by Roger Taylor
Farnor twisted his hand nervously around the rail that he was holding, but made no reply.
Marken shivered and folded his arms about himself. ‘Come on,’ he said, moving past Farnor. ‘The night’s chilly.’
* * * *
The following morning, old habits asserted themselves and Farnor woke as soon as light began to filter into his room. There was a faint sound of distant activity in the lodge, and the smell of cooking. For a heart-rending moment he thought that he was back in his own room at the farmhouse. As realization dawned, he clenched his teeth and his fists, and stiffened his entire body in bitter rage. ‘Rannick, Rannick, Rannick,’ he muttered: a dark litany of hatred and intended vengeance, accompanied by the image of his enemy, slain, that he had chosen to guide himself by.
Dressed and brutally scrubbed, he eventually found his way to the kitchen where, somewhat to his surprise, he found a bleary-eyed Derwyn cooking.
‘A good riser, I see,’ Derwyn greeted him, smiling. ‘Anxious to be off?’
‘Marken told you, then?’ Farnor replied.
Derwyn nodded. ‘He certainly did. I’ve not seen him so excited in years. No…’ He corrected himself. ‘I’ve never seen him so excited, ever.’ A stifled yawn twisted his face. ‘He was here half the night, rambling on and on.’ He became thoughtful. ‘But no excitement for you though, was there?’ he said, swinging out a chair from the table and motioning Farnor to sit down. ‘Have you thought any more about what you want to do?’
‘What did Marken tell you?’ Farnor asked, bluntly.
Derwyn sat down opposite him, and began eating. ‘That you’re a Hearer,’ he replied. ‘A remarkable one at that, to put it mildly, judging by the way he was going on. And that perhaps you’re something else, something that even you don’t understand.’
‘And that they’re afraid of me?’ Farnor said.
Derwyn nodded.
‘And are you, now? Knowing what you know?’ Far-nor asked.
The lines in Derwyn’s face deepened as he scruti-nized his questioner. ‘No,’ he said dismissively, returning to his food. ‘But then what do I know about such things? I just see a young man in pain. And even Marken doesn’t know what they see.’ He indicated a large bowl of fruit and cereal grains. ‘Help yourself. There’s no ceremony here. I just advise you to start before Edrien gets down, unless you’re good at close-quarter fighting.’
Hesitantly Farnor filled his plate. The simplicity of the action and Derwyn’s casual openness stirred uneasily within him.
‘You’ve all been very kind and patient with me,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve been difficult. Caused you such trouble.’
Derwyn shook his head, his face thoughtful. ‘There’s change in the air, Farnor,’ he said. ‘I don’t know what, or when, but it’s there, I can feel it.’ He looked at Farnor and began eating again. ‘But I doubt you’re the cause of it. I suspect you’ve just been caught up in it more than we have so far.’
Farnor wanted to ask him for advice, but instead he said, ‘I’ll leave as soon as I can. Marken said he’d tell me how to reach this place.’
‘Don’t you want a guide?’ Derwyn asked.
Farnor shook his head. ‘I don’t think they’ll let me get lost,’ he said flatly.
Derwyn chuckled. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t laugh. It was just your manner.’ Then, more seriously, ‘You’re absolutely sure that this is what you want to do?’ he asked. ‘You’re welcome to stay here, or we can try to take you back to your home, if you wish.’
Farnor shook his head. ‘That might bring trouble down on you,’ he replied. He looked down, ostensibly turning his attention to his food. ‘I’ve made my mind up about what must be done, and I’ll see it through.’
Derwyn watched him, his eyes narrowed and his face concerned. Farnor’s hand shook momentarily under this searching gaze and his spoon rattled against the bowl. Derwyn saw him gritting his teeth and forcing the tremor from his hand. He opened his mouth to speak but then thought better of it.
Farnor looked up. His eyes were distressed. ‘There’s perhaps one thing you should do,’ he said. Derwyn waited. ‘Go south. Follow the tracks I made. Find my valley if you can.’ Farnor seemed to be struggling with something. ‘Guard yourselves against what’s in there. Take your best hunters, well armed. And take Marken. You’ll need a Hearer. And be very careful.’
Derwyn nodded slowly. ‘I’ll discuss it,’ he said, un-happily, knowing that Farnor would not, or could not, tell him anything further.
