The Stolen Lake

by Joan Aiken

  As the sun climbed higher it illuminated the gigantic symmetrical cones, the fantastic snow-covered peaks and pinnacles, like spectral cities of ice, that surrounded them on every side. Bath Regis was now a mere dot in the distance.

  When they reached the top of a lofty ridge Dido, looking back, let out a cry of wonder.

  'What's to do?' inquired Mr Multiple, kicking his burro till it came level with hers.

  'Look at all that flat land we been riding across, Mr Mully. See them lines on the rock?'

  'I could hardly miss them,' he said. 'I reckon they are geological strata. They are far too huge for people to have had anything to do with them. Why, some of them must be more than fifty miles long!'

  From side to side of the upland plain long lines were to be seen, as if some god or giant had leaned down from the heavens and with an idle fingernail scraped a series of huge drawings over the countryside. More and more of the pattern became visible as the party mounted higher.

  And when they halted for the noon meal, Dido said, 'Well: I wasn't certain before, but now I am! Look, Mr Windward, ain't those marks down there the exact same as Mr Holystone's birthmark?'

  'Holystone's birthmark? Can't say as I even knew he had one,' Mr Windward said rather sceptically. However Dido rolled back the blanket to show the sick man's forearm, and he was obliged to agree that there was a remarkable likeness.

  'I often noticed that mark when he was a-peeling spuds,' said Dido.

  'It must be nothing more than a coincidence,' observed Windward. 'For why should a man have a mark on his arm that's the same as one nobody can see unless they're on top of a fourteen-thousand-foot mountain?'

  'I dunno,' said Dido. 'But I reckon it's lucky for us as we brought Mr Holy along. Looks like he belongs to these parts all right.'

  Lieutenant Windward absently pulled his chronometer from his pocket to check it against the position of the sun in the sky, and uttered an exclamation.

  'What's up?' said Multiple.

  'It's started going again!' He set it to the correct time.

  'So's mine,' said Multiple, pulling out his turnip watch. 'Well, if that don't beat cockfighting!'

  They soon started off again. Dylan the guide, a wizened, talkative little man, was emphatic that they must reach the valley of Lake Arianrod before dusk, and not risk being overtaken by night on the bare mountainside, or they would freeze to death, not to mention having their blood drained by vampires or being pecked to pieces by giant owls.

  'Aurocs bad along here, etiam atque etiam; yet remains a long way to go, sirs,' he kept saying anxiously.

  Dido felt she would be quite pleased to see an Auroc; she had heard them mentioned so frequently, without ever actually encountering one, that she had begun to doubt their existence and wondered if they were not bearing the blame for somebody else's activities.

  'Which is Mount Arrabe?' she asked Dylan.

  He pointed ahead and to the left.

  'We now go round, circumvenimus, back of Mount Damyake. Lacus sacratissimus – Arianrodwater – is lying between Damyake, Arrabe, Calabe and Catelonde mountains; Arrabe not first mountain you see, but second; having two big teeth like cayman. Very bad mountain, Arrabe!'

  'Why bad?' Dido wanted to know, studying Arrabe's towering twin peaks.

  Dylan made the double-circle sign. 'Belong to King Arawn, king of the Black World! Aurocs roost on top, pecking at stars. Old Caradog the Guardian live there in the temple of Sul, in Sul's town. I not taking you past Arrabe. Ladies of Night come there, too.'

  'Who,' inquired Dido, 'are the Ladies of Night?'

  Dylan traced the two circles again, and squinted through them at Dido.

  'Owl ladies. Better not speaking names.' He made a gesture as of snipping with shears. 'Queen owl ladies who make dress.'

  'Do you mean,' said Dido, greatly puzzled, 'the queen's Mistress of the Robes? And her people? Lady Ettar -'

  'Hssssh!' Dylan nodded nervously, glancing around as if on the lookout for eavesdroppers, then urged his donkey faster, to get away from Dido, who rode on very thoughtfully.

  If this Elen, she thought, is a prisoner on Arrabe, I reckon I know who put her there. And I reckon I can guess why. But no use talking about it to Windward or Mr Mully! They'd think I'd got windmills in my head. I'll jist have to keep a sharp eye out myself. Best do that anyhows, if there's really Aurocs about.

  The existence of Aurocs, which she had begun to doubt, was soon confirmed. A huge shadow drifted across the track, and all the burros shied and brayed nervously. As they descended the pass, more of the great triangular shadows crossed the mountainside.

