Merlin's Wood (Mythago Wood)

by Robert Holdstock

  The Watchman’s fire crackled and flared in the lee of the south wall. The priest walked away down the hill to the village, stopping just once to stare back at the half-constructed shell of the first stone church in the area. Then he was gone.

  Thomas stepped from the darkness and stood, staring up through the empty roof to the clouds and the sky, and the gleaming light that was Jupiter. His heart was beating fast, but a great relief touched his limbs and his mind. And as always, he smiled, then closed his eyes for a moment. He thought of what he was doing. He thought of Beth, of what she would say if she knew his secret work; sweet Beth; with no children to comfort her she was now more alone than ever. But it would not be for much longer. The face was nearly finished …

  ‘Hurry!’

  A few more nights. A few more hours working in darkness, and all the Watchman’s best efforts to guard the church would have been in vain.

  The church would have been stolen. Thomas would have been the thief!

  He moved through the gloom, now, to where a wooden ladder lay against the side wall. He placed the ladder against the high gallery – the lepers’ gallery – and climbed it. He drew the ladder up behind him and stepped across the debris of wood, stone and leather to the farthest, tightest corner of the place. Bare faces of the coarse ragstone watched the silent church. No mortar joined the stones. Their weight held them secure. They supported nothing but themselves.

  At Thomas’s muscular insistence, one of them moved, came away from the others.

  With twilight gone, but night not yet fully descended, there was enough grey light for him to see the face that was carved there. He stared at the leafy beard, the narrowed, slanting eyes, the wide, flaring nostrils. He saw how the cheeks would look, how the hair would become spiky, how he would include the white and red berries of witch-thorn upon the twigs that clustered round the face …

  Thomas stared at Thorn, and Thorn watched him by return, a cold smile on cold stone lips. Voices whispered in a sound realm that was neither in the church, nor in another world, but somewhere between the two, a shadowland of voice, movement and memory.

  ‘I must be finished before the others,’ the stone man whispered.

  ‘You shall be,’ said the mason, selecting chisel and hammer from his leather bag. ‘Be patient.’

  ‘I must be finished before the magic ones!’ Thorn insisted, and Thomas sighed in irritation.

  ‘You shall be finished before the magic ones. No-one has agreed upon the design of their faces, yet.’

  The ‘magic ones’ were what Thomas called the Apostles. The twelve statues were temporarily in place above the altar, bodies completed but faces still smoothly blank.

  ‘To control them I must be here first,’ Thorn said.

  ‘I’ve already opened your eyes. You can see how the other faces are incomplete.’

  ‘Open them better,’ said Thorn.

  ‘Very well.’

  Thomas reached out to the stone face. He touched the lips, the nose, the eyes. He knew every prominence, every rill, every chisel-mark. The grains of the stone were like pebbles beneath his touch. He could feel the hard-stone intrusion below the right eye, where the rag would not chisel well. There was a hardness, too, in the crown of Thorns, a blemish in the soft rock that would have to be shaped carefully to avoid cracking the whole design. As his fingers ran across the thorn man’s lips, cold, old breath tickled him, the woodland man breathing from his time in the long past. As Thomas touched the eyes he felt the eyeballs move, impatient to see better.

  I am in a wood grave, and a thousand years lie between us, Thorn had said. Hurry, hurry. Bring me back.

  In the deepening darkness, working by touch alone, Thomas chiselled the face, bringing back the life of the lost god. The sound of his work was a sequence of shrill notes, stone music in the still church. John Tagworthy, the Watchman, outside by his fire, would be unaware of them. He might see a tallow candle by its glow upon the clouds, he might smell a fart from the distant castle on a still summer’s night, but the noises of man and nature had long since ceased to bother his senses.

  ‘Thomas! Thomas Wyatt! Where in God’s Name are you?’

  The voice, hailing him from below, so shocked Thomas that he dropped his chisel, and in desperately trying to catch the tool he cut himself. He stayed silent for a long moment, cursing Jupiter and the sudden band of bright stars for their light. The church was a place of shadows against darkness. As he peered at the north arch he thought he could see a man’s shape, but it was only an unfinished timber. He reached for the heavy stone block that would cover the stone face, and as he did so the voice came again.

