by Greg Bear
“I know. But we lost three blunters. And there is a drake out on the meadow, badly wounded. Likely will die.”
“Whose?” Nem asked.
“Asquith’s, I think.”
“Asquith’s among the dead,” Sondheim said.
Dana called forward Gareth and Nem and asked them to take Reynard to a place where he could get food and drink, and sleep for the rest of the night.
“The houses are in bad shape here, folks are being sent to other homes, and many of the barns have burned,” Gareth said, flexing his broad shoulders and sharing the exhausted Reynard’s weight with Nem.
“There is a sheepfold out on South Road, near the stables. The old shepherd’s place. Take him there. It is beyond this mayhem, and will serve until morning.”
Dana and the blunters, led by Anutha, were met by a candlelit procession of ten men and boys and four women, in deep twilight at the edge of the destruction. This procession was guided by the older, gray-haired woman who, Reynard now saw, bore a resemblance to Dana, perhaps mother to daughter. He wondered if this was Maggie.
In the middle of the grieving and preparations for funerals, news of their success with the nymphs on this part of the coast was met with the gray-haired woman’s sad approval, as if they had done all that could be expected—and perhaps all that was necessary.
The paired defenders were brought forward and treated with respect, but no congratulations, and the whereabouts of their drakes were inquired after, but few knew much. Drakes that had killed and likely fed on humans were not responsive for days, Nem told Reynard in hushed tones. “And they did eat, I saw them!” he added.
“How many more Spanish still out there?” Maggie asked Manuel.
“Maybe fifty,” Manuel said. “Dependeth on how many died in the forest.”
“We stabled Eater horses the last three nights,” Maggie said. “Let us hope the Spanish have had enough.”
Manuel and Reynard were now studied without being touched or questioned. Nem spoke to the other youngsters, some also injured and bandaged, in a language Reynard could not understand—not the Basque that Manuel had used, that he had heard from other fishermen, nor the Tinker’s Cant of his grandmother, but something else mellifluously round and complicated.
The assembly split in three, and Nem, Gareth, Manuel, Maggie, and Dana continued on, Manuel a few steps to one side. Reynard wobbled along between Gareth and Nem, barely able to keep his feet under him as they took him to the edge of a tree-ringed clearing, between several magnificent, spreading oaks, onto a trail covered with ancient cut stones and bordered by woven fences made, Reynard thought, of willow or perhaps hawthorn. The candles provided little light, and the group seemed to want to keep them at least partly ignorant.
Dana and Maggie were conversing in quiet tones.
Manuel murmured to Reynard, “They talk about me. And about thee.”
“Will they kill us?”
Manuel made a face. “Not likely,” he said “We have fought beside them, and we have both been touched and recognized.”
“By Eaters?”
“By Travelers. Those who connect,” Manuel said.
“I do not remember them,” Reynard said.
“They will be more obvious, in time,” Manuel said.
“Who are these from the town?”
“The older woman is Maggie,” he confirmed. “She is in charge of the blunters who work this coast. She reporteth to Maeve. Both rely on Anutha.”
“Quiet,” Gareth warned.
They passed these lanes and continued on in a tight group, lit by shaded lanterns. After a walk of a mile or more, they saw candlelit windows in the distance and came upon a wide, cleared common, with another sheep-dotted meadow behind split-rail fences, and more people emerging from rounded stone houses with smoking chimneys, men and women and a few children commenting in several tongues about the fight, as they had heard it from this side of town, and of the return of the lost blunters, and how many more could now be placed on the rolls of paired defenders. They seemed more interested in those facts than in the facts of the battle.
Reynard flinched as a black shadow passed over the woods. Three children leaped the enclosures and began to push and whistle the sheep into low stone mangers along the fence lines.
“They eat sheep? The drakes?” Reynard asked. Nem scowled as if this was a stupid question.