They said little else for the remainder of the meal, Farnor pulling a deadening shield of politeness about him. He maintained it as Edrien entered, scratching herself vigorously and in a most unladylike manner, in marked contrast to her mother, whose movements were at once both profoundly earthbound and seemingly incapable of anything ungraceful.
It was only Angwen who penetrated Farnor’s de-fences, and she did it with no more than a single glance. But she merely smiled enigmatically and did not press home her advantage. Marken too, emerged eventually, tousled, red-eyed, and stiff, having finally fallen asleep in a chair following his excited and protracted harangue of Derwyn.
It was scarcely two hours later that the momentum which Farnor’s will had given to events bore him into the saddle. His well-tended horse with its well-packed saddle bags gave testimony to his increasing debt to Derwyn and his lodge, as too did a small but sturdy-looking pack pony standing sullenly beside the horse.
‘Thank you,’ Farnor said simply, as he looked down at Derwyn and the others who had gathered to see him on his way. In his hand was a crumpled piece of paper on which Marken had hastily attempted to draw a map of the route he should follow. It was covered with many crossings-out, and notes.
‘Keep moving north,’ the Hearer had said fre-quently, as a general nostrum for the flaws in his draughtsmanship. And he had given Farnor a lodespur, a fine needle which, when allowed to pivot freely, always pointed to the north. It was mounted in a robust but finely made wooden box.
At the last moment, Bildar appeared, pressing more jars of pungent ointment into Farnor’s hands. ‘For your aches and pains,’ he said.
Farnor felt some twinges of regret as he made his farewells, but for the most part, his armour held. And it held too against the many cries of goodwill that came down to him from the surrounding trees. He acknowl-edged them with a wave and a smile, though a close observer would have noticed that the smile did not reach his eyes.
Then, following Marken’s outstretched arm, he clicked his horse forwards.
Derwyn and the others stood watching him for some time as he rode slowly away, but he did not look back.
Chapter 11
‘A more typical attendance today,’ Derwyn said, with some irony, as he looked out over the empty clearing of the Synehal.
There was little mood for humour of any kind among those gathered for the meeting, however. Although it was several days since Farnor had left, his arrival and the turbulent events of his brief stay still formed the major part of talk about the lodge.
‘It’s just the weather,’ Bildar said, looking at the grey rain streaming vertically down beyond the edge of the Synehal canopy.
Derwyn gave him a knowing look. There were only twelve of them sitting on one of the tiers at the rear of the Synehal platform. ‘Even you don’t believe that,’ he said. ‘It’s good old-fashioned apathy, that’s what it is. The lad’s the sole topic of conversation at every hearthside, but when it comes to talking about him seriously, they can’t be bothered stirring their roots.’ He shook his head ruefully.
‘It is only a shrub Congress meeting, Derwyn,’ a yellow-haired young man said. ‘We’re lucky if all the members who’re supposed to turn up, let alone any observers.’
‘I know, Melarn,’ Derwyn replied. ‘You must excuse me. Farnor’s arrival might have given us some prob-lems, but more than once he made me look at things I’ve known all my life and see them with new eyes. Not least here. The pla
ce, and what it means to us, as a lodge; as a people, even. I’m grateful for that. It’s made me realize that perhaps we’ve become a little too staid in our ways. People should pay more heed to what happens here. Things haven’t always been so peaceful and orderly, and there’s no special reason to believe that they’ll always be so.’
‘You worry too much, Derwyn. Things have been the way they’ve been for generations. Why should they change? It doesn’t do to go fretting about such matters.’ The speaker was Melarn’s father, Helgen. He was only a few years older than Derwyn, but bore himself as though he were several decades his senior.
Derwyn gave a discreet glance skywards. ‘Yes, Hel-gen,’ he replied, trying to keep the irritation from his voice. ‘But you can’t deny that it was good to see so many here the other night, such interest. The Synehal hasn’t been that full in my memory and it was a splendid sight. It gave me a good feeling.’
‘It gave me indigestion,’ Helgen retorted, patting his chest. ‘All that commotion and disturbance. Outsiders coming in, Marken disappearing; it was a bad business, and we’re well rid of the lad. The sooner things get properly back to normal, the better. You should never have brought him here in the first place.’
