by Kim Wilkins
Ash returned her gaze to the cliff and kept going. The way, which she had been dreading climbing, was cut with a narrow and steep staircase. She walked up, almost without effort, until finally she was standing, looking back the way she had come.
‘Hello?’ she called, and her own voice echoed back to her, as small and frail as a child’s. Ash realised she could not see the ocean. The edge of the island blurred into yellow-white light. She needed to get back, ask the giants for advice. She hurried down the narrow staircase, across the rocky plain. The wind picked up, plucking at her coat and hair. Who had called her? Why were they hiding now? Perhaps all this could wait until after Blicstowe was returned to Bluebell’s rule. Perhaps she could come back, unlock this puzzle then.
She approached the hollow where the house should be, passed it, moved up the ridge.
Then …
Why was she not stepping out of the mist? The edge of it had been here. She backed up a few steps then walked forward again, but still the mist didn’t clear. Her stomach went cold. Running, back and forward through where the wall of mist should be. Not finding the island.
She could not get back.
Twenty-nine
When the shadows were growing long across the sand and the tough grass, Bluebell finally allowed herself to worry about Ash. She told herself over and over that Ash was safe: she could control fire and wind and water. Nothing could hurt her. Bluebell also knew she had some business with the giants, but she had sent Frida to the giants’ hall and they had all said they didn’t know where she was.
‘But they didn’t seem worried,’ Frida had been quick to add.
This reassurance only lasted until the day began to wane. As powerful as Ash was, the island was made of precarious rocky ridges and slopes. It had rained all morning, clearing to cold skies in the afternoon, but everything was slippery. What if her sister was lying somewhere with a broken limb? Bluebell could not bear the idea of Ash being so helpless and in pain.
Light was fading; she sent out search teams. ‘Do not stay out past dark,’ Bluebell said, pulling on her own cloak and boots. ‘The island is far too rocky and dangerous. You need to see your feet.’
She sent the pairs in five different directions, and left the remaining soldiers to prepare food for their return. With Frida at her side, Bluebell set out towards the house in the hollow.
‘You don’t have sisters, do you?’ she grumbled to Frida as they picked their way up the rocky slope.
‘I have no sisters and no brothers.’
‘My sisters are always getting themselves into trouble,’ Bluebell said. ‘Consider yourself lucky.’
If Frida had opinions about this, she kept them to herself.
At length they descended on the little house. Bluebell called Ash’s name but heard no response. As Bluebell rounded the side of the house, Frida went inside. A few seconds later she called out, and Bluebell hurried back to the open front door.
‘She’s been here,’ Frida said. ‘This fire has burned today.’
‘But where is she now?’ Bluebell asked.
Frida shook her head. It was dark in the house. Bluebell glanced over her shoulder. Clouds moving in. Too dark to be out.
‘We need to go back,’ she said.
‘Yes,’ Frida said. Then, ‘My lord, I can stay here the night and listen out for her. Keep her company if she returns to the house.’
Bluebell considered. She did not like to leave one of her band out here alone, but if Ash came back it would likely be to this location. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘And if she comes back, you are both to stay here for the night. I will not have you climbing that ridge in the dark.’
‘As you wish, my lord.’
‘At first light, return to camp.’ With Ash, Bluebell thought, but didn’t say.
That night was cold and windy, and Bluebell slept fitfully, very aware of the lack of Ash’s warm body, and nearly mad with wondering if her sister had returned to the house in the hollow. She tried to force herself to sleep, but that never worked. A few hours before dawn she fell under deeply, then woke with a start in grainy light. Hyld stirred, licked her hand and went back to sleep.
She rose, wrapping the blanket around her shoulders against the morning chill, and left the tent. The morning fire had been lit, and a group of men sat around it talking in low voices and eating porridge. Bluebell looked around hopefully. ‘Frida hasn’t returned?’
‘Not yet,’ Sal said, legs stretched out in front of him, yawning widely.
Bluebell ladled out some porridge and sat with them, rubbing sleepy eyes and wondering what today’s test would bring. How she could even focus on it with Ash missing. The first spoonful was halfway to her mouth when Frida’s figure, a silhouette in the dim morning, appeared on the ridge.
