High The Vanes (The Change Book 2)

by Kearns, David

  “Tomorrow you may make a fire. The Expected One will eat now. Then we sleep. It grows late.” All this spoken directly to Eluned.

  “Eat what?” I asked.

  “Cheese and meat. Good food.” He shrugged his shoulders.

  I looked at the two objects before me on the table. This was supposed to be ‘meat and cheese’? I picked up the ‘cheese’ and dropped it back on the table. It landed with a heavy clunk. The ‘meat’ I didn’t bother to touch. “And this is what he calls food?” I asked Eluned, adopting his habit of ignoring the person addressed.

  “Best that you sleep, my lady,” she said. “Tomorrow I will make a fire and seek other food. Please take the blanket I have laid out for you.”

  I looked in horror at the blankets she had laid on the floor. Still hungry, still cold, finally I whispered to Eluned that I needed to relieve myself. He obviously heard me as he pointed at the curtain in the corner which I had not noticed before. I have already described its contents to you. Needless to say, I tried to sleep that night with an empty, aching stomach and a full bladder. Sleep evaded me.

  Thus nearly three weeks had passed since that first, terrible night. In that time, I had forced myself to grow as accustomed as possible to the living conditions we had no choice but to endure. I had also managed to persuade Nefyn to talk to me, which made a considerable difference, particularly as he had obviously read many books and was very knowledgeable. My efforts to persuade him to spend more time above ground seemed to be working, if very slowly. Eluned, as I have said, refused point blank to join us.

  I heard her stirring. I sat up, ready to face yet another dreary day.

  Chapter 18

  Of course, Eluned had not been idle these past days. She was incapable of sitting around doing nothing. She had explored every nook and cranny of the Room, discovering a hidden cupboard of sorts behind Nefyn’s bed. She had also found another, smaller, room off the tunnel. Here she had found red terracotta bowls and plates, some odd-looking little objects that Nefyn informed us were Roman oil lamps, a metal object that she had placed over the fire on which she could heat the bowls, and, best of all, a wooden box filled with candles.

  Nefyn was convinced that all these things had lain undiscovered in that room since the time of the Romans, and he eagerly showed Eluned some pictures in one of his old books that certainly did look like the things she had found. Best of all, of course, were the candles, because it meant that at last there was enough light to read in the Room.

  Eluned also seemed to quickly establish a relationship with Nefyn that meant he did whatever she told him. As a consequence, he disappeared for long periods on most days, coming back with several sacks full of wood, some dead animals and birds, such as rabbits and pigeons, and, most surprisingly, piles of the red vegetable I knew as the root of the beet. With a roaring fire burning, Eluned soon cooked up a good stew that was the best food I had eaten in many days. Even Nefyn had to admit that this was better than his ‘cheese and meat’. After grumbling about being sent out the first couple of times, he soon changed his tune when he discovered what she could do with the things he brought back.

  I tend to think that it was because his belly was more full than it had been for years that he finally agreed to come outside and talk to me. This only happened when we were out of Eluned’s earshot, because he was conscious that she would consider it wrong. At first our conversations were stilted. We asked simple questions about each other’s lives. He told me he had been living in this place since he was a child. His parents had died, or so he presumed, for they had left the Room one morning and never returned, when he was about eleven years old. Since then he had lived alone, foraging for food when he felt hungry, learning to need very little. Gwenllian had appeared to him on only three occasions, once to inform him that she would soon be leaving to take a long journey, secondly to inform him that she had returned, and finally to inform him that he was now to consider himself her servant.

  Our conversations grew more interesting as he relaxed while talking to me. He had no idea what it meant to be Gwenllian’s servant, as she had never told him what his duties were. Indeed, he had no real idea who Gwenllian was, apart from the fact that she was, as she had told us, the ‘High Servant of the Lady’. He had no idea why he was living in Uricon, only that his parents had moved there when he was still a baby. When I asked him why he had never thought of leaving, he simply shrugged and said, “Where would I go?”

  One of the most curious things about him I discovered was that he had never been taught to read, yet he was perfectly capable of doing it. He had discovered the pile of books that must have belonged to his father when he was about six or seven, had opened one and proceeded to read it. He was not aware that this was a skill that normally needed to be taught. Most of his father’s books were dry discussions of what he called ‘science’ which meant nothing to him or me, but there were one or two ‘story books’, which he preferred. His favourites were the one that contained the songs of the old English people, a line from which he spoke to me when we were above ground, as I have told you.

