Eldritch wights lacked the ability to tell lies, as everyone knew, and trows were no exception.
“Tae our knowin’, that ye cannae do,” solemnly said the first trow-wife, she who had asked for the clean water. “Boats cannae cross Stryksjø. Drowners and fuathan rive boats. Waterhorses devour boatmen.”
“Would it be possible to build a bridge?” asked Arran, as he had asked once before, in another place.
“Fuathan break bridges.”
“Is there any chance we might cross Stryksjø by sky-balloon?”
“Ælf-archers are cunning. They are not shooting awry. Balloons shall fall.”
The trow-wives continued to withdraw into the gloom, but Arran said desperately, “Tell us about the Well of Dew. Is it out there?”
The wights shrieked, and would have fled except that Arran thwarted them. He stared straight at them, without blinking, ignoring their moans. His unfaltering scrutiny seemed to hold them immobilized. “Tell us,” he insisted.
“On Ragnkull Island in Stryksjø lies the Well of Dew,” they cried shrilly. They would say nothing else. Ultimately Arran gave in and released them, whereupon they vanished into the night.
The impression of unseen crowds dissipated, and the weathermasters intuited that once again they were alone in the juniper glade. They relaxed a little, but did not let down their guard.
“I shall take first watch,” said Rivalen. “The rest of you, bed down in the warmth of the tents and seize what sleep you can. There are precious few hours until the morning.”
“Arran, how did you prevent the henkies from escaping when you wished to question them?” Gahariet wanted to know, as Rivalen stoked the fire and the young men rearranged their sleeping-furs and leathers.
“ ’Tis an old trick I learned from my father. As long as one keeps one’s eye on them they are unable to disappear. By that means I had hoped to learn something of use to us, but I have failed.”
Diminutive points of light glowed forth from amongst the foliage of the junipers at the glade’s borders. It was as if the boughs had been festooned with strings of miniature lamps; gentle pink, pastel green, and mellow gold, so soft and mild their shining seemed to be filtered through gauze.
“What’s that?” Gahariet blurted.
After a pause, Rivalen said pensively, “Methinks ’tis nothing ill. I daresay they are merely the lights of the hurtless siofra. Be unworried. Sleep, now. I shall waken you all if anything seems amiss.”
“I shall sleep under the stars tonight,” said Arran. He rolled himself up in furs and a sheet of canvas, and stretched out on the ground.
The temperature dropped. A high-altitude wind was blowing the clouds away. In the clear skies, stars evolved. Those that shone from far off were dim, gauzy scarves of mist; the closer stars sparkled brilliantly, hard, crystalline points, purest dazzling white.
Crossing his arms behind his head, Arran lay back and gazed at the splendor of the constellations, without seeing it. Once, he had placed duty to Ellenhall above all else, but love had altered him. These days, fealty to that code stood second in line. Jewel was never absent from his thoughts. Always, in some guarded corner of his mind, he treasured a picture of her. Sometimes, when he was free to wander in the labyrinths of his own reasoning, he would allow himself to gaze at this mental image. He would dwell on her laugh, her gestures, the blue flash of her eyes, some chance remark she had made in passing, the way her hair lay against her cheek like a fan of softest swan’s down. He would visualize the graceful way she walked, the lissom willow-wand of her waist, the svelte contours of her form, and after torturing himself with bittersweet fancies he would become sick with longing, and endeavor to thrust her from his awareness in order that he might find peace.
Gradually, slumber overtook Arran, Bliant, and Gahariet. Later, Rivalen passed the duty of the Watch to Bliant, who, at the end of his shift, was replaced by Gahariet.
Near morning before dawn, when darkness still lay across the countryside, the sleepers were roused by the voice of the journeyman calling urgently, “Awake! Awake!”
Immediately the weathermasters cast aside their covers and sprang from the tents, snapping to alertness. Gahariet hurled handfuls of kindling on the fire, causing it to flare.
A black horse was trotting around the outskirts of the clearing.
It moved so lightly through the soundless rain of starlight that it seemed not subject to the attraction of the ground, but suspended from above on invisible wires. Graceful and fluid were its steps, elegant its shape, exquisite the sheen of its hide. It was like a beast made of molten obsidian, the volcanic glass, with its shiny, curved surfaces.
