The Wind Singer

by William Nicholson

  ‘To the north. To the mountains.’

  ‘The mountains?’ Jum wrinkled up her brow. ‘What would you be’m wanting with the mountains?’

  ‘We’re going to the Halls of the Morah.’

  A sudden silence fell all round her. People began to get up and shuffle away, glancing nervously back at the twins as they went.

  ‘We don’t talk of such things here,’ said Jum. ‘Nor even give them a name.’

  ‘Why not?’

  Jum shook her round head.

  ‘There’s none of that here, and we don’t want any, neither. There’s enough of that up yonder.’

  She turned her eyes up to the cave roof.

  ‘In Aramanth?’

  ‘Up yonder,’ said Jum, ‘live the people of the one we don’t name. But you know that, little skinny. That’s why you’m running away.’

  ‘No – ’ said Kestrel. But her brother cut her off.

  ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘We know that.’

  Kestrel stared at him.

  ‘Do we?’

  ‘Yes,’ said her brother; though he hardly knew how to explain what it was he had just realised. Indistinctly, he was sensing that the world he knew so well, the only world he had ever known until now, was a sort of prison, and that its people, his people, were trapped within its high walls.

  ‘Up yonder is the world of the one we don’t name,’ said Jum again. ‘One way or t’other, they’m all belong to the one. Only here in the sweet earth, they do let us alone.’

  ‘But when the wind singer sings again,’ said Bowman, ‘we won’t belong to – to the one you don’t name – not any more.’

  ‘Ah, the wind singer, is it?’

  ‘Do you know about it?’

  ‘They’m be stories. Old stories. I should like to hear that wind singer, I should. We do take pleasure in song.’

  ‘Then please help us find our way.’

  ‘Well,’ she said after a moment’s thought. ‘You’m best talk with the Old Queen. She’ll know what to tell you.’

  She pointed with a stubby finger to a mound that rose up out of the lake, someway off. On the top of the mound was a low timber stockade.

  ‘You’ll find her in the palace, over yonder.’

  ‘Will they let us in to talk to her?’

  Jum looked surprised.

  ‘Why wouldn’t they?’ she said. ‘Yes, you talk with the Old Queen.’

  So the twins thanked her and set off along the ridge towards the palace. All round them the mudmen were in high spirits, laughing and singing, even dancing in a roly-poly fashion. The tixa leaves evidently filled them with affection for all mankind, for as the twins passed they were forever receiving waves and smiles, and even hugs.

  In a little while they passed a region of mudfields where the mud was too deep to be harvested on foot, and the mudnuts were reached by rafts. These long wooden frames were designed to lie on the lake’s surface, over which they were slowly pulled by ropes wound round great winches. During the harvest, the pickers lay prone all round the edges of the raft, reaching their arms into the mud below. Now that work had stopped for the day, the rafts had come to rest, and the winches were unmanned. This was the opportunity for the bolder young men to compete in the sport of mud-diving.

  Bowman and Kestrel paused to watch them, amazed at the sight. At the corners of one of the rafts, tall slender poles had been fixed, rising up about twenty feet into the air. The mud-divers tied ropes round their waists and shinned up these poles like monkeys. They hung on at the top, swaying back and forth, throwing out first one hand, then the other, in a display of daring. Then, with a loud cry, they leaped from the pole into the mud, the rope snaking out behind them. The mud was so liquid here that they disappeared at once below the surface. For a few heart-stopping moments, nothing at all happened. Then the rope began to twitch and jerk, and there was a surge in the mud, and up would pop the mud-diver, to wild cheers. The ones who were cheered the loudest were those who stayed under the longest.

  Kestrel was watching the mud-divers with admiration, when she saw a familiar figure shinning up one of the poles.

  ‘That’s Mumpo!’

  And so it was. He looked thin and fragile alongside the others, but he was the most daring of them all. He swung himself about on top of the pole, and swooped and sprang back again, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. And when he dived, he flung himself farther than any of them, and stayed beneath the mud longer than any of them, and surfaced to the grandest cheer of all.

  The twins were astounded.

  ‘How did he learn to do that?’

  ‘Mumpo!’ cried Kestrel. ‘Mumpo! We’re over here!’

