There was no kind of response from Hafny. Perhaps the queer form he was in could neither hear nor feel. Brenda had to give up talking on the hill beyond the village. It was very steep. But she puffed her way up it in the end. There was the wood. With any luck, she would find Ayna and Ceri in a few minutes. She was leaning the bicycle against the bank, when a Landrover came grinding round the corner, going toward the village.
Oh bother! thought Brenda. Mr. Masterfield and Mr. Claybury going home for their dinners. Now I’ll have to stop and tell them.
She waved. The Landrover stopped, and Mr. Masterfield rather grudgingly leaned out. “What is it? A puncture?”
“No,” panted Brenda. “Something awful’s gone and happened to Gerald. Only I can’t stop now. I’ll tell you later.” She lifted Hafny carefully off his cushion and hurried into the wood.
“What’s happened? Where is Gerald?” Mr. Masterfield shouted after her.
“The Dories got him!” Brenda shrieked over her shoulder. Birds flew clapping out of trees at the din. She ran, looking anxiously about for any sign of Ayna and Ceri. Though how I should expect to see them when I never have before, I can’t think! she thought. “Ayna! Ceri!”
There was no answer, only more frantic birds. Three minutes later, she was at the other end of the wood, with the Moor spread into gray-green distance below. There was no trace of any Lymen, but Garholt humped into the green view fifty yards to the left.
“Then I’d better see to you first,” Brenda said to Hafny, and surged toward the mound. When she reached it, it seemed easier on Hafny to go down it sitting. Brenda arrived at the foot of it with a rush, a slither and a squelch. A shimmer of movement in front of the mound abruptly stopped. There was sudden complete silence. Brenda stared at the last place where she had seen movement. It seemed daft, but it did look as if there might be a person standing against the nearest bush. “Ceri?” Brenda said doubtfully.
Half the bush came to life, and Ceri scudded toward her. “Brenda! What’s gone wrong?”
“Ceri!” said Ayna’s voice. Then she, too, hurried toward Brenda from the other side of the bush. “What is it?”
“They took Gerald and Gair for human sacrifices!” Brenda said.
“What?” someone else said sharply.
Upon that, the whole space in front of Garholt sprang to life. Brenda was bewildered, and more than a little alarmed, to find herself surrounded by warlike men and girls. These people were not smooth and skinny like the Dorig. Their hair was shaggy. They had bright, bold, determined faces. Most of the men had beards. They wore sheepskin and Moor-colored tweeds, and all of them carried knives and spears of some metal that did not seem to be iron. Though none of them was more than a few inches taller than Brenda herself, she had no doubt that even the boys of Ceri’s size could make short work of her if they chose. Lymen gathered together were formidable. Dozens of bright eyes looked at her—eyes blue, gray or greenish, all of them more almond-shaped than Brenda was used to. To Brenda’s confusion, at least eight of them wore golden collars of one sort or another, so that it was impossible to tell which one was Gair’s father. When someone said, “How do you know that?” Brenda hugged Hafny protectively and replied to the whole band.
“Halla told me. And she did make me mad! All she cared about was not getting into trouble over Hafny.”
“Bother, Halla! She’s stupid,” said Ceri. “What about Gair?”
Brenda told them what Halla had said. One man in a gold collar, a fair man with blue eyes, said soberly, “That’s just what I was afraid of.”
Another, a younger man, who had bees crawling over his face and clothes, asked, “And where’s the other Dorig—the King’s son?”
“Here,” said Brenda, and held out the furry thing.
All the bright eyes turned to the misshapen small body, and a number of the people shuddered. A third man with a gold collar—he had a thin, clever face which Brenda liked the look of—pushed his way to the front and said, “May I see?”
Brenda found she trusted him. She let him take Hafny in his hands. He handled the queer creature very gently, turning it about and looking at it carefully, and finally laid it on the grass and squatted beside it. Everyone else gathered round to see. “Careful, Banot,” someone said. “It could be a trick.”
Banot shook his head. “The People of the Moon sometimes get like this,” he said. “It’s a form of despair.” He looked up at Brenda. “It will take more words than Adara or I know to shift this one back.”