Courteously, timorously, the lovely creature approached the men, extending its long head inquiringly, as if to sniff at them. Rivalen snatched a burning stick from the fire and the horse jumped back.
“Not so hasty, Master Hagelspildar,” murmured Bliant, placing a restraining hand on Rivalen’s elbow. “Conceivably this is a real horse. Perhaps it has escaped from its owners and is now lost, seeking human company. See how fine and well-bred it is.”
“Do not be taken in,” warned Rivalen. “There are things in the wilderness that are masters of deception. It is hardly likely one would find a tame horse out here in the remote regions of Grïmnørsland.”
“And yet,” Bliant said wistfully, “fain would I ride such a steed.”
The horse pricked up its ears and trotted closer to Bliant. It stood shyly, at a safe distance from Rivalen and the fire; then, extending one foreleg like a dancer, it bowed prettily.
“See!” Bliant cried delightedly. “It offers itself to be ridden. How skillfully it has been trained!” He stepped toward the creature, but Arran pulled him back.
“Don’t go near it,” he advised. “Look away, Bliant. You ought to know better! It is drawing you under its spell. Take heed also, Gahariet; do not look at the horse.” Firmly he grasped the arms of his friends, and refused to let them go.
Rivalen advanced on the creature, waving the firebrand in one hand, his long knife in the other. “Avaunt!” he shouted. “Avaunt, you wicked wight, or we shall smite you with cold iron!”
Coquettishly, the winsome steed pranced a little.
“Bo shrove!” Rivalen called out the ancient words of warding, and drew back his knife-wielding arm.
Suddenly the horse flattened its ears to its skull and drew back its lips. Its maw, instead of housing the square teeth of a herbivore, was filled with the long, cruel spikes of fangs. The manifestation snorted wrathfully and galloped away. Through the still freeze of the night, the men heard the sound of the splash as it entered the lake-water.
The fire ate itself away to a smolder.
“That was a wicked beguiler, and no mistake,” said Rivalen, sheathing his knife.
There was no more sleep to be had before dawn.
The weathermasters sat cross-legged, or leaned against their packs. Scant conversation took place between them. It was a habit instilled by training that at times when there was little else to do but wait and watch, they would put forth their brí-working faculties to diagnose the current state of the weather. Invisible rivers became apparent to them; currents of chilled air flowing down the surrounding slopes into valleys and dingles and frost-hollows. As their awareness extended outward through the plenum they detected temperature, wind speeds and directions, and cloud cover. They traced systems of high or low pressure, and sensed electrical forces building up and discharging. They quantified humidity, and inhaled the scents of forest and soil.
The eight winds blew through their consciousness.
Arran, who could reach farthest, perceived gravity waves high in the troposphere, moving across deep convective clouds. They were creating lee waves above the mountains. Higher still, and he was cognizant of powerful jet streams flowing at great speeds through the lower stratosphere. Extending his perception in the opposite direction, he became aware of volcanic activity deep beneath the crust of the world, and of j
uvenile water being pumped up from far down in the mantle, to be expelled at the surface for the first time since its conception.
In the forest clearing where the weathermasters bivouacked, the temperature had plummeted. Vapor from the air had condensed, forming ice-crystals that coated the surfaces of each grass-blade. Some of the leaves and branches around the glade were now adorned with bunches of spiky white needles of hoar frost. Upon encountering the drop in temperature, the fogs that had stealthily arisen from Stryksjø began to congeal also, forming rough crystals, white and opaque, and depositing them as rime on every needle of every juniper tree. Black-boled, black-boughed stood the junipers, but their hair turned gray-white, as if they had aged many years over a few hours.
Far away, over the western ocean, a stationary depression with an associated cold front was building up. The weathermasters sensed it, as their brí-faculties coursed through the regional troposphere.
Yet, for all their skills, how could they guess that many leagues away Fionnuala and four of her mercenaries were sleeping, while the fifth kept watch? How could they suspect that with each passing day the archer with the poisoned arrows was closing in on them?
