Urtha and I stepped into the Spirit of the Ship, walking into the heat and sunlight of a world that did not belong to us. Mielikki stood there in her summer clothes, her face veiled in grey against the biting insects that swarmed around her. A lynx sprawled playfully at her feet, half an eye on us as we walked towards the waiting woman. Mosquitoes plagued us. The land was restless and hot, the woodland disturbed by the grazing of reindeer.
‘This is my place,’ Mielikki said from behind the dark veil. ‘The threshold place. I keep it as I like it. Walk on and you will have entered the land of your own shadows, and your children are there, Urtha.’
She was young. Her eyes gleamed from behind the thin veil. This was not the sinister crone who watched over the deck of Argo.
She added, ‘And there is something for you too, Merlin, though I can’t see it clearly enough to say whether you’ll want to remember it.’
I didn’t like her words, but curiosity was a tempting Fury in my head. I could hear, distantly, both the playful laughter of children and the cruel chatter of crows. Mielikki had allowed Urtha into the Spirit of the Ship, a gesture of kindness. But knowing what I knew about this birch-barked elemental I was suspicious, though I hid my concern from the warlord himself.
‘How long can we stay?’ I asked her.
‘As long as you like. It will make no difference to the others.’
‘Then we’d better not stay too long.’
‘From the whispers I can hear, you’ve stayed too long already.’
Mielikki, I thought, smiled at me from behind the veil. Insects fussed with the sweat on my skin, and the scent of pine resin added to the heavy stillness of this summer gate. I dismissed Mielikki’s words as a tease. I was certainly aware that Urtha and I were entering a place where the days and nights might be lifetimes in our own world—which is to say the world of Ambaros and the mysterious Great Quest—lifetimes; or perhaps … just moments. Though it would make more of a difference to Urtha than to me.
Urtha was impatient. He thanked Argo’s protecting spirit and before I could counsel caution he had run ahead of me. I pursued him, passing from the insect-blighted summer forest of the Pohjolan protectress to the wilting summer greenwood of Urtha’s land. A few minutes later we rushed from the trees into a clearing, where a group of children were playing an elaborate circle game, holding hands and dancing to right, then left. Four of their number stood in the middle waving cloth-headed sticks, the white material painted with eyes and grinning mouths.
Urtha’s son, Kymon, was in the middle. His daughter was among the circling throng. The game went on for a while, then suddenly Munda was summoned from the ring. She joined her brother, who seemed annoyed with her, then suddenly saw her father standing in the shadows. Kymon and Munda screamed with delight and came running to us. The game was over, the other children dispersed, ignoring us completely. The surrounding forest seemed to swallow them up.
Munda flung herself against her father, crying now. Urtha picked her up and swung her round, planting kiss after kiss upon her forehead and braided hair. The boy jumped on to his father’s waist and hung there until Urtha’s firm hand shifted him higher. In a gesture somewhere between anger and delight, Kymon thumped his father’s back until calmed by the man. I watched with a strange moment of envy as Urtha sat down with his children and talked to them of his adventures, listening in turn to their own excited chatter. I saw nothing in bright-eyed Kymon to suggest the unlovable brat of Urtha’s Pohjolan description. Perhaps he had only been monstrous in the company of his brother, and there would have been nothing unnatural in that.
I’d thought that Urtha was closed to everything except his children and I started to wander back into the forest, but the man called out, ‘Where are you going?’
‘To have a look around. That’s all. Take your time.’
‘Don’t go too far,’ Urtha commanded. ‘We’re here by indulgence, not by invitation…’
Quite so, I thought. To Urtha and his kin, this ghostly realm was a place of legend, loss and fear; he would have grown up with stories of the Land of the Shadows of Heroes; he would be balancing his dread of the place with his delight in contacting his surviving family for a while.
As for myself, there was again that nagging feeling of familiarity. The shape of the high hills beyond this woodland, the way the crags cut starkly against the clouds, the echoing sound of falling water, the murmur of wind in the branches, the sense of peace and the pricking of danger combined.
