‘There’s a long barn – it was the wheelwright’s but he gave it over after the Serpent came, for use as a – well, a place of rest. We have lain all the dead there. I’m sure E’rinel will have gone up to see if his family–’ he fought the tightness of his throat.
‘And are they there?’ Medrian asked in the same matter-of-fact, chilly voice.
‘Yes.’
They reached the low stone barn and entered. Each side of the long building was lined with wooden pallets where many of those slain by the Serpent had been placed. All were covered in cloths of pale green and had leaves and yellow flowers twined in their hair. There was nothing grim about the barn; the atmosphere was like the clear twilight of a spring evening, cool and peaceful.
At the far end, Estarinel was kneeling by a pallet, grasping his mother’s hand. His face was whiter than any of the corpses and he looked too numb with shock to weep. Very slowly, Falin approached him, Medrian a little way behind.
‘E’rinel,’ Falin said softly. He flinched as his friend looked up. The terrible grief in his eyes was just as Falin had imagined it would be, time after time. Falin went to him and Estarinel stood up, and the two embraced each other without speaking.
Medrian looked at the bodies of Estarinel’s family. She recognised Estarinel’s sister Arlena, a tall silver-fair girl who had also been at the House of Rede. Their mother was similar, though fair in a warmer, more golden way. Next to her lay a man who was obviously Estarinel’s father, he was so like his son and did not look much older. The younger sister, Lothwyn, also resembled her brother in her darker colouring. Her face was gentle and sweet.
Strange how suddenly and infinitely more real Estarinel seemed to her amid his family, as if before he had been no more than a spectre whose path had happened to cross hers. How different her perception was without M’gulfn in her skull. It was both painful and wondrous to know that people mattered to each other, existed and suffered in a vital way that she had not understood before. It was as though she had known, abstractly – but only now did she feel the truth of it. She no longer felt detached.
I must stay detached! she thought, turning her back on Estarinel and Falin so that they could not see her face.
She recalled how his family must have died, crushed by the collapsing farmhouse. The others there had, presumably, died in the Serpent’s jaws, or been consumed by its venom, or died of illness caused by the ash it had left. Yet there seemed not to be a mark on any of them, nor any sign of decay even in the bodies that had been there the longest.
A terrible feeling swept through her, a terrible vision hung crucified across her brain; figures in a colourless landscape, frozen under topaz glass in eternal, agonised worship of the Serpent…
She then found out just how hard it was to hide her feelings, without the Serpent’s dreadful presence to make it essential. She had to struggle not to run or cry out, steeling herself until at last her horror subsided and her face was expressionless again.
It’s only a feeling, only a feeling, she told herself. There must be another reason why the bodies are perfect. Don’t think of it, she told herself. They are dead – even the Serpent could not –
‘E’rinel,’ Falin was saying, ‘come back to the cottage. We can talk there. You’ll feel better after a drink.’
‘Tell me how it happened,’ Estarinel said hoarsely.
‘Yes – when we get back. Come on.’
Darkness was falling as the three left the barn and gently closed the wooden double doors behind them. Falin supported Estarinel as they went; he was too faint with shock to walk unaided. Medrian walked ahead of them as if they did not exist, cold as alabaster.
Falin found himself disliking her, though it was a most un-Forluinish reaction to dislike someone on sight. Still, nothing had been the same since the Serpent’s attack. It was also un-Forluinish to feel fear and misery, to know hunger and illness – to find that even the love he shared with his many friends in the village was edged with the pain and dread of losing them also.
But at least that most Forluinish of traits, the love and concern they felt for each other, had not been diminished by the Worm. In that respect it had not conquered them, and never would. So he could not understand this strange woman, who had come with Estarinel, yet had not spoken a word to him, who kept her back turned to him, and whose face clearly showed – he thought – that she felt nothing, absolutely nothing at all.
Perhaps Falin’s feelings towards her were also tinged by jealousy of a sort. She had been Estarinel’s companion for several months, while Falin and his other loved ones had been separated from him, not knowing how he fared or whether he was alive or dead. And he had an idea that whatever they had been through together, they were not going to tell him. Falin felt excluded by their relationship, and angered to think that Estarinel might have come to feel love and friendship for her while she was apparently quite indifferent to him.
