by Joan Lennon
Shut up, shut up, he thought, partly talking to the musician and partly to himself.
From the way he was squinting, it looked as if Hurple wasn’t enjoying the concert much either, and Jay and Adom appeared to be fighting the temptation to cover their ears with their hands.
And then it was over. The last note wailed away and the visitors unscrunched their shoulders and shuffled their cold feet, ready and eager to leave. But no one else moved. There was an uncomfortable silence, in which everyone in the tribe was staring at their little group, or at any rate, at the ice floor beside their little group. They still did not seem able to look the ferret god straight in the face.
Hurple, Eo, Adom and Jay went into a huddle.
‘I think they want me to do something,’ said Hurple, while trying not to move his lips. ‘Something to do with the statue.’
‘What – like, greet it somehow?’ said Jay. ‘Is that it?’
‘Well, perhaps…’
‘OK, don’t be thrown by it being made of ice. Just think about if it were a live ferret, what would you do, then?’
Hurple rubbed his nose with a paw. ‘Well, I’d probably touch noses and then grab it by the scruff and wrestle it to the ground, yipping loudly.’
The others exchanged glances.
‘Not perhaps what the moment requires…’ murmured Eo.
‘I think they want you to bless the statue,’ said Adom. ‘Not engage it in a bit of rough and tumble.’
‘It’s good to have a religious expert on board, for an expedition such as ours,’ said Hurple, nodding graciously at him. ‘That’s what I’ll do, then… uh, now, any advice on how to bless something?’
‘Look, it’s not as if you’ve never been blessed,’Jay put in impatiently. ‘You just have to do whatever the Columba guy did to you.’
Three pairs of utterly shocked eyes fixed on her.
‘What? What did I say?’ she asked.
‘Columba was a saint!’ said Eo. ‘Is a saint. Er, will be a saint.’
‘Well, he should know what he’s doing, then, shouldn’t he?’Jay had no time for their scruples. ‘You’re just going to have to wing it.’
There was a tiny pause, and then Hurple nodded. He flowed down from Eo’s shoulder and lolloped over the ice, as solemnly as his cold little paws would let him. Then he made a single graceful leap up into the ferret god’s niche. He leaned forward and touched his warm live nose to the statue’s icy one, and then, with an almost tender touch, he placed his paw on its forehead and closed his eyes. The ice cavern was utterly still for a moment, and then Hurple jumped lightly down again and ran across to Eo and the others.
‘I hope that was what they wanted,’ he murmured.
Jay made sure no one was watching, then leaned down and stroked his nose. ‘It was just right,’ she said. ‘I knew it would be.’
Just right,’ Adom agreed.
The Neanderthals seemed content as well. Each member of the tribe now came up to the statue to bow and murmur a few words. There was no polite way to leave before they had finished, so the four waited over to one side, trying not to let their teeth chatter too loudly.
Adom invited Hurple up on to his arm and then stepped away a little.
‘Could I have a word?’ he said quietly.
‘Surely What’s your problem?’
Adom looked uncomfortable. ‘It’s this – you know, the glacier – it’s just that there’s nothing like it in my time. Not that I’ve ever seen or heard tell of. So, what happens between then and now?’ he asked.
‘The world gets warmer,’ said Hurple. ‘The leading edges of the glaciers will recede hundreds of kilometres as the Ice Age ends.’
‘It all melts?!’ said Adom. All this?!’
The ferret nodded.
‘But… how will they feel, when their gods melt?!’
Hurple shrugged one narrow shoulder. ‘I expect they’ll feel abandoned.’
There was a moment’s pause in which the worshippers’ words could be heard whispering round the space in the icy air.
‘Hurple, is that why they – the Neanderthals – is that why they became extinct?’
‘It’s never just one thing… but I don’t see how it can have helped. Do you?’
‘No.’
‘They’re leaving now,’ said Eo, coming up behind them. ‘Can we go too? – I’m freezing!’