Alone.
Bluebell watched her approach.
‘I’m sorry,’ Frida said. ‘Nothing stirred all night.’
Sal shuffled a little closer. ‘My lord, do not worry. Your sister is so powerful …’
‘I know,’ Bluebell said sharply. Then returned her attention to her breakfast. Time to put Ash out of her mind. No matter where her sister was, today Bluebell had to pass the last test. She could worry later.
Ash woke, stiff and cramped in a hollow. A moment passed where she could not remember why she was sleeping cold among dewy grass, and a shimmer of dread ran over her skin, as though she had travelled back in time to her unhappy days in exile. Then she remembered she was lost, and was not comforted by the realisation. She thought of Bluebell, who would be worried, who needed her.
Ash sat and stretched and her stomach rumbled. She turned her eyes upwards. The sky, which had darkened to yellow-tinged half-light before she had closed her eyes, had now brightened. She had a sense that there was sun out there somewhere, as if behind a pall of smoke. Ash rose, brushed off her cloak, and tried not to succumb to despair.
As she straightened and turned her eyes to the clifftop, the light hit something dazzling and white that had not been there before. A hall.
The white hall.
Her heart jumped: relief and fear all in one. She nearly fell over her own feet in hurrying towards the hall, back over the rocky slope and up the stairs. Her blood was thundering when she hit the top step, and she slowed and approached the hall.
Up close, she could see it was made of the same gleaming white stone that lay in ruins behind her family home in Blicstowe. The hall stood taller at one end than the other, with huge oak-andiron doors set deep under stone overhangs. Ash pushed against the door and it grated open. She entered a white room. Round, carved wooden pillars led up to gleaming roof beams. Apart from that, it was empty.
Ash stood, her shoulder holding the door open, and called out, ‘Hello?’
Nothing.
Or …
Her vision began to shimmer. She blinked rapidly to clear it, then closed her eyes altogether to palm at them. When she opened them, everything had changed. The rush of sights, sounds and smells on her senses made her wince.
Now the roof beams were hung with posies of dried flowers and the limp bodies of rabbits and geese. Now the hearth was burning bright, aromatic bog smoke curling up towards the ceiling.
Now she was no longer alone. People – servants – moved about, setting up a spit over the fire, dragging tables around, carrying pots and pans. No matter how hard she focussed, Ash couldn’t see their faces. It was like peering through smoke. But if she looked just to the side of them their faces seemed to gather until they resembled other people Ash had known in Blicstowe. The shoemaker. The woman who sold her her favourite brooch. The old drunkard who stood on the corner near the White Dog alehouse and told every woman who walked past he wanted to marry them. ‘Who are you?’ she cried, but nobody paid attention nor answered.
Ash glanced behind her, and realised that the island and the sulphurous sky were gone. Instead, she could see an ancient wood, the trees all wild and uncoppiced. Hazel and oak, overgrown with vines. A wide eart
hen track cut through the wood, edged in blue and yellow wildflowers. The air had turned warm, as though autumn had never been. The sky was pale blue and balmy as summer dusk.
She didn’t want to move and let the door close behind her, in case she became lost deeper in whatever world she had wandered into. So she waited until one of the faceless people was close by to reach, and grasped him by the edge of his sleeve.
‘You must help me,’ she said.
He turned and his face resolved. The shoemaker, but how he might have looked when she first met him, fifteen years ago. Skin unlined, his beard richly brown.
‘Who are you?’ she asked.
‘I am nobody,’ he said. ‘I only exist because you see me.’
‘Where am I?’ she tried.
‘They are coming,’ he said, and loosened himself from her grasp.
They are coming.
As she repeated the words in her head, the ground began to rumble and shake.
‘Who is coming?’ she called after the shoemaker, but suddenly he was no longer there. In a blink she was alone in the smoky haze and something was thundering through the woods towards the hall.
Ash pressed her back against the open door and turned her gaze towards the path through the woods. A cool breeze touched her face, as though whatever was coming drove the air before it. Her heart hammered. The thundering intensified.