He must try not to pre-judge her, though that was difficult when Estarinel’s life was at stake.
In a few minutes they were inside Falin’s cottage. He moved around the room lighting lamps, and then stoking a dying fire until warm light flooded away the darkness. The floor was covered with rugs of russet, gold and green, and the creamy walls bore several small tapestries. On either side of the stone fireplace, dark wooden doors led off to other rooms.
Estarinel sat in a chair by the fire and gratefully drank the wine that Falin offered. Medrian sat opposite. He glanced at her but she was not looking at him, just staring into the fire.
Gradually the wine steadied him; his muscles loosened and he felt the colour returning to his face. He felt almost unnaturally calm as he said, ‘This is your aunt Thalien’s cottage, isn’t it?’
‘Yes,’ said Falin, sitting down on the floor near him. ‘Edrien and Luatha were staying here too, but they decided to return to the coast. Thalien went with them because she wasn’t feeling well, and thought the sea air might help. So I’m here alone now.’ Falin was plainly fighting tears as he spoke. For the first time Estarinel noticed how pale and strained he looked. After losing his own family in the Serpent’s first attack, he had been virtually adopted by Estarinel’s. And of course there was Arlena – he should have realised that Falin had as much cause to be in despair as he had.
‘Falin, I’m sorry. We shouldn’t have appeared out of nowhere like this. I was only thinking of myself...’
‘I dreaded having to tell you,’ said Falin. ‘I don’t know what made me think you’d come to me before you even went to see your own family, especially as you wouldn’t have known where I was living. It only happened a few days ago; I’ve been too confused to think straight.’
‘Tell me what happened,’ Estarinel said gently.
‘Well, your father,’ Falin swallowed hard, ‘he died not long after you left. They told us when we arrived back from our voyage. It was the fever that the Serpent brought, it’s nearly always fatal. But there was no warning of what would happen to the farm. It was as though the Serpent’s poison seeped through the ground and dissolved the mortar; it must have fallen so suddenly that your mother and sisters had no chance to escape. Lilithea woke in the morning and it had happened. She rushed to the village to tell us. We were able to get into the ruins and bring their bodies out, but soon afterwards the Serpent’s venom flooded in covered everything. We can’t get rid of it. It seeps out of the very ground. It kills. Oh, if only I’d been with them they might not have died!’
‘Falin, it’s all right,’ Estarinel said, grasping his friend’s hand. ‘More likely you’d have died too. Where is Lilithea? Her cottage was empty.’
‘She’s all right. She went south, to rejoin her own family.’
At this, Estarinel sagged with relief. At least she and Falin had been spared so far.
‘On the voyage back from the House of Rede,’ Falin went on, ‘Arlena and I were together most of the time. We decided that the Serpent mustn’t win, and the best way to defeat it was to go
on living and making the very best of life. We were going to be handfasted in a couple of weeks’ time...That creature won’t rest until we are all dead, will it?’
Medrian stood up as if a hot ember had leapt out of the fire and burned her. She paused, then said quietly, ‘Do you have somewhere I can rest?’
‘Yes – yes, of course,’ said Falin, getting hurriedly to his feet and opening one of the doors. He showed her along a short corridor to a room with rugs strewn on the floor and a patchwork cover across a low bed. Again Falin wondered what she and Estarinel had been through together since he had stood among the cold mountains of the Southern Continent watching them, with Eldor and Ashurek, dwindle to nothing in the Antarctic half-light. He lit a lamp for her.
‘The earth-closet is in there, and fresh water for washing,’ he said, indicating a side-room. ‘At least the Worm’s poison hasn’t yet polluted our deep wells… Would you like something to eat? I’m sorry, I should have asked before.’
‘No,’ she said, staring at him with those heartless eyes. She hesitated, but added only, ‘Thank you.’
Falin rejoined Estarinel and sat in the opposite chair with a sigh. Perhaps Medrian was just being tactful; he certainly felt more at ease with her gone.