“Oh dear!” said Brenda. “He was ten times nicer than that Halla.”
A fourth man with a gold collar pushed forward, and a boy behind him. Brenda did not like either of them. The man had scraggly reddish hair and a pompous manner. The boy’s ears stuck out and he looked mean. “This is just wasting time,” the man said. “Put the thing out of its misery and then let’s open the mound.” Upon this, the boy raised his spear, intending to drive it through the furry body on the ground.
“You dare!” said Brenda. “Just either of you dare, and see what you get!” She advanced on the pair of them, breathing through her nostrils like an angry bull.
The boy bolted. The man backed away. “I didn’t mean it,” he said, laughing uneasily.
To Ayna and Ceri, it was one of the best moments of their lives, seeing Orban and Ondo routed by an enraged and purple Giantess. But, as Brenda seemed likely to get herself stuck on the end of Orban’s spear, Ceri said hastily, “I can shift Hafny back, Brenda. Father, may I use a Thought on him?”
“Yes, do,” said Gest. He was the fair one, Brenda saw. She liked him, too.
Ceri drew a breath and prepared to concentrate. Immediately, the furry body dissolved and heaped itself into a mound of gray mist. The mist coiled and hardened and became Hafny, squatting in a miserable heap on the grass. He was without his hood, so that the first thing they saw was a curly head of hair. Then he raised his head, and they saw his face was ash-white and his yellow eyes ringed with red. He did indeed look desperately unhappy. But Brenda, Ayna and Ceri were not deceived. Ceri knew he had not used a Thought. Brenda and Ayna remembered that Halla had not dissolved at all. She had shifted straight back and yelled as if it hurt her. Hafny saw the way they were looking at him and gave them a look which plainly implored them not to say anything.
The rest of the hunt was amazed. “Is that a Dorig?” one of the girls said.
“Look at its collar!” said Ondo.
“It looks almost as if it’s a man!” said someone else.
“So they are,” said Banot, “when they’re unhooded.” He tried to pull Hafny to his feet. Hafny slipped back onto the grass, groaning. Brenda thought he had cramp from keeping up that queer shape so long, but it worried Banot and Gest.
“What’s the matter?” Gest asked kindly, bending over him.
Hafney looked up at him miserably. “It was my fault they’re going to sacrifice Gair and the Giant,” he said. “I brought them down to our halls, and I was a traitor to them and to my own people. Will you take me and sacrifice me?”
“We don’t make that kind of sacrifice,” Gest said.
“But you must!” Tears ran from Hafny’s yellow eyes and down his white face. “Tell my father you’re going to do it, so he’ll let those two go.”
“That’s an idea,” Orban said. “He’s the best hostage we could have.”
“I know I am,” said Hafny. “Please use me.”
“Nonsense,” said Gest. “Come on, lad. You’d better go back to your own people.”
“No!” said Hafny. “Don’t you understand? I—”
“Come along,” said Gest, and he picked Hafny up. Hafny struggled. Orban muttered. But Gest walked toward the main door of Garholt with silvery arms and legs flailing out on either side of him and started to say the words to open it.
Garholt shook to its roots. A loud voice said, “I don’t know where she went. But you get a splendid view from here. Right across to the Gallows Stone. Look.” Mr. Master
field appeared on top of the mound, with Mr. Claybury beside him. Around Brenda, everyone melted out of sight, except for Ayna and Ceri and Gest, standing in the open with the struggling Hafny.
Mr. Claybury saw Gest. He pushed his glasses against his nose and stared. “Titch!” he said. “It is Titch, isn’t it?”
Gest let Hafny slide to the ground. Hafny still could not stand properly, so Gest held him up. “Shift shape if you want to,” he said to him. Then he tilted his head to look up at the two Giants. “I’m glad to see you,” he called. “Come down. We’re in trouble.”
The two Giants exchanged buzzing mutters and began to descend the mound in their heavy, gingerly, Giant way. “Has this got anything to do with Gerald?” Mr. Masterfield called over to Brenda.
“Yes,” she called back.
When they were down, Mr. Claybury nodded cheerfully to Brenda, Ayna and Ceri, and both of them looked curiously at Hafny. Hafny shrank away from the prevailing largeness of the Giants, but he made no attempt to shift shape. “No more gold collars, then?” Mr. Claybury said jokingly to Gest.