They waited until the last of the worshippers had filed out of the ice temple and then followed. Gratefully, they walked out of the glacier’s blank white wall, picked their way over its bow-wave of destruction and carried on into the trees. It was only then that they realized they had been left behind. It seemed the entire tribe had moved off down the hill without waiting for them.
‘It’s as if they’ve forgotten all about us!’ said Eo, surprised and hurt.
‘There’s no place for you.’
It was MakK. He was standing by a lichen-covered rock, so still in his scruffy furs that he looked like a rock himself.
‘I don’t understand,’ said Eo, so MakK explained, slowly and carefully, as if he were speaking to children.
‘Now that the god has breathed himself into the statue, it’s the god. There is no need to consider any other. Now that the slaves of the god have carried him to the place of the gods, there is no need to consider them either.’
Eo, Jay and Adom exchanged glances.
‘What will happen to us, then?’
‘You will go away’.
It was too close to the truth to argue about, but Jay argued anyway.
‘And what if we don’t just go away?’ she said.
‘They’ll drive you away.’
And if we keep coming back?’
MakK shrugged. ‘You wouldn’t. But I suppose, eventually, they’d have to kill you.’
Jay’ said Adom softly, ‘we’re going anyway. You know that.’ To MakK he said, ‘Can you show us the way back to the shore? It’s time we returned… the way we came.’
The Neanderthal nodded and, without another word, led the way downhill. They followed. Nobody seemed much in the mood for talking, but Hurple kept giving Eo worried looks.
Finally, he had to speak.
‘Look, lad, it’s just the way it is,’ he said. ‘Was. Is going to be. There’s nothing you can do to change things for these people.’
Eo didn’t answer for a moment, and then seemed to come to a decision.
‘Maybe not for all of them,’ he said, ‘but maybe…’ He turned to Jay. ‘Here, take the Professor for a bit, will you?’
‘Sure…’ She took Hurple into her hands and draped him over her shoulder, as Eo hurried forward. ‘Where’s he going, O Divine One?’
The ferret sighed. ‘Off the deep end and into left field, I suspect,’ he said.
Eo caught up with MakK as the track came out from among the trees. The Neanderthal slowed down a little, courteously, and smiled.
‘MakK, listen I… I’m worried about you,’ Eo began breathlessly. ‘I think you’re in danger. Some things the Professor – I mean, you know, the god – overheard… I think your tribe is –’
‘Going to exclude me soon,’ MakK finished for him. ‘Yes, I know. I’ve pretty much always known. They give you time, my people, to grow out of wanting to change things – but I’m well past the end of my time! They’ve been patient, but I just never could grow up. Look, it’s not changing that has always worked for us, as a tribe. As a people,’ MakK explained earnestly. ‘If we change we’d become something else. Staying the same is how we know we’re us.’
For a moment, Eo could only stare at him. The gulf was so great… Then he shook himself and got back to what he’d started to say.
‘I can’t save your people, but maybe I can save you, if you’ll let me,’ he said, wishing he wasn’t sounding quite as pompous as he knew he did.
‘Save my people from what? From not being like me? Don’t be foolish. Or do you mean you can save me from not being like them? EoG, don’t you think
others have tried? Don’t you think I’ve tried?!’ He gave that smile of his, and Eo suddenly saw how sad it was.
‘Come with us,’ he said with a catch in his throat. ‘I don’t care if you aren’t a warrior or a saint or, or anything – come with us.’
MakK just looked at him. Then he held out his hand. His pipe was in it.
‘This is for you,’ he said simply. ‘So you’ll remember.’
‘But –’
‘You’ll have no trouble finding your way back to the shore. Just follow the river down.’ He spoke to the others, who had caught up with them now.
‘You won’t come?’ Eo gave one last try.
MakK shook his shaggy head.
‘Goodbye, lad,’ said Hurple, a little hoarsely.
MakK bowed, but, like the others of his tribe, would not look a god in the eyes – not even a superfluous one.