  'Blimey,' said Dido to Mr Multiple, 'if we could put a couple of those on show at the Battersea Fun-fair, we'd all lay by enough mint-sauce to buy Threadneedle Street. Ain't they the ugliest monsters you ever saw?'

  The Aurocs, becoming inquisitive, wheeled in closer and closer to the cavalcade, with hardly a flip of their great fur-covered, leathery wings. Their claws could clearly be seen, and their cruel beaks, with protruding tusks on either side. Though Dido tried to joke about them, it was plain they were no laughing-matter. They were evidently attracted by the sight of Mr Holystone, motionless on his litter; they drifted lower and lower. Once or twice Lieutenant Windward discharged his musket at them, and then they would flap away to a distance, with raucous shrieks, but they invariably returned, and their numbers increased as the day drew on.

  Mr Multiple, an excellent marksman, managed to wing one with a pistol-shot; it fluttered wabbling away, squawking hideously, to a cactus-studded knoll a hundred yards from the track, and the travellers then witnessed a horrible spectacle, for the other Aurocs all swooped down on their wounded comrade and in a very short time devoured it completely, leaving nothing but a few shreds of fur and splinters of bone on the sandy ground.

  'Ugh, the cannibals!' shuddered Noah Gusset. 'Still, at least it keeps their nasty minds off us!'

  Unfortunately, by the time the Aurocs had finished their repulsive feast, the travellers had reached a very dangerous section of the pass they were traversing. This was a valley region of strange, heaving, pulsing bogs and quagmires, coloured in bright prismatic hues, dark-red, ochre-yellow, and sulphurous, iridescent blue; great gouts of steam drifted up from the ground and, from time to time, an explosive fountain of mud would suddenly spurt into the air, each time from a different spot.

  'It is a thermal region,' said the knowledgeable Lieutenant Windward. 'I have seen such places in Iceland, when I was second mate on the Arctic Tern. These are geysers, caused by the volcanoes round about.'

  'Careful! Quatn celerrime, here, sirs, but extra careful,' warned Dylan. 'Get stuck in mud here, you sink down, down, to King Arawn.'

  The burros were evidently well aware of the danger; they flapped their long ears, hee-hawed, and stepped nervously and delicately along the narrow slippery path, which wound a circuitous way between heaving, steaming pools and spouting fountains. Every now and then the party were spattered by hot mud. A dismal stench hung around the place.

  'Like unwashed Christmas socks full o' rotten potatoes,' as Dido said.

  Strange vegetation grew in this valley, nurtured by its dank, unwholesome warmth; grey-green fleshy leaves clustered round the bubbling pools, and grotesque, sickly, scented flowers hung from fat pale stalks on the rock faces.

  'I'll be glad when we get out o' here,' commented Mr Multiple, thumping his burro to make it go faster.

  But the Aurocs, emboldened by the slow pace of the travellers, now circled in closer and closer; one of them wheeled so near to Plum's donkey that it panicked and shied away sideways, slipping off the track and tossing its rider into a great heaving pool of mud. Plum yelled frenziedly, trying to extricate himself from the gluey, dripping morass.

  'Keep still, man!' shouted Lieutenant Windward. 'We'll throw you a rope! Don't struggle – you will only sink yourself faster!'

  But before Windward could drag a rope from his saddlebag, the hovering Aurocs, a
ssured of a helpless prey, had swooped down in a flurry of black hairy wings, snapping beaks, and flailing talons. Two of them fought for the donkey, and the larger won; with a screech of triumph it snatched up the wretched animal by its saddle and flapped away, dwindling in no time to a speck in the distance. Meanwhile two others had dragged poor Plum out of the mud-pool and were battling over him while Windward and Multiple, cursing with frustration, waited for a chance to shoot without injuring their companion. No such chance was given; while the two Aurocs were fighting, a third swooped in, snatched up the hapless man, suddenly soared on a rising current of hot air, and disappeared behind a crag. Windward and Multiple both fired at it, but both missed.

  'Devil take the brute!' cried Windward, reloading with shaking hands. 'We must go after it. We must rescue Plum!' He kicked his burro to urge it to a gallop.

  'No, sir, no gallop, no gallop!' shouted Dylan urgently. 'Festina lente! You go in mud, we all go, Aurocs eat the lot of us. No possible save that homo. He done for. Aurocs eat quick.'