  The other was a story about a man called Macsen Wledig. I vaguely remembered Eluned telling me that she knew this story. According to Nefyn this man had been a king or a leader of the Romans who had dreamed about a beautiful young woman and then sent out his servants to find her. They did find her eventually, but she refused to go to him, so he had to come to Uricon to meet her. According to the story, they were married and their children eventually ruled the whole country. He liked the story best because it spoke of the old people, including the Votadini, of which he claimed to be the last survivor, as well as others, including the Ordovices, who he now knew were Eluned’s people.

  In return, I must admit that I told him very little about my life. I mentioned Taid, telling him that I missed him enormously, and one day hoped to be able to see him again. I told him that I had lived in a great house which had been destroyed by some angry men. I did not know, at the time, how much he knew about ‘my world’, so I kept things deliberately vague. I briefly recounted my time with the Teacher, omitting the fact that I had been taught many skills. I also did not say anything about Y Gododdin, or Taid’s translation, as I could not see that he would be interested. Much later, when we discovered that the words ‘gododdin’ and ‘votadini’ were probably one and the same, with all that meant for us, I regretted that I had kept it from him. At the time it hardly seemed relevant.

  As the days passed, I grew to like him. Although he had many odd ways, and often seemed frightened or despairing, the more he told me about his life, the more I thought I understood these feelings. I also, mistakenly, began to assume that he liked me. On reflection, his apparent ‘friendliness’ probably sprang from acute loneliness. The chance to talk to another person after years of absolute silence must have been a huge relief.

  I thought in those early days that he might have become a real friend. While I appreciated my relationship with Eluned, I could never count her as a true ‘friend’ since she always regarded me as her ‘mistress’. I recalled my arguing, all those years ago at Plas Maen Heledd, that she was my friend, adamant that our relationship was exactly that. The passing years had shown me that I was wrong to believe that. We had an enormously warm relationship, she would do literally anything for me, but I would hardly call her a ‘friend’ any longer.

  My conversations with Nefyn were in fact opening my mind to the fact that I was as lonely as he was. Yes, I had a true, loyal and honest servant, but I had lost my family, lost my grandfather most of all, and had been alone since he had gone. Even before they took him, perhaps, because the relationship I had had with him before we reached Plas Maen Heledd had dwindled while we were there. The work had drawn him away from me. Now I found myself, approaching my twentieth year, living a strange life cut off from everything I had known before. I knew that life had been a sham, but it had been where I spent my childhood and early adolescence. Since then I had lived through a series
of incomprehensible existences, plunging into unknown territory after unknown territory, constantly being told that I was the ‘Expected One’.

  The terrible truth, it dawned on me more and more, was that I had no idea what was expected, what they expected of me, indeed who ‘they’ were and what they wanted me to do. Looking back, it was no wonder that I mistakenly believed that Nefyn could help me through the chaos of my life.

  Chapter 19

  The next day I managed to persuade Nefyn to come outside with me again. We walked about the strange site, filled with the broken walls of the old Romans. I climbed up on one and walked a little way along it. Like all of them, it suddenly stopped. When I made to jump off it, Nefyn said, “Be careful,” and put out his hand. I put out my own but he dropped his before they touched, and I jumped off the wall on my own.

  “Why are you afraid to touch me?” I said.

  “I’m not.”

  “You held out your hand but when I held out mine you took yours away. Why did you do that?”

  He shrugged and walked on.

  “Tell me more about your favourite story. Did the woman in the story have a name?”

  “Yes. She was called Helen. Helen Luyddawc. Though I do not know how to say that second word properly.”

  “I suppose she was beautiful?”

  “All women in stories are beautiful. Of her the story says,

  And he saw a maiden sitting before him in a chair of ruddy gold. Not more easy than to gaze upon the sun when brightest, was it to look upon her by reason of her beauty. A vest of white silk was upon the maiden, with clasps of red gold at the breast; and a surcoat of gold tissue upon her, and a frontlet of red gold upon her head, and rubies and gems were in the frontlet, alternating with pearls and imperial stones. And a girdle of ruddy gold was around her. She was the fairest sight that man ever beheld.

  I remember that. Exactly as it was written. That was how he saw her in his dream.”

  “And was she the same when he found her?”

  “The same.”

  “He was a fortunate man. To have seen such a beauty in his dream and in reality.”

  “Then I must also be a fortunate man.” He turned and looked directly at me.

  “What did you say?” I said.

  “I have seen you in my dreams. And now you are real.”

  “You saw me in your dreams? That’s not possible. You’ve never seen me before I came here.”

  “Macsen Wledig dreamed. And he sought his dream and found her. Why not me?”

  “But it’s just a story. You probably dreamed about a woman because you are a man. When I arrived you think I am that woman because you have seen no other.”

  He looked at me and smiled. He did not smile very often.

  “What about Eluned?” I said. “Do you think she is beautiful?”

