Plainly the only way forward, he shuddered at the state of them. It was only his intrigue, fuelled by sight of a door in the far side of the yard, that brought him to balance a leg carefully on the top step. It was definitely too slippy, as safe as greased ice, and so instead he just stood and pondered, whilst the wind steadily grew stronger.
Suddenly, a fitful gust tugged him off balance and towards the yard. He fell at the very edge, his fingers grasping at the moss, and, for a terrifying moment, stared wide-eyed at the fearful drop below. He pushed himself back, his stomach sinking as though it had taken the fall instead, or he’d swallowed a large lump of lead. It was as he sat back against the wall, panting, that he then noticed the green stain on his fingers and it gave him an idea.
He untied his sandals, removed and then knotted them about his neck, before edging towards the top step on his backside. This time, with toes digging into cold but compliant footing, he found far better purchase.
Slowly and very cautiously, he brought his other foot down and began to edge his way from the shelf, grabbing at the lush carpet as he went. Despite the fitful wind’s peevish tugs Falmeard did, eventually, arrive safely at the bottom.
Relieved, he stepped onto the filth and debris strewn flags and looked up at the rearing walls, feeling like a bug that had fallen into a bucket. He slipped his sandals back on and, legs still unsteady, threaded his way to the door.
Peering in, he found it held nothing but complete blackness, a depth unrelieved by torch or window, its air heavy and stagnant. Picking up a fragment of stone, he tossed it in and then listened to it skitter as it sharply echoed across the floor. With its meagre forewarning, he cautiously edged his way in.
He felt along the wall but only far enough to let his eyes adjust, not that it made much difference at first. It was actually quite a while before he began to make out a very faint light, seemingly someway off in the distance. At least it did give him direction. Every so often, however, he’d reach down and scrabble for yet another piece of debris, cast it ahead and then listen to what its skittish voice foretold, whilst the faint light continued to beckon him on.
Eventually, he ran out of debris and had to rely solely on touch, although the faint light was getting steadily brighter. It certainly wasn’t enough to reveal what had caused the sudden loud clatter he now heard ahead.
He stopped and stared, fruitlessly, but the noise came again, only softer but still ahead, from where the pale light still shone. Creeping carefully forward he was startled when the passage lit up brilliantly, but only for a moment. It gave Falmeard a brief glimpse of a vast space opening out at the end of the passage, a surreal flash of pillars, plaques and columns, all suggesting some great hall.
Even with the light again dimmed, Falmeard began to see an end to the passage, could make out something like a parapet. With aid of the occasional flash, he soon came to it and discovered the top landing of a flight of steps. Peering between stout balusters, he looked down onto a disappointingly sparse scene.
It was obviously a big hall, quite vast by the feel of it, but its pitch blackness was relieved by nothing more than a single angrily sputtering torch. It stood on a prominent dais that rose mid-way across the hall’s great width but its flames revealed little other than the dais itself.
The only other thing Falmeard could see was, what appeared to be, a figure deftly moving about the far shadowy depths. As if to reinforce it, a loud clatter rang out closely followed by a series of disjointed oaths. Something in that voice sounded familiar, something in it definitely rang a distinct albeit distant bell.
If it were only one thing his long life had prepared him for then it would have to be patience, patience that let him squat there for some time, behind the balustrade, watching very little, if anything, happening below. Occasionally, he’d dimly see the figure moving slowly against the distant wall, appearing and then disappearing behind its march of columns. So, he waited and wondered.
He’d certainly plenty of time to study the dais, not that there was much to it. It was no more than five yards across and surrounded by steep steps that gave it access to the floor, some five yards below. It was plainly flagged, and currently empty but for the torch stand, and made entirely of black marble slabs. It sat at the centre of a large star shaped pattern on the floor that vanished out into the hall’s depthless gloom.
Footsteps brought his eyes back to the torch where, he was astonished to see, a very familiar figure strode into its pool of light. He quickly scrambled to his feet. “Greetings, Nephril!” Over the subsiding echoes he added, in a lower voice, “So, what’re you up to in this forsaken place?”