  Remembering the hideous speed with which the Aurocs had devoured their own companion, Lieutenant Windward was reluctantly obliged to give way.

  'He's right, sir, I'm afraid,' said Multiple, and Noah Gusset muttered, 'Ay, those greedy monsters can swallow a man before you can prime your pistol. Poor old Plum's mincemeat by now, no doubt of that. Ah, he had a rare voice for a shanty – when he were in the mood; and he could knit faster than anyone in the fo'c'sle.'

  Daunted and appalled by this horrid mishap, the remaining five travellers drew closer together, Mr Multiple riding alongside the sick man with his pistol ready cocked. Fortunately they soon left the thermal region, climbed up through a narrow rocky defile, and presently came in sight of their first objective.

  'Arianrod,' said Dylan briefly, pointing ahead and downwards.

  For a moment the travellers were deluded into thinking that the lake was full of water.

  'Can the queen have been mistaken?' exclaimed Mr Multiple. 'Or King Mabon have restored it already?'

  'Perhaps a spring has replenished it,' said Lieutenant Windward.

  But then they realised that the vast, star-shaped basin lying among the four mountains was filled only with white mist, which billowed and heaved like the waves of an insubstantial sea.

  They spent the night on a rock ledge above the great hollow. Dylan kindled, a fire to keep off jaguars and mountain lions, which it successfully did. The fire was of small use for cooking, since they were so high, up here, that water boiled at a very low temperature, but they toasted plantains on sticks, and ate hunks of barley bread. Then, wrapped in ruanas and vicuña fleeces, they lay down to a cold and uneasy night's rest, with the burros tethered in a ring round them for added protection.

  'What about Aurocs?' Dido said to Mr Multiple.

  'Dylan says they all go to roost at night; they have weak vision. And they don't like dark or cloudy weather. At least we shan't have to worry about them till sun-up.'

  But Dido could not easily dismiss the thought of the horrible ereatures; they flapped and shrieked through her dreams. Mr Holystone, too, seemed troubled by nightmares; he tossed and moaned, and cried out words in some foreign tongue. Dido remembered that he had

  said he was found as a baby on the shores of Lake Arianrod; she wondered if the knowledge that he was so close to his birthplace had somehow penetrated his slumbers.

  Long before dawn Dylan was up and feeding the burros.

  'I go now, sirs; I leaving you here,' he announced briefly. 'Arianrod you see below: you keeping south, sun behind you – ' he gestured along the basin, between the steeply angled sides of Calabe and Catelonde – 'you soon coming to Pass of Nimue. Lyonesse on ahead. You finding stable of Caradog the Guardian down below. Sul's temple up above on mountain. You showing permit to Caradog, he let you through pass.'

  Windward and Multiple tried to persuade Dylan to accompany them farther, but he shook his head emphatically.

  'Arianrod nogood place, sirs. Benigne. I coming no farther, I going now, celerrime.''

  'But what about the Aurocs, man, on the way back? How the deuce will you ever get through safely on your own?'

  'Keeping them off, no fear -' he gestured with his cross-bow. 'I riding best fast burro, so valete, goodbye, sirs.'

  Lieutenant Windward having paid his fee, which he demanded in cash, he kicked his mount into a rapid trot, and departed, waving his sombrero, but without ever looking back. The rest of the party lost no time in setting off in the opposite direction.

  A narrow track, dug out of the steeply sloping mountainside, led down in zig-zags to the level of the lake basin, and then along beside what had presumably been the shore of the lake when it was full of water.

  As they scrambled down the zig-zags the sun mounted behind Catelonde, which was plainly an active volcano; black clouds of smoke issued from its cup-shaped summit, throwing wild shadows over the white mist which still filled the lake-bed. However, just as the party reached the narrow level track that skirted the lake, all this mist rose up and hung in the sky overhead, so that the travellers were able to see the dry, sandy and stony arena which was what King Mabon had left his neighbour Queen Ginevra when he removed her lake.

  'Musta been a right job, taking it,' said Dido. 'Hey, Mr Windward, why don't us ride along the bed of the lake, 'stead of this narrow track? Then we can all bunch together in case of Aurocs.'

