City of Pearl

by Alys Clare

  Before I could think about that, she was hurrying on, speaking swiftly now.

  ‘I was sick, exhausted, grieving, and I know now that these factors combined to put me into a quite different state of mind from any I had ever known. This, too, was perhaps predestined: that I should find the painted darkness just at the time when I was most receptive to what was hidden in its depths. I saw with such clarity that first time, and it took me years until I had the sight again.’

  ‘What did you see?’ I whispered.

  ‘I saw exactly what you see,’ she replied, ‘what all of us who undertake the journey into the dark will see, for the images are there on the walls for every one of us.’

  ‘But you saw more,’ I said. ‘They are not just images, are they?’

  And the look she gave me then had triumph in it, for all that she quickly suppressed it.

  ‘Are they not?’ she said with a smile.

  ‘You know they aren’t.’

  ‘Perhaps, but tell me what you know.’ It was a command, and her voice was hard now.

  I paused, for the whirl of my thoughts was only now beginning to coalesce into something that had any meaning.

  I stood up, moving away from her as she sat on the stone ledge. I walked over to the nearest wall – it was the one with the spotted horses – and ran my hands over their flanks. It felt as if they moved beneath my touch; as if they were contracting and releasing the little muscles just beneath their coats, as a horse will do when flies bother it. I moved on, slowly, thoughtfully, and went to the wall on the other side, putting my hand over one of the places where an ancient hand had once been flattened against the rock while its owner had blown a spray of red paint all over and round it.

  My hand, as I knew it would, fitted perfectly.

  And then it felt as if that long-ago person was beside me, and I was seeing through her eyes. I knew she was a woman. I saw the rock walls as she had done: as something no longer solid but as a veil between me and the life that pulsed and throbbed, that had its being, on the other side.

  Not a veil but a membrane, said a voice in my head.

  A membrane.

  A layer of tissue such as we have in our bodies; a barrier, that allows some things to pass but not others.

  Suddenly, fleetingly, I was back in the City of Pearl with my dark little doctor. Just for an instant, everything came together and I heard that summertime drone again, louder now and far more powerful.

  Then it stopped.

  A membrane. I went back to where I had just been. It was a healer’s term, and I knew that she – this long-ago woman from deep in the past – had been a healer like me.

  Yes.

  And just as the membranes in our bodies were selective, so was this one. It chose who it allowed to see its secrets.

  I turned slowly, staring at first at one section of the walls, then another, then yet another. The images were everywhere now. It was as if, having discovered – having been shown – the right way to look, to perceive, everything was now open to me.

  For a long, long time, I just stood and drank it in.

  And I understood, very dimly and right on the edge of my mind, that the viewer brought something of her or himself. For gradually I began to see images that were not from this ancient mountain world of huge cattle and bears and wild horses, but from a world much nearer to my heart.

  I saw the fens, and the sun on the water, and the islands that appeared and then mysteriously disappeared as the levels rose and fell and the land changed. I saw creatures that I had known in my own life: hare, fox, weasel, rat, snake, fish. I noticed that the fox appeared more than the others, and I recalled the fox I had known all my life: Fox, my own spirit animal.

  And here he was, waiting for me, and both of us were full of joy at our reunion.

  After an age, I turned to go back to Luliwa, sitting silent, watchful and still behind me.

  And then, even as I walked slowly across the rocky floor, I saw another vision; it was close, very close, just there on the far side of the veil.

  Not animals now, not even Fox and the other familiar, beloved creatures of home.

  This was something quite different.

  Perhaps it was the presence of the healer woman from the far past that made it happen. Perhaps she was still there with me, her mind somehow in tune with mine across the huge temporal gap between us.

  Perhaps it was simply that I had been thinking of home.

  In the vision – the hallucination – I thought I saw a parade of figures who I knew, without being told, were also healers. But they were great healers: far above anything I had achieved. I saw many that were strangers to me, wearing their power like a mantle that shone all around them. And, at the end of the line, I saw some that I recognized.