  ‘Kess! Kess!’

  As soon as he spotted them, he made another dive, just to show off. Then he unhitched his rope, and came bounding along the trail to join them.

  ‘Did you see me?’ he cried. ‘Did you see me?’

  He was tremendously pleased with himself, all grinning and bouncy like a puppy. It was Bowman who saw the yellowish stains on his teeth.

  ‘He’s been eating those leaves.’

  ‘I love you, Kess,’ said Mumpo, embracing her. ‘I’m so happy, are you happy? I want you to be as happy as me.’ And he gambolled around her, laughing and waving his mud-encrusted arms.

  Bowman saw the look on Kestrel’s face, and before she could speak he said quietly,

  ‘Let him be, Kess.’

  ‘He’s gone mad.’

  ‘We can’t leave him here.’

  He took hold of Mumpo’s outstretched arm as he came swirling by.

  ‘Come on, Mumpo. Let’s go and see the Old Queen.’

  ‘I’m so happy! Happy, happy, happy!’ chortled Mumpo.

  ‘Honestly,’ complained Kestrel, ‘I think I liked him better when he was crying.’

  But Bowman was reflecting on the image of Mumpo diving from the top of the high pole. His body had been so surprisingly graceful. It gave him a different sense of Mumpo altogether. He was like a wild goose: ungainly on the ground, but beautiful in flight. Bowman liked this thought, because there was no pity in it. It struck him now that the pity he felt for Mumpo was a form of indifference. Why had he not been more curious about him? After all, Mumpo was in his way a mystery. Where did he come from? Why did he have no family? Everybody in Aramanth had a family.

  ‘Mumpo – ’ he began.

  ‘Happy, happy, happy,’ sang Mumpo.

  This was not the time to ask questions. So they walked on, and Mumpo didn’t stop laughing and singing all the way to the palace.

  12

  A Queen remembers

  As they got near the palace, they realised there was a very odd noise coming from within. A babbling squeaking gurgling sort of noise. There also seemed to be an immense amount of pattering footsteps, and voices calling out, ‘Stop that!’ and, ‘Get down!’ Whatever was going on was screened from their view by the timber stockade, in which there was a single door.

  As they approached the door, even Mumpo became interested, and stopped his own carolling to listen. This came as a relief to Kestrel.

  ‘Now try and behave yourself, Mumpo. We’re going to see the Queen. She’s the most important person here, so we have to be very respectful.’

  She then knocked on the door. After a few moments, realising that no one inside could possibly hear her knock with such a cacophony going on, she opened it.

  Inside there was a wide open space, completely full of muddy babies. There were tiny ones lying on mats, and crawling ones scurrying about like small dogs, and toddling ones toppling into each other, and walking ones, and ones that ran about yelling at the tops of their little voices. They were all completely naked, though of course also completely coated in mud. And they seemed to be having the time of their lives. They were forever colliding and trampling on each other in the most chaotic way, but somehow none of them came to any harm, or even made much complaint. They just bounced up again, and got on with their infant concerns.

&
nbsp; In the midst of this writhing mass of babies there sat a number of very fat old ladies. Unlike the children, they remained motionless, like mountain islands in a seething sea. The babies clambered over and around them exactly as if they were land masses, and here and there the old ladies reached out a protective arm, or called out a warning. But mostly, they did nothing at all.

  Faced by such confusion, the twins weren’t sure what to do. They saw that there was a wide opening in the middle of the stockaded space, with steps leading down to what was presumably an underground room or rooms, and they guessed that the Queen was to be found down there. But clearly the thing to do was to ask.

  Kestrel approached the nearest old lady.

  ‘Please, ma’am,’ she said. ‘We’ve come to see the Queen.’

  ‘Of course you have,’ the old lady replied.

  ‘Could you tell us where to go, please.’

  ‘I shouldn’t go anywhere, if I were you,’ the old lady said.

  ‘Then may we be taken to the Queen, please.’

  ‘Why, I’m the Queen,’ she replied. ‘Leastways, I’m one of them.’

  ‘Oh,’ said Kestrel, going very red. ‘Are there very many queens?’