Gest shook his head. “I’m very sorry I gave you that one,” he said. “I didn’t know it was the one with a curse on it. A woman called Kasta gave it to me, and in the dark I took it for another one which was very like it.”
“We might have known it was Aunt Kasta!” Ayna whispered to Ceri.
“But what’s the trouble?” said Mr. Masterfield.
Hafny leaned round Gest and caught Ceri’s eye. He pointed meaningly at Garholt and then at Ceri. “What do you think?” Ceri asked Ayna.
“I think it’s a good idea,” said Ayna. “Those Giants won’t understand for a week if you don’t.”
Ceri nodded and concentrated. Garholt rumbled open on a seething of silvery Dorig, noise, smells and confusion indescribable. Everyone in the mound knew the hunt was back. The Dorig were armed and ready, but, to judge by the shouts behind them, Miri was leading an attempt to break out. Dorig voices hissed urgently. Sheep bleated. Babies howled. The smell of a mound that had been sealed for nearly two days rolled out, mixed with the gluey scent of Dorig. And above the din, the loudest voice of all quacked: “I insist on going to that door!”
Both Giants spun round and stared. Ayna could have sworn Mr. Claybury said “Ooh-er!” just like Brenda. The first thing that he saw was the grim crowd of Dorig, braced in the opening. The first thing the Dorig saw was Gest apparently holding Hafny prisoner. They were horrified, one and all, and screamed abuse at Gest. The bees, finding their enemies at hand, left Med in a cloud and made for the Dorig. Med leaped up, followed by Banot, calling them to come back. And the rest of the hunt, seeing that Gest was unprotected in front of a band of angry Dorig, hurriedly appeared around him, alarming Mr. Claybury considerably. Brenda saw him take his glasses off and put them in his pocket, and she did not blame him.
The din grew louder still. Mr. Masterfield bawled at Gest, something with Gerald’s name in it, and Gest replied with an explanation which plainly horrified Mr. Masterfield. Around them, everyone in the hunt was yelling to relatives inside the mound, and the people inside were shouting back. Kasta quacked deafeningly. The Dorig yelled at Gest and at one another, and Adara suddenly appeared among them, very pale and jostled this way and that, evidently as a hostage. She looked at Ayna and at Ceri, and then her eyes searched and searched, looking for Gair. Finally she, too, called out to Gest, and Gest, rather reluctantly, replied. Ceri and Brenda put their hands over their ears.
The ground shook. Mr. Masterfield’s voice rose above all the others. “Shut up, the lot of you!” There was dead silence. Even Kasta stopped. The nearest Dorig shrank, and braced themselves on the others behind. In the noiseless pause, Mr. Masterfield nodded at Gest.
“Thank you,” said Gest, smiling his merriest smile. He turned to the Dorig. “This lad’s not a prisoner,” he said. “You can have him—but you might let Adara look at him, because I don’t think he’s well.” He pushed Hafny toward the Dorig. Hafny limped a few steps and stood uncertainly, while the Dorig looked at him, understandably puzzled. “And we’ve not come to fight,” said Gest. “We’ve only got hunting-spears. We’ve come to ask you to take us to your King—quickly.”
The silver people drew together indignantly. “We can’t do that!” said the leader. “The King doesn’t see Lymen and Giants.”
“He’ll see us,” said Gest. “Take us to him. By the shortest way, if you don’t mind.”
“We’ll do no such thing!” said the Dorig leader.
“Yes you will,” said Gest. His merry smile died away and he looked grimmer than anyone had ever seen him. “I have your King’s name in my head. If you don’t take me to him at once, I shall put such words to that name that the King and all his people will suffer as long as he lives.”
“I don’t believe you,” said the Dorig.
Gest beckoned to Hafny and when Hafny, looking awed and troubled, limped near enough, he bent and whispered to him. “Now tell those stubborn idiots what I said.”
“He’s got it,” said Hafny. “He means it.”