  I saw Hrype, and, standing close to him, their love wrapped around them like a blanket, my aunt Edild. Yes, of course, I was well aware my aunt was a healer, and, now that I saw Hrype in this company, the realization came that I’d always known he was as well. I saw Thorfinn, and the power thrumming and pulsing from him was so strong that I flinched. I saw my Granny Cordeilla, a healer too – the best, Hrype had once told me – and now my heart leapt with joy for in a swift blink I saw them together, my grandfather and my grandmother, as they were when they were young, and they too were enclosed in their love. There was another, shadowy figure standing on the fringes of the group, but I couldn’t make out the identity. It was someone I knew; there was no doubt of that.

  But there was no time to work it out, for all at once I was among them, standing in a circle with them. Lying on the floor in the middle of the circle was a still figure wrapped in a blanket, and I knew from one look that this man, or it might have been a woman, was very sick. I wanted to protest, to say to the healers that I wasn’t ready, didn’t have their power, but they held out their hands to me and I couldn’t step away. Then all of us were raising our arms, and from our fingertips came lines of light which linked into a veil, or a mesh, that wrapped itself gently around the sick person, surrounding him – her – with lines of bright gold.

  And then, as the force embraced the figure lying on the ground and reanimated her – it was a woman – I looked across the circle and into the eyes of the figure standing opposite to me: the one I had known but not identified.

  It was Jack.

  I must have cried out. I don’t remember. I had my hands up to my face, half of me wanting to blot out that loved face, half of me wanting to preserve its image, I don’t know.

  Then Luliwa’s arms were round me, she was murmuring kind, gentle words, saying it was enough, it was too much, and guiding me to where she had placed something soft on the hard ground. She helped me to lie down, covered me with my own shawl, cradled my head between her hands and said, her voice low, hypnotic, ‘Close your eyes. Rest. Let it all settle down.’

  And, finally, ‘Sleep.’

  SIXTEEN

  They nearly caught him in Concarneau.

  The skill of Thorfinn’s son Einar and his crew had achieved the long voyage from the mouth of the Wash to southern Brittany in excellent time. Jack, spending much of the journey huddled in layers of clothing, rugs and furs and crouched beside Hrype in the meagre shelter of the ship’s sides, had at first thought the pursuit hopeless before it had even started. They had learned in a small port on the Kent coast where they had purchased supplies that a ship, the Holy Mother, had lately sailed for the French coast, catching a favourable wind that had been blowing hard out of the north-east. But the wind had abruptly changed.

  ‘It’ll delay the other ship just as it’s delaying us,’ Thorfinn said calmly, observing Jack’s frustration.

  Then, when they were on their way once more, it had been a series of vivid impressions. The cold. The exhilaration – you couldn’t sail on a fleet and superbly engineered ship such as Malice-striker without wanting to shout aloud from time to time from the sheer thrill of it. Fear. The crew were evidently experienced and highly skilled and
they clearly respected and were possibly in awe of Einar, but even their proficiency and air of calm couldn’t prevent the fact that sailing far away from the shore in open water with a high sea running was pretty terrifying.

  And Jack worried constantly about Lassair, and whatever peril Gurdyman had led her into, and whether or not she would survive. Whether or not she was still alive.

  He didn’t dwell on that.

  They found the Holy Mother at St Malo, but she had already taken on her cargo and was preparing to sail back to England. Yes, they had indeed carried a passenger over with them; a slim young man, foreign-looking. Their master said he had no idea where the young man was bound, but a lad who was probably the youngest member of the Holy Mother’s crew came running after Jack and Hrype and said he’d heard the man trying to find passage to Bordeaux.

  So Malice-striker had set out again, rounding the great triangle of land that pointed out into the vast sea to the west like an arrowhead aimed at the sunset. The voyage was awful, and far too many times Malice-striker seemed so close to the horrifying array of sharp black rocky outcrops guarding the shore like a vicious army that Jack was amazed they survived. Again, he had to admit, with a silent and fervent prayer of thanks, that the crew knew what they were doing.

