by Sarah Rayne
With the anger came a sudden, cascading awareness, a cold, steely strength, and the sensation that it was not his strength, but that it was being poured into him, as easily as pouring water from one jug to another.
As if the strength came not from within, but from without …
The Spirit entering the Twelve …
The thought formed with silken ease, and Andrew seized on it, for it did not matter whence the strength came, only that it was there for the taking. He whirled about, snatching a spear from the nearest of the Fomoire, pushing the creature back, fury against Coelacanth blazing through him like a forest fire, knowing, at some deep, unacknowledged level, that it was not his fury, and it was not his strength …
The Fomoire was caught off balance at once and, as it went tumbling and shrieking to the floor, Andrew, still in the grip of the strange, alien force, plunged straight into the churning pool, feeling the water drag at his woollen robe, but barely aware of it, hardly noticing the icy sting of the pool.
The Fisher King’s webbed hands were around Rumour’s slender waist, and he was beginning to lift her above his head, holding her aloft, so that she would slide into his gaping maw … Behind them, the Fomoire had recovered from their first shock of surprise and were starting forward; from the edges of his vision, Andrew caught a glimpse of the nimfeach closing in on him.
He plunged into the foaming water, the strength that was not his strength lifting the spear, and then thrusting it at the Fisher King’s face, aiming straight at the bulging, lidless eyes. He felt the tip of the spear pierce the eye-sac and meet hard bone. A cry of agony split the air, and thick eye-fluid, viscous fish blood spurted out, evil-smelling and repulsive, spattering Andrew’s hands. Coelacanth fell back, the great fin hitting the water behind him.
Andrew pounced at once, dragging at Rumour with his free hand, the three of them crashing over and over, tumbling in the churning, foaming pool, its surface curdled and slimed with the Fisher King’s thick, colourless blood, the Fisher King himself thrashing and screeching, flailing in his death agony.
Rumour was in his arms now, blinded, gasping, but blessedly alive. She clutched frantically at him, almost pulling them both under the water, and Andrew staggered back, and then righted them both. He lifted the spear again and brought it slicing down on the Fisher King’s trunk, seeing the cold scaly skin part, feeling the repulsive juices spurt over him.
A great cry of agony rent the air, and the Fisher King writhed and threshed, the great tail-fin lashing the water and sending cascading waves over the sides. Great sheets of water drenched Andrew and Rumour, but now it was the pure cool water of the sidh’s pool, and it had a sharp, clean feel.
The nimfeach had fallen back, and Andrew, still supporting the half-drowned Rumour, managed to look back, and saw fear in their eyes; and through the threshing of the dying Fisher King, he saw the gills in their necks gaping and distorting as they fought to frame Humanish speech.
‘The Samildanach … The promised Humanish …’
Their voices were wet and ugly, but Andrew’s senses were reeling and he barely heard them. His mind was sickened at what he had done, but he was still caught in the spinning maelstrom of rage, and his entire body was throbbing with angry passion against the loathsome Coelacanth.
He dragged Rumour bodily from the pool, and climbed out after her, turning her on one side, shaking her so that the water gushed from her mouth. She was white and pinched, but she was breathing, and Andrew sent up a heartfelt prayer of thanks.
The Fomoire were moving towards him, circling the pool, but Andrew saw that they were very wary indeed. The nimfeach were cowering, and he heard again the ugly, unnatural gill-speech. ‘The Samildanach. The mantle of the Samildanach is upon him … It is as it was prophesied.’
A tiny part of his mind registered that the nimfeach pronounced the word not as he had heard it in the Porphyry Palace, but with a different, eerily beautiful cadence of their own.
From the corner of his eyes, he caught the movement of the Fomoire as they lifted their spears and bunched together, as if to make a concerted rush. He shook Rumour again, hating himself for doing it, seeing that she was barely conscious, knowing that she should be left to healing sleep, but knowing as well that if they were to have any hope at all of escaping, she must pronounce a spell at once. Coelacanth was dead, his maimed body was now floating, face down, in the crystal pool; but Andrew knew that, although the nimfeach might hesitate, the Fomoire would not. He had disconcerted them, he had slain Coelacanth, and the nimfeach had ascribed to him the mantle of the legendary Samildanach. And that is all it was! he thought. That is all it was, and at any minute the Fomoire will be upon us.