Nephril leapt and rapidly scanned about, as he fell back to retrieve and brandish the torch, but Falmeard’s next call stopped him. “Up here, you old dog, on the stairs, ‘tis I, Falmeard.”
Nephril stepped towards him, or at least towards his voice, to put the glare of the torch behind. “In all that be certain, what art thou doing here?”
Falmeard carefully began to make his way down the stairs. “Now, I asked that question first!”
There was no reply until he’d reached the floor and was striding towards Nephril, who, he could now see, still held some uncertainty. However, a broad grin spread across his face, as Falmeard’s own came into the light.
“Well, I will be blowed! ‘Tis thee indeed, mine young friend. What a tonic it be to mine spirits, there be no naysaying.” Nephril rushed forward and clasped Falmeard by the shoulders, with his scrawny hands. Then, from down his angular nose, he searched Falmeard’s face.
For a moment they were silent, each staring at the other in disbelief, until Falmeard finally spoke, as he amicably clapped Nephril’s arms in greeting. “It’s a fillip to my own heart, you know, to stumble across you like this, and after all this time. How long’s it been, eh, you old scrote, how many years? And what on earth are you doing here, Nephril?” He broke away and opened his arms, as if to embrace the hall. “What brings you all the way from the coast, and your cosy chambers there, to this place, I wonder. Eh? Something special I’ve no doubt.”
When he turned back to Nephril, he could see the dim outline of a grin, despite it being largely in the torch’s shadow. It was confirmed when Falmeard walked around him, bringing Nephril’s following gaze fully into the light. “I can see, from your look, that you’re up to something, Nephril. I’ve never known you be abroad on little pretence. Come on, what are you up to then?”
Nephril grasped Falmeard’s arm and dragged him earnestly to the dais, up the steps and onto its platform. He then sat, cross-legged, inviting Falmeard to do the same.
Facing each other, in the flickering light, Nephril stared into Falmeard’s questioning eyes, his own pregnant with bound excitement. “The Certain Power must be with thee today, Falmeard, it must indeed, for thou art come upon the right place, certainly at the right time and into the right company. Ha! The one day in the year, eh, mine old mucker, when this vast hall hath purpose, when its slumbering emptiness be given over to one of Dica’s greatest and most cherished spectacles.”
He stopped and looked pensive. “Have I not shown thee this place afore? Surely I must have, eh, must have shared this wonder with thee at some time in the past, hmm?” Falmeard just shook his head. “I am surprised, mightily surprised. Oh well, better late than never, I suppose.” He then sank into his own ancient memories, seeming unconscious of Falmeard sitting impatiently before him.
“Well, Nephril? What is it you can show me here? What wonder lies in wait?”
Nephril jerked and looked completely surprised at being there at all, and quickly looked about. “Ah, yes, what indeed. Now, I do not wish to spoil it for thee, and have some things still to arrange, so I suggest thee hold back thy curiosity awhile and remain here, still and silent. Just sit where thee are but turn to face … that way, along the hall.” He pointed into the stark blackness and, without further word, sprang up, trotted back down the steps and was away into the shadows once more.
From where Nephril’s indistinct figure now moved, secretly beyond the columns, Falmeard could hear faint noises, as though drawers were being opened and metal objects tapped together. It went on for some time, with nothing happening, and so he turned instead to the blackness now hanging so pregnant before him.
It was whilst he was fruitlessly peering into the dark that he heard Nephril returning, turned and saw him race up the steps, bag in hand. “The time is nearly upon us, mine friend, nearly here.” With that, he threw the bag over the torch before Falmeard heard him sit at his side in the stifling darkness.
The shock of that utter lightlessness was palpable. Falmeard felt as though he’d been suffocated by tons of black felt cloth, a rising irrational fear clawing feverishly at the back of his neck. All manner of flashing lights careened across his sight, strange shapes he eventually realised were but inner delusions of the eye, remnants of the torch’s light and phantom creations of the blood now pounding at his temples.