  But everyone’s luck failed at Concarneau. The wind dropped, and old hands looked at the sky with worried frowns and spoke ominously about something bad brewing. The something bad was a storm, blowing in with such ferocity out of the south-west that ships’ crews safe in harbour blessed their good fortune and others not so prudent or so lucky tried to outrun it or perished. Most perished, for when the wind was blowing you towards the perilous shore with a fist like iron in your back, there was nowhere to run.

  Einar and his crew stayed on board Malice-striker, reasonably well protected by the enclosing walls of the harbour. Thorfinn went ashore with Jack and Hrype and they found damp, dirty and unwelcoming lodgings.

  And they waited.

  On the second night of the storm, with no sign of diminution in the wind’s strength, Jack and Hrype sat in damp dejection in a tavern close to their horrible lodgings. Thorfinn was trying to fight the crowds all after the same thing – more ale – and Jack watched as the huge old man bodily lifted a lad who had tried to push in front of him and put him down again out of the way.

  Thorfinn returned, three large mugs of ale in his hands.

  ‘I don’t envy Einar and the crew,’ Jack said as Thorfinn sat down.

  ‘They’re probably saying the same thing about us,’ the old man replied. ‘Crowded taverns full of surly people, filthy, vermin-infested lodgings, townspeople out to make the most of the storm and overcharge for every last thing? They’ll all think they’re better off on board, believe me.’

  There was a sudden commotion on the other side of the taproom. Raised voices, fists flying and a fight that sparked off so quickly that Jack and the others barely had time to pick up their mugs before a body came flying towards them and crashed into the table. Jack reached down to grab the young man by his collar and prop him up against the wall, and he noticed Hrype going to the aid of another, older man with blood pouring down his face while Thorfinn, having carefully put their mugs on a shelf out of harm’s way, strode towards the two main combatants and prised them apart.

  When all was calm again, the three of them resumed their seats and Thorfinn handed them the ale.

  Jack had his mug to his lips when Hrype said quietly, ‘Don’t drink it.’

  Jack stopped. ‘Why not?’

  Hrype was staring into his own mug, an expression of fierce intensity on his face. ‘It’s been drugged.’ He sniffed. ‘Poisoned, maybe.’

  Not pausing to wonder why he should instantly believe him, Jack raised his head and stared slowly all round the room. ‘Pretend to be drinking,’ he said. Thorfinn and Hrype, understanding, obeyed. ‘Talk.’

  Again, his companions realized why he’d given the command.

  As the three of them made the sort of remarks and speculations about the storm that most of the town had been making for nearly two days, Jack went on staring.

  And, in a corner near the wide door, he saw a slim shape in a heavy cloak. The figure was in shadow, and Jack had the strange illusion that he was melding with the wall behind him, either coming out of it or flowing into it. He had the impression of a pale oval of face under the hood, but he could make out no details other than, just once and very briefly, a flash of brightness as some stray light caught the eyes. They were looking straight at him.

  He turned to Hrype, sitting on his right, as if interested in what he was saying. When he next looked up, the young man had gone.

  Jack leapt up. ‘I’ve seen him. Come on!’

  Hrype and Thorfinn were close behind him as he shouldered his way across the crowded room, and he noticed that Hrype – careful Hrype, healer Hrype – had the three mugs of ale in his hands. As they hurried out of the door, he bent down and poured the contents into a gutter.

  They went out into the wind and the rain and began hunting.

  They made themselves unpopular in a dozen lodging houses along the quay, barging in and pulling covers off sleeping people, staring at bemused faces roused to anger by the disturbance, muttering apologies when they were the wrong ones. Then they ventured up into the town and started again. They checked ten, a dozen, fifteen taprooms, but there was no sign of the slim young man. Short of knocking on the doors of private houses and demanding to search them, there seemed little more they could do.

  ‘He’s maybe already on board some ship,’ Thorfinn said as they staggered back to the harbour against the blustering, buffeting wind. ‘Other crews will be doing what Einar’s doing, and waiting out the weather on their ships. Could some master have agreed to take our man before the storm hit and permitted him to sleep aboard until they can sail?’

  ‘It’s possible,’ Jack conceded.

  So they approached the line of ships along the quay, asking, looking, and met with no success there either.