The first light of morning turned the bottoms of the clouds a fiery pink. Smoke still tainted the air. Reynard was led by Nem and Gareth to a stone barn with a wooden shed projecting from one side. They half carried him to a cot near a line of narrow stalls and laid him down on a rough blanket, where he rolled over and closed his eyes, but could not stop his tumbling thoughts.
Maggie took Manuel to the farthest stall. Reynard pretended to be asleep, but listened to their quiet converse. “I presume thou wilt stay nearby?” Maggie asked Manuel.
“Of course.”
“May we call you Widsith, the Pilgrim, once more?”
“It is been too long since I heard that name.”
“How long gone this time, and where to?” Maggie asked.
“Thou wert a beautiful young girl.”
“How long?”
“In the years I felt, maybe forty. Long enough to visit China and live by their ways. They are ruled by Mongols now, the same who oft rise out of the grass like hornets and plague the west.”
“Crafters too clever by half,” Maggie said doubtfully.
“Methinks the world groweth now by itself,” Manuel—Widsith—said. Which name would Reynard call him? Were any of those names privileged and private?
Maggie asked, “Didst thou marry?”
They had moved almost out of Reynard’s hearing. His body ached all over. He could barely turn his head.
“I married for a time,” Widsith said, “there, and later, once in the Philippines, islands named after a king of mixed abilities at best.”
“Thou didst vow to return to Maeve,” Maggie said.
“And I have.”
“She is very old.”
“I did not mean to be away so long.”
“Dost still love her?”
“Of course,” Widsith said.
“Even whilst thou wert here, I remember thou wast not faithful.”
“My time with Maeve was all I wanted. I did not volunteer—the town volunteered me! Can I see Maeve now?”
“She hath ruled from seclusion the last few years. She wanteth not, of all men, that thou shouldst see her so old.”
“Her age meaneth little to me.”
“And thou wouldst make her young again? How?”
“I will persuade.”
“Maeve doth treasure the time she was given, and is stubborn she needeth no more.”
“That is not her decision!” Widsith insisted.
“Did Calybo fill thine own cask of years?”
“He did. It is my due.”
“So thou couldst leave at any moment, spend yet another forty years beyond the island, and abandon Maeve, leave her alone yet again all that time!”
“I shall stay a while. A long while.”
Maggie huffed. “Thou dost believe that, in truth? Once thou hast done delivering thy tales, thou wilt not flee on another long voyage?”
“Who tendeth thine allotment, Maggie?”
“None beyond the pacted years. Sad, is it not? I will never leave, and so never see the finished lands.”
“Wouldst thou like that?”
“No,” Maggie said. “Despite all, I am a widow, but I am happy here.”
“Was he a good man?”
“The best.”
“Wilt thou marry again?”
“None I have met. Hath the boy you brought here, at such cost, greater value than our town?”
“Certes he is a mystery I would love to solve.” Widsith spoke now in a low, soft tone, barely audible from Reynard’s position. “Hast thou wondered what it would be like to meet the Crafters in perso
n, have they persons—to submit this boy like a proper writ?”
Listening to the distant converse, Reynard shivered, but knew not what he could do, nor where he could flee. In the morning, he would explore and try to find out.
“No,” Maggie said. “I am dubious thou hast so much courage thyself.”
“I have seen many strange lands, the results of much Crafter plotting. I might summon courage, to answer questions I have long held.”
“Most likely thou’lt hand this boy to the Travelers, to carry bundled and helpless to the cities around the waste. And then thou shalt leave, renewed of years, to gather more evidence of Crafter plots. And for that, for a ready ship, maybe thou’lt again seek out the Spanish and offer thy services!”
“They are done with me. Anutha did inform thee I was caged with the boy?”
“She did.”
“Comb I favor from Cardoza like sparks from a cat’s fur?”
“No,” she admitted.
“And Maeve?”
“I am sure she is already asleep. We all need sleep. Go take thine own rest. I must play captain to the sentries.”
And that was the last Reynard heard before ache and sleep overwhelmed him.
Of Childers and Bone-wives
* * *
REYNARD FELT something nuzzle his bare foot and opened his eyes. He had slept soundly, the sleep of fear and pain giving way to healing, as if, all else aside, his simply being on this island soothed him like a balm.