  Windward thought this a good suggestion, and the burros were urged down on to the lake-bed. No Aurocs, however, appeared today, presumably because of the heavy cloud overhead, which now obscured the sun. A great many dried fishbones were scattered on the sand; evidently when the water had been removed a number of mountain predators had been furnished with an unexpected fish dinner.

  'This looks like gold-bearing soil to me,' said Mr Multiple. 'There's gold-mines in Wales, where I used to stay with my uncle. The ground looked like this. I daresay we could all make our fortunes if we sieved up a bit of this sand.'

  'Best not touch it!' warned Windward. 'Don't forget, Arianrod was a sacred lake. The queen would have our guts for garters, likely, if you begin digging up the bed.'

  Mr Multiple's face assumed an obstinate expression. He made no answer, but continued to keep a careful eye on the ground as he rode along. Presently he let out an ejaculation.

  'Now what?' demanded Windward. 'For heaven's sake, man, keep up a better pace! We shan't reach the frontier by nightfall at this rate.'

  But Mr Multiple, tumbling impetuously off his burro, had scooped something off the ground which he now triumphantly exhibited.

  'What do you say to that, then? A diamond as big as a pullet's egg, or my name's not Frank Multiple!'

  'Are you certain?' said the lieutenant sceptically. 'It looks to me like any earthy pebble.'

  'That's no pebble, sir, it's a diamond – see here -' and he scraped with this thumbnail. 'My granddad was a goldsmith; I could not mistake. Hey – there's dozens of 'em – let us stop but half-an-hour, and we are all as rich as Crusoes!'

  Windward was resolute, however, that they must press on, so Mr Multiple discontentedly climbed back into the saddle, muttering privately to Noah Gusset that it was a hem shame! He stared hard at the ground as they rode along, every now and then leaping down to grab a stone, remounting, and kicking his donkey into a fast trot to overtake the others again.

  Dido could not help being somewhat infected by his enthusiasm; she, too, began to study the ground as she rode, and so chanced to perceive what seemed to be a rusty metal cross, half buried in a shallow sandy depression. A wink of red at its extremity had caught her eye.

  'Here – hold hard a minute, Mr Windward,' she said.

  'Maybe that thing's summat worth taking along -might be vallyble -'

  Sliding to the ground she knelt and tugged at the cross-shaped object. To her surprise the buried end was far longer than it had appeared, and quite deeply embedded in the ground. She had a hard struggle to pull it out.

 
; 'Do, pray make haste, Miss Twite,' said Windward impatiently. 'We cannot be forever stopping for trifles -'

  'This ain't no trifle – blimey, it's a sword?' cried Dido in. triumph. 'And I reckon it's worth a packet, too -look at all them coloured sparklers in the handle!'

  'Yes, well, that's as may be, but the blade is all rusty – I wish you will not be lumbering us up with such useless articles! In any case, it indubitably belongs to the queen.'

  'Well then we'd better hand it to that-there what's-his-name, the Guardian, and he can send it back to her,' said Dido reasonably. 'It won't hurt poor old Mr Holy to have it by him.' She laid it in the litter and hopped back on to her burro.

  No further incidents occurred to fidget Mr Windward during the ride along the dried-up lake-bed. Fortunately the low cloud prevented any attacks by Aurocs, but the atmosphere was very oppressive, sultry and heavy. The burros slipped and stumbled on the shingly, powdery sand.

  'I guess even the ground is hot hereabouts,' said Dido, feeling it with her hand when they stopped for a drink; none of them felt hungry.

  'It may well be,' said Mr Multiple. 'After all we're getting uncommonly close to that big volcano. Look, you can see lava running down it like toffee. Supposing that big rock toppled off when we were passing by?'

  'I reckon it's been there for a good few thousand years,' said Lieutenant Windward.

  'This is a right spooky place. I ain't surprised Dylan didn't want to come here,' Dido said.

  Deep among the four surrounding mountains – twin-headed Arrabe, dome-shaped Damyake, cloud-girt Calabe and smoke-belching Catelonde with a huge stone balanced on its summit – the travellers felt as if they were at the bottom of a well, with black, steeply shelving slopes rising all around them. There were very few birds to be seen here, and no animals at all; the only sound that broke the silence was an occasional rumbling mutter from Mount Catelonde ahead of them. I'll be glad when we're past that one, thought Dido. She noticed that when Catelonde rumbled, Mr Holystone stirred restlessly on his litter, as if he could hear the sound in his dreams.