‘Indeed.’ The support came from EmRan.
Derwyn held out a hand before EmRan could begin to amplify his objection. ‘I know what you’re going to say, EmRan,’ he said. ‘We all do. You’ve been saying it incessantly, even since the lad left, though what you think to gain by it I can’t imagine.’ A note of anger seeped into his voice. ‘I did what I did because I felt it right. And no one’s offered me a realistic alternative. The Congress agreed with me. The lad’s gone, Marken’s back; and he also agrees with what I did…’ He levelled his finger at EmRan. ‘And the only person who behaved badly during the time Farnor was here, was you. Why don’t you let it drop, for pity’s sake?’
‘Second, if I may.’ Marken’s voice forestalled any reply from EmRan, and his formal tone prevented Derwyn from continuing. ‘We’d all prefer to be in our lodges. I suggest that we discuss what we came here for.’
With some reluctance, Derwyn nodded an apolo-getic acknowledgement. ‘I think we already are, Marken,’ he replied. ‘But you’re right. There’s enough tittle-tattle buzzing through the branches without our adding to it.’ He, too, became formal. ‘I called this meeting because I wanted you to hear what Marken Heard when he was with Farnor the night before he left. And also to decide whether, in the light of what he had to say, we should try to find new hunting trails to the south.’ He motioned Marken to proceed, before his companions had any chance to assimilate this last remark.
When the Hearer had finished, there was a stunned silence. Inevitably, EmRan was the first to speak. ‘You’re sure about all this?’ he asked, frowning. ‘I can’t recall you, or any other Hearer for that matter, ever being so positive about anything before.’
‘Oh, yes,’ Marken replied quietly, despite EmRan’s acid tone. ‘I told you. I’ve never experienced anything remotely like it before myself. And there was much more than I’ve told you, though some of it was vague and difficult to understand, and quite a lot was beyond any words I can find. However, what I’ve told you was clear and beyond misinterpretation.’
EmRan grunted noncommittally. ‘I thought he’d just decided to go on his way,’ he said. ‘So did everyone else.’
‘Well, in a manner of speaking, he did,’ Derwyn said. ‘I offered to let him stay with us, or to help him go wherever he wanted, but he chose to go north, on his own.’
‘It’s as well,’ EmRan declared. ‘They let him in, they can deal with him.’
Derwyn looked at him angrily, but Marken caught his eye with a look that cautioned calmness. With an effort that brought tension to his jaw, Derwyn took the unspoken advice.
‘Be that as it may,’ he went on. ‘Farnor’s decision was his own to make, and he made it. We gave him hospitality and offered him help, so we did all that we reasonably could. What I think we have to do now is decide what to do about the problems in Farnor’s land, to the south.’
‘What!’ EmRan exclaimed.
‘I said, I think we…’
‘I heard you,’ EmRan interrupted. ‘You said some-thing before about opening trails to the south, didn’t you? Now you’re talking about doing something about the problems in his land!’ He slapped his forehead in disbelief. ‘What in Imrel’s name has his land to do with us?’
‘Mind your language, EmRan,’ Derwyn said angrily. ‘This is a Congress meeting not a climbfest.’
EmRan’s lip curled superciliously. ‘Since when were you so sensitive, Derwyn? I don’t know what’s got into you since you brought that thing back…’
Fury lit Derwyn’s face, but he managed to keep his voice measured. ‘Don’t you ever listen to anything, EmRan?’ he said. ‘You heard Marken telling how that young man was pursued here by some evil power. We don’t even know what it was – people, or something else. Farnor wouldn’t talk about it and Marken Heard nothing from them that would enlighten us. But the fact is, they let him in, as you’re so fond of pointing out, and they turned whatever it was back. And, apparently, it was no easy task. Indeed, it left them afraid and unsure. That, to me, signifies that there’s a danger down there that we simply can’t ignore.’
‘The only danger we’ve got is certain parties getting over-excited,’ EmRan said scornfully. He opened his arms and surveyed the others present. ‘Evil powers, for pity’s sake! I ask you. Fireside tales for children. Somehow this outsider’s got in, caused a bit of a commotion, and now Derwyn wants us to start a war. What are we going to do, Derwyn? Raise the levy of ancient days? Launch ourselves like Athrys of old, against this… mystic… evil that’s suddenly appeared from the south? You’ll be seeing tree goblins next.’