* * *
I found a sunlit dell, tall with grass and purple flowers, heavy with the scent of oak, and sat down for a while in this silent place. Evening crept across the sky, and night shadows emerged from around me, figures that breathed softly, that crept close to explore me. I was not alarmed. I saw the glitter of twilight on a hawk’s beak, the gleam in a hound’s eye, the glimmer on a salmon’s scales; moonlight shone from another face, and the innocence of a child from a fifth. The grass rustled with furtive movement. Sadness, then laughter, drifted through my head. I was suddenly stunned by memories of a past that was obscured from me, a richness of story and event, of people and families that made me cry out. Stories, shadows … as fast as those glimpses of my past had come, so they had gone, but three grim, masked faces pushed forward to peer at me before abruptly withdrawing.
All in all, ten: and they sat in a circle around me in the glade, whispering. I could see only the tops of their cowls above the high grass. Their voices murmured and urged, ten voices from a time I had forgotten; ten memories of my childhood; those same ten faces that seemed to dog my life, always appearing unexpectedly.
‘What are you doing here?’ asked one of them. ‘You shouldn’t be here. Not yet.’
‘We weren’t expecting you,’ whispered another. The voice of the forest … Skogen! ‘We are surprised to find you here.’
The grass before me parted and a sniffing hound peered at me; Cunhaval! Then the air around me was disturbed by wings and I remembered Falkenna. These were two of the forms that I could adopt to see and smell beyond my own body. To use the hound and the hawk was not expensive.
Then a child giggled and pinched my cheek—how could I not recognise Sinisalo?—but he/she had vanished before I could turn and look at its face more fully.
‘I remember you,’ I said to the circle. ‘Some of you, anyway. You were watching me as I left for the Path. I was just a child. The world was so empty then.’
‘You’re still a child,’ laughed one of them. I caught a glimpse of watching eyes and a name came to me, a dream breaking: Hollower. ‘And you’ve left the Path too soon,’ this Hollower went on. ‘You’re still young. You should be walking the world. I know you very well. I’m the one who watches you from the caves…’
‘All but one of the others have almost finished walking the world,’ whispered Falkenna. ‘Not finished yet, but finished soon. You have hardly started.’
And a gentle voice I remembered as Moondream added, ‘What is your name at the moment?’
I told them, and they burst out laughing. After a moment, Moondream explained, ‘This is just a nickname, the name your mother gave you; merlin … a small part of the name you were given when you first played by the waterfall. It holds something of you, but not very much. Your full name is much bigger. Do you have any other nicknames … Merlin?’
Again the laughter as the name was repeated.
I said that I didn’t. I’d adopted many names in my long life; only now did it occur to me how regularly I returned to that simple sound. Merlin. There was comfort, if not meaning, in the name.
‘You are still so young,’ said Skogen. ‘You should be older. But you always were the lazy one. Your mother had to tie your leather shoes for you. I remember you standing by the fall, the others already gone, and there you were, undone, unshod, uncertain, unburdened. You hadn’t even caught your supper for those first nights on the Path. You hadn’t stitched the leather to make your bag for carrying. You had to be helped. Yo
u haven’t learned very much in all your walking, it seems.’
‘Why do you say that?’ I challenged the harsh-voiced Skogen.
‘Because you’ve come back, Merlin. To have your leather laces tied again. If you’d learned what the others have learned, you would have known not to cross the river. You seem to be blind.’
‘I’m helping one friend, the man who’s here with me, with his children. I’ve been helping another, a man who is resurrected, a Greek called Jason.’
‘Not helping them very much,’ said Cunhaval the hound.
‘All I can, without giving too much.’
‘The others have given a great deal during their long lives,’ said Hollower, his voice admonishing me.
‘Then they’re old and grey,’ I muttered angrily. ‘Old and grey.’
‘And wiser by the day, and no less tired for it,’ said Sinisalo, the child lecturing the child. I caught a glimpse of the fresh-faced youth darting through the grass, dark hood thrown back. Sinisalo’s mask-face was my own, though without the wiry beard, without the lines, without the sunburn, and windburn and the scars of thorn and birdclaw. A moment later I felt fingers tugging at my boots. ‘Laced up!’ Sinisalo mocked. ‘He’s solved one problem, then.’