  ‘God take your gizzard, Thomas Wyatt. It’s Simon. Miller’s son Simon!’

  Thomas crept to the gallery’s edge and peered over. The movement drew attention to him. Simon’s pale features turned to look at him. ‘I heard you working. What are you working on?’

  ‘Nothing,’ Thomas lied. ‘Practising my craft on good stone with good tools.’

  ‘Show me the face, Thomas,’ said the younger man, and Thomas felt the blood drain from his head. How had he known? Simon was twenty years old, married for three years and still, like Thomas himself, childless. He was a freeman of course; he worked in his father’s mill, but spent a lot of his time in the fields, both his family’s strips and the land belonging to the Castle. His great ambition, though, was to be a Guildsman, and masonry was his aspiration.

  ‘What face?’

  ‘Send down the ladder,’ Simon urged, and reluctantly Thomas let the wood scaffold down. The miller clambered up to the gallery, breathing hard. He smelled of garlic. He looked eagerly about in the gloom. ‘Show me the green man.’

  ‘Explain what you mean.’

  ‘Come on, Thomas! Everybody knows you’re shaping the Lord of Wood. I want to see him. I want to know how he looks.’

  Thomas could hardly speak. His heart alternately stopped and raced. Simon’s words were like stab wounds. Everybody knew! How could everybody know?

  Thorn had spoken to him, and to him alone. He had sworn the mason to silence and secrecy. For thirty days Thomas Wyatt had risked not just a flogging, but almost certain hanging for blasphemy, risked his life for the secret realm. Everybody knew?

  ‘If everybody knows, why haven’t I been stopped?’

  ‘I don’t mean everybody,’ Simon said, as he felt blindly along the cold walls for a sign of Thomas’s work. ‘I mean the village. It’s spoken in whispers. You’re a hero, Thomas. We know what you’re doing, and for whom. It’s exciting; it’s right. I’ve danced with them at the forest cross. I’ve carried the fire. I know how much power remains here. I may take God’s name in oath – but that’s safe to do. He has no power over me, or any of us. He doesn’t belong on Dancing Hill. Don’t worry, Thomas. We’re your friends … Ah!’

  Simon had found the loose stone. It was heavy and he grunted loudly as he took its weight, letting it down carefully to the floor. His breathing grew soft as he reached for the stone face. But Thomas could see how the young man drew back, fingers extended yet not touching the precious icon.

  ‘There’s magic in this, Thomas,’ Simon said in awe.

  ‘There’s skill – working by night, working with fear – there’s skill enough, I’ll say that.’

  ‘There’s magic in the face,’ Simon repeated. ‘It’s drawing power from the earth below. It’s tapping the Dancing Well. There’s water in the eyes, Thomas. The dampness of the old well. The face is brilliant.’

  He struggled with the covering stone and replaced it. ‘I wish it had been me. I wish the green man had chosen me. What an honour, Thomas. Truly.’

  Thomas Wyatt watched his friend in astonishment. Was this really Simon the miller’s son? Was this the young man who had carried the Cross every Resurrection Sunday for ten years? Simon Miller! I’ve danced with them at the forest cross.

  ‘Who have you danced with at the crossroads, Simon?’

  ‘You know,’ Simon whisper
ed. ‘It’s alive, Thomas. It’s all alive. It’s here, around us. It never went away. The Lord of Wood showed us …’

  ‘Thorn? Is that who you mean?’

  ‘Him!’ Simon pointed towards the hidden niche. ‘He’s been here for years. He came the moment the monks decided to build the church. He came to save us, Thomas. And you’re helping. I envy you …’

  Simon climbed down the ladder. He was a furtive night shape, darting to the high arch where an oak door would soon be fitted, and out across the mud-churned hill, back round the forest, to where the village was a dark place, sleeping.

  Thomas followed him down, placing the ladder back against the wall. But on the open hill, almost in sight of the Watchman’s fire, he looked to the north, across the forest, to where the ridgeway was a high band of darkness against the pale grey glow of the clouds. Below the ridgeway a fire burned. He knew that he was looking at the forest cross, where the stone road of the Romans crossed the disused track between Woodhurst and Biddenden. He had played there as a child, despite being told never ever to follow the broken stone road.