Rumour, swimming in and out of consciousness, heard Andrew’s voice shouting to her to pronounce an enchantment to beat back the advancing Fomoire.
‘Something — anything! The Draiocht Suan,’ cried Andrew, picking one of the few enchantments he had heard of. ‘Rumour, you must!’
‘I can’t —’
‘You must!’ cried Andrew, desperately. ‘There will be all the time afterwards to recover, but you must find that last shred of energy! I cannot do it! You must safeguard us!’
Rumour, clutching the remnants of sanity, heard Andrew say that they could be safe, and her mind cleared a little. Iron bands still held her lungs in a vice, and it hurt to breathe, but Andrew had said she must pronounce a spell that would safeguard them.
She summoned the last dregs of her strength, and whispered the words of the ancient, powerful Draiocht Suan, the gentle Enchantment of Slumber, and then fell back in Andrew’s arms, exhausted. She did not know if it had worked, or if the darkness of Coelacanth would stifle the spell, but there was nothing more she could do.
Holding her to him, trying to infuse the warmth of his own body into her, Andrew saw, with deep and immense thankfulness, the silver cobwebs of the Draiocht Suan descend about the advancing creatures, so that they fell to the ground, caught in the sticky silver cobweb of the ancient Enchantment of Slumber.
*
He carried her out of the chamber with the crystal pools, leaving behind the dead body of the Fisher King and his unconscious servants. He had no knowledge of the Palace, but there would surely be somewhere he could lay her down and dry her and warm her, and let her sleep.
She was dripping wet, and her skin was still streaked with the thick grease and with the spattering of Coelacanth’s viscous blood. Her head was bare and shaven, but Andrew, looking down, saw the long thick lashes lying against her cheeks, and the beautiful bone structure, and felt something painful wrench his heart and his loins, because she was so beautiful, she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen, and her pain was scarcely to be borne.
He was barely aware of her weight; he thought she felt like a trembling bird sheltering, her heart pounding against the thin cage of her ribs. The anger and the strange, invasive strength had left him, going as swiftly as it had come. I suppose, thought Andrew, that it was simply something born out of fear and out of the need to save Rumour. Yes, of course that was what it had been. Little more than a perfectly natural self-preservation. He dared not believe anything else. And Coelacanth was dead and the others locked into slumber by the Draiocht Suan, and for the moment they were safe. For the moment he would concentrate only on healing Rumour, on finding somewhere for them to rest.
Directly ahead was a corridor with doors opening off it, all of them etched with the silhouettes of sea-creatures and twining hazel wands and beings with rippling hair and lashing, iridescent tails. Surely there would be a room where they could rest and recover. He turned into the first, and saw with immense thankfulness that, although there was not a bed in the sense that he understood it, there was a low, wide dais with pale, silken cushions. To the left was a tiny crystal pool, with a silver fountain spouting fresh water, and behind the dais were thin, gauzy lengths of some blue-green stuff that shimmered silkily. Some kind of guests’ wardrobe?
He laid Rumo
ur on the dais, piling the cushions about her for warmth and comfort, turning to reach down lengths of the blue-green silk to wrap about her, seeing that the silk was fashioned into the shapes of loose robes, some of them fur-trimmed, several of them crusted with iridescent stones. He pulled off his own drenched robe impatiently, and pulled on the nearest of the robes before turning back to the unconscious Rumour.
The water in the tiny pool was fresh and clean; when Andrew dipped his hands into it, it slid over his hands like thin rainwater, gentle and soothing. He soaked a length of the thin silk in the pool, and turned back to sponge Rumour’s lacerated body, thinking that, when she regained consciousness, at least she would be cleansed of the Fisher King’s spattered slime and fish blood.
He thought: I should like to bathe her in the perfumes and the unguents I am sure she is used to. I should like to immerse her in swansdown pillows, and wrap her in down and velvet so that nothing harmful or evil could ever touch her again …
He was conscious of the absurdity of it, for he had only plain water, and he had only his own rough, unskilled hands, more used to the monks’ harsh lye soap than to perfumes and soft lotions.