Fortunately, Nephril’s voice brought some much needed calm. “It will not be long, Falmeard, not long at all now. The sun must be near its optimum place in the heavens and I have set its channelling as prescribed, so it should all …”
A single brilliant spot of blue-white light appeared far off in the hall, as singular as a star but thousands of times brighter. It drew both their eyes instantly and centred their attention. Then, slowly, it spread and faded, drawn to two duller clouds that serenely floated apart. They seemed to spill into their own vast and ornate, lace-like moulds that hung, unseen, in the inky blackness. Soon, they each began to coalesce and strengthen.
On the left, the chaos of lines and curves shortly condensed to the massive image of a penthdragon, its five heads held proudly erect, each bearing menacing red eyes, like embers of a fire. They stared down long snouts to grimacing mouths that spewed forth yellow fire and slate grey smoke. It sat back on its haunches, pawing at the blackness, whilst its talons dripped vivid red blood. Its whole ghastly, green body quivered and rippled with malevolent energy.
At the same time, but on the right, the jumble of veined light entwined to form a hippogriff, rearing its virgin white form against the penthdragon. Its pastel blue eyes stared serenely, below attentive ears, down at its gleaming, silver hooves, as they pawed the blackness between them. A searing blue-white main undulated from its neck whilst a full and long tail whipped at its muscled flanks. Yet, despite all the vast and life-like activity, there was not a single sound.
Falmeard’s face reflected that far off image in a mixture of stark horror and utter fascination. Nephril’s, though, reflected a pure and innocent reverie, one that transported him back to a long lost and almost forgotten time. Neither spoke, neither made even the slightest sound, as they sat transfixed. Between the two mythical figures another spot of brilliant white light appeared and steadily grew larger, as though drawing towards them.
It had a regular and rhythmic movement, steadily revealing itself as the form of a far off galloping horse. Pure white it was, and as silent as its attendant figures, remorselessly bearing down on them. Its head, and main and tail, each thrashed from side to side whilst its mouth snarled wide, throwing flecks of foam across neck and withers. When it soon drew near enough, they could plainly see its eyes firmly fixed to them both.
Although still deathly silent, its headlong gallop evoked the deafening sound of hooves, crashing upon marbled floor, until Falmeard was convinced he could actually hear it. He was, by then, so convinced he really did fear they’d soon be trampled underfoot.
Abruptly, it vanished and reappeared, still in full gallop. Nephril jolted and then gasped in surprise, the only noise he’d yet made. None of it registered with Falmeard, not against the surge of fear and wonder now coursing through his body, keeping him frozen, unable to think. In it all, though, the now gigantic stallion still thundered ever nearer but, as it should have crashed upon the dais, it abruptly came to a stamping halt and reared high above them.
Falmeard could almost smell the sweat pouring down its legs, so scarily clear and close. He could certainly see the stain of foam plainly smearing its neck and hear the rasping snorts steaming through its flared nostrils. Most terrifying of all was the look in its azure eyes, a look that wept so high and plaintively above them. From its briefly static rearing stance, its hooves swiftly descended towards them before they and the horse all vanished, leaving Falmeard with his arms protectively thrust above his head.
For a moment, in the silence, he cowered - eyes closed, arms aloft, expectant of sudden annihilation. It didn’t come and only left Falmeard, eventually, to sneak a look with one eye. Unbelievably, he saw they were once more quite alone. Still in the far distance, the two persistent mythic beasts continued to hover in the blackness whilst, between them, a sapling grew.
Slender and slight, it was glowing ghostly green and almost imperceptibly thrusting out new growth; a fresh leaf here, a new shoot there and all the while gaining bulk and girth. Soon, it stood proud, taller than its attendants, with a full crown of verdant foliage held aloft by an emerald bole. From between its spreading roots, a vermillion serpent slithered out and coiled itself about the trunk, as the hippogriff and penthdragon both froze. There, before them, immobile and massively splendorous in the dark, hung the very crest of the Realm of Dica.
How long Falmeard stared, in wonder, at that resultant emblem he couldn’t guess but would have continued so, open mouthed, had a repeated noise at his side not impinged. Slowly, he managed to tear his eyes away and look to where Nephril had been sitting only to find his place empty. He turned further and then saw him urgently trying to throw spark to the torch. He was clumsily using a flint and firesteel, but with some difficulty, though not for the want of dry tinder.
