High The Vanes (The Change Book 2)

by Kearns, David

  “Then why have we not seen any? We walked along that road all day and saw no one. Sounds to me like a story made up to stop your people coming here.”

  As I was speaking I became aware of the sound of voices. They were some way distant, but clearly approaching. Eluned, still holding on to my arm, hastily retreated back into the neighbouring field, where she half-dragged me along the line of the hedge away from the opening. We stopped, both breathing heavily. The voices grew louder. They seemed to be coming from the other side of the house.

  “Check the front.” A woman’s voice separated itself from the chatter. At this point she clearly entered the house as her voice became muffled, but she was still shouting orders. “See to that fire. Open the window in my room. Well, go and collect more wood. Idiot.”

  We could hear the noise of some one’s heavy boots walking along the path I had recently stepped on. Another, younger woman’s, voice pierced the evening. “Nothing. Who’s going to come here, anyway?” The footsteps returned and we heard the door closing. I looked at Eluned.

  As our breathing slowed, I whispered, “That was two women’s voices.” Eluned nodded. The door opened again and footsteps came nearer. A figure appeared in the opening to our field. We shrank back into the hedge. I was convinced that we were about to be discovered, but night was falling quickly.

  “How much should I get?” The shadowy figure was another woman, again quite young. A window opened in the house and the first woman’s voice called, “Enough for tonight. Stupid. Get a move on. We need to make something to eat.” The young woman quickly crossed the field. Within minutes she returned carrying a bundle of sticks. We froze, but we were obviously not visible to her. Or she was not looking in our direction. Again, footsteps, followed by the door closing.

  “We must cross to the next field,” Eluned whispered. “Further away.”

  “What if they hear us?”

  “I think they are all inside. They will not come outside when it is dark. Come!”

  She stood up and scrambled back across the field, heading for the opening we had taken earlier that day, although it was more difficult to find in the near darkness. Once through, she turned along the hedge until she reached a corner.

  “We must stay here tonight. There is no other choice. They will leave early in the morning.”

  She unrolled one of the blankets and laid it out over the thick grass. I lay down on it, pulling the other half over me. The grass was a little more comfortable than the cold stone in the previous place, but it was damp, and I could soon feel the dampness seeping through. Eluned pushed her bag under the hedge, unrolled her blanket and lay down herself. Surprisingly, I was soon asleep.

  Some time later I awoke. There was a thin light in the distance, which suggested that dawn was coming, but I was only aware of how much I was shivering. My blanket was thoroughly wet, as was the side of my shift where I had been lying. I sat up, clutching my arms around my knees trying to find some warmth. It made no difference. I sat feeling totally miserable until I heard the soft murmur of voices. They must be awake. I threw aside my blanket and stood up, my shift clinging to my side, damp and cold. Eluned was still fast asleep, so I left her. As quietly as I could, I crept back to the opening in the hedge. Across the field in front of the house I could see movement. The murmur of voices grew louder, that of the woman who issued orders once again standing out.

  Suddenly a figure appeared in the opening in front of the house. “All right. All right. As quick as I can. Yeah.” It was the young woman who had collected sticks the previous night. And she was heading straight for me. She moved quickly, following the rough path she had beaten before. I tried to run back along the hedge, but my shift caught on a branch. As I struggled to undo it, she was upon me.

  Looking back, she was obviously much more surprised than I was. I had seen her coming towards me, she was not even aware of my existence. I am sure that the last thing she expected to see when she set out to collect some wood was a bedraggled young woman of about her age. For the moment that I had the advantage, the Teacher’s skills kicked in. Still attached to the hedge, I raised my arm and swung around with the full force of my body. With a dull thud, my elbow contacted with her face. A sharp pain shot up my arm to my shoulder as she fell backwards. As she hit the ground I heard another, louder thud. Her eyes stared at me for a couple of seconds before her head fell to the side.

  I pulled at my shift and it came away, leaving a tear in the fabric. I knelt down beside the young woman, but she was clearly unconscious, if not dead. I felt Eluned’s hands grasp my shoulders. She pulled me to my feet.

  “What have you done? What have you done? They will know we are here.” She was shaking.

  For once, I took command of the situation. Adrenalin still pumping through my veins I turned to her and said, “Stop it. We must get away. Now. Get your bag. And mine. Forget the blankets.” The control in my voice worked. Eluned turned and ran back to the corner, before returning with both bags. I grabbed her hand.

  “Now. Away. Before they realise she’s not coming back.”

