I relaxed for what seemed the first time in days. Soon, with the sun already dipping red towards the low hills to the west, we should be snug in some cottage for the night, with perhaps a spoonful or two of stew to warm our bellies.
The driver pulled to a halt, and skipped down to relieve himself. "Best do the same yourselves," he said cheerily. "Last stop before my cousin"s. I"ll help your brother, la.s.s, and you disappear in them bushes."
I needed no encouragement: I had been really uncomfortable with the jolting of the cart over the last mile or so. I clambered down and looked about me.
The road was deserted and the land lay flat and featureless, except for a dark ma.s.s of forest a couple of miles or so ahead. The nearest shrubs were a little way off, and as I trotted towards them the ring on my finger started to itch: I must have caught one of Growch"s fleas or touched a nettle.
Squatting down in blissful privacy I looked up as a flock of starlings clattered away above my head, bound for roosts in the woods. It was suddenly cold as the sun disappeared: even my b.u.m felt the difference as the night wind stirred the gra.s.ses around me and I stood up hastily and pulled up my drawers.
Suddenly there was a shout from the direction of the roadway, a clatter of hooves, frantic barking and the creak of wheels. Whatever had happened?
Had we been attacked? Had the horse bolted? Had my beloved Gill been abducted? Hurrying as fast as I could, all caution forgotten in my anxiety, I tripped over a root and fell flat on my face. Struggling to rise I was immediately downed again by a hysterical dog.
"C"mon, c"mon, c"mon!"
"What"s happened?"
"Come-"n"-see, come-"n"-see, come-"n"-see!" was all I could get out of him.
"I"m coming!" I yelled back at him, skirt torn, face all muddy, shaking like a leaf. "Get out of the way!"
The first thing I saw as I arrived at the roadside were the long legs of Gill waving from the ditch as he tried frantically to right himself. I rushed forwards and grabbed an arm, a hand, and by dint of pulling and tugging till I was breathless, managed to get him back on his feet again, spluttering and cursing.
"Are you all right?"
"No thanks to that cursed carter! Just wait till I see him again-till I get hold of him," he amended.
"The carter? Oh, my G.o.d! Where is he?"
"Gone," said Growch, back to normal, his voice full of gloom. "Gone and the horse and all our food with "im. Waited till you went behind those bushes then tipped your fancy-boy into the ditch. Chucked a stone at me and was off down the road like rat up a drain. Got a nip at "is ankle, though," he added more cheerfully. "Now what we goin" to do?"
Chapter Eight.
What, indeed! As for this "we," it was down to me really, wasn"t it? So, I could cry, scream, yell, kick the dog, run off down the road in vain pursuit. I could refuse to go any further, abandon both my knight and the dog, do my own thing. I could tear my hair out in handfuls, creep away into the wilderness and die; I could become a hermit or take the veil. . . .
I did none of these, of course. Instead I sat down by the roadside and considered, steadily and calmly, the options left to us. I was aware that despair was only just around the corner; I was also aware just how much I had changed. A few days ago, while Mama was still alive, I would have been totally incapable of coping. Then, if even the smallest thing went wrong, my fault or no, I had run to her skirts and asked for forgiveness, aid, advice, whatever; I had been whipped, scolded, but given my course of action. Now I was on my own.
No, not on my own. I had the others to consider. Without me they would probably perish, except perhaps for Growch. Had the unaccustomed responsibility brought this mood of somehow being able to deal with it all? Or had my "magic" ring wrought the change? It had certainly tried to warn me of danger when it p.r.i.c.kled and itched on my finger. I glanced down at it wryly.
In the stories I remembered one twist and straw would be spun into gold, a table spread with unimaginable delicacies-But of course! I still had all my money safe, so we wouldn"t starve. We might have lost our transport, food, provisions, utensils and, saddest loss of all to me, my Boke and writing materials, but what was that against our lives and some money?
And my ring did give me the power to communicate with Growch and Mistral: why not send out a call to her to escape back to us if she could, however long it took? Given the choice, I would rather have her back than regain our goods. If the carter turned her loose perhaps she would find us. Shutting my eyes and praying that my thoughts had the power of travel I sent her a message, wondering at the same time if I wasn"t being foolish to hope.
