Whistler [A sequel to The Chronicles of Hawklan]

by Roger Taylor

  Then Dowinne canted her head as if she was listening to someone and her eyes rolled upwards, replacing their manic stare with a dead whiteness. But Skynner could still feel her gaze on him.

  'As You will, Lord,’ she said.

  Her eyes closed and she sank to the ground.

  * * *

  Chapter 38

  Vredech scrambled rapidly to his feet and looked around wildly. He was at the summit of the Ervrin Mallos. Rain was drizzling down and all about was greyness.

  'Allyn!’ The cry was accompanied by a vigorous shaking of his arm. Terrified, he snatched himself free and spun round poised to defend himself, only to see Nertha, her eyes wide with fear. ‘For pity's sake, what's happened? Where are we?'

  Without thinking he put his arms around her and held her tightly. He wanted to say, ‘Don't be afraid,’ but he couldn't. There had always been truth between them, and it held even now. ‘I don't know,’ he said. ‘Just stand by me. And be aware.'

  'Allyn, how can this be?’ Nertha burst out. ‘Tell me I'm dreaming.'

  Vredech shook her. ‘Listen,’ he shouted. ‘You're not dreaming. I don't know how or why we're here, but as you love me, stand by me.’ He closed his eyes. He was different. Something within him had been awakened by his mysterious contact with Leck. ‘We are here,’ he said softly. ‘And we are in the Witness House also. I can feel it.’ His voice was full of awe, then a hint of irony came into it. ‘Asleep to anyone who sees us.'

  Nertha looked at him, still fearful. ‘This is madness,’ she said. ‘I am dreaming.'

  'No,’ Vredech said. ‘This place is as surely as Troidmallos is. Whether it should be or whether we should be in it, I don't know. I've no answers to any of your questions, but trust your senses, and be alert. Something dreadful's happened. I think Cassraw's dead.'

  Nertha clutched at his hand, her grip desperate. She was taking slow deep breaths, her mind demanding control over her shaking body. ‘We can't be in two places at once, it's not possible,’ she muttered, as if she needed to hear the words spoken out loud before she could continue.

  'This is the darkness where your ability to measure ends,’ Vredech said. ‘You're not afraid of the dark, are you?'

  'Not at noon,’ Nertha retorted immediately.

  A smile formed inside Vredech at this hint of recovery, but it barely reached his face, so strained did he feel.

  ’”Fabric's torn ‘fore all was born",’ he quoted.

  'I wondered who would come to this dismal place in such weather.'

  The voice made both of them start, for all that Vredech recognized it. The Whistler emerged from behind a rock. He looked at Vredech thoughtfully. ‘I was going to call you “night eyes", but I see you're not any more.’ He flicked the flute to his eye and squinted along it. ‘It's a marked improvement,’ he said. ‘You look almost human.’ Then, before Vredech could reply, the Whistler turned his attention to Nertha. His eyes gleamed, at once mocking and lustful. ‘Ah, you must be the sister who isn't a sister. The wonderful Nertha.’ He held out his hand. ‘My dear, you're as lovely as I'd imagined. Quite the kind of dream I prefer. I can see why my man here is so taken with you.'

  Nertha's eyes narrowed, but out of a mixture of courtesy and curiosity, she took the offered hand, at the same time tightening her grip on Vredech's. Vredech looked on darkly. ‘Allow me to introduce myself,’ the Whistler said. He carried the hand to his mouth and kissed it with a flourish. ‘I am your ...’ he paused. ‘... your maker, I suppose.'

  Vredech leaned forward and placed a significant forefinger on the Whistler's chest. ‘Truce, Whistler,’ he said. ‘Who's dreaming whom no longer matters. We need to be back in our own world, something bad's afoot.'

  The Whistler looked down at the finger. ‘Martial as ever, eh, Priest?’ he said, releasing Nertha's hand lingeringly and smiling massively at her. Then he shrugged. ‘My dreams pursue their own course, Allyn, you know that,’ he said, but suddenly there was pain in his eyes. ‘He's here, isn't He? All around us. Stinking the air.'

  Vredech felt Nertha's grip on his hand tightening again. He had been so preoccupied with tending to her distress at their mysterious arrival in this place that he had not noticed but, as the Whistler said, the presence of the spirit that had infected Cassraw was permeating everything.