  ‘A good many, yes. All these ladies here, and plenty more besides.’

  Seeing Kestrel’s confusion, she shook her head and said,

  ‘Don’t you worry yourself about that, young skinny. You just tell me what it is you want.’

  ‘We want to talk to the Old Queen.’

  ‘Ah! The Old Queen, is it?’

  At this point, three toddlers who had been mountaineering over her back all fell off at once, and set up a lamentation. The Queen put them on their feet again, and patted them, and said,

  ‘It’ll be bedtime soon enough. I’ll take you to see the Old Queen after they’ve gone to bed. It’ll be quieter then.’

  At that moment, a bell rang, and all the old ladies lumbered to their feet and started shooing the babies down the broad steps. Bowman, Kestrel and Mumpo followed behind, more or less unnoticed. The effect of the tixa leaves was wearing off, and Mumpo had gone quiet.

  At the bottom of the steps there was a burrow-like room of the same kind they’d seen before, only this one was enormous. It was so wide that when it had been dug out pillars of hard earth had been left in place to support the roof. The effect of these rows of pillars was to make the room seem to go on forever, as alcove succeeded alcove far into the shadowy distance.

  The tribe of babies was put to bed in the simplest possible way. As in Willum’s burrow, the floor was deep in soft cloths, and the babies laid themselves down, crowded together in piles, all tangled up with each other, and mumbled and squeaked. The fat old ladies waddled among them, patting and stroking and rearranging, pinning on nappies where necessary, pulling rugs over the tops of them in places, but mostly leaving them to lie as they chose. Then they sat down round the edges and sang them a lullaby, in their creaky old voices, and the song filled the great burrow, lapping softly round the great nest, and the babies snuffled and yawned and slipped quickly into sleep.

  Mumpo complained that his head felt funny. Then he looked at the sleeping babies, and gave an enormous yawn, and said he might sit down for a moment. Before they could stop him, he had curled up on the rugs among the babies, and he too was fast asleep.

  Within a surprisingly short time, silence reigned; if silence it can be called when the air is rippled by hundreds of tiny breaths. Then the old lady who had first spoken to the twins turned to them and beckoned them, and they made their way to the further end of the colonnaded room.

  As they went, she told them that her name was Queen Num, and they mustn’t think that the babies usually spent the night at the palace. On ordinary days the queens looked after the babies during the day only, but tonight it was harvest night, and the people stayed up late feasting. Kestrel said it was strange to have queens looking after babies, and queen Num laughed and said, ‘Why, what else are queens good for? We’m too old to work in the fields, you know.’

  At the far end of the great underground hall they found a little group of even older ladies, sitting in a circle of armchairs round a fire, staring vacantly into space. One of these was so very old that she really did seem to be almost dead. It was to this one that Queen Num led the children.

  ‘Are you awake, dear?’ she said, speaking very clearly. And to the children, ‘This is the Old Queen. She doesn’t hear very well.’

  There was a moment of silence, then a cross little voice emerged from the withered face.

  ‘Of course I’m awake. I haven’t slept in years. I wish I could.’

  ‘I know, dear. Very trying for you.’

  ‘What would you know about it?’

  ‘There’s some young skinnies come to see you, dear. They want to ask you some questions.’

  ‘Not riddles, is it?’ said the peevish voice. She hadn’t shown any sign of seeing the children, though they stood directly before her. ‘Riddles bore me.’

  ‘I don’t think it’s riddles,’ said Queen Num. ‘I think it’s memories.’

  ‘Oh, memories.’ The Old Queen sounded disgusted. ‘Too many of them.’ Suddenly her bird-like eyes fixed on Kestrel, who was the nearest. ‘I’m a thousand years old. You believe that?’

  ‘Well, not really,’ said Kestrel.

  ‘Quite right. It’s a lie.’ And she burst into a cackle of slow dry laughter. Then the laughter faded away, and her face set once more into disagreeable lines. ‘You can go now,’ she said.

  ‘Please, dear, won’t you talk to them just a little?’ said Queen Num. ‘They have come a long way.’

  ‘More fools them. They should have stayed at home.’

  She shut her eyes, screwing them up tight. Queen Num turned to the twins with a helpless shrug.