And while I was about it, an ordinary prayer wouldn"t do any harm. So I made one, and Gill joined in with an "Amen."
Rising to my feet I dusted myself down, retrieved Gill"s staff, put one end into his right hand and took the other in my left.
"Right! Hang on tight. I"ll try and keep to the smoother part of the road, but it will soon be dark and we must seek shelter."
"Where?"
"There are woods a mile or so down the road."
"And what do we do for food?"
"I"ll find something."
"Not more of your stupid "magic," I hope!"
"If you must know, yes, I have tried to reach Mis-the horse."
"What rubbish! She"s miles away by now. You"ll never see her again."
"Wait and see. . . ."
And in this way we set off down the road in the gathering gloom, a sneaky wind fingering my ankles and blowing up my skirts indecently. Then just as we reached the shelter of the first trees, it started to rain. It was now almost too dark to see, and we sheltered uneasily, unwilling to lose our footing venturing father into the forest. But the rain came down harder, and while the firs and pines provided some protection, the oaks and beech had lost most of their leaves by now and were useless as shelter.
From the distance came a growl of thunder, a gust of wind shook the branches above us, increasing our wet misery with a few hundred more drops, and we struggled on, Gill falling on every tenth step and Growch tripping me up on every twentieth. If we didn"t find better shelter soon we could die of exposure- A vivid flash of lightning flared through the trees, followed almost immediately by a tremendous clap of thunder and- And something else.
A frightened cry. An owl? Something trapped? Someone in distress? It came again. The high-pitched whinny of a terrified horse. This time I recognised it at once.
"Mistral!" I shouted. "Mistral, where are you?"
An answer came, but from which direction? I plunged forward, forgetting Gill, and we near tumbled together.
"Mistral, Mistral! Here, we"re here!"
But it took a few minutes more of stumbling around and calling before she found us. I flung my arms around her trembling neck, dropping my end of Gill"s staff.
"What happened? Are you all right? How did you escape?" I had forgotten about thought-speech, forgotten that Gill would hear me.
She told me that when the carter had rattled off down the road she had resigned herself to her fate, but once she heard my thought-call-yes, she had heard it-she struggled to free herself, but alas! I had fastened her too securely to the tail of the cart. Then she had tried to bite through the rope, with little success until the cart had b.u.mped over a particularly deep rut, when the chewed rope had at last parted, and she had galloped back to find us.
"Brought the food back with you?" asked Growch hopefully.
"Everything is just as it was. He didn"t stop to investigate." She paused. "But now I am so tired and wet. . . ."
"Now you"re back everything will be fine," I said. "I"ll light the lantern and we"ll find a snug spot in no time at all!"
"And eat," said Growch.
For once I was in full agreement with him. "And eat."
I held the lantern high to try and get our bearings and saw what seemed like a reflection of our light off to the right. I blinked my eyes free of moisture and looked again. As I watched, the lantern or whatever it was swung slowly from side to side. Yes, it wasn"t my imagination.
I stumbled forward, never considering any danger I might be heading for. "Is there anyone there? Help, we need shelter. . . ." and grabbing Gill"s hand I made off towards the other light.
The trees shuffled away into the shadows on either side and we found ourselves in a small clearing. A flickering lantern held by a small man threw dances of light onto a queer, humpbacked building, no taller than me, that crouched for all the world like a giant hedgehog beneath the trees. It must be a charcoal-burner"s hut, I thought, and certainly not big enough to hold us all.
A wisp of smoke trickled from the roof.
The small man bowed. "Welcome travelers. It is not often I have the pleasure of welcoming visitors so far into the forest. Pray take advantage of my humble dwelling, for methinks the weather can only worsen." He spoke in a creaky, old-fashioned way, as though speech came seldom to his tongue. He was elderly, and looked to be dressed in skins; the hand that clutched the lantern was gnarled like a bunch of twigs.