  'Damn you, Priest,’ the Whistler burst out angrily. ‘Must it always come to this? Must I always have to face Him myself? Why didn't you kill Him like I told you to?'

  'Cassraw is dead,’ Vredech shouted back at him. ‘I was in his dream as he died. He nearly took me with him.’ Then, furiously, ‘Why don't you play your damned flute and whistle off to some other place if you don't like this one? Leave us alone! We'll get back somehow.'

  Unexpectedly, the Whistler sagged and looked down at his flute. ‘I daren't,’ he said uncomfortably. ‘It's too ... sensitive. It always is when He comes too close. I daren't play it. Everything's too fragile—so many worlds come together. The least note opens so many, and I've not the skill to separate them. No control.’ He leaned forward confidentially, and spoke softly. ‘I'm frightened, Allyn. I think perhaps I'm on the verge of waking when it's like this, but what's waiting for me when I wake? Am I some sick lunatic bound in a cell for my own good? Or a miserable labouring peasant languishing in a hovel? Then, perhaps again, I'm about to die. But in either case, where will you be when I abandon you?’ He gazed up into the greyness about them, waving his hand, fingers twitching. ‘You'll be nothing. Gone. All of my creations, gone.'

  Torn between compassion for the Whistler's patent distress and fury at his own confusion and helplessness, Vredech could only stare at him.

  Then, Nertha reached forward and took the Whistler's arm. ‘Help us, please,’ she said.

  The Whistler looked at her, his eyes full of pain. Then he gazed at Vredech.

  'I've made such fine people,’ he said. He pursed his lips and screwed his eyes tight shut. When he opened them they were wide and full of manic mischief. ‘I was always susceptible to beautiful women. And we should live our dreams with a little flare, don't you think, Allyn? Let's raise the devil.’ He lifted the flute to his lips and looked at Nertha. ‘For you, my dear, my favourite note.’ For an instant he hesitated and there was a flicker of fear in his eyes, then he blew a single, brief note, soft and low.

  The sound floated out into the grey dampness and seemed to enter into the very heart of everything that was there, from the misting raindrops to the glistening damp rocks. Vredech felt the presence about them change. He began to feel very afraid.

  The Whistler let out an incongruous, ‘Ooh!’ and began gingerly rubbing the ends of his thumbs with his forefingers. ‘Something nasty's coming,’ he said, hopping on to the rock that Cassraw had announced as marking the point of his revelation. He squatted on his haunches, the flute at his lips, and his eyes peering hither and thither into the gloom.

  A figure emerged through the rain.

  It was Dowinne. She was walking slowly towards them.

  There seemed to be almost an aura about her, then Vredech saw that the rain was not falling on her. He, like Nertha, was soaked, the rain flattening his hair to his skull and running down his face. Dowinne however, was completely untouched. And there was something serpentine about the way she was moving—half-walking, half-gliding ... as if she were in another place. As she rose up the final slope to the summit, Vredech saw that in her hand, hanging idly by her side, was a long, bloodstained knife.

  The Whistler drew in a hissing breath.

  Dowinne paused as she reached them, then turned slowly to Nertha. Vredech made to step forward protectively, but Nertha's arm came out to stop him as she met Dowinne's gaze. The two women stared at one another for a long time, then a hint of an unpleasant smile curled the side of Dowinne's mouth and she turned to look at Vredech.

  Vredech could read nothing in her gaze, though it was profoundly unnerving. It was as though someone else was looking through her eyes at him, assessing him, coldly c
urious yet at the same time wildly excited.

  Finally she turned towards the Whistler, her head tilted to one side, while the Whistler, his flute still at his mouth, raised an eyebrow.

  'You blaspheme,’ she said after a moment, her voice distant and harsh. Without comment, the Whistler jumped down from the rock and skipped a few paces away. Dowinne's eyes followed him, still unreadable.

  She placed the knife on the rock and then laid her hand beside it. At her touch, the rock became dry, but immediately blood began to flow from her hand. Slowly it spread across the surface of the rock, wider and wider.

  'So much blood in him,’ she said quietly.

  The presence about them grew more and more intense.

  Nertha took Vredech's arm. She was shaking.

  'Release him, woman,’ Dowinne said. ‘He is mine.'