  There was a clearing at the deserted crossroads, and years ago he, and Simon Miller’s elder brother Wat, had often found the cold remains of fire and feasts. Outlaws, of course, and the secret baggage trains of the Saxon Knights who journeyed the hidden forest trails. Any other reason for the use of the place would have been unthinkable. Why, there was even an old gibbet, where forest justice was seen to be done …

  With a shiver he remembered the time when he had come to the clearing and seen the swollen, greyish corpse of a man swinging from that blackened wood. Dark birds had been perched upon its shoulders. The face had had no eyes, no nose, no flesh at all, and the sight of the dead villain had stopped him from ever going back again.

  Now, a fire burned at the forest cross. A fire like the fire of thirty nights ago, when Thorn had sent the girl for him …

  He had woken to the sound of his name being called from outside. His wife, Beth, slept soundly on, turning slightly on the palliasse. It had been a warm night. He had tugged on his britches, and drawn a linen shirt over his shoulders. Stepping outside he had disturbed a hen, which clucked angrily and stalked to another nesting place.

  The girl was dressed in dark garments. Her head was covered by a shawl. She was young, though, and the hand that reached for his was soft and pale.

  ‘Who are you?’ he said, drawing back. She had tugged at him. His reluctance to go with her was partly fear, partly concern that Beth would see him.

  ‘Iagus goroth! Fiatha! Fiatha!’ Her words were strange to Thomas. They were like the hidden language, but were not of the same tongue.

  ‘Who are you?’ he insisted, and the girl sighed, still holding his hand. At last she pointed to her bosom. Her eyes were bright beneath the covering of the shawl. Her hair was long and he sensed it to be red, like fire. ‘Anuth!’ she said. She pointed distantly. ‘Thorn. You come with Thorn. With Anuth. Me. Come. Thomas. Thomas to Thorn. Fiatha!’

  She dragged at his hand and he began to run. The grip on his fingers relaxed. She ran ahead of him, skirts swirling, body hunched. He tripped in the darkness, but she seemed able to see every low-hanging branch and proud beechwood root on the track. They entered the wood. He concentrated on her fleeing shape, calling, occasionally, for her to slow down. Each time he went sprawling she came back, making clicking sounds with her mouth, impatient, anxious. She helped him to his feet but immediately took off into the forest depths, heedless of risk to life and limb.

  All at once he heard voices, a rhythmic beating, the crackle of fire … and the gentle sound of running water. She had brought him to the river. It wound through the forest, and then across downland, towards the Avon.

  Through the trees he saw the fire. Anuth took his hand and pulled him, not to the bright glade, but towards the stream. As he walked he stared at the flames. Dark, human shapes passed before the fire. They seemed to be dancing. The heavy rhythm was like the striking of one bone against another. The voices were singing. The language was familiar to him, but incomprehensible.

  Anuth dragged him past the firelit glade. He came to the river, and she slipped away. Surprised, he turned, hissing her name; but she had vanished. He looked back at the water, where starlight, and the light of a quarter moon, made the surface seem alive. There was a thick-trunked thorn tree growing from the water’s edge. The thorn tree trembled and shifted in the evening wind.

  The thorn tree grew before the startled figure of Thomas Wyatt. It rose, it straightened, it stretched. Arms, legs, the gleam of moonlight on eyes and teeth.

  ‘Welcome, Thomas,’ said the thorn tree.

  He took a step backwards, frightened by the apparition.

  ‘Welcome where?’

  In front of him, Thorn laughed. The man’s voice rasped, like a child with consumption. ‘Look around you, Thomas. Tell me what you see.’

  ‘Darkness. Woodland. A river, stars. Night. Cold night.’

  ‘Take a breath, Thomas. What do you smell?’

  ‘That same night. The river. Leaves and dew. The fire, I can smell the fire. And autumn. All the smells of autumn.’

  ‘When did you last see and smell these things?’

  Thomas, confused by the strange midnight encounter, shivered in his clothing. ‘Last night. I’ve always seen and smelled them.’

  ‘Then welcome to a place you know well. Welcome to the always place. Welcome to an autumn night, something that this land has always known, and will always enjoy.’