Horses. It must be horses. As she had the thought, she saw them. A war band was approaching. She could hear hooves, dogs barking. At the head of the party a tall figure sat in the saddle of a white stallion. She thought of Bluebell, of Father, of her grandfather and somehow her mind put them all together and produced the image of a man with long, flowing fair hair and a bristling beard, who looked as though he might be any or all or none of the kings of Ælmesse. She began to understand that all around her were things she was incapable of understanding, and that her mind was clothing them in ways she could make sense of them.
‘Welcome to Meregard,’ the man boomed as he reined in his stallion in front of her. ‘Welcome, Ash, daughter of Thyrsland’s kings, keeper of the way.’
She knew then that this was the Horse God. A wave of white heat flashed through her body. Ash could not speak, could not move. Her eyes bugged, staring at him. The rest of his train had ridden towards a stable somewhere. The dogs gathered on the grass to sniff and piss and lie down with their tongues out. Faced with the knowledge she had somehow entered the realm of the gods, Ash was mute with fear and wonder.
Somebody touched her arm. She snapped her head around and it took a moment for whatever was there to resolve into something she could see: a woman, round-hipped and beautiful. A cross between her mother, her sister Rose, her old nurse Byrta. Dark-haired, pink-cheeked, her mouth set at an angle that was both ready to smile and ready to scold. Ash began to cry. This was the Great Mother. She slid down the door and fell to her knees.
‘My lady,’ she managed. ‘My lady.’
The Great Mother gently picked her up, pulling her against her warm bosom. ‘My child, do not be afraid. Long we have waited for you. Be happy to see us, as we are so happy to see you.’
The Horse God had dismounted and he rattled towards her, his helm under his arm now. ‘Will you eat with us, Ash of Ælmesse?’
‘Eat?’ she said. Did gods eat?
‘Be comfortable in understanding that you cannot understand,’ the Great Mother said, as though reading Ash’s thoughts, releasing her with a gentle stroke of her hair. ‘Whatever you see, it is built from your own memories and imagination. An approximation of us, for we are gods and not knowable by mennisc. Accept what you see and hear, and know that we will not harm you.’
Ash breathed away her tears. ‘Then, yes, it would be my greatest honour to eat with you.’
‘Come inside and let’s close this door,’ said the Horse God, his hand warm and firm on Ash’s shoulder. ‘I can smell rain on the way.’
He urged her inside and the Great Mother led the way to the hearth, where a trio of padded stools sat close to the fire. Ash sat, and the Great Mother served her some soup from the pot on the chain. Ash took it, trying to calm her whirling mind. She was in too much shock to pick up the spoon and put it to her mouth, so the bowl remained in her hands, the soup cooling.
They sat across from her, looking ordinary and familiar and somehow extraordinary and unfamiliar at the same time. They ate as real folk might.
‘Go on,’ the Great Mother urged, and Ash saw a hint of her stern face and immediately picked up the spoon.
The soup tasted like gold might, were it edible. She managed a few spoonfuls, but her stomach was lurching too much to digest it properly, so she put the bowl aside on the flat stones around the hearth and watched them finish their meals. None of the servants reappeared. She could hear rain. Ash’s wild brain began to calm and finally she asked the question.
‘Why am I here?’
‘Because we wanted you to be,’ the Great Mother said, placing her bowl on the ground. The Horse God drained his and wiped his beard.
‘Why?’ Ash asked.
‘You are the keeper of the way.’
Ash remembered the Horse God had said that to her before. ‘What does that mean?’
‘Did you not ever wonder why you were given such intense gifts?’ the Horse God asked, standing to pace slowly. His mail and weapons rung like music. ‘Surpassing all undermagicians, all counsellors and preachers?’
‘I did. I thought it an accident of birth.’
‘And so it was,’ the Great Mother said, ‘because our keeper is not always a princess, you understand. Our keeper does not always keep such company, have such advantages and obligations.’
‘What is a keeper?’