"Thank you, sir, for your kind offer," I said formally. I looked at the low doorway. "But there are four of us, and I fear . . ."
"Plenty of room: You will see."
One of us wasn"t waiting; Growch pushed past and disappeared behind the hides that covered the entrance and I found myself pulling Gill in with me.
Inside it wasn"t a bit what I expected.
Somehow the roof seemed higher-perhaps we had come down a step or two-and the s.p.a.ce far greater than I had imagined. It was quite roomy, in fact. The floor was clean sand, the walls wattle and daub; there were piled skins to sit on and a merry fire burned in the center, the smoke curling up tidily to a hole in the roof. To one side of the fire a cauldron simmered and on the other meat was skewered to a spit, browning nicely. A pile of oatcakes was warming on a flat stone, a flagon of wine stood by a jug and wooden bowls and mugs were piled ready. The tantalizing smell of the food was almost more than I could bear without drooling.
I guided Gill to a pile of skins and sat him down, hanging his sodden cloak on a hook in the wall. Growch was already steaming, as near to the fire as he could get, and biting at his reawakened fleas. I heard a munching sound and there was Mistral behind me, lipping at a bunch of winter gra.s.s.
It was all rather unexpected, but then I was still unused to much of the refinements of the world. Perhaps houses could, and did, stretch to accommodate extra guests; far more likely, I told myself, my eyes had deceived me outside and I had thought the place much smaller than it obviously was; if not, then we must be in some underground chamber.
Our host came forward, rubbing his hands together with a dry, whispery sound. "Help yourselves to refreshments, my friends. There should be more than enough for all."
Indeed there was. Gill and I spent the next half hour or so crunching into the delicious spicy meat, throwing the bones to Growch, and chasing the last of a thick, hearty broth with oat bread. Then with a mug or two of wine to follow I leaned back and relaxed. The fire still chuckled merrily, apparently without need of fuel, although our host threw a handful of what looked like powder into the flames and instantly the room was full of the scents of the forest.
He was much taller than I had thought, nearly as tall as Gill. How could I ever have thought him smaller than me, I thought muzzily. It was difficult to make out his features properly, too. He seemed to have greyish hair and bushy eyebrows, big ears like ladles and small, round eyes so deeply set I couldn"t make out their color. I thought at first his nose was as round as an oak-apple, but in the firelight it suddenly seemed sharp as a thorn and twice as long. His mouth was hidden by an untrimmed beard, but one moment he seemed to have long, sawlike teeth, then none at all.
The food and the wine and the fire were getting to me, I thought: I must pull myself together. Glancing to one side I saw that Mistral"s eyes were closed, her head drooping; Growch was staring vacantly at the fire and Gill had his head on his chest. I pinched myself on the hand, surrept.i.tiously, to try and keep awake, catching at my ring as I did so. It seemed very cool to the touch.
I looked up at our host. "I thank you, from all of us, for your food and shelter."
"A pleasure, young traveler. As I said, it is rare for anyone to venture this far into my territory."
"Your territory?"
"Indeed. I said so. This forest is my domain."
Surely all land and the people thereon were owned by the lords of the manors? Even in our village we owed ours work in his fields and t.i.things.
"You are a lord?"
He chuckled, a sound like wind in the trees. "Lord of the Forest, yes. All around you are my trees, my shrubs, my brushes. My birds, my wild creatures. Every living thing . . ." He sounded quite fierce.
"It-it must be a big responsibility," I said weakly.
He shrugged. "Everything usually runs smoothly: I see to that. Besides, who is there to challenge my authority?"
Certainly not me, I thought, noting the scowl, the beetling brows.
"And now," he continued, "I should like to ascertain just how you come to invade my territory. You seem an ill-a.s.sorted company, if I may say so. This young man . . ." Gill was fast asleep, too far gone even to snore. " . . . is a relative, perhaps?"
