power to lift up whole mountain ranges or hurl them beneath the ocean, would you have believed me? And would you have done anything other than go and see for yourself in your doubts? And Isloman with you?’
Hawklan did not reply.
Gulda continued, ‘And had you believed me, would you still have done anything other?’
Hawklan lowered his eyes. ‘Damn you,’ he said after a long silence.
‘We had choice and no choice, Hawklan,’ Gulda said softly. ‘Both of us were free to walk away, but both of us were bound to our paths. It was ever thus for people such as you and I, people with the wit to see. And it ever will be.’
A faint reproach still flickered in Hawklan’s voice. ‘Perhaps had we known, we mightn’t have confronted him so recklessly,’ he said.
Gulda turned back to the softly whispering stones. Idly she prodded them with her stick, making a small flurry of cached sunlight spark upwards. Unexpectedly, she chuckled.
‘What would you have done to meet such a foe, assassin?’ she said mockingly. ‘Crept into his room at night to smother him or stab him? Bribed the Palace servants to poison his food?’
Hawklan frowned uncertainly.
‘No,’ Gulda went on. ‘You’d still have had to see first. Then having seen and decided, I suspect you’d have shot an arrow into his malevolent heart, wouldn’t you?’
Despite himself, Hawklan smiled ruefully at this cruelly perceptive analysis.
‘I was no different, Hawklan.’ Abruptly Gulda was explaining. ‘I could see no other way than to wait and see what would be. I could not face him myself… not yet. I was a spectator whether I wished it or not. All I could do was arm you with weapons of some worth, and have faith in the resources I saw within you.’
‘And had we died?’
‘You didn’t,’ Gulda’s reply was immediate.
‘But… ’
‘You didn’t,’ she repeated.
‘We might have!’ Hawklan insisted through her denial.
‘You might indeed,’ Gulda replied passionately. ‘But you still know I could have done nothing about it. I knew that you had to see him for what he truly was, and both my heart and my head told me that even if I could have given you a measure of the man-which I couldn’t, as you know now, he’s beyond description-it would have hindered you more than helped you. Clouded your vision with fear. Marred the true strength that only your… innocence… could take you to.’
Gulda turned again to her contemplation of the radiant stones. Hawklan leaned back into the comfort of his chair and looked at her stern profile, red in the firelight.
‘You were so certain of the outcome?’ he said after a while.
Gulda smiled ruefully. ‘Certain?’ she said. ‘Cer-tainty’s a rare luxury, Hawklan. The butterfly beats its wings and stirs the dust, which moves the grain, which moves the pebble, which… ’
‘Moves the stone, the rock, the boulder, etc., etc., and down comes the mountain.’ Hawklan finished the child’s lay impatiently, though as he did so, the memory returned to him of colourful wings stretching luxuri-ously on the toe of his boot as he had sat shocked and bewildered in the spring sunshine after he and Isloman had fled from Jaldaric’s doomed patrol. He recalled that the butterfly too had fled at the approach of a shadow.
Gulda’s voice returned him to the present again. ‘I went as far as my reason and my intuition could go, Hawklan,’ she was saying. ‘After that all I had was faith and hope.’
‘Faith and hope in what?’ Hawklan asked.
Gulda shook her head and, after a moment, began to smile broadly. ‘Just faith and hope that my reason and my intuition were right.’ Her smile abruptly turned into a ringing laugh that rose to fill the room. ‘Have you finished my trial, judge?’ she said, turning to Hawklan, still laughing. ‘Me, who gave you Ethriss’s bow and made Loman forge those splendid arrows for it? Me, who you would have brushed aside if I’d fallen weeping at your knees imploring you not to go. Me who, above all, told you to be careful.’
She drew out her last words and, despite himself, Hawklan fell victim to her mirth.
Yet even as he began to smile, the thought came to him that he had done right to make Gulda release her doubts and fears; she would be less impaired now. It was a cold and sudden thought, and as such thoughts had done before, it repelled him, for all its truth. I had the same need, for the same reason, he thought in hasty mitigation of this unwonted harshness.
Gulda’s laughter gradually subsided and she took out a kerchief and began to wipe her eyes. ‘Who knows what butterfly blew us all here, Hawklan?’ she said, still chuckling. ‘And who knows where it’ll blow us next. Let’s take some joy in the fact that what happened, happened as it did and that Oklar’s hand is stayed for the moment. And that you and Isloman and all the others are alive, and unhurt, and wiser, and here.’
Abruptly she jerked her chair nearer to Hawklan and, reaching forward, seized his wrists affectionately. Once again Hawklan was surprised by her grip. It did not crush or hurt, but he knew that it was more powerful even than Loman’s or Isloman’s.
‘Now I must interrogate you,’ she said, releasing him, but still staring at him intently. ‘What has Oklar’s touch taught you, key-bearer?’
Hawklan turned away from her gaze. ‘His touch on Fyorlund and its people taught me that there’s no end to his corruption; it’s unfettered, without restraint of any kind,’ he
said. ‘It taught me that I must seek him out again, and his Master, and… destroy… them both, and the others, wherever they be.’
‘Has Hawklan the warrior slain Hawklan the healer then?’ Gulda demanded.
Hawklan looked at her, unsure of her tone.
‘There’s no warrior in this room, unless it’s you, swordswoman,’ he said after a moment.
Gulda looked at him enigmatically and, sitting back in her chair, placed her stick across her knees.
Confused by his own strange remark, Hawklan glanced awkwardly round the darkened room, his huge shadow seeming to turn to listen to him.
‘I doubt there’s any real difference between warrior and healer here anyway,’ he said diffidently. ‘Oklar is a disease beyond help; his Master, more so. Excision is probably the only treatment.’
‘You already knew that,’ Gulda retorted, leaning forward. ‘Any half-baked stitcher of gashes could have told you that. Now answer the question you know I was asking. What has Oklar’s touch taught you?’
‘I don’t know,’ Hawklan replied after a brief silence.
Gulda’s eyes narrowed. ‘Go back to the source, Hawklan,’ she said purposefully, leaning back in her chair again.
Hawklan looked into the fire and welcomed its warmth on his face. The terrible confrontation at the Palace Gate came to him again as it did every day, as did all his doubts and questions.
‘I was frozen with terror after my arrow hit him,’ he began. ‘I felt his malevolence overwhelming me before I could even reach for a second one. Then Andawyr’s voice came from somewhere, very weak and distant. "The sword," he said. "Ethriss’s sword."’ Hawklan’s eyes widened as the scene unfolded before him inexorably, their green eerie in the red firelight. ‘But I didn’t know how to use it against such a foe-no part of me knew how to use it-no dormant Guardian rose up from within to protect me when his power struck me-nothing. I did what I could. I tried to heal. I felt the sword severing his dreadful destruction but still it came on, pushing me deeper into… darkness.’