  Chapter 13

  We ran. Ran and ran and ran. Stumbling through fields thick with overgrown grass and crops, our lungs scorched with each intake of breath, we ran. Without once looking back, regardless of which direction we were running in, we ran. Until I could run no further. My chest burning, my legs turned to jelly, I could not continue. I collapsed in a heap in the middle of the last field that we had reached. Eluned took a few more steps before she, too, collapsed. We lay spreadeagled like that for who knows how long. Slowly, very slowly, my breathing returned to normal. As the pain in my chest subsided, I was able to gulp in more air. When I opened my eyes the sun was high in the sky.

  Half a day had passed. We should have been approaching Uricon by this time. Instead, we lay in a field surrounded by other fields. Nothing else. I sat up and lifted my shift to rub life back into my legs. As sensation returned, I was able to lift myself up to a standing position. Every muscle in my body ached. The backs of my thighs felt as if they had been stretched beyond breaking point. Even though my breathing was now near to normal, the muscles of my stomach felt stiff and unyielding.

  “Eluned?” I said, looking over to where she still lay.

  She turned her head towards me, wincing as she did so. “My lady?” she whispered.

  I crossed the short distance between us and knelt beside her.

  “I’m so sorry, Eluned. We had been doing so well. Now where are we? And it’s all my fault. I should not have struck that poor woman. What was I thinking?”

  She opened her eyes. “Your strength is greater than I had thought, my lady. This will be a good thing in the future. But you must learn to control it.”

  “Do you think I killed her? Was she dead, do you think?”

  “I do not know. She was terribly injured. Your blow inflicted much damage.”

  “Oh, God.” I sat back on my heels. “What have I done?”

  “She may have seen you, my lady. If she did the others would have come. They would have taken us. Our task would have been over before it began.”

  “Do you think so?”

  “It is possible that they still do not know of us. It would have been some time before they noticed she had not returned. More time to discover her. It is possible they would think she had fallen. They had not seen us.”

  “What about our blankets? We left them there, remember?”

  “They were far from the place where she lay. I pushed them under the hedge. They would need to search for them. Why would they do that? They did not know we had been there. If the woman lives, she will no doubt tell them of you. If she is dead, we may still be safe.”

  “What a terrible thought. To hope that someone is dead so that we may be safe. And if she is, I killed her.”

  “She is a crwydren, my lady. She must expect to die. If she died in some conflict it would be a great honour.”

  “Some conflict? What conflict? She didn�
��t stand a chance. She only saw me for a few seconds. I shall never forget the look in her eyes before she lost consciousness. It was a look that said, ‘Why?’. You cannot call that a conflict.”

  “Warriors die in battle, my lady. Some die slowly, an agonisingly long, painful death. Others die swiftly, struck by the first blow. It was your first blow that killed this one. That is conflict enough.”

  I closed my eyes. The young woman’s eyes stared at me wherever I turned my head.

  “They have not followed us, my lady. We have run far and I do not hear them in any direction. We must give thanks to the Lady that we are safe. Now we must discover a path that will lead us to our destination. I think it may not be too far. Yesterday the sun went down in the same direction. Perhaps we were running the right way. ‘In all your ways acknowledge her, and she will make your paths straight.’ The Lady will guide us.”

  I sighed. Always, Eluned had this unfailing trust in the Lady. I envied her such trust. I had killed someone. A young woman, much the same age as me, simply doing what she was asked. Going about her task. A task that was so simple – collect some wood to make a fire. Yet now she was dead. A single blow from my arm and her task was over, before she had a chance to complete it. What right did I have to think that I could complete my task? Whatever it might be.

  Eluned had picked up her bag and was slowly heading for an opening in the hedge on the other side of the field. With still aching legs, I followed her.

  Chapter 14

  Keeping the sun, slowly sinking in the sky, to our right, we crossed two more fields and then came upon a path. Long overgrown by the wild hedges, it was just wide enough for us to walk along, much more easily than the struggle through the fields. We picked up a little speed. My leg muscles still ached, but at least they seemed stronger now there was nothing to restrict them. Eluned took the lead again. I did not argue with this, as she was convinced that the Lady was guiding us – or at least, she was guiding her.

  Before long, the hedge on either side thinned, before eventually disappearing altogether. The path, now clear, was wide and, we noticed for the first time, paved. Just like the old Roman road we had previously followed.

  “This is not …?” I said.

  “No, my lady. It is not the same road. You need not fear.”

  For one brief moment I thought we had somehow run in a circle and had returned to the road we left two days previously.