Jay reached over and stroked MakK’s cheek with the back of her hand. ‘Goodbye,’ she said.
Adom gave him a nod. The Neanderthal turned and strode back up the valley with that ground-eating pace. Eo seemed frozen to the spot, unable to go forward or back.
Jay and Hurple looked at him and then headed off down the hill to the sea. Adom moved to join them. Then, as he passed Eo, he paused and said quietly, ‘That’s a large soul.’
‘What?’
‘Your friend. He has largeness of soul.’
‘Yes,’ said Eo after a bit. ‘That’s it, isn’t it? He does.’
Adom nodded again and carried on along the track. Eo stood for another moment and then, holding the bear-bone pipe tightly in his hand, started downhill after the others.
At a bend in the path, he looked back, wondering if MakK might still be there, watching them. But the slope was empty.
He was gone. And then, soon after, they were too.
11 The Throw of Interrupted Cadence
All G are youthful-looking, but Interrupted Cadence always, no matter what form he took, seemed to give the appearance of having only just fledged. Maybe his eyes were just that bit wider, or his skin that bit softer, or the shaping of his bones just that bit more delicate… Whatever the reasons, Interrupted was – and always would be – boyish in appearance. And because people saw him as younger than he really was, they tended to overlook him when adult matters cropped up.
Interrupted was used to this. In a way, he even preferred it. It is usually the less pleasant duties that fall to the adults of any population, and Interrupted was G enough to want to avoid anything that wasn’t much fun.
But now…!
Now it was his throw. Whatever he, Interrupted Cadence, chose to do on this pleasant autumn afternoon could decide the fate of the G for all foreseeable ages to come – and he wasn’t even sure what the choices were! If he lived a thousand years, he’d never feel old enough to do this.
‘What should I do? Where should I aim?’ he wailed, desperate for some answers.
‘Just fling the thing,’ Market Jones advised.
‘We haven’t exactly been successful with directing it, have we?’ agreed Hibernation Gladrag. ‘I can’t help thinking random chucks might have been a better strategy from the start.’ She was looking haggard and white-faced. They all were.
Hope was leaching away with every Tide. This latest visit to the people of the Ice Age might have yielded some long-lost tribal wisdom on dealing with the eldritch dimensions… but somehow Interrupted doubted it.
‘Here it comes!’
Interrupted squared his shoulders and planted his feet firmly at the edge of the tidemark. For some reason it seemed important to notice exactly where the Traveller re-emerged, but, as always, it was too sudden. In a blink it was already there and hurtling towards the beach, contracting down from the height of a man at incredible speed. The Queen plucked it out of the air with arrogant carelessness – and instead of playing about with it, as she had done before, immediately lobbed it at Interrupted. He yelped in surprise, and when the vortex made contact with his skin, he yelped again. It was cold – piercingly, shockingly cold. It hurt to hold it…
… and then he did something he hadn’t planned to do. He cradled the Traveller in close to himself and breathed on it, as if it were a freezing bird that had fallen out of the sky, or a small animal needing warming. He wasn’t sure why it seemed right to do so, or why, when he made his throw, it was with quite a gentle action. But that was how it was. Hibernation gave him a sign at the moment of the tide’s turn. Interrupted threw. The Traveller arced over the wet sand, dropped down – and once again was gone.
‘Best bet?’ murmured Market Jones.
Interrupted nodded. ‘Let’s see what I’ve just done,’ he said in a husky voice, and turned back to the disc.
12 The Fifth Tide
Jay was dreaming – the nightmare that kept coming back. With no body she shouldn’t have cared about the cold and the dark and the ceaseless whirling round and round – she shouldn’t have even been aware of it – but knowing it was impossible didn’t help. Nothing helped, not even the silent words she kept saying in her mind: It can’t go on much longer, it can’t go on much longer…
The end came without warning, but instead of crashing in a heap with Adom and Eo and Hurple, all together on some new shore, she was suddenly wrenched away from the others by a current of water powering in the opposite direction. She shot sideways, completely submerged, completely helpless. She started to breathe too soon, and saltwater flooded into her mouth and burned her throat, but just as she thought, This is drowning, the current flung her, retching and gasping, up to the surface and on to a tumble of jagged rocks.
