Within the great circle of standing stones she was aware of circles within circles of people moving rhythmically to the music of drum and flute, stepping sideways slowly and with elegance, their arms raised so that the tips of their fingers brushed their neighbours’ as they moved. On a certain beat they dipped their heads and bent their knee in a way that gave the whole ring movement a sinuous serpentine character. As each concentric circle was moving around the stone circle in a direction opposite to the one within and without itself, the currents and eddies of invisible force generated were complex indeed.
Kyra quite forgot she was supposed to be playing a part in the ceremony and stared blatantly at everything she could see.
She noticed that the people in the rings were placed alternately man and woman, boy and girl. The force they seemed to be trying to create this day was to come from the tension between, in a sense the friction between, differing elements. She knew that a mysterious energy was released when man and woman came together. She had felt the spark of it when she had been near the young desert priest. The priests of this community appeared to be using this force to build up energy for the use of the Lords of the Sun.
Curious about the people themselves who lived and worked in the presence of such a temple, Kyra began to look at individuals. There were people there she recognized as country villagers like herself, in roughly woven woollen garments, their bodies liberally browned by the sun and muscles well developed from work in fields. There were people she knew were metal workers, stone masons, flint miners, merchants. Others were stranger to her. Tall people. Elegant people. Dressed in flowing cloth, finely woven, the very way they held their heads different from the farmers and the villagers. The women of this type wore jewellery, some of which reminded her of her ‘travels.’ She saw necklaces of black jet, collars of sun metal, earrings and bracelets. The men wore studded belts and bands of leather on their heads and arms.
And then there were the strangers from other countries, darker people, lighter people, dressed in different ways but all part of the ring moving with the same rhythmic movement.
Undeniable forces and vibrations were set up, currents and eddies of power. She could feel it. She could almost see it. The pulsing of the music added to the intensity of the feeling. The mist that moved with its own serpentine life about their feet added to the impression of detachment from the earth. Everything was charged and potent. She was on a level of reality that she had not known before. Her heart began beating loudly. She had finally reached the conjunction of the Lords of the Sun.
The figures of the concentrically moving circles began to dim for her and she became aware with greater clarity of the smaller stone circle within the greater, in which she herself was standing.
She was in the centre and around her in a ring but standing as still as the tall stones themselves were figures she could only think were the Lords of the Sun. They were impressive figures dressed strangely in the styles of their countries, each different from the other, and all different from the circling figures around them. The stillness of her circle was astonishing in comparison to the movement surrounding them. It was as though they were enclosed in a capsule of great peace, the still point at the centre of ceaseless motion.
She felt the movement was generating power for them in some way, but leaving them undisturbed.
Within her circle there seemed to be no one in charge, no priest conducting the meeting. With a sudden tremor she realized that she was expected to speak, she had called them together and they were waiting for her to tell them what to do.
She looked around in despair. So many strangers! And then her heart leapt. She saw first the girl athlete from the palace of the Bulls, this time dressed like her countrywomen in long, flounced skirt and sleeved bodice open over the breasts, and then her young priest from the desert temple of the sandstones. Her face flooded with the warmth of a smile and she took a step forward. But the young priest shook his head slightly and she knew she had to stand in the centre and make a ‘speech’.
She glanced up at the sky and she remembered that with the dawn her body would not be safe in the Sacred Circle of her community. She remembered also these Lords had work of their own to do and she must not waste their time.
She drew herself up to her full height and prepared to ‘think’ the whole story of Wardyke coming to their village and what had happened since.
When she had done she stayed quietly, trying to keep her mind a blank, ready for their thoughts. The drumming and the movements of the people around them had become like a low vibrational hum and was no disturbance at all.
Slowly thoughts that were not hers began to come to her. She was not sure if they came from individuals, and if they did, from which ones. It seemed more likely that it was their composite thinking that was reaching her.
‘. . . It is true Wardyke has not received the final seal of the priesthood and so has no right to practice as a priest . . .’
She found herself wondering why they had not prevented him doing so.
‘. . . You are reminded that we are human and know only what is communicated to us. Before you had told us the story we had not known what was going on . . .’
She felt ashamed that she had questioned and doubted in this way and determined not to interrupt with her own thoughts again. She shut her eyes the better to concentrate.
‘. . . He must be stopped, but Maal was right to say that you must not do it with force . . .’
She smiled with pleasure at the warmth of their approval for Maal.
‘. . . It is the evil in Wardyke that must be destroyed, not Wardyke himself . . .’
‘To kill him would be to surrender oneself to the same evil that ruled his life . . .’
Kyra agreed. But how?
‘. . . Confidence and belief are the strongest forces in a man’s nature . . .’
‘. . . It is here that you must mount your attack . . .’
In answer to Kyra’s unspoken question the Lords of the Sun patiently explained.
‘. . . The key to Wardyke’s power in your community lies in confidence and belief. He believes that he has the right and the power to do what he is doing, and you believe that too. This gives him his strength . . .’
