Solem

by Clive S. Johnson

  Craith grabbed her ankle as she slid out to her waist over a sheer drop. Her boot then jammed hard against his grip, her weight dragging him nearer the edge. Frantically, he lashed out with his free hand and found a hold, against which he braced himself to pull her back. But she didn’t budge.

  “You’re caught,” he strained to call then lost his grip of the rock, his fingers dragging painfully over its surface until snagging on a sharp edge. “Shit,” he grimaced as he locked his fingers. Janeen’s backside and legs were now the only parts of her visible.

  She screamed, short and sharp, then must have gathered her wits, for her thin and muffled voice came back: “My belt caught. Pull again. I’ll keep it clear.”

  Craith tried but now didn’t have either the angle or the strength, his fingers fast numbing in the pain of the sharp rock. Then a shadow darkened about him and Slobber’s snarling grey muzzle darted past his face, clamping onto the hem of Janeen’s skirt. Another jaw shot past, joining Slobber’s, and together, man and wolves, they drew her away from the edge.

  “By Solem,” Craith panted as they finally sat facing one another, now well away from the edge, “but that were a near one.” He patted Slobber as the wolf nuzzled up against him.

  Janeen seemed unable to speak, her head tilted back to the rock against which she rested. She appeared to be mouthing something, as though talking to an unseen presence. Craith looked up at the scudding grey clouds that had already lent a dew-covering of mizzle to their clothes.

  “You’ve got to admit I was right,” he offered, to no avail, her face still heavenward. “You’re not going to get to Gryff this way, Janeen. Next time you might not be so lucky.”

  Her head snapped forward and he felt her strange gaze. “Trust, Craith,” was all she said before pushing herself to her feet. Slobber immediately rushed to her side, seemingly guarding her from the edge. “Where to now?”

  Craith let out a resigned breath then sucked the blood from his fingertips before again providing her with instructions. Now, sandwiched between them, they followed the lead of the wolves, taking it slow and easy. By the time they’d safely reached the top, the noon hour Sun had already delivered its daily pointer towards Gryff.

  Craith looked around him, his gaze roaming over a vast expanse of flat, crazed rock, its cracked and fissured surface dull grey in the overcast light. Towards the spring-rise it eventually rose to a jagged near horizon but extended far into the distance towards the noon-high, where a spread of dark green marked the start of yet more forest. Straggly pale green growth poked its head above the surface from the shelter of the deep fissures, what Craith reckoned Janeen would see as a loosely woven net. For Craith, though, that there was anywhere so extensively and completely devoid of forest was a marvel in itself. He found the openness deeply disquieting.

  When he again looked along their way ahead, he thought to himself, Janeen’s going to break a leg crossing this lot, and then turned to see what little he could of her expression. Her mouth had become a short, thin line.

  Meanwhile, the wolves had continued to stream up from below, spreading out around them, their heads darting this way and that. About to voice his concerns, Craith noticed a large black shape heave itself up over the edge, behind the last of the wolves.

  Its broad, black-furred head and long fawn muzzle turned a doleful but disquietingly narrow, dark-eyed gaze at Craith and Janeen. It ambled towards them, the wolves snapping and snarling at its legs as the grey horde parted before the beast. It lashed out a broad fan of long, ebony-black claws that swept close to the snout of a wolf as it darted out of reach.

  Craith had no idea what he was staring at. Clearly huge, its muscled shoulders stood well clear of the circle of wolves keeping their distance around it. Then he heard Janeen’s strangled gasp.

  “A… A bear!” and she pressed herself closer to him, grabbing his arm.

  Unimpeded by the wolves, the creature ambled nearer but then sat down on its haunches immediately before them, grumbling under its breath. It snorted and shifted its weight back, to lift its huge forepaws to its muzzle. Delicately, a pink tongue flicked out at its extended claws, its gaze now intent on their washing. The wolves continued to circle as they growled their unease whilst Craith and Janeen held tight to one another, dumbstruck.

  The bear looked so self-assured Craith felt sure it would speak. Instead, Janeen said in a small voice, “Trust, Craith. Trust in Solem,” but she didn’t sound convinced.