She didn’t know where she was, but she was out of the Traveller and that was a blessing all on its own. She looked about her, trying to see where the boys and Hurple had fetched up…
The stark landscape of the Ice Age was gone and a more temperate scene had taken its place. The sea filled a wide channel at her back, with misty hills in the distance across the way. Before her, there was a narrow heathery shoreline with low cliffs rising from it, on up to a high rounded peak. Compared to the world she’d just left, this one seemed full of colour – russets and greens, and the sky was beautifully blue… It was as she was gazing up at it that she saw the girl, following a path along the bottom of the cliff.
‘Hey! Hello!’Jay croaked, but her voice had no strength. She felt bruised all over and close to tears. ‘Please…’
The sharp shells of barnacles were cutting into her hands and her throat felt raw but she scrambled higher, frantic to get the girl’s attention.
‘Hey! HEY!’
The girl paused and looked vaguely back up the path, then ahead again – but not at the rocks on the shoreline.
Whimpering with frustration, Jay made one more effort. Teetering dangerously on the rock spines, she half stood up and began to wave her arms.
‘I’m HERE! Help me! HEL ‘
It was one effort too many. Her foot slipped, and in trying to find her balance again she stepped back and on to a patch of slimy seaweed. Arms windmilling, Jay crashed over, hit her head on the rocks and knew no more.
‘I’m extremely fed up with being wet all the time!’ said Eo – more or less.
What he actually said was full of colourful vocabulary which Professor Hurple certainly never taught him. Squelching further up the pebbly beach, he pulled at the wet straps of his bag to let the ferret out.
At least it’s not freezing wet this time. You all right, Adom?’ he called over this shoulder. Adom?’ The silence made him look round. ‘What’s up – where’s Jay?’
Adom was standing there, looking down at his hand, too shocked even to be sick.
‘I had her,’ he croaked, ‘and then… she just wasn’t there any more!’ He looked over at Eo, white-faced.
‘You let her go?! Eo charged up to him and grabbed him by the shoulders. You left her in the Traveller:’!’
Adom shook his head slowly, like a bewildered beast. ‘No… no, I’m sure we w
ere out of it, because I remember I actually could feel her hand – but we were still under the water… and then she was just ripped away…’
The sound of pebbles crunching interrupted him.
fay! the two boys cried, turning in sudden hope –just as a rough net was thrown over their heads, entangling their arms and legs until they both crashed helplessly on to the shingle.
The girl glaring down at them wasn’t Jay.
‘What are you doing?’ spluttered Eo.
‘Let us out this minute!’ Adom commanded, though the squeak in his voice undermined the effect a little.
The girl didn’t reply. Instead, she put her hands up to her mouth and let out a long, yodelling cry. It was obviously some sort of signal, and at a volume that would carry for quite a distance. And all the time she didn’t take her eyes off them, not for a second, as if she were expecting them to leap up and attack at any moment.
In reality they couldn’t have successfully attacked a piece of wet bread in their current tangled state.
After some more blustering and a bit of wheedling, the two boys gave up. Their captor was not going to let them out any time soon, or chat about her reasons for packaging them, though she did give a sour little smile when Eo complained to Adom about the way his elbow was poking him in the eye.
Another girl appeared round the rocks. ‘Moira?’ she called. ‘You all right? I came ahead – the others are on their way. What’s up? Yeurch!’ She gave a strangled cry and leapt back as she caught sight of the lump under the net. ‘What kind of catch is that?!’
‘Something for the Old Woman.’ The one she’d called Moira spoke for the first time.
The new girl looked closer.
‘Goodness – more!’
‘What do you mean, more?’ asked Eo, thrashing frantically to get the new arrival into view. ‘Has anyone else been found? A girl? Is she all right?’