In the silence that awaited the answer to his question, short though it was, I suddenly became aware of all sorts of sights and sounds that had been hidden before. The uneasy p.r.i.c.kle of the ring on my finger, the rush of wind and thunder of rain outside, the fire that needed no wood, the unnatural stillness of my companions. Even the shelter in which we found ourselves was seeming to change: the walls were closing in, the roof becoming lower. It"s all a big illusion, I thought; he is trying his magic on me and if I tell him the wrong thing- Before there had been a great compulsion to tell the truth, but now outside reality and I had erected a kind of barrier between the Lord of the Forest and us. So, I told him the story I had told everyone else, lying as though it were the truth.
At the end of it all he humphed! as if he knew it was untrue but couldn"t fault the telling. I was beginning to relax again when he suddenly switched his attention to something else.
"That"s an unusual ring you have on your finger. A pity it is so undistinguished. Not worth much, I should say."
"It is worth the love of my father, who gave it to me. Were it made only of thread, still would I treasure it. Of course, because it is part of the horn of a-"
Horrified, I stopped myself, the ring itself now throbbing like a sore on my finger.
"The horn of a what? Some fabled creature who never existed, save in the imagination of man? I am surprised you believe in such a fable. Still," and now his face was all smiles, benign, kindly, "I am willing to exchange it for something far more valuable, just because I am grateful for your company.
See here. . . ." and from his pocket he drew out a handful of jewels; gold, silver, green stones, red ones, blue, purple, yellow. "Rings, brooches, necklaces, bracelets: take your pick! Just slide that old piece from your finger and I will give you two for one! How"s that?"
"It won"t come off," I said flatly. "Not even if I wanted it to. Which I don"t. It was my father"s gift, and I shall keep it. Sorry."
Of a sudden I felt a great squeezing, as though the breath were being taken from my body by an unwelcome hug, and the walls were so close as to squash me up against the others. Instinctively I took hold of Gill"s sleeping hand and cuddled Growch close. Above me Mistral"s mane hung like a curtain before my face and I grabbed a handful with my free hand.
Then sleep came down with a rush like a collapsing tapestry.
A drop of rain plopped onto my nose, the aftermath of the storm. Opening my eyes, I blinked up at the trees above. I was cold and very hungry. I had been lying uncomfortably on a heap of twigs and stones and my hip and back ached. I sat up; where was the fire? A tiny charred ring in the gra.s.s. Walls had gone, roof disappeared. I let go Mistral"s mane, Gill"s hand, moved away from Growch. Whatever had happened? In a little heap beside the remains of the fire lay a pathetic heap of small, burnt bones: mouse, rat, vole? By them a small pile of desiccated skins crumbled to dust, and blew away on the morning breeze together with half a dozen acorn cups.
Gill stretched and yawned. "What time is it? I"m hungry."
"Hungry?" said Growch. "Hungry? I could eat an "orse!"
"You can talk! I haven"t eaten for twenty-four hours," said Mistral.
I gazed at them all. "But don"t you remember last night? The food? The little man?" But none of them had the slightest idea what I was talking about.
Chapter Nine.
After that, all I wanted was to get away back to normality, and I never thought I should be so glad to see a plain old ribbon of road again. We had no idea exactly where we were, but with the aid of a watery sun headed west by south; even so it must have been at least an hour of stumbling progress before we were free of the forest.
All the while I wondered about what had really happened during the night. As far as we four were concerned we shared the experience of seeing the flickering light between the trees, but after that the others remembered nothing but disturbed dreams. Only I recalled a gnarled old man first small then tall, a room that expanded then contracted, a fire that needed no fuel, food and drink. . . . And in the morning the Lord of the Forest had gone, if he had ever existed. So had his shelter. I might have believed myself the victim of hallucination, except for that tiny ring of charred ground, the little chewed vermin bones, the acorn cups. Magic of a kind, but not nice.
How many other travelers had succ.u.mbed, I wondered? If it hadn"t been for my ring, the ring he had coveted, the ring that I realized had bound us all together as I gathered the others around me, we too might have been bones on the forest floor. I glanced down at the circle on my finger: it was the color of my skin and nestled quietly now. Whatever had threatened was behind us now, but I wouldn"t rest easy till we were away from the forest completely.