  ‘He’s a phantom,’ Jack said in disgust. ‘He’s—’

  But he didn’t finish the remark.

  They were fighting their way back to their lodgings, ducking down below the harbour wall to derive what little shelter it could provide, repeatedly soaked by spray blown off the turbulent sea, and suddenly one of the huge stones set along its top came crashing down in front of them, so close that, even with the force of the wind, Jack felt the rush of it as it passed him.

  He grabbed at his two companions, securing his fists in Hrype’s sleeve and the folds of Thorfinn’s heavy cloak, and dragged them back under the wall. Just in time, as a second stone fell right on the spot where they had just been standing with a thump that made the ground shake. The air was filled with sharp and deadly fragments of granite, one of which Jack felt slice across the back of his hand. He glanced down, but it was only a shallow cut.

  ‘Back!’ he yelled, his voice fighting the fury of the elements. ‘Back the way we came, so we can utilize the overhang of the wall, and we’ll return to the middle of the town the long way round.’

  He tried to look everywhere at once as they fought their way along beneath the wall and off towards the quay, and he sensed Thorfinn and Hrype were doing the same. He felt eyes on him, every step of the way, but whoever was watching them so closely kept himself hidden.

  Back in the tavern, they ordered more ale. Recalling their earlier experience, now all three of them kept their mugs in sight, on the small table in front of them.

  ‘Why is he trying to kill us?’ Jack said.

  Hrype looked at him coolly. ‘Because we have succeeded in following him this far, which he cannot have expected, and he is becoming desperate.’

  ‘Yes, I appreciate that’ – Jack held on to his impatience – ‘but why is he so intent on stopping us?’

  ‘Because he’s aware we know he killed the vagrant found with the pearl in his hand.’ Even as Hrype spoke the words, Jack knew he didn’t
believe them.

  ‘Hardly!’ he protested. ‘A lawman and two companions taking all this trouble over one dead beggar? No. It must be to do with his destination, and what – who – he expects to find there.’

  Thorfinn was watching him, understanding in his eyes. ‘You think as I do. His presence in Cambridge, the trap he set to entice Gurdyman and the way he’s trying to stop us, all suggest he knows what Gurdyman’s doing in Spain and what has summoned him there.’ Then, his voice grave, he said quietly, ‘He is making his way back to whoever is the architect of this matter, and he does not want any witnesses to their reunion. Especially not us.’

  ‘We are all agreed that the matter does not originate with him,’ Hrype said shortly. ‘He is carrying out another’s will.’

  ‘Yes,’ Jack said. ‘This matter is just too big for one slim young man.’ He paused, another thought forming. ‘And, given the lengths he’s going to as he tries to shake us off, I’d conclude he fears this other man’s wrath.’

  ‘He is right to,’ Hrype said softly.

  Jack turned to look at him, noticing Thorfinn had done the same. ‘Explain,’ he said curtly.

  Hrype shook his head. ‘I am not sure that I can,’ he admitted. ‘But I am convinced that something very deep and dangerous lies at the heart of the matter. It has its origins in Gurdyman’s past; in the years he spent in Spain. It must have,’ he insisted, although neither Jack nor Thorfinn had spoken, ‘for why else has Gurdyman gone back there? He is growing old, his heart troubles him, and perhaps at long last he recognizes that he will not live for ever.’ He paused, frowning hard. ‘I sense that there is darkness within him. It has lain hidden for much of his life, and the bright intelligence that is typical of him has been in the ascendant. But that beggar’s corpse with the pearl in its hand opened the heavy door within him that he locked on the far past, and now he—’

  But Thorfinn had evidently had enough. ‘You speak of his bright intelligence that hides some dangerous darkness,’ he said roughly, ‘and while it is clear that you both admire and like him, I can have no opinion, for you speak of a man I have not met.’ He paused, breathing heavily. ‘You tell me you believe he has set out to right a long-ago wrong, and normally I would say of such a man, well done! Good! What you are doing is admirable, honourable!’ He leaned forward, and his eyes were full of both anger and pain. ‘But this man has taken my granddaughter with him, and that is another matter altogether.’