  ‘I’m sorry. When she gets like this, there’s nothing we can do.’

  ‘Could I talk to her?’ said Bowman.

  ‘I don’t think she’ll answer you.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  Bowman settled himself down on the ground beside her and closed his own eyes, and turned his mind towards the Old Queen. After a few moments, he began to feel the slow buzz of her thoughts, like winter flies. He felt her angry mutterings, and faraway regrets, and beneath it all, a dull bone-aching weariness. And then, waiting patiently, reaching deeper and deeper, he came upon a region of fear, that was dark and silent as night. And there – suddenly he felt it – was a hole, an emptiness, a nothingness, that opened into terror.

  Without realising he was doing it, he cried out loud.

  ‘Aah! Horrible!’

  ‘What is it?’ said Kestrel anxiously.

  ‘She’s going to die.’ Bowman was whispering, his voice shaking. ‘It’s so close now, and so horrible! I never knew dying was like that.’

  At this, the Old Queen spoke, more to herself than to Bowman.

  ‘Too tired to live,’ she said, her creaky voice breaking in what could have been amusement. ‘Too afraid to die.’

  And as she spoke, tears began to stream down her withered cheeks. She opened her eyes and gazed on Bowman.

  ‘Ah, skinny, little skinny,’ she said, ‘how did you creep into my heart?’

  Bowman wept too, not out of sadness, but because for the moment the two of them were joined. The Old Queen raised her thin trembling arms, and knowing what she wanted, Bowman climbed on to her chair and let her fold him in a fragile embrace. She pressed her wet cheeks to his face, and their tears mingled.

  ‘You’m a little thief,’ she murmured. ‘You’m a little heart thief.’

  Kestrel watched, proud and full of wonder. Even though she was Bowman’s twin and sometimes felt as close to him as if they shared the same body, she didn’t understand this trick he had of going into people’s feelings. But she loved him for it.

  ‘There, there,’ said the Old Queen, soothing herself and Bowman together. ‘No use crying over it.’

  Queen Num looked on, aw
estruck.

  ‘My dear,’ she said. ‘Oh, my dear.’

  ‘Nothing to be done,’ said the Old Queen, stroking Bowman’s mud-encrusted hair. ‘Nothing to be done.’

  ‘Please,’ said Bowman. ‘Will you help us?’

  ‘What use is an old lady like me, little skinny?’

  ‘Tell us about – ’ He hesitated, and caught Kestrel’s silent warning. ‘About the one you don’t name.’

  ‘Ah, so that’s it.’

  She stroked him some more in silence. Then she began to speak, in a faraway remembering kind of voice.

  ‘They say the nameless one is sleeping, and must never be woken, because .. . There was a reason, but I forget. All long, long ago. Ah! Wait! I remember now. ..’

  Her eyes widened in memory of a long-forgotten fear.

  ‘They march, and they kill, and they march on. No pity. No escape. Oh my dears, let me die before the Zars come again.’

  She stared into the shadowy space before her, sitting up stiff with terror, as if she could see them coming even now.

  ‘The Zars!’

  ‘Oh my little skinnies!’ said the Old Queen, trembling. ‘All these long years, and I had forgotten till now. My grandmother told me such tales of terror. It was her grandmother saw the last march of the Zars – oh pity, pity! Better we all die than the Zars march again.’

  She began to breathe with difficulty, showing signs of distress. Queen Num stepped forward.

  ‘That’s enough, my dear. You rest now.’

  ‘We know how to make the wind singer sing again,’ said Kestrel.

  ‘Ah .. .’ The Old Queen seemed to become calmer when she heard this. ‘The wind singer .. . If I could hear the song of the wind singer, I’d not be afraid .. .’

  Kestrel took out the map and unrolled it for the Old Queen to see.

  ‘This is where we have to go,’ she said. ‘Only we don’t understand it.’

  The Old Queen took the map and peered at it with watery eyes. Several times as she studied it, she sighed, as if for the lost days of long ago.

  ‘Where did you get this, little one?’

  ‘From the Emperor.’

  ‘Emperor! Tchah! Emperor of what, I’d like to know.’