  When Slobber tentatively stepped forward, the bear gave its claws one last lick before rolling forward, onto its forepaws. It then rose to all fours and turned to stand side-on to Craith and Janeen.

  Slobber crouched down on his hind legs, his rear end waggling in anticipation as he pointed his snout at the bear, then he leapt onto its back. He sat down and stared straight ahead, between the attentive ears of his uncomplaining mount.

  As Craith and Janeen looked on at this strange tableaux, she whispered, “Do you get the impression Slobber’s trying to tell us something?”

  “The only impression I get, Janeen, is that the world’s gone mad—completely and utterly mad.”

  35 An End in Sight

  It took Janeen a long time to pluck up courage to move close to the bear, only doing so when Craith eventually had the temerity to quote her own mantra at her: “Trust in Solem” he said with a wry grin. When she finally nerved herself to lean over the bear’s back and stroke Slobber’s head, the wolf seemed to unfreeze and promptly leapt down.

  As Craith and the wolves stood by and watched, she stared at Slobber’s vacated seat—black, furry and broad. The bear remained still, seeming content to wait patiently.

  She turned her face to Craith and he slowly nodded.

  After a deep breath, Janeen hitched her skirt up, lifted her leg and placed the inside of her boot tentatively on the bear’s back. The beast still didn’t move. Only when Craith took her hand to steady her did she finally slide her leg across, gingerly coming to rest astride her strange new mount.

  “Well,” Craith quietly said, still holding her hand, “if you can get it to move and go the right way, it’ll save you a crawl to Gryff.” Her mouth tightened for a moment, then the bear did indeed move and she yelped, grabbing a handful of fur to stop herself falling. The black beast had turned and now pointed is long, powerful looking muzzle towards the noon-high.

  Craith raised an eyebrow. “Looks promising,” he said, but her mouth only turned down at the corners.

  They tried all sorts to get the bear to move again, but it was only when Craith walked a short distance away, to hide his frustration for a moment, that the beast stepped forward and followed him.

  And so began Janeen’s bear-ride across the bare and fractured rock of the mountain flank, high above the valleys that had driven them there, and on towards Gryff. About them walked a close escort of wolves, the main body fanning out, darting here and there as though clearing the way. Craith soon found he could drop back and walk beside the bear, giving Janeen the reassurance of his closer company.

  After a while, partly to distract her but also due to his own wonder at this latest marvel, Craith asked, “What do you actually know about Solem, Janeen? Not the usual stuff everyone knows, but…but what you’ve learnt yourself, first-hand, like.”

  She didn’t answer at first, Craith naturally assuming that riding a bear might not leave much room for thought. He put his hand on hers, the bear’s thick coat knotted through her whitened fingers.

  “So,” she said, a distinct tremor in her voice, “what you going to call this one, then?”

  He peered at her for a moment, then briefly laughed, but more from relief, feeling some of his own tension ebb. “Well, how about…Barny? Barny the Bear, eh?” and he hoped the silly name would somehow soften the beast’s fearsome presence. Her lips quivered, but when the bear grunted from deep within its chest, she succumbed to a brief fit of giggles.

  “Barny it is, then,” she finally said, but then lurched t
o one side and gasped as the bear stretched its stride over a wider fissure. Craith’s hand shot out to her thigh, keeping her aboard, and Barny snorted, as though in apology.

  Her mouth slowly softened, but then she looked down. “I think I’m safe enough now, thank you, Craith.” He followed her mind-gaze and abruptly snatched his hand back.

  She soon seemed to become more comfortable in the bear’s ambling gait, her grip of its fur lessening. Then, for a moment, she pursed her lips before quietly saying, “Solem is…is real to me, Craith, as real now as are you and these beasts.”

  “‘Now’? You mean since you almost fell during our climb?”

  She turned to face him and again he felt her stare, but she didn’t answer.

  “Despite how crazy it sounds,” he confided, “I’m beginning to believe you; I really am. I’m not just saying it. I mean, look at you: riding this fearsome beast. That must say something, mustn’t it?”