  ‘But who are you?’

  ‘I have been known by many names.’ He came close to the trembling man. His hawthorn crown, with its strange horns, was like a broken tree against the clouds. His beard of leaves and long grass rustled as he spoke. His body quivered where the night breeze touched the clothing of nature that wound around his torso. ‘Do you believe in God, Thomas?’

  ‘He died for us. His son. On the Cross. He is the Almighty …’

  Thorn raised his arms. He held them sideways. He was a great cross in the cold night, and his crown of thorns was a beast’s antlers. Old fears, forgotten shudders, plagued the villager, Thomas Wyatt. Ancestral cries mocked him. Memories of fire whispered words in the hidden language, confused his mind.

  ‘I am the Cross of God,’ said Thorn. ‘Touch the wood, touch the sharp thorns …’

  Thomas reached out. His actions were not his own. His fingers touched the cold flesh of the man’s stomach. He felt the ridged muscle in the crossbeam, the bloody points of the thorns that rose from the man’s head. He nervously brushed the gnarled wood of the thighs, and the proud branch that rose between them, hot to his fingers, nature’s passion, never dying.

  ‘What do you want of me?’ Thomas asked quietly.

  The cross became a man again. ‘To make my image in the new shrine. To make that shrine my own. To make it as mine forever, no matter what manner of worship is performed within its walls …’

  Thomas stared at the Lord of Wood.

  ‘Tell me what I must do …’

  *

  Everybody knew, Simon had said. Everybody in the village. It was spoken in whispers. Thomas was a hero. Everybody knew. Everybody but Thomas Wyatt.

  ‘Why have they kept it from me?’ he murmured to the night. He had huddled up inside his jacket, and folded his body into the tight shelter of a wall bastion. The encounter with Simon had shaken him badly.

  From here he could see north to Biddenden across the gloomy shapelessness of the forest. The Castle, and the clustered villages of its demesne, were behind him. He saw only stars, pale clouds, and the flicker of fire, where strange worship occurred.

  Why did the fire, in this midnight forest, call to him so much? Why was there such comfort in the thought of the warm glow from the piled branches, and the noisy prattle, and laughter, of those who clustered in its shadowy light? He had danced about a fire often enough: on May eve, at the passing of the day of All Hallows. But those fires were in the village bou
nds. His soul fluttered, a delighted bird, at the thought of the woodland fire. The smell of autumn, the touch of night’s dew, the closeness to the souls of tree and plant; timeless eyes would watch the dancers. They were a shared life with the forest.

  Why had he been kept in isolation? Everybody knew. The villagers who carried the bleeding, dying Christ through the streets on Resurrection Sunday – were they now carrying images of boar and stag and hare about the fire? He – Thomas – was a hero. They spoke of him in whispers. Everybody knew of his work. When had they been taken back to the beliefs of old? Had Thorn appeared to each of them as well?

  Why didn’t he share the new belief with them? It was the same belief. He used his craft; they danced for the gods.

  As if he were of the same cold stone-stuff upon which he worked, the others kept him distant, watched him from afar. Did Beth know? Thomas shivered. The hours passed. He could feel the gibbet rope around his neck. Only one word out of place, one voice overheard – one whisper to the wrong man, and Thomas Wyatt would be a grey thing, slung by its neck, prey for dark birds. Eyes, nose, the flesh of the face. Every feature that he pecked for Thorn with hammer and chisel would be pecked from him by hard, wet beaks.

  From the position of the moon, Thomas realised he had been sitting by the church for several hours. John the Watchman had not walked past. Now that he thought of it, Thomas could hear the man’s snoring, coming as if from a far place.

  Thomas eased himself to his feet. He lifted his bag gently to his shoulder, over-cautious about the ring and strike of iron tools within the leather. But as he walked towards the path he heard movement in the church. The Watchman snored distantly.

  It must be Simon, the miller’s son, Thomas thought, back for another look at the face of the woodland god.

  Irritated, and still confused, Thomas stepped into the church again, and looked towards the gallery. The ladder was against the balcony. He could hear the stone being moved. There was a time of silence, then the stone was put back. A figure moved to the ladder and began to descend.