‘Meregard exists here on the Brenci Isles,’ the Horse God said. ‘Both in it, above it, around it, beneath it. The tides start and end here. The way between the world of gods and the world of men – the mennisc – is here. You have crossed it. No other of the mennisc might, though they sometimes come here by accident, by design, for greed, for piety … but they must not. This realm is not theirs to know. The keeper stops them.’
‘Stops them?’
He paused and bent so close that she could see every wiry hair of his beard. ‘You command the elements, and you will grow stronger. So much stronger.’
Thrilling. Terrifying. ‘Are you sure?’ she asked, half a breath pressed in her lungs. ‘Until recently I had lost my abilities altogether.’
‘We took them from you,’ he said, straightening and returning to his stool, where his big fingers idly traced the carved patterns on the wood. ‘We needed you to come. It’s the quickest way to call a keeper. Take her powers and know she will come to find them.’
‘So all of those ideas of the west, of the islands?’
‘Yes, that was your gift calling to you.’
A flicker of hope lit in Ash’s heart. ‘So I didn’t become weak because I am in love?’
‘Most certainly not,’ the Great Mother said. ‘Love is the most important thing there is.’
‘War keeps those we love safe,’ the Horse God countered.
Ash felt the temperature in the room drop suddenly. Thunder rumbled overhead and mortal dread flared in her blood. Then the air warmed again and all was as it had been.
She looked around. ‘What just happened?’
‘We don’t always agree,’ the Great Mother said. ‘But it’s nothing to be afraid of.’ Then, she said, only inside Ash’s head, I am stronger than he is.
Ash flicked her glance to the Horse God’s face. He certainly hadn’t heard. He smiled at her good-naturedly. Ash was aware that she was in such a heightened state of awe that she was not thinking straight; she closed her eyes and took a deep breath, straightening out what they had said.
When she opened her eyes, the dread was returning. ‘So your last waykeeper was?’
‘Elwine.’
‘The body I found?’
‘Yes. Much beloved of the eoten.
As will you be.’
The house in the hollow was Elwine’s, and now she was dead. Ash would take her place, so far from home. From Blicstowe. Then her dilemma crystallised fully in her mind. ‘But I can’t stay,’ she blurted. ‘Not yet. I’m needed in Blicstowe.’
‘The eoten will go to Blicstowe. You will remain,’ the Great Mother said.
‘The raiders will set fire to it. I need to contain the fire, protect my people. Giants can’t do that.’
A silence ensued. Ash could hear the fire pop, the rain. The gods were angry; she could hear that too, in their silence.
‘If you leave this island, you leave without your powers,’ the Great Mother said, at length.
‘No!’ Ash cried. ‘You must let me play my part in saving my own kingdom. I will do whatever you ask afterwards, only let me help my sister.’ She turned her eyes to the Horse God. ‘You are the war god. You favour Bluebell, surely?’
The Horse God looked to the Great Mother, and Ash thought she saw a look of entreaty on his brow. ‘The raider queen has help,’ he said to her.
Ash’s curiosity prickled. ‘The raider queen? Willow? What kind of help?’
The Great Mother sighed. ‘One of our number who fled Meregard. You know him as Maava.’
‘Maava is from Meregard?’ Ash thought of all the other minor deities that the common faith paid tribute to. Gods of weather and journeys and crops and buildings. Had Maava been one of them? ‘How many gods are there here?’
‘We are beyond counting. Neither one nor two nor one hundred nor one thousand. Again, you are not built to understand. We are your gods, Ash. That’s all that matters.’
‘Then who is Maava?’
‘My nephew,’ the Horse God said. ‘My sister’s spawn. Ill-favoured from birth. He left us thousands of mennisc years past, after …’ He trailed off, turned his eyes to the Great Mother. ‘We should have ended it by now. We should never have let him grow so powerful in the world of men.’
‘We cannot interfere with their free hearts,’ the Great Mother said. ‘The ones who follow Maava have chosen to do so.’
‘Not all of them,’ Ash protested. ‘The trimartyrs force their religion on people with violence. They mess with everything. They say that women cannot rule and must be subservient to men.’