Again, Reynard’s foot was nuzzled. He looked down the length of the cot and saw, in a ray of sunshine falling through a narrow crack in the roof of the fold, the familiar, silly face of a goat, rolling and sliding its lower jaw back and forth, chewing cud.
He had slept through the day and into the next. He looked around for Manuel, but the old man—he would have to stop thinking of him that way!—was nowhere to be seen. Doubtless the Pilgrim had wandered off to attend to other business—perhaps this Maeve, his wife. Or to arrange to trade Reynard for Traveler favors.
But this morning, Reynard was anything but afraid. He rose and discovered that his body had a kind of liquid vibrancy, as if it liked being here, liked waking—despite his fears. But he was thirsty and very hungry. And then he spotted, in one corner of the stall, a small table supplied with a loaf of bread and a pewter flagon. He sniffed the flagon: mead, sweet and pale. He sipped, then took a bite of bread, hearty and dense. In a few minutes, the small breakfast was gone and he was not so very hungry. The goat remained, watching him and chewing philosophically.
But the goat was not alone.
Something moved up into the light beside the goat and stared at Reynard. It was a child, naked . . . but small, little more than knee-high, all its limbs proportioned to that size, appearing perhaps five or six years of age, with scrubby brown hair and black eyes . . . neither a boy nor a girl. Just too small.
The goat turned its head, poked at the child with some irritation, and the child vanished.
But there were others in the manger. They walked, moved, flitted like moths—four, five, six. He stopped counting. One paused nearby, held up a hand, and smiled.
“Greetings,” Reynard said. The child danced around him, still smiling, and then popped like a bubble. A tiny musical note followed, and the goat bleated, then moved away into the shadows—bored.
Strangeness everywhere, Reynard decided, and looked around. Beside the table he found an iron chest, opened to reveal worn leather shoes and patched clothes folded neatly. He stripped down, then knocked out the shoes and shook the breeches and shirt and vest. His uncle had taught him that on faraway isles, one had to be careful about creatures dwelling in clothes and footwear. Would the spirit children hide there as well?
He tried the new garments and the shoes. The shoes had holes in their toes, through which his own toes poked, but the breeches and shirt fit reasonably well. The vest was too tight and so he left it off. He then put into the chest the garments that had presumably belonged to a now-dead blunter. Waste not, want not.
A few minutes later, he pushed through the wicker gate of the fold and emerged in watery sunlight. The fold was a few dozen yards from an intact manor house with stone walls and a slate roof. Apparently the fight had not reached this far. Both house and the fold were surrounded by tall trees, all rustling naturally enough in a light breeze. Above the trees the sky was still hazy with smoke, but the sun shone through warmly, and he felt encouraged that he had been left so long to sleep and recover from another awful night.
“Fine morn for childers,” spoke a gravelly voice behind him. He spun around and saw a bald, elderly man with a long, brown-stained beard, sitting on a milking stool beside the gate. “They seem to like thee.”
Coming out, Reynard had not noticed this figure, but now the man surveyed him from a hunched angle, holding a long, flute-like reed with a bowl at one end, from which unwound a steady curl of thin white smoke. Reynard knew of tobacco; it was smoked often by sailors and, he heard, Raleigh and the Queen’s folk, but never among fisherfolk in Southwold. His uncle had shunned it because of the example of Hawkins, whom he had hated with a dark passion.
“Children?” Reynard asked, feeling a moment of such strangeness that his fingers prickled and neck hair stood on end.
“Childers!” the man with the smoking flute almost shouted. “Little ones, come and go—fine weather for ’em around thee, lad.”
“Are they fey—are they fairies?” Reynard asked.
The man drew with a hiss on his reed. “They come, they go. They harm no one.”
“What are they, then?”