  Nertha's jaw tautened, but Vredech motioned her to be silent, and gently eased her grip from his arm.

  'How did you come here, and why have you killed your husband?’ he asked, bringing a priestly sternness to his voice that he did not feel.

  The blood stopped flowing. Dowinne addressed him. ‘I did not kill Cassraw, I sacrificed him. As I did the others. Blood and the terror of its drawing are necessary for the heartstone of His temple. And He brought me here, as He brought you also.’ She waved a graceful hand towards Nertha and the Whistler. ‘And these two are perhaps for the stone.'

  Vredech in his turn began to shake. Dowinne stepped forward until she was immediately in front of him. He felt the rain stop falling on him. Dowinne opened her mouth slightly and blew a soft scented breath in his face. Suddenly he was riven with desire for this woman; old, long-forgotten desires from his youth. His trembling became different in character, and sweat formed on his forehead.

  'You are the Chosen One, Allyn Vredech,’ she said, moving herself against him. ‘You are mine, we shall be joined in His name and His service, and His will shall be done through us.'

  'This is madness,’ Vredech said hoarsely. He raised his hands to push her away but, as if beyond his control, they merely came to rest on her shoulders. She closed her eyes ecstatically at his touch.

  'No,’ Dowinne said. ‘The only madness would be to deny the destiny that has been laid out for us since the beginning of all things. We are His servants and we shall be rulers in this world. All will fall before us.'

  'I have no gifts,’ Vredech said weakly.

  Dowinne smiled. ‘I have the power of change,’ she said, lifting a hand to Vredech's face. As he looked at it, he saw glittering silver spirals winding around her fingers, criss-crossing her hand and winding about her wrist, like a delicate and magical glove. Only as he stared at it did he realize that the shifting silver threads were water, twisting and flowing as water could not. ‘He has awakened it in me. And you...? You span the worlds beyond. That is your gift, and that, His presence alone has wakened in you. Cassraw possessed merely a shadow of it. He was but a vessel through which He could attain me. Millennia might pass before such as we come together again to pave the way for His coming.’ She reached up and put her arms around his neck. Vredech's arms moved irresistibly to return her embrace as he felt her body pressing against his. ‘Come to me, Allyn Vredech,’ she whispered. ‘Be with me. Everything you have ever desired is before you now. We are His, and you are mine.'

  Her face came closer to his.

  Vredech bent his head forward.

  'The hell he is, you murderous bitch!'

  Nertha's angry cry accompanied her hand which appeared suddenly between them. She clamped it over Dowinne's face and pushed her violently, tearing her free of Vredech's embrace. Then, her elbow against his chest, she sent Vredech staggering backwards.

  Suddenly the cold rain was falling on him again.

  Dowinne's spell had gone.

  The Whistler's eyes flicked between the three protagonists.

  Dowinne had steadied herself on the rock. Her face became suddenly savage; teeth bared and eyes wide with uncontrollable rage. She snatched up the knife and spun round to face Nertha. Vredech had stumbled and was scrambling to his feet as he saw Nertha bend down and pick up a large rock in response.

  Then, before he could cry out, Dowinne's snarl had turned into a smile. The cruelty in it froze him. Deliberately she laid the knife back on to the rock, then held out a hand to Nertha.

  Nertha reeled back as if she had been violently struck. Vredech caught her. Her hands were flailing frantically and her face was contorted. It took him a moment to see what was happening, but as water had run about Dowinne's hand in a delicate tracery, now it ran over Nertha's face, a shallow, suffocating sheet, forcing itself into her tightly clamped mouth and into her nostrils. Desperately he tried to brush it away, but it flowed around his hands relentlessly.

  'Stop it, Dowinne!’ he cried out. ‘For pity's sake, stop it. You're killing her.'

  'It must be,’ Dowinne said. ‘His need is without end. And to be mine absolutely, all the affections that bind you here must be severed. As your gift drew Him here, so your incestuous love has ensured her death.'

  Vredech looked down at Nertha. He could hardly hold her, she was struggling so violently. Her begging eyes seared through him.

  'Whistler, help me! Do something!'

  But the Whistler only watched.

  'There is no help for you, my love,’ Dowinne said, smiling still. ‘I'll drown her in little more than would quench your thirst. It's fascinating.'