‘. . . No magician . . . (and here Kyra remembered Maal had said this too) . . . has power over you if you do not believe that he has . . .’
She understood this, but did not know if she would have the strength, faced by Wardyke, to doubt his powers. When Maal talked, when the Lords of the Sun explained, it all seemed quite simple. But meeting the burning eye of Wardyke was another matter. Then she could not doubt.
‘. . . We know it is not easy, but it must be done. You must return to your people and speak to them, make them understand that Wardyke has no power of himself. It is their belief that he has power that gives it to him. Without their belief he is helpless. You must render him helpless and thereby harmless.’
‘. . . That way your community will be free without becoming the slaves of evil themselves . . .’
Kyra’s eyes were open now and she was looking worried. She knew they were right but how she wished, how she had hoped, that they could do something sudden and dramatic to remove Wardyke from their midst. She knew it would be a long hard struggle to persuade the villagers to change their beliefs like this. In fact, she did not think she could do it.
‘. . . You can do it . . . You can! You have powers within yourself that you are only just beginning to tap, and we will give you help . . .’
Kyra looked up hopefully at that.
‘. . . Before the Spring a new priest will arrive to work in your community. He will have the final seal and he will be a good man . . .’
‘. . . When he comes, you will leave, your work there done . . .’
She looked startled. Leave her home?
‘. . . You will travel south through many trials and dangers and you will come, in the flesh, to this place and you will train to be a priest yourse
lf . . .’
She gasped. Me.
‘. . . Yes, you. You have been chosen . . .’
‘. . . But there is much still for you to do.’
‘When you return to your home this dawn you will go to the place where Maal is buried and you will find a small stone upon his burial mound. Yes, you will know which one it is when you see it. You will take it and keep it close with you until Wardyke is overthrown. Maal’s help will be in that stone.’
‘. . . Our help will be in the sky. Look at the sky and you will see a sign that is confirmation of our help . . .’
‘Now?’
‘. . . No, not now. You will know when to look . . .’
‘This is like Maal’s advice,’ Kyra thought with a certain discontent. ‘Always telling me I will mysteriously ‘know’ something and then leaving me by myself!’
But she was comforted that she would have definite help.
‘. . . You have already proved to yourself that you are capable of projecting images into Wardyke’s mind. Work on this. Encourage your friends to help you. There is strength in communion of thought. Choose a time for as many as possible of you to project the same image into Wardyke’s mind.
‘Never let him forget his crimes. Haunt him night and day. You will find that particularly when he is asleep it will be easy to influence the images of his dreams. His surface mind will be off guard and there will be no interruptions from superficial distractions . . .’
‘. . . We will join with you in this work . . .’
‘. . . Finally eroded by guilt and undermined in confidence, he will be helpless and will have to look for a new way to live his life . . .’
‘. . . Believe it, child, for it is true . . .’
* * * *
Kyra looked around the circle. The thoughts of these great people were locked in her heart and she would draw upon them in the difficult days to come.
One by one she looked at them. Each the possessor of knowledge and skills far beyond the ordinary man, each from a country far distant from her own. She recognized the large man from the Temple of the squares and circles and beside him stood a woman of dark skin and hair of black silk streaked with silver flowing to the silver sandals on her feet. Beyond her a man clad in a magnificent cape of multicoloured feathers stood beside an old man dressed in rags, so thin and wasted that he seemed more of a skeleton than a living man, his hair wild and straggling, leaning on a gnarled and knobbled stick to keep himself upright, but his eyes full of light and fire.
Then she saw her beautiful athlete and could not help wondering at her youth. The girl met her eyes and smiled.
‘Age has nothing to do with it,’ she said in Kyra’s head. ‘We are all thousands of years old and yet still in our infancy.’
Beyond her was a priest standing straight and tall, dressed simply in woven wool except for one magnificent pendant of green jade that he wore on a thong about his neck. She knew instinctively he was a countryman of hers. He was the high priest of this great circle. The host of this extraordinary gathering. She looked closer at his face and was impressed with its calm strength. In these people she had confidence. If they said she could bend metal with a mere touch, she would believe it and she would do it. If they said she could be a priest, she would believe it and she would do it.
The task she had to do within her own community no longer seemed impossible. She would not be alone. She would have their strengthening thoughts with her in everything she did.
She began to think about her own powers and her own relationship to those around her.
‘I cannot be too helpless,’ she thought, ‘otherwise I would not be here now. Otherwise I would not be chosen to be trained as a priest!’
And with that she had a surge of self-confidence that would see her through many a difficulty.
Pleased to feel the strengthening confidence that was coursing through her, the Lords of the Sun prepared to leave.
Kyra became aware of it when she suddenly noticed that the undercurrent of rhythmic sound from outside their small circle had risen to a crescendo and was beginning to deafen her.