  She seemed not to have heard, for then she told him, “You’re right, Craith: it was after you pulled me back from the edge. Solem…Solem again spoke to me then. The trouble is, I can’t remember what she said, other than ‘Do not despair, my daughter’. That stuck with me. But I know she said more, far more. I just can’t recall it now; you know, like when you wake from a dream.”

  “It’s a bit creepy, really,” Craith said, now feeling uneasy. “When I think of all the times I’ve used her name, never thinking she might be something real. But, Janeen, ‘ave you any idea what she is, or…or where—other than in the sky?”

  Janeen slowly shook her head. “In the sky?” she murmured to herself and turned her face that way, the pale leather of her pain-guard spotting in the fall of renewed rain.

  She fell silent, now moving fluidly, in tune with Barny’s gait. Craith at last felt at ease enough to take advantage of the view their high position lent. He soon found the line scored across the forest’s canopy, far below and in the distance, that now even more clearly marked the road to Fonschore. Where it vanished from sight at the start of its descent to the lake beyond, two narrow grey fingers pointed at the leaden sky above.

  “Ah, the junction for Gryff,” he told himself. “Now, that does help.” He traced the outline of the hillside that rose from it, remembering the zigzagged climb he’d made with Duncan. He could even see where the trees had thinned enough to allow him that spectacular view towards the noon-high, the one that had revealed a seemingly never-ending forest.

  “So,” he pondered, “that gentle rise running from there must lead to—“and his eyes grew wide as he breathed in sharply.

  “What’s wrong?” Janeen asked.

  “There,” he said, excitedly pointing, then remembered what it meant for Janeen and a dark shadow shrouded his heart. “Er, well, I think I’ve just spotted Gryff.”

  “Where? Show me,” and she grasped his shoulder. “Are we getting near?”

  He considered lying, but knew it would be futile. “I don’t think you’ll be able to see it, Janeen. It’s built of stone, and we’re on a level with it, so its clearing can’t be seen either, not from here. But,” and he couldn’t help his voice rising, like the walls of Gryff itself, “I can see it well enough, even at this distance.”

  “This distance?” and Craith could hear the disappointment in her voice.

  He directed her mind’s eyes towards the mountain’s forest-enshrouded noon-high horizon, describing where Gryff reared above its canopy, and Janeen sighed.

  “Still so far. I’d hoped we’d almost be there by now.”

  “It’s not that far, Janeen. We can make better time up here, where we’re clear of the forest, although we’ll be back into trees before reaching Gryff. But I reckon we can get there before the day’s out.”

  He looked at Janeen, her evident impatience bringing deep lines to Craith’s brow. How could a girl of seventeen seem so sure of herself, he wondered, so sure of her purpose—and so hopeful, even eager, in the face of her own impending death?

  36 So Near yet so Far

  Barny proved an able and reliable mount. With a docility belying his formidable appearance, he quietly carried Janeen beside Craith to where the mountain’s bare rock eventually gave out to a boulder-strewn slope falling away below. They’d spent the afternoon tramping along the high exposed rock whilst the rain had grown heavier. Now they stood, bedraggled, looking down the slope.

  At the bottom, thick grass stretched to the edge of the forest blanketing the lower spread. Away across its grey canopy, Gryff now seemed almost close enough to touch, the hundreds of windows of its upper storeys clearly visible above the near tree-clad horizon.

  Before tackling the wet and slippery descent, though, Craith placed his shoulder close beside Janeen’s cheek and pointed. “Do you think you can remember that direction?” As Barny held still, she angled her head over Craith’s arm and mind-sighted along it, then nodded.

  “I’m aiming us to the spring-set of Gryff, to hit its only road. If we go the wrong side, we may end up missing Gryff altogether in the dense forest that surrounds it. This’ll be the last clear view we’ll have.”

  “I’ll remember, Craith. Don’t worry. But whether we can keep to it, if the forest’s as dense as you say, is another matter.”

  “I know,” but Craith then noticed the long press of rain-glossed wolves now poised along the top of the slope. There seemed to be even more than he remembered.