  Nertha's legs went from under her and she slipped from Vredech's grip.

  'No, no,’ he gasped as she fell, thrashing, to the ground. Then with a furious roar he leapt at Dowinne. He had scarcely taken a pace, however, when a terrible blow struck him. He felt as though his entire body was blazing.

  'I can bind you with chains of water, my love, or slowly drown you like your sister here. Or boil the blood in your veins. You are mine and we are His, struggle how you may. Learn that now and spare yourself endless hurt.'

  Vredech tried to cry out, but could not. He looked upwards. A darkness was gathering.

  Dowinne moved forward and bent over Nertha. ‘See how she fights for life. See how she'll die. Revel in it. This is the Heart Stone's need. There'll be many more.’ And she laughed.

  Then the Whistler spoke, ‘I, too, have the gift to move between the worlds, woman,’ he said.

  Dowinne started and spun round to face him. The pain that had suffused Vredech vanished as suddenly as it had come. And Nertha's dreadful choking became a relieved gasping as the water fell from her face.

  'See?’ said the Whistler. He began to play the flute, very softly.

  Vredech felt the darkness overhead stirring, moving downwards. And as the Whistler played, Vredech saw what eyes cannot see, nor minds know. He saw a myriad worlds opening before him. Worlds beyond his imagining yet which he knew were within his reach. Worlds which had as their focus the Whistler and his haunted tune.

  Dowinne glanced from Vredech to the Whistler, her face full of uncertainty. Then she looked upwards. ‘Guide me, Lord!’ she cried out.

  The darkness began to close about the summit, as did the presence which had been there throughout; inhuman in its coldness, all too human in its barbarism and cruelty.

  Dowinne made a move towards the Whistler and the darkness crept further in.

  Then Vredech caught the Whistler's eye. There was such fear there!

  He must do something. Whatever the Whistler was, he was as trapped here as himself, pinioned by the worlds he held open to save this foolish priest. Yet the ravening desire that Vredech could feel in the approaching darkness told him that he must not allow Dowinne to reach his saviour.

  But what could he do?

  One, two, three, four...

  The terrible litany he had taught himself while awaiting the arrival of Cassraw returned to him.

  This time, guilt-driven, he did not hesitate. As Dowinne reached out to touch the Whistler, Vredech felt for his father's militia knife.

 
It was not there.

  Panic surged through him.

  'Allyn!'

  Nertha's cry cut through it. She had crawled to the bloodstained rock with the same intention. But she was too weak. As he turned, he saw her slithering to the ground, Dowinne's murderous blade in her hand. Then, her face riven with despair, she made a final effort and hurled the knife towards him.

  Before his mind could register what was happening, he had seized the twisting handle.

  With two long strides he reached Dowinne and, gripping her around the throat, tore her away from the Whistler and drove the knife into her back.

  As he did so, the Whistler's soft tune became a harsh, screaming trill. He felt the many worlds about him shimmering, moving, becoming a great whirling tumult. And then there was no summit, no Nertha, and no Whistler, save for his frantic trilling call pervading everything. And the dark presence scrabbling to seize the still-living Dowinne.

  Dowinne clutched at Vredech's hand, still about her throat.

  'No, Allyn, please!’ she cried. ‘Please!'

  Pity and a lifetime's memories filled him.

  'Damn you into eternity,’ he howled into the enfolding darkness. Then he stabbed her again, and with what strength he had left he pushed her away from him into the chaos between the shifting worlds.

  He heard her crying his name as she fell.

  * * * *

  Cautiously, Skynner approached the fallen figure. Baton ready, he kicked the knife away from her. Then he bent down and placed his hand against her throat.

  After a moment he looked up.

  'She's dead,’ he said.

  * * * *

  The Whistler's tune carried Vredech and Nertha through the time and distance that could not be, to return them to the Meeting House. It mended many hurts and told many tales, but still Vredech and Nertha wept for a long time as they embraced one another.

  * * *

  Chapter 39

  Privv's Sheet was quite sombre the following day. It seemed that following the assassination attempt by the tragically deranged Jarold Harverson, Covenant Member Cassraw had died of his injuries. His steadfast wife Dowinne, broken-hearted, had succumbed to her grief on hearing the news. The couple would be a great loss to the community.