These shadows faded into the wood. The last words were from Hollower: ‘I watch you when I can…’
‘From the caves, from the oracles, I realise that now … I never recognised you.’
‘I didn’t interfere. I was just there to keep an eye on you. But fiercer eyes are following you and watching you, now.’
‘Fiercer eyes? Whose?’
‘The one who went astray, Merlin. That one, too, has left the Path and crossed the river, but is hiding from us, and hiding from you. You were the best of friends, once, when you were children. You played in the waterfall together, and learned together, and created your own language together. Have you forgotten?’
‘Yes … though sometimes I remember … just a little. I loved her … I remember being sad to leave. So long ago.’
‘But now she hates you. Her anger has transformed her.’
‘Why? I’ve never in all the generations of my walking met any of the others. I even doubted their existence. I’ve always felt so alone.’
‘All of you were alone. Until it was time to come home. And all but two of you are very close to home.’
‘Then how can she hate me?’
‘Search your past. But she’s close, and watching. Stay still and you might get a glimpse of her. I can’t help you more than that. You’ve learned how to tie your laces. Several forests grew, flourished and died before that miracle happened! Now to untie the other knots. And persuade you to grow old gracefully.’
* * *
The wind ruffled the grass. The shadowy presences had gone. I sat dreamily, aware of cloud shadow and the day turning cooler. My limbs were heavy. I tried to rise and failed. Then I heard the sound of falling water. I managed to turn and peer through the leaning trees at the sparkling pool, its surface calm for the most part despite the cascade of crystal liquid that tumbled from the high cliff above.
This was home, the place where I had played.
She sat there watching me, wearing the buckskin and lambswool dress, glittering with polished shell and painted stones. The small bow was drawn and she struggled to hold it taut, the arrow with the plum on the end nocked and ready to fire. Her hair, long and lankly black, blew across her face for a moment and in that moment I jumped to one side, but she sensed me, eyes closed, and the plum struck my chest and splattered. Her laugh was triumphant. She swept her hair away from her face. Her eyes gleamed with pleasure and teasing.
‘Got you! Got you! You can’t hide from me.’
I remembered being furious. And when I charged her, to push her with me into the pool, she had fleet-footedly moved out of sight. I hit the water alone.
But those mischievous eyes—peering down at me as I floundered …
Turning! Suddenly turning. Furious. Narrow. Old! Peering from above a glittering veil, full of anger, full of fierceness. Fierce eyes, hating eyes!
Gone suddenly, leaving me feeling sick and shaken.
* * *
A girl with arrows painted on her cheeks was peering at me. She was holding me by the ears and shaking my head, calling my name. I recognised her suddenly as Munda. When she saw that I was back in the land of the living, she bobbed down and picked up two coarse-skinned apples.
‘For you,’ she said. ‘You need to eat. Daddy said so.’
‘Thank you.’
‘Who were you talking to?’ she asked as I bit into one of the fruits.
Her question took me by surprise. How long had she been watching me? I stood up and looked around, then fumbled with the leather ties on my deerskin boots. The knots were fine, but almost self-consciously I unthreaded and re-threaded them. Munda watched me in bemusement.
I was being watched! By the one who had gone astray! I struggled to recapture another, any other, memory of childhood, but even the waterfall moment was vague, evaporating like a dream, leaving only those eyes, those terrible eyes. Had this been a true encounter? Or was it just that entering into Ghostland had called shades of my own past out of hiding, a tease, a provocation from myself to myself for having refused to let age take its toll on me?
I couldn’t focus; I couldn’t see clearly. Had I been home, albeit briefly? Or just seen a glimpse of home, a world within the world, made possible by passing through Argo’s spirit heart?
It slipped away; the encounter became unreal. There was just Munda, staring up at me with a frown.