  Being cautious of Janeen’s safe descent aboard Barny, Craith forgot to take a last look at Gryff before it was too late. It had already become lost to the wall of the forest’s edge towards which they now slithered. A patter of raindrops into the mudded pools at the bottom announced the rain’s heavier fall until it became muffled by the thick carpet of grass that grew in the shadow of the trees.

  They welcomed the cover of the first of the branches they came beneath, but not so the forest’s close-held gloom, nor the utter silence in which it brooded. Despite its promised shelter, the wolves hung back, clearly wary of entering in. Even Barny baulked at the prospect, nervously turning about and about, grunting uneasily into the greying light.

  “It’s pretty dark in there, Janeen,” Craith said as he leant against one of the outer trunks and peered in. This might be harder than I thought.”

  Janeen startled him when she placed her hand on his shoulder. “But I can mind-see well enough, Craith. Better in this dense growth of life, although…I must say the colour’s aren’t as vibrant, nor as familiar.”

  “Where’s Barny?” and Craith looked behind him.

  “He was making me feel dizzy with all his circling. I think he wandered back to the slope when I got off.” Craith spotted the bear amongst the outer fringes of the mass of wolves now weaving back and forth along the edge of the forest. He was snorting and pawing at the ground.

  “Come on,” Janeen breezed. “Time I led you,” but within only a couple of strides she’d doubled over, sliding off something into long, straggly stems. She yelped and shot to her feet.

  “Nettles!” she growled. “Bloody nettles,” and she darted her head this way and that, pausing each time as though staring at the ground. Craith could see nothing in the half-light, but she soon gave a jubilant cry, bent, pulled at something, and triumphantly held aloft what looked like a large dock leaf.

  “You mustn’t have noticed this fallen tree,” Craith said, tapping its trunk, having stepped in after her.

  “Where?” she demanded, rubbing her hands and cheek with the leaf.

  When he pointed it out, she frowned. “That’s odd; I can’t see it.”

  “Well, it is dead, so I suppose—”

  “No, but I should have seen the moss and the rot, the fungus that always grows on dead wood.” She felt close by Craith’s hand, now resting on the offending tree’s strangely intact bark. “Weird,” she said to herself. “Even close up I still can’t see it.”

  In the silence that followed, Craith’s skin began to crawl at the dead stillness, the air close, dry, al
most dusty, suffocating in its soft stale smell. His own voice then startled him: “Why can’t I—” and he dropped it to a whisper. “Why can’t I hear the wolves slipping in behind us?” by which time he’d turned to stare out from the forest. They were nowhere to be seen, and nor was Barny.

  Craith and Janeen had entered the forest alone only to come up against a deep and thick tangle of dead wood and dense undergrowth crammed in between close growing trees. It made for hard labour and many slips and trips. Guiding each other as best they could, Craith eventually said, “I’d have thought Slobber would have stayed with us.”

  “To your left,” Janeen instructed.

  “What? This way—” and his stomach went light as he vanished into the undergrowth, a jar to his back sending searing pain to his legs. He caught his brow on something as he came to rest, lying on his back, peering through his star filled sight at the dark grey canopy far above. He was sure he’d heard rain thundering against its leaves before Janeen cried out “Craith?”, but the air he now drew in through his clenched teeth tasted eternally dry and acrid.

  He heard her crashing through the undergrowth, her close warmth soon beside him, fear in her voice. “Oh, by Solem, say you’re all right, Craith.”

  He groaned, his pain subsiding when he shifted his weight and rolled onto his side.

  “Shit,” he spat into the gloom. “What happened?”

  “I’m sorry, Craith; I really am. I didn’t see the drop.”

  “Drop?”

  He tilted his head, to look down his body, and found himself lying in a dry streambed. Above, down which he’d clearly forced a passage, rose a steep bank, dark with gnarled roots and grey earth, laced with long white tendrils of ripped out stems. Dusty earth trickled onto him, some finding its way down his neck. He rolled out of the way, finishing up on his back, looking up at Janeen’s now fraught face and grubby-looking pain-guard.