  “How do you know, Eluned?”

  “See, my lady.” She was pointing ahead. “See, this was once a village. There is no village on the other road. We passed our destination by running so far. Now we approach it from the other direction. The Lady has indeed protected us.”

  “What road is this, then? Another Roman road?”

  “Yes, my lady. Continue on this road in the direction from which we came and, after many days walking, you would arrive at the place your people call Deva Caster. A very large city. As you saw, no one travels this road today. That is why it has become so overgrown.” She turned her head away from me as she muttered the last words. “One day you will have to take it.”

  “What was that?”

  She shook her head. “The other side of this village we will find our destination. Soon we will be there. Come, my lady.”

  She set off. I had heard what she said, even though I pretended I had not. ‘One day you will have to take it.’ What did she mean by saying that? Why would I have to go to this ‘Deva Caster’? A little unnerved, I followed her.

  The road passed through the middle of what had been a small village, now completely ruined. It seemed odd to me that people should wish to live in such a remote place. I supposed it was what Eluned called ‘the old people’ who had built it, but why here? Once again, it reminded me of the ruined village near the lake beside Plas Maen Heledd. Eluned had told me she once lived there when it was a thriving place. Hundreds of years ago. So she claimed.

  “Who lived here?” I asked as we passed through the village.

  “The old people, my lady.”

  “I know that. Which old people? What sort of people? Why would they want to live here? It seems to be in the middle of nowhere.”

  “The old people lived in small places like this. They feared living in large communities. The old Romans had moved them into cities, much like your casters. But when the old Roman soldiers left, the people abandoned the cities and moved into small places such as this. At first they made their dwellings with wood, as their ancestors had done, before the Romans came. As time passed, they made them from stone. A stone dwelling provides greater protection against the seasons as they change.”

  “But what did they do? How did they live?”

  “The fields we have passed through, my lady. Each one of the old people would have one or two of those fields, perhaps with a beast, mostly with vegetables and a little wheat to make bread.”

  “Did they have children in those times?”

  Eluned laughed out loud. “Children, my lady? Of course they had children. There are always children.”

  “Did they go to school?”

  She laughed again. “No. No school. Why learn to read when you have no books? Why learn to number when there is never more than the fingers on your hands?”

  “No school? No books? Not even the Bible?”

  “There was a time when the people would have a Bible, my lady, but not when the old people were living. There were books but they belonged to the kings and the holy men, who lived in the houses of kings and holy men.”

  “So what did the children do?”

  “Do, my lady? They worked in the fields with their mothers and fathers. What else would they do?”

  “Is that what you did? When you were a child?”

  “That. And helped my mother make the flour. To make bread. In the winter I was given the task of watching the broth, making sure the wind did not blow out the fire. And we learned the songs and stories of the old people. I liked that. With the wind howling outside, my little sisters would huddle against me to keep warm while we slowly drank a bowl of broth. My father would tell us the stories, and my mother would sing the songs. That is how I learned them, my lady.”

  I looked up. We had continued walking while we talked and had now passed through what remained of the village. I turned to take one last look, imagining the small families sitting around their fires, listening to poems and stories. Now they were gone. Soon their houses would also be gone.

  “Soon we will be there, my lady. Look.”

  I turned back to the way we were travelling. The road ran straight and level ahead of us. Just visible on the horizon was what looked like a wall, which had at least one huge hole in it, possibly two.

  “That’s it?” I said. “That broken wall is where we are going?”

  “The wall is the biggest part left of the city the old Romans made here. In their time there were many people here. There were many houses. Large halls. A place where the people gathered to wash themselves. Many markets.”

  “Now there is nothing left but a broken wall.”

  “That is what your people think. It is best that they think that. The truth is different. Come.”

  She walked on. I stood for a moment, wondering at all the people who had once lived in this countryside. Romans, ‘old people’. Some in large cities, some in small villages. When I lived in ‘my world’ I did not know of these places, nor of the people who once lived in them. I pictured the posters in my school – ‘Before was Chaos. After was Order.’ - and – ‘That was NOT then. This is NOW. That will NOT be.’ It seemed to me that these things were so wrong. It had not been chaos, but a different kind of order. My ‘now’ – the ‘now’ of my world – was only one of many. There had indeed been a ‘then’. A ‘then’ with people who made huge cities and small villages. Who probably did not think that their great stone buildings, or their small ones, would one day collapse into ruin, then decay away to nothing. What would be the ‘wall’ that would be left of my world, I
wondered. I could not think of one.