At last it caught and, in the light of the new ember, Falmeard saw in Nephril’s face a far off and confused look, a deep reverie tinged with sadness and disillusion. Nephril was so distracted, he couldn’t purse his lips enough to blow the ember to flame.
Falmeard stood, gently eased the torch from Nephril’s shaking hands and steadily blew until it was once more aflame. As it took hold Falmeard saw the suspended crest slowly dim until it vanished, once more, into the blackness.
When he looked at Nephril’s face in the torchlight, he saw in it only distress. When he listened more carefully, he could faintly hear his beseeching words. “It faltered! It did not run true. No. Surely not.”
Nephril nervously glanced at Falmeard before drifting off into its own far distance, before forlornly musing, “How can it be so? How can it be that Leiyatel did not play her part full, as she hath always done afore, over countless centuries?”
Falmeard placed his arm around Nephril’s shoulders and drew him close. “The winds of change, my friend. The winds of change. I’ve felt them before, though not as keenly as of late, but today I see it writ so plain upon your face.” Nephril then turned him a dazed and tear ridden face before simply smiling, uncertainly.
4 A Portent Witnessed
For the couple of hours since leaving the vast hall, Nephril had remained quiet but for the occasional brief replies to Falmeard’s valiant attempts at chat. At first, as they’d passed along innumerable sparsely lit passageways and under leaden skies above countless yards and courts, he’d seemed enmeshed in some kind of shame or disillusion, perhaps even grief.
By then, even Falmeard was becoming lost in the unfamiliar ways Nephril had found. His route had certainly seemed circuitous, as though keen to avoid busier precincts. When Nephril then turned to passages, stairways, tunnels and vaults buried deep within the castle’s thick skin, or through the mountains very rock, he found himself totally lost at last.
Those ways did seem to bring Nephril some comfort and so Falmeard a little more conversation. Mostly, though, Falmeard had simply followed the soft footfall of his old friend, until eventually they came to what appeared to be a dead-end.
“Mine ancient friend, although I dearly love thee as a
true brother would, I fear I must ask thee to avert thine eyes for a moment, whilst I make open mine chambers. I trust thou wilt take no offence, Falmeard, but will pander to an old man’s whims and so ensure his peace of mind.”
Falmeard waved his assent, in the meagre light of a nearby torch, and averted his eyes by turning and peering back along the gently curving passage. His wandering gaze noticed movement, near one of the few remaining lit torches back the way they’d come. Peering deeper into the gloom, he briefly saw a shadow dart back and out of sight. He swung about but just in time to catch Nephril’s hand move away from an apparently featureless part of the wall, as a section of it began to swing quietly outwards.
“Thou darest stain the bond I thought we had between us? Thou surprise me, Falmeard …”
“I saw something move, down there, back along the passage. Quick, give me your torch.” He was about to grab it from Nephril’s hand when his own was grasped surprisingly strongly. The torch went out as he was pulled harshly through the newly opened doorway.
With its closing thump, he found himself drawn close to Nephril who whispered urgently into his ear. “Accept mine apologies for mistrusting thee and manhandling thee so. If thou didst but know what we have so narrowly missed then thou wouldst gladly thank me.” At that, he quickly moved away and was lost for a moment, leaving Falmeard confused and, to be honest with himself, somewhat unnerved.
He heard a flint being repeatedly struck, a short distance away, until a newly fired torch flickered before him. He then asked Nephril what he’d meant, but his friend only demurred, promising to discuss it later, and certainly not before they’d eaten.
Nephril busied himself lighting the many candles about his chambers which gave Falmeard a chance to look around. It was certainly a cosy room, if somewhat small, and was lined with shelves piled high with books. Where the shelves were overburdened then the floor below was heaped, and where there weren’t books there were scrolls or loose parchments. Many had worn or torn spines, some missing altogether, but all had, at one time or another, been exquisitely tooled and inlayed.
Leiyatel's Embrace (Dica Series Book 1) Page 3