  “Yes. But she does not possess beauty such as yours.”

  “You flatter, Nefyn. It is meaningless. Tell me what happened to the lady in the story.”

  “Macsen made three castles for her. And she made roads between the castles. They are supposedly the roads made by the old Romans.”

  “Is that all? She made roads? Hardly the work of a beautiful woman.”

  “What you must do is not the work of a beautiful woman. Yet you must do it.”

  I looked at him. For the first time he had mentioned something about what was to happen to me.

  “How do you know this? Who told you what I am going to do?”

  “You are the Expected One. It is known what you will do.”

  I walked away from him, turning his words over in my mind.

  “It is known, except by me,” I said, still looking away. “I have no idea what I am supposed to do. I don’t even know why people call me the ‘Expected One’. Are you going to tell me?”

  When I turned, he had walked away. My words echoed emptily in the air. I had to run to catch up with him.

  “Tell me,” I yelled.

  He stopped. I stopped.

  “‘Canwyll yn tywyll a gerdd gennym.’” he said.

  Those words. They rang a bell in my head. The words on the wall of the tunnel.

  “Those are the words in the tunnel,” I said. “You know them.”

  “‘A candle in the darkness marches with us.’” he said.

  “Wait,” I said, walking up to him. “That is what the words mean. Do you know what the rest of the words say?”

  “‘In forest, field, hill and dale,

  A candle in the darkness marches with us,

  The one who is ready leading every attack.’”

  “Who wrote those words? What do they mean? Tell me.”

  “The old ones made them. After the Romans left. Before my people came. Before my people were slaughtered at Catraeth. They say this. You are the Expected One. You are the candle. You march with us. You are the one who is ready.”

  “Did you say at Catraeth? You cannot mean that. ‘Gwyr a aeth Gatraeth oedd fraeth eu llu.’”

  “They went to Catraeth many in number. None returned. My mother. My father. My brothers. None came back. I am the last of the Votadini. I am the last Gododdin. As I was a babe in arms they did not take me.”

  “But that all happened hundreds of years ago. How is it possible ...?” As I spoke I remembered Eluned’s stories of her life. Nefyn was the same. People for whom time was different to mine. Eluned had been born hundreds of my years previously, yet to me she was still a young woman. Nefyn was the same. No wonder he was lonely. For hundreds of my years he had lived in this bleak place alone.

  If that was true, it dawned on me, then what about the times Gwenllian had visited him? In his time scale they seemed far apart. In my time scale they could be hundreds of years apart. That could only mean that her next visit could also be in another hundred years. Maybe more. Not a few days, or weeks as I had been expecting.

  I sat down on the nearest fragment of wall. When I looked up at Nefyn tears were running down his cheeks. Now I knew why he always seemed so sad. I covered my face with my hands and wept. I heard him shuffle his feet then move off. I let him go.

  Chapter 20

  Another two weeks passed, as far as I could tell. I wondered what the passing of time meant to people like Eluned and Nefyn. Did it appear to move more slowly? Each day we went about what became our routines. Nefyn disappeared some time after the sun came up and rarely returned before it went down. Each day he brought a sack full of wood for the fire, so that before long there was a high pile beside the fireplace. He also managed to bring some small animal or bird most days, as well as a variety of roots.

  Eluned still spent all her time in the Room. She transformed it as much as she was able. The books were placed in one corner, after she had blown the dust from them and polished the ones with leather bindings. She washed our sleeping blankets and our shifts, a very laborious process with the primitive facilities available to her. The first night I slept in a newly washed blanket I think was the best sleep I had had since we arrived. Two days later, having spent the day huddled under a blanket, I was able to pull on a fresh shift, which felt wonderful. She also cooked a delicious stew every day.

  I offered to help her, but of course my offer was refused. I rooted through Nefyn’s books, discovering, as he had said, that most were incomprehensible. I did not even understand the titles of most of them. One was actually in ClassLat, which startled me when I first opened it. I didn’t bother to struggle with that. The only two that were of any real interest were the two Nefyn had mentioned. A story book with strange tales, written in English, but supposedly translated from the old Welsh. I flicked through a few of them, until I found the story of Macsen Wledig, which I read. The other was a book of poems, this time translated from what the writer called ‘Anglo-Saxon’. I had no idea what that meant, so I left it.

  Most days, as the weather stayed fine, I took the story book, went outside, found a quiet corner amongst the walls, and read. Sometimes, if the sun was warm enough, I found m
yself dozing off. One afternoon I must have slept longer because when I awoke the sun had gone down and it was growing quickly dark. On the odd days when it rained, I stayed inside, reading by the light of a candle, although this annoyed Eluned who complained that I was using too many of the candles.