Chapter
15
GAIR AND GERALD SAT AGAINST OPPOSITE WALLS of their prison. They had given up talking. It did no good. The walls they leaned on were suave and soapy, and the light which came from them clear and unrelenting. Gerald found both horrible. Gair, who was used to something not unlike it, hated the wet warmth of the place most. Their clothes were still damp and beginning to smell of mildew. The prevailing gluey smell they both loathed.
They avoided looking at one another. Gair perhaps looked less odd than Gerald, because his hair had been slightly longer and he had been too frightened and shamed to move. The Songman had simply seized it in one hand and sheared it close by Gair’s ears with the other. Gerald had fought, wildly and frantically. He had been so terrified and so angry that he became truly like a Giant out of Miri’s stories, and hurled Dorig about the cell. It had taken six of them to hold him down, and much snipping by the Songman to collect a handful of hair. They did not like to look at one another’s shorn and tufty heads. They were ashamed that they now seemed to belong to the Dorig to do as they liked with.
The Dorig had given them bowls of crumbled fish after that, but neither of them could eat much. It was then that they gave up talking and just waited and thought. After a while, Gerald busied himself cleaning Gair’s collar and then with patiently forcing it into a shape which would fit his thicker neck. He seemed to find comfort in it. Gair could do nothing with the watch Gerald had given him. It had stopped ticking. He suspected it had drowned when Hafny brought him down through the water. And he wished Gerald would put his collar away. It reminded him of the other collar, which he knew now had brought them here to die.
For a while, Gair was furious with himself for the way he had let himself be led by a thing he knew was evil. Now he was away from that collar, he knew that without it he would have gone with Ayna and Ceri to find Gest. But it had filled his head with fine nonsense about saving his people and hopes of reasoning with the King and coming back triumphant, saving the Moor, doing what nobody could hope to do. He had thought more noble nonsense about keeping Ceri safe to be Chief after Gest, when the fact was he had confidently expected to come back. His Gift had told him otherwise, and he had ignored it. It had also told him not to give the collar to the King, but the collar had whispered that he could do some good that way, and he had believed it. Throughout, it had blurred his mind and confused his Sight. And he had known it had!
Now Gair was alone with his Gift, it told him coldly and quietly he was going to be a sacrifice. And his end was only the start of the end for all his people. They would be drowned, slaughtered, driven away and crushed by the huge numbers of Giants and Dorig. Gerald was sighing deeply at his own gloomy thoughts. Gair wished he had not brought this on Gerald, too. And here the rather ignoble thought struck him that he minded far more about Gerald than about nobly saving his people. Who in their senses would want to save On
do or Aunt Kasta? He began to suspect that the collar had worked on something in him that lay very deep and was not at all noble—since even the most powerful curse could not force a person to act entirely against his nature.
Gerald carefully put Gair’s collar to his neck. It was still not quite wide enough. He took it away, sighing. “I say,” he said, from the midst of his own troubles, “do you find you get on with your father?”
“No,” said Gair, and he thought, You, too? And Hafny as well, probably. Perhaps that was what they all had in common. Certainly Gair knew he had always stopped short of real friendship with Brad, the only other person he liked half as much, simply because he could not understand the free and easy relationship Brad had with Banot. Which was rather a waste, Gair thought, since he and Gest were chalk and cheese and probably never would have understood one another.
Then everything turned over in his head and he knew why the collar had been able to lead him on. He had thought he was the only ordinary one in his family and that Gest was disappointed in him, when, in fact, they had simply not understood one another. Gair had thought Gest a hero, then he had thought he was a cheat. And once he thought Gest a cheat, Gair knew he had set out after Giants and Dorig to cheat his way to being a hero, too. He may have saved Ayna’s and Ceri’s life by doing it, but that had not been his real motive. The funny thing was, now that he knew what Giants and Dorig were really like, Gair suspected that Gest was a hero after all. No one but a hero could have come out of those adventures unharmed, with Adara in the bargain. But Gest had done it all in an ordinary way and must feel quite ordinary to himself. The giveaway had been when Gair had sat on the bridge as bait to catch Dorig, and felt just as ordinary as before, even though he had found he had a Gift, too. All he had really wanted was to do something so blazingly heroic that Gest would have been forced to pat him on the back and praise him. And so the collar had been able to lead him on.
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