“Childers. Get used to them.” He pointed the reed’s bowl around the corner of the manor, away from the fold. “Thou art free to go where thou pleasest—but perhaps not the town for a while. The townsfolk think the Spaniards were led to the island. They might blame Widsith, or thee, but Dana and Maggie work to calm them, and testify thou art no danger and fought hard for Zodiako.” Another long, sucking draw and smoke expelled from mouth and nostrils. “There be no more breakfast here, ’less thou be’st a goat or a sheep.”
Reynard’s discomfort had grown to a peak. “I have eaten and thank you. What know you about the old Spaniard?”
“I am old, lad. Widsith is no Spaniard, and hath not that luxury in which I wallow—to grow old.” He waved his smoking flute. “Widsith hath said I should send thee on his trail. But I saith back, thou art free. Git. Whither thou goest, no matter to me. Thou art a chain, boy, and I am the anchor. Cut loose.” He fluttered one hand and drew on the tobacco again with the other. The smoke that filled the air was at once sweet and acrid.
“Which way?”
Reynard wondered if he should simply avoid Widsith and find his way to the beach. But his inner pleasure was strangely compelling, and gave him courage despite the words he had heard two nights before.
He wanted to explore but not to flee.
The elderly man shrugged, then consented to point along a path through the margin of trees. Reynard started to walk, and then to run, away from the fold and the manor house, his shoes making soft scraping sounds along a well-trodden path rutted by wagon wheels and dotted profusely with evidence of sheep, horses, and kine.
Very familiar. Just shite, some fresh.
After a while, deep in leafy shadow, he stopped to catch his breath. The holed toes of his borrowed shoes provided little protection against roots and stones. He removed them and stuffed in thick leaves and grass. Then, for a few long moments, he sat under a white-flowering tree, taking stock. He had made a kind of pact, a strange sort of friendship, with a man who changed his age as he changed his name. He had seen many things in the last few days: sea monsters and at least one tattoed islander or freebooter. And of course, he had seen vampires who dealt in time, years taken or given . . . And beyond that, perhaps most formidable and frightening of all, drakes that killed at the behest of those who drank their birth liquor. He had just seen as well the strange, airy souls of lost childre
n, perhaps waiting to be born. He neither needed nor wanted any more marvels. He had to find his way to a place that was not wrapped in dream, or nightmare, or perhaps the gloom that comes after death. Should he continue along this path or strike out?
“Surely I am not the greatest mystery here,” he murmured. “And not so valuable as a town!”
Perhaps not even worth his food and shelter. And as for food . . .
His earlier sense of balm and health was seeming illusory, the more he considered. He wondered about his meager breakfast. Could he eat in this land without partaking of something unholy? Was there food to be found on this island that would not threaten his very soul?
Thou art wiser than that, lad. Thou pray’st the prayers of others. Find thine own strength, and thine own way.
Reynard turned to see whoever had spoken, fearing it might be the dark man with the white shadow, but the words, the strong and stern advice, came from inside his head. Still, he thought the voice sounded familiar—raspy, smoky, deep and deeply female, like his grandmother. Did the dead come here to haunt . . . perhaps to become child-ghosts and be reborn in the east, where, he had heard, such things were believed?
He looked down, closed his eyes, wished for a sign. Nothing. And so he looked up. The high branches obscured most of that twisted sky, but daylight still filtered down, as if through a stamped pane of window glass. That light said, however soon he might face doom, for the moment there would be warmth, familiar trees, solid ground beneath his worn shoes.
Ahead, he heard high laughter and female voices. Were they women, humans from local farms—or the Eaters he had seen on the beach? He hid behind thick brush and listened. Several, perhaps four, were walking lightly and quickly along the path he had just abandoned. He pushed aside a branch and saw the first of them, dressed in long, filmy robes, her shoulders draped with a dark leather jerkin. Over the jerkin, swirling waves of brown hair fell to her waist—and then came into his sight three others, similar in appearance, like sisters. One had reddish hair, two brown, and one black. They were speaking a kind of ancient English, mixed with something that could have been Icelandic. Old, accented oddly, some words half familiar . . . but definitely neither Spanish nor Dutch.