Later that morning the sun climbed high above the southern peaks of the Nordstüren, the lofty ranges fencing northern Grïmnørsland from Narngalis. Its dilute rays melted the frosts and hunted the mists of the lake country so that they must flee to hide in hanging valleys. Bright daylight flecked the diamond-clear water of Stryksjø with glinting silver fish-scales, and enriched the colors of the landscape: the brilliant greens of the mosses, the black-browns of the rocks, the albescence of the snows on the highest crags.
The most recent explorations of the weathermasters had proved fruitless, and they returned to the campsite in low spirits.
“Two nights have we bided here, and we are no closer to reaching the isle,” Arran said. “Impatience gnaws at me.”
“Hunger gnaws at me,” said Gahariet. “The sun is at its zenith. It must be time for the midday meal.”
“Dine if you wish,” said the young Maelstronnar. “For my part, I shall go to look at these ruins of which you and Rivalen spoke.”
“In that case I will come with you,” said Bliant, prudently filling a pouch with dried fruits, to bring as rations.
Without much difficulty the two young men forced a path through the hazel brakes and located the site of the abandoned Oratorium. Once they had arrived, Bliant sat on the remains of the stairs and munched desiccated medlars, while Arran investigated. In due course he came upon the mosaic floor discovered by Gahariet, and knelt to study the designs.
The pictures, although chipped and mutilated by weathering, were still legible. They appeared to depict an old druidic favourite, “The Marvels of the Fates,” a tableau in which Lord Ádh was always shown walking on treetops or oceans or clouds, Míchinniúint, Lord Doom, flew unaided through the air, Cinniúint, Lady Destiny, passed unscathed through fire carrying her spindle, and an empty space was left for Mí-Ádh, Lady Misfortune, because she had become invisible.
“What have you learned?” Bliant’s voice was distorted by a mouthful of food.
“Nothing,” said Arran, in despair. “Nothing at all.”
Having so far discovered nothing to further the quest, he sank into silent despondency.
Weathermastery
Deep in the wilds of Grïmnørsland, Fionnuala Aonarán and her five mercenaries were galloping through a beech forest. They had been traveling for more than a fortnight—since 6th Ninembre, when they set out from Cathair Rua. Their journey had been fast and hard.
Through dark forests they had passed, and over rolling water-meadows, across bridges that spanned rivers of ice, and around the rocky shores of tarns layered beneath mists. In this rugged land the streams flowed fast and noisy; the winds were edged with broken glass. Blowing clouds and snowy peaks pondered on their reflections in profound lakes whose steep shores were clothed with tiers of black alder, elm, birch, and maple. Long cascades of snow-melt, chained in rainbows, tumbled down sheer precipices.
The landscape’s beauty eluded the travelers. Its harshness did not.
The wilderness of this western kingdom teemed with eldritch wights. It being a region of many waters, it was the haunt of numerous waterhorses, fuathan, lake-maidens, and watercattle. The placid surfaces of the lakes hid the secret abodes of aughiskis, phookas, cabyllushteys, and kelpies; the lairs of bloodthirsty fuathan that were nameless, the dwelling-places of the gentle, seelie asrai and the gwragged annwn, the crodh-mara and the gwartheg-y-llyn. The forests harbored an assortment of seelie and unseelie entities, including bogies and bogles, hobyahs and red-caps, warners and the melancholy trows. Murderous duergars roamed there, and hobgoblins and Jacks-in-Irons. Compared with these deadly incarnations, the wolverines and brown bears seemed relatively un-daunting.
Encounters with dangerous wights hampered the progress of Fionnuala and her henchmen. More than once they were forced to flee for their lives, or to make wide detours around perilous places. Ruthlessly, the riders pushed their horses to the limits. Three of their mounts perished from exhaustion and illtreatment. They stole replacements from remote settlements, and when the stolen horses collapsed beneath them they thieved some more.
These sparse villages were tiny. Steeply pitched roofs topped houses that huddled together for warmth. Built of locally quarried stone, they looked to be growing out of the hillsides. Their chimneys stood up like rows of trees, with smoke for foliage. Behind the houses the mountains towered, their shoulders patched with snow. Villages were useful to Fionnuala’s band. They supplied horses; they also supplied food, which the men seized at knifepoint. Fionnuala had no time to waste on the courtesies of hospitality.