The water revived her; colour touched her cheeks, and the velvety lashes fluttered. Her eyes opened, and Andrew murmured a prayer of gratitude.
She looked up at him as he continued to wipe away every trace of Coelacanth’s monstrous assault, and as he reached for a robe of peacock-blue to wrap about her, she said, very softly, ‘I have no words to thank you, Andrew.’ For the first time since he had known her, Andrew heard her voice falter. ‘But I do thank you,’ said Rumour, reaching out a hand to trace his features. ‘I thank you for my life and for my sanity.’ A travesty of her old mocking smile showed. ‘My poor man of peace,’ said Rumour softly. ‘Had you to wrestle with your conscience and your god to kill him, Andrew?’
‘No,’ said Andrew, staring down at her. ‘There was no fight. The creature had to die.’
Because if he had not died, you would not he here, my love …
‘There was no fight,’ he said, again. ‘And what I began, you finished. I could not have held off the Fomoire if you had not pronounced the Draiocht Suan.’ He looked at her, seeing all over again that, even without the rippling hair framing her face, she was beautiful; there was no part of her that was not beautiful. Eyes, skin, teeth, shoulders, breasts … The peacock-blue robe turned her eyes to pure turquoise, the colour of the Gaillimh coast on a brilliant summer day, the colour of dragonflies’ wings. The robe was loosely tied, and beneath it her skin gleamed ivory white …
Rumour half sat up, propping herself up on one elbow, looking about her; Andrew, knowing that, despite his resolve, his body was betraying him, sat back. At length, Rumour said, very softly, ‘If you would enfold me in your arms, as I think you have been wishing to, I should be so grateful.’
Andrew said, ‘That creature has — hurt you …’
‘The hurt is deeper. Please,’ said Rumour and, unexpectedly, there was a thread of amusement. ‘I have never before had to plead for an embrace,’ she said, and Andrew saw that, although the familiar mockery lit her eyes, behind them was hurt; pain and terror, and the dreadful memory of what Coelacanth had done to her. He could have coped with the mockery; he had schooled himself to cope with it ever since they had descended to Tiarna, and he could have withstood the lingering fear. But the knowledge of her pain unmanned him. He could not bear to think of her hurting. He thought: after all, I am only Human, and after all, she is asking for no more than warmth and closeness. He held out his arms, and Rumour went into them.
*
There was more sweetness, more warmth and more pure joy in holding her than he had ever imagined possible.
Her skin smelt of the clean water, and of her own special fragrance, and Andrew held her, not daring to do more, feeling that she was still shivering, knowing that he was shivering also, although whether from cold or from some other cause, he was unsure.
He thought: there is no sin. She has been used cruelly, and there must only be this closeness, this warmth. But all the while, he was aware of his traitorous body, throbbing with wanting, aching with desire, hard and sinful and sweet.
At length she fell asleep, and Andrew moved away cautiously, because it would be sensible to make sure that the Draiocht Suan still held their enemies, and it would be practical to find if there was food and wine in the Palace, lotions for Rumour’s torn skin.
But each time he moved, she cried out, like a child frightened of the dark, and clutched him, and at length Andrew crept beneath the silken covers and the cushions, and held her.
*
There was no dawn in Tiarna; Andrew, lying with Rumour quiescent at his side, thought that, where there was no sky, no sun, there could not be day or night, as he knew it.
But gradually he became aware of a faint softening of the rippling water-light, arid a silvering of the shadows. There was the feeling of renewal, of the darkness receding, of an awakening.
And imbued with the new Teaching of the Nazarene as he was, he found himself remembering the ancient beliefs, pagan but suddenly comprehensible. The sun-worshippers, the many peoples who had lifted their voices in paeans of praise and thanksgiving for the dawn and the light. The legendary Mansions of the Gods in the East, and the ritual sun-dances of primitive tribes.
I understand it, thought Andrew, watching the light grow grey and then silver, feeling the creeping shadows retreat. There was something strong, reviving, about the beginning of a new day.