As if reading his thoughts, Estarinel said, ‘Don’t think ill of her. She’s had a great deal to bear.’
Falin nodded, thinking that he had no right to pass judgment on Medrian. ‘How long can you stay?’ he asked.
‘Only tonight. We return to H’tebhmella in the morning. Did Medrian tell you?’
‘She told me a little. Not much. I realise the Quest is not over.’
‘No, it isn’t. Falin, I should not have come back; it was wrong of me. It will only raise new fears and perhaps false hopes, for you at least, even if no one else knows I’ve been here. I just had to know how things were.’
Falin looked at him, noticing that his friend looked older, world-weary and haunted. There were scars on his face. What battles had he been through?
‘Then you’d better know everything. That venom that the Serpent left is like a living substance; it spreads through and over the ground, killing everything it touches. We’ll have to evacuate the village soon. It spreads in sudden rushes, without warning. So many animals killed, farmlands ruined… Eventually it will cover the whole of Forluin. We’re doing our best with what’s left, but it’s only a matter of time. Once it goes into the water, we’re finished. That’s how things are, my friend.’
Estarinel felt hollow with misery, as though there was no ground beneath his feet and never would be again. But for Falin’s sake…
‘There is hope,’ he said, trying to sound convincing. ‘The H’tebhmellians are helping us... forgive me, I don’t feel I can speak of it, nor all the things we’ve been through so far. But there is hope.’
Falin tried to smile. ‘It’s all right. I don’t need to know yet. I’d rather wait until the Quest is over and then you can spend hours by the fire, or out in the meadows, telling us everything that happened.’ His bravery was forced.
‘I will come back,’ Estarinel said.
‘Yes. You must.’ And they looked at each other, sharing memories of their childhood and families, all the friends and animals and places that had made their lives in Forluin so beautiful, until the Worm came.
They sat by the fire for another hour or so, but there was little else they could say to each other. At last Estarinel stood up and wished Falin good night, saying he would look in on Medrian before retiring, to see that she was all right.
Falin settled the fire and put a guard over it, then doused all the lamps except one, which he took into his room. Once in bed, he extinguished that as well and lay for a long time, staring into the darkness.
He was desperately worried about Estarinel. He seemed exhausted and disheartened by the first stage of the Quest, and on top of that he’d had the terrible shock of his family’s deaths. Yet Falin noticed how unnaturally calm he appeared since arriving at the cottage. Something within him was suppressing the grief, allowing it no expression in tears or anger. If Estarinel continued to restrain his misery, Falin thought, it would eventually destroy him. He would be unable to continue the Quest on which Forluin’s future depended.
Falin came to a decision then. He had the same grief to bear, but he’d had longer to accept terms it. He finally believed the nightmare was real, and he had not suffered Estarinel’s mental and physical anguish on the first part of the Quest. He knew that slaying the Serpent was not a matter of revenge, but of Forluin’s survival, and he would do anything to spare his dearest friend left alive from further suffering.
They should have sent me in the first place, he thought. My family was already dead, I had nothing to lose – except Arlena. I am ready to go in his place.
With the decision came release from the terrible anxiety that had gripped him for days, and he closed his eyes and slept soundly.
#
Estarinel knocked softly on the door of Medrian’s room, then hesitated. He realised that his calmness, which had descended apparently from nowhere, had come from inside himself, solely to protect Falin from the even greater distress his grief would have caused. Out of Falin’s company he no longer felt calm, was starting to tremble. He hoped Medrian would be asleep, so that he could sit with her for a few minutes and then leave.
Instead, she was sitting on the floor, hugging her knees to her chest and gazing at the softly glowing lamp.
‘Medrian,’ he said quietly. ‘I should have waited for you by the farm – you could have got lost. I wasn’t thinking.’
She did not look at him, only stared at the lamp as if he were not there. He knew it was pointless to apologise, that she must understand well enough the distress that had caused him to run blindly to the village without her; for all her coldness, she was not insensitive.
He felt dizzy, suddenly affected by the way she looked so self-contained and utterly alone. There were swathes of darkness around her, like the wastes of space, and anyone who ventured into that darkness would die of cold before they ever found Medrian at the centre.