Startled, she looked around and noticed that the Lords who had looked so solid a moment before were beginning to dissolve in the air, whose visible vibrations were increasing every second.
‘Oh no!’ she cried, loth to let them go.
She turned to the young desert priest and had such an overwhelming feeling of yearning for him to stay with her that it was almost a pain.
As though her desire for him was holding him back in some way, he was the last to go. She was sure his eyes were seeking hers as longingly as hers were seeking his. For a moment they seemed to melt together and Kyra had the strangest feeling that she was within his arms, although she knew she was not and could see him separate from herself across the circle.
She opened her mouth to cry out in real words and at that second he and all about her disappeared.
Shaken and trembling she found herself on a slab of cold stone, early sunlight streaming everywhere, and the anxious faces of Karne and Fern looking down at her.
‘Kyra!’ Karne was calling urgently. ‘We must go! Someone will find us here.’
‘Are you all right?’ Fern put her arm around her gently and helped her upright.
Kyra looked dazed.
She could not answer. Everything was shaking and whirling around her. She felt as though she were going to faint.
‘Kyra!’ Fern cried, and Karne caught her as she fell.
‘Oh you gods protect her!’ he muttered fervently.
‘We must take her out of here,’ Fern whispered anxiously. ‘Perhaps when she is out of this circle she will be better.’
Together they lifted her and carried her out and down the hill and as far as they could go from the standing stones.
* * * *
In the valley the tired villagers were preparing for the funeral of the two young people. The fires of vigil that had burnt all night were nothing more than smouldering embers.
Chapter 16
The Forest is Punished
As autumn gradually came to the community, Karne and Kyra worked hard to change the villagers’ attitude to Wardyke. As they had expected, it was not easy.
They explained much of what had happened to them to people they felt were ready for it, starting with their family.
Their father listened to everything they had to say with great attention and asked few, but pertinent, questions. Their mother was immediately horrified at the risks Kyra had been taking and the blasphemy of her entering the forbidden Sacred Circle. She was so occupied with fussing about these things that she did not seem to grasp the real implication of what they told her.
Thon was angry almost immediately and wanted action, arguing that the Lords of the Sun were soft and that there was only one way to deal with Wardyke – with force. He had had his eye on Mia for a wife and could think of nothing but revenge.
Patiently Kyra explained the reasons the Lords of the Sun had advised against this. Patiently she went over the whole ground again. But Thon was not convinced. The only reason he had not already killed Wardyke was that he had not had the opportunity. The other villagers refused to rise again after what had happened, and alone he stood no chance against Wardyke. There always seemed to be some of his most unpleasant strangers with him as bodyguard and Thon had noticed they were now carrying weapons, short bronze daggers tucked into the top binding of their sandal leggings, and stone axes in their belts.
Kyra pointed out that Wardyke could not be such a powerful magician if he needed armed men to defend him. This made the people think and one by one they joined her in her efforts to discomfit him by projecting disturbing images into his mind. This was not easy, as they were not used to sustaining one image for a long time, nor to disciplining their minds so rigidly. Most of them found, as they lay in their warm rugs at the appointed hour of the night, that they started with great enthusiasm to project the image of Mia’s death and the
boy being stoned, and then one by one they drifted off the point, some to sleep and some to think of other things.
Many times Kyra felt close to despair. Weeks passed and though they tried projection every night Wardyke showed no signs of being disturbed. He strode about surrounded by his lackeys, more confident than ever.
He had set the villagers to work making battle-axes from the hard granite of their local hills. Day after day they sat chipping and hammering and banging away, making weapons of war that they did not want.
He spoke to them of enemies about to invade, and remembering the fall of stars they obeyed his every command. Most of them were too afraid openly to oppose a man upon whom the gods had apparently set their seal of approval.
He told them flint was coming in great quantities from the south and that they would be able to make arrow and spear heads with it. Swords and daggers were on their way as well.
* * * *
One evening, at her lowest ebb, Kyra sat upon the hillside feeling very much alone. There seemed no way she could carry out the instructions of the Lords. She, Karne and Fern were consistent and dedicated to the plan, but the others listened, agreed and seemed to want to help, but as soon as the slightest difficulty got in their way they gave up.
It seemed to her they had forgotten about Mia and the boy, were in fact deliberately trying to forget. It was so much easier to drift with each day, occasionally grumbling, but on the whole obeying Wardyke. If only she could show them some sign of success their resolution might be strengthened and they might be prepared to take more chances and make more effort.
She thought longingly about the Lords of the Sun. If only they were here to help! Perhaps she could summon them with her will as she had done before.
She shut her eyes to the pale gold of the evening sky, the red gold of the autumn woods, and thought about the Lords of the Sun. At first she could not get beyond the young desert priest, but her longing to see him was not entirely connected with the problem in hand and she forced her mind to visualize the others, one by one, and to call upon them with all her might for help.
The Tall Stones Page 20