‘Daddy said you were strange. You should eat more,’ said the girl, shaking her head. Then she took my hand and led me through the woods, back to where Urtha and his son were wrestling for possession of a small, bronze sword. The three dark-robed women stood silently at the other woodland edge, the eldest smiling as she watched the antics in the field.
‘I have to go,’ Urtha called to me from below the weight of his determined son. ‘I have to go to the east. I need to get moving, and you must come with me, Merlin.’
He suddenly tossed the boy over his head, turned and roared a warrior’s-kill roar, overwhelming the smaller knight.
‘First lesson in life: never trust your father to fight fair!’ he laughed.
Then he picked up both children by the waist, slinging them under his arms like pigs. He came over to me and said, ‘You’re right, Merlin. Children are more of a burden than I’d realised. Do you think our Scythian friend Ullanna could paunch, joint and roast these little boars for us?’
‘I’m sure she could. But she might be offended that she was cooking something she hadn’t caught herself.’
Urtha grumbled as his children squealed and squirmed. ‘That’s a wise thought. I suppose you’re right. When we come back, perhaps.’
‘Certainly. If they’re really that troublesome, I’m sure we could cook up a feast.’
‘I’m nobody’s feast!’ Kymon shouted, half in alarm, half in hysterical laughter as his father’s fingers probed his ribs.
‘You’re Nobody’s feast? Nobody was a good man, according to the story. We’ll invite him to eat with us too.’
Abruptly, Urtha swung the children into his embrace, holding them one on each side. ‘Well, daughter, give me a kiss,’ he said to Munda.
The girl grimaced, pulling back. ‘You’re too hairy.’
‘Kiss me anyway,’
‘Too hairy,’ she insisted.
‘Kiss me anyway,’ Urtha said, squeezing her tightly.
She searched her father’s face and finally planted a kiss on his forehead.
‘Take hold of my moustache,’ he said to his son, and the boy grabbed the two looping strands of hair. Urtha let him fall, bracing himself as the boy’s weight was taken by the voluminous growth. After dangling for a moment, Kymon let go suddenly.
‘Who said you could let go?’
‘Didn’t it hurt you?’
; ‘Of course it hurt me.’ Urtha reached for the lad’s topknot and hauled him from the ground. Kymon cried out, then hung limply in the painful embrace, angry eyes on his father. ‘Does that hurt?’
‘Yes.’ The boy folded his arms defiantly. ‘But as long as you can hold me, I’m happy to dangle here.’
‘How much does it hurt?’
‘Very much.’
‘Only very much?’
‘Very much,’ the lad said grimly. ‘But never mind that. Your arm is certain to tire long before my neck breaks away.’
‘Well spoken, you little bastard.’ Urtha let him drop. ‘Pain hurts; it’s in the nature of pain to hurt. Limbs tire; it’s in the nature of limbs to tire. The hurt, the tiring, aren’t the point. If the hair on our heads and on our lips can be so strong, how strong are our hearts?’
‘Very strong,’ said Kymon, massaging his scalp.
Urtha crouched down and gathered his children to him. ‘Stronger than hair, make no mistake. Don’t forget that. Either of you. Before I see you again I will have encountered a strong man and sent him to wander the poisoned marshes, where the dead have no bones, no memories and no song.’
‘Cunomaglos!’ Kymon cried out furiously.
‘Indeed. Cunomaglos. He has a strong beard too. But how strong is his heart?’
‘A chicken has a stronger heart!’ shouted Kymon.
‘True enough. I’ll use his beard for rope, though. Never waste good hair.’
‘When he dies, others will sing from Ghostland,’ Munda announced proudly.
‘Yes. Your mother among them. Your brother among them. Now then, both of you, go over to the Mothers. You’re in the safest hands possible.’ He kissed each child, hugged them, then pushed them towards the three waiting women. ‘I’ll be back before next spring,’ he called after them as they walked away, sadly, reluctantly. ‘And we’ll go home together. I promise you both!’
He had seemed loving and gentle as he’d played with his children. But now, as we walked back to the edge of this world, to waiting Argo, his face had become like death.
The Hadassah Covenant Page 17