His listeners were mixed in their reception of this outburst. Some laughed openly, but more of them frowned at EmRan’s manner. He read the dominant mood and, lowering his voice, spoke in a more reason-able tone. ‘It’s not to be denied that we’re very – parochial – down here,’ he went on. ‘No outsider’s been seen here in generations, and when one arrives – a very strange one at that – we get ourselves in a great stir about it.’ He became affable. ‘Not least me, I’ll admit.’
Derwyn watched him carefully. EmRan in this mood was far more difficult to deal with than when he was ranting and blowing.
‘But if, by chance, we’d had friends from the north or the east visiting, they’d have taken it in their stride. They’re used to outsiders. Some of them even trade with them, I’ve heard.’ EmRan paused to assess the effect of his words. ‘It’s quite possible that there might be trouble in this lad’s land. Forest knows, everyone has troubles from time to time.’ He looked around the group significantly before casually adding, ‘For all we know, he might have been the cause of it, just like he was here. He could be a bandit, a thief, anything.’ Then with an airy gesture he dismissed this notion before Derwyn could protest. ‘But, whatever the case, it’s nothing to do with us.’ He waved a finger towards the surrounding forest. ‘This land is theirs. It’s they who guard its boundaries, who keep outsiders outside. And for their own reasons, when all’s said and done. It’s not for us to go prowling into the fringes, arrogantly thinking we know best, taking on ourselves the job that they’ve been doing since ancient times.’ He looked at Derwyn. ‘I think we should all do our best to forget the disturbance that this lad’s caused. He’s gone on his way – made his choice, as Derwyn tells us – and I think the rest of us should do the same. We should choose to forget him and get back to normal as quickly as possible.’
There was some applause and much nodding of heads for this, as EmRan sat back. Then all eyes turned towards Derwyn. He too, nodded as he looked at the familiar faces. The Synehal was empty, as it invariably was, EmRan was going on about something, as he invariably was, and even in himself, he felt the great momentum of his ordinary life seeking to reassert itself; to make him set aside thi
s brief aberration and ‘get back to normal’.
But the effects of his contact with Farnor could not be so lightly shaken off. It was like a log-weighted arrow in the side of a great stag. It would drag and drag, constantly wearing him down, until he collapsed with exhaustion, easy prey for the tracking hunters. He scowled. Bad analogy, he thought. His contact with Farnor was not without its grim concerns, but it had had more the feeling of release than capture.
He cast a glance at Marken. He could see that the Hearer was looking concerned after EmRan’s speech. ‘Before he left, I asked Farnor what he wanted,’ he began quietly. ‘Nothing, he said. He’d made up his mind what he had to do, and he was going to see it through. A good trait in a young man, I thought. Forest knows, we grumble often enough that our children rarely finish what they set out to do. It was the last of several things that he did that confirmed the opinion I’d already formed about him. Whatever else he was, he was no criminal. He was a lost and much troubled young man, plain and simple.’
EmRan conspicuously stifled a yawn.
‘Then he said the most that he’s ever said about what had driven him here,’ Derwyn continued, ignoring the jibe. ‘He said we should follow his tracks and try to find the valley that he’d come from, and then we should guard ourselves against what’s in there. Odd phrase, that. We’d need our best hunters, and we’d need Marken. And above all, we should be very careful.’ He leaned forward and lowered his voice. ‘He didn’t have to tell me anything. He’d decided to leave and he knew that I wouldn’t interfere with him or question his decision. And he knew he’d probably never come back. But he wanted to warn us. For some reason he won’t, perhaps can’t, tell us what brought him here, but he knows that it’s some kind of a threat to us.’ He looked at each of the others in turn. ‘EmRan likes to make fun of my concerns, talking about tree goblins and children’s tales. But perhaps, like Farnor, EmRan’s reluctant to talk even about what might be happening here. All this, “let’s get back to normal, do the things we’ve always done”.’ He allowed himself a little acidity. ‘Stick our heads in the hollow tree,’ he said, baring his teeth. ‘Perhaps those are the real children’s games.’