He did not know why she needed to hold herself apart from everything, protecting herself in layers of callousness. She had often shocked him, even terrified him, as though behind her coldness she was the Serpent itself, and he had never been able to hold the terrible darkness of her eyes. Yet in spite of that, she had always fascinated him. He had never felt repulsed, even by her worst hostility. At the heart of her iciness he sensed a misery so great that it had become her whole being. He had longed to draw it out of her, to replace it with love and hope. But she had steadfastly refused all his attempts to comfort her, as if she found any trace of comfort agonizing. Perhaps he had not tried hard enough; perhaps he had been afraid to discover that he was wrong and that she really was formed of solid ice, with only petrified evil at the core.
This thought grew in strength. She was proving it herself. She’d shut herself away from him more completely than ever, at a time when even a word to show that she understood his loss would have helped. He was falling. Falin could not catch him, for he was falling too. But Medrian could have done, because in spite of what she appeared to be or what she actually was, he loved her.
They had faced death and danger together, many miles from his beloved family and home. Now his family was gone and only Medrian was still there. His head was spinning. He stumbled to the bed and sat down on the patchwork cover before he fell. Something was constricting his chest, he could hardly breathe. He put his head in his hands, looked down at the floor – and there saw a rug that his sister Lothwyn had woven. It was a simple thing, one of her first attempts at weaving as a child. He had forgotten that she had given it to Falin’s aunt, Thalien, who had been especially fond of her. And here it still lay, in pride of place by the bed, loved and cherished because Lothwyn had made it.
Oh, Lothwyn, my little sister, he cried inwardly – and in a moment of pain so intense it seemed a dazzlin
g light, he came to understand, as Falin had done, that the nightmare was real. Inescapable. To be lived through to the end – never to be woken from.
Medrian saw the rigour of his body and the distraught lines of his face. Estarinel looked like a man who was being buffeted from every side by cruel winds and could find no refuge anywhere. And I am one of those winds, she thought. She hugged herself tighter, reminding herself of her decision. She could not afford to weaken. Let him think she didn’t care; it was better in the long run.
She thought he was going to weep, but he did not. Instead he began to talk, as if beyond caring if she replied or even listened.
‘I was glad, in a way, to show Forluin to someone who’d never been here before,’ he began, his voice flat and tinged with bitterness. ‘Even as she is now, you saw that part of her is still beautiful. You mustn’t think we were unaware of her beauty and took our good fortune for granted. We gave thanks all the time – in every aspect of our lives. We cared for the land and the plants and animals, and especially for each other. We gave Forluin all the love and respect we had in us. She bestowed everything we needed to be happy, so we thanked her by being happy. Life was that simple.
‘But we must have gone wrong somewhere. We were unaware of the possibility that it could all be taken from us. We were complacent. We never thought,’ he hardly raised his voice, yet it rang with anguish, ‘we never thought that our happiness and good fortune were due but to the grace of the Serpent in refraining from attacking us for so long.’
I must be cold, cold – he must not suspect I am different, Medrian told herself frantically. She could see how more and more desperately he needed some kind of comfort from her. She felt sick with horror at her own cruelty. But she could not pretend, could not offer a few trite phrases of consolation while remaining cold within. She knew if she said one word she would be lost. Loathing herself, she willed her mouth to silence and her eyes to lose focus.
‘My little sister, Lothwyn, wove this rug,’ he went on. ‘When all this first happened, it seemed like a dream. Surely no one could have a nightmare this bad and not wake up. But when I saw the rug just now, I realised – Lothwyn and the others have made me realise – it’s real. When I saw the Worm lying on Falin’s house – when it stared at me and I saw that it had blue eyes – that was real. How can we hope to defeat something that has so much hate?’ He was shuddering with revulsion at the memory of the Serpent. How well Medrian knew that revulsion, and how familiar she was with the Serpent’s hate; she had known them, day in and day out, through long years of misery. Oh, he needs my help – I must not…
A Blackbird In Darkness (Book 2) Page 7