Andrew silently offered up prayers of thanks, and a simple brief supplication for strength to continue. He looked down at Rumour, sleeping peacefully, and thought: there must be no more nights like this one, the two of us alone, our bodies tangled together for warmth and comfort …
Moving cautiously, he washed in the cool, pure pool, and found it refreshing and faintly scented. His Order decreed that a man must wash and cleanse his body regularly. ‘For,’ had said Brother Stephen, ‘the body is God’s creation, and must perforce not be abused.’ But Andrew had guessed that the Brothers’ rule of regular washing in cold water and the scouring of the rough drying cloths was intended to quench sensuous thoughts and desires.
Now, rinsing his entire body in the pool, he felt not just cleansed but purged, refreshed, silken clean all over.
Donning the blue-green robe, so different to the serviceable but rather coarse wool robes the Brothers wore, he remembered Brother Stephen’s edict against any material other than homespun for robes. And, in truth, there was a soft, insidious sensuality about the very act of sliding his arms into the whispering silk; there was a caress in the cool, slippery robe, there was even pleasure in the colours of the silk — azure blue, shot here and there with a thin silver thread. Andrew stood very still, feeling the glossy robe stroke his skin, brush his thighs, and with a twist of irony, he made brief acknowledgement to the wise Brother who had known that men could be vulnerable, and that the sexual appetites could be aroused by things other than a woman’s body.
*
Andrew and Rumour found food in one of the adjoining rooms: fruit and honey, exotic and unfamiliar, but wholly delicious. There was wine in exquisite silver casks, fragrant and sweet, tinged with the scent of fruit and with the colours of the oceans, blue-green and heady.
‘I do not know if Coelacanth’s creatures would have fed on this,’ said Rumour, wrapped in the vivid turquoise robe, eating and drinking with industrious pleasure. The long Amaranth eyes glanced up and filled with amusement. ‘I am ravenously hungry,’ she said. ‘I daresay it is indelicate of me, but there it is.’ She reached for the wine.
Andrew said, ‘The sidh would eat this?’
‘In fact, I have no idea,’ said Rumour, reaching for the platter of strange-looking fruits with crisp, spicy outer crusts and strong, sweet hearts. ‘It is said that they feed on the senses of their victims,’ she said, and bit into the fruit, and although the look she threw him was not quite the old mischi
evous one, it was a creditable attempt at it. Andrew smiled back.
But he said, after they had eaten and drunk, ‘Perhaps you should stay here while I explore?’ and looked at her, and knew this for only a token attempt at chivalry.
Rumour said, ‘Rest and recline on the silken couch?’
‘I did not really think you would. Also,’ said Andrew, draining his own wine chalice, ‘to explore Tiarna together will be more interesting.’
‘So it will.’ Rumour set down the wine chalice and stood up, and then, suddenly serious, her eyes sliding away, ‘my strength is gone,’ she said and, lifting one slender hand, indicated the shaven ivory scalp. ‘Therefore I must find a carapace, a covering until it is restored. And also,’ said Rumour, looking up and grinning, her eyes filled with the fight of self-mockery, ‘I could not possibly be seen abroad looking like this.’ But she reached for his hand as she spoke, and Andrew heard the fear and the note of self-doubt.
He took her hand, and said, ‘Like this you are even more beautiful.’ Reaching out, he touched her face with his other hand, tracing its outline, lingering over the satiny feel of her skin. ‘Truly, you are the most beautiful creature I have ever seen.’
There was a sudden silence. Andrew thought: her closeness is almost unbearable. I dare not remember how she lay in my arms.
And then Rumour withdrew her hand, gently and naturally, and said, ‘Well, I shall feel better properly covered. And therefore, I must plunder the sidh’s cache.’
‘Will there be something?’
‘Oh yes. For there have been times when the sidh have donned the garb of Humans, and walked abroad in our world. They do not like to do so, and they only do it in extreme danger. Perhaps at a time such as this, when they have lost their music and their very existence is threatened.’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘Yes, that is entirely possible,’ said Rumour, thoughtfully. ‘If they had time and sufficient strength left to them, they may have sent out one — perhaps more — of their number to try to find the lost enchantment.’