“Speed is of the essence,” she would say. Ever she looked to the skies, searching for the white mote of thistledown that signified a weathermasters’ balloon. “Curse them and their aircraft,” she would rail. “We must beat them. We must be pressing on, without rest, or they will overtake us. Perhaps they have already done so. Perhaps they have passed us in the sky, and I have not spied them.”
“What’s the prize we seek?” the men wanted to know.
“You are not paid to ask questions. You shall see when we get there.”
Settlements were few, and therefore food supplies were limited. Sometimes at dusk, they hunted, in order to avoid becoming weak from lack of nourishment. Wielding her crossbow, Fionnuala shot hares and squirrels. Once, she brought down a young reindeer.
“ ’Tis not inconceivable the weathermaster reached High Darioneth by the 20th,” Fionnuala calculated, muttering to herself. “If he departed by air on the same day, he would have arrived at the lake by now. Nonetheless, if that is true ’tis possible he has not managed to obtain the prize yet. There might well be difficulties. He believes he has limitless time to surmount any challenges. He has no notion that I am on the trail. He has no reason to hasten. It might yet be myself who is the winner.”
She scanned the skies once more, then jabbed her heels into her horse’s flanks, shouted to the men, and galloped away.
At the site of the ruined Oratorium Bliant Ymberbaillé finished chewing and began idly throwing the medlar-pits at the decaying stub of a column.
His third pitch missed the mark and the missile landed amid a patch of alpine spear-grass. Instantly a shrill shrieking broke out, mingled with indignant jabbering. The grass-stems shivered. The shiver traveled, passing away through the hazels and snow daisies, and the hubbub faded.
“Methinks our presence here at Stryksjø has attracted plenty of onlookers,” surmised Bliant. “ ’Twould be wise of us to speak softly, if we speak of important matters. Our every word is likely to be overheard.”
There was no response to be had from Arran.
“Let’s go, my friend,” Bliant said, hurling the last of the fruit-stones into the hazel brakes. “This place hides no secrets, and sleeveless pursuit grows tedious.”
Arran left off
his close examination of the old mosaics and rose to his feet. “As you wish,” he said absently.
Together they beat a path back to the campsite, Bliant whistling as he walked, the other thoughtful and silent.
“What’s on your mind?” Bliant asked, eventually noting his friend’s unwonted taciturnity.
“An extraordinary notion has occurred to me. I am formulating a stratagem, which I shall reveal to all when we reach camp.”
Bliant allowed his friend to deliberate and did not question him further.
Back at the campsite the four weathermasters seated themselves around the fire, crosslegged on their canvas groundsheets.
“Master Ymberbaillé tells us you have been inspired,” Rivalen said to the young Maelstronnar.
“In sooth, I have. It came to me as I gazed upon the tiles in the Oratorium. In how many ways is it possible to cross water? One might go by boat or bridge or by air, but there is a fourth method.”
His companions regarded him quizzically.
“One might walk across,” said Arran.
After a pause, Rivalen said, “Surely you jest.”
“One might walk across without sinking, if water were solid,” said Arran. “And what is solid water, but ice?”
“By all the storms of Winter!” Gahariet said incredulously. “You don’t mean to freeze the entire lake, do you?”
Bliant burst out laughing. “But that is marvelous!” he cried. “The best invention I’ve heard of since Darglistel engineered a secret entrance into the larder at Long Gables!” Then he subjoined, “ ’Tis a shame it will not work, of course.”
“Why should it not?” argued Arran. “We are four in number, and between us we can command formidable power. Hereabouts, the temperatures are already low. We could muster enough clouds to form heavy overcast during the day, thus keeping the area around Stryksjø shielded from incoming solar radiation, then drive away the clouds at night to allow maximum outgoing infrared radiation. If we can do that, there is a fair chance we might freeze the lake—or at least, solidify enough of it to form an ice-bridge between the near shore and Ragnkull Island.”
The Well of Tears: Book Two of The Crowthistle Chronicles Page 48