"Your friend Rasscu has been several days in this state of half-life. Usually, as Tsandro will have told you, a person either comes out of it by himself within a day or so or he dies. Rasscu will also have to come out of it by himself, there is no other way; but something is holding him in the world of dreams and he will need help to break free. I must reach him there and try to awaken his consciousness. Anything you can tell me about him will help."
"But we hardly know him," Caldar said despairingly. "We only met him the day before he fell down that hole. I don't know if we can help at all."
"Try. It may not seem much, but just tell me what you can remember."
Prompted by the tinker and by each other, they were surprised at how much they could recall. The old man wanted to know every word, every action, every mood, gesture and expression they could remember. They were cold and the stars were out, before they finished and went in to the warmth of the fire. Caldar looked towards where Rasscu lay, white and motionless as before, feeling strangely hopeful and closer to the still figure then he had for days.
The tinker made an infusion of leaves in hot water, a traditional Hamna drink he said. It was a comforting brew, especially in the cool of the evening. Then in response to his questions, the boys told him about their lives in the Rimber valley. It seemed a very long way away now. Even Hamdrim at the Rails belonged to another world, a safer more ordinary world, whose boundaries had suddenly split open.
Berin was the first to start yawning and minutes later was asleep in his blankets. Caldar went to bed also, but lay watching as the tinker began to prepare the herbs. Some of them he washed and then ground up in a little bowl, mixing in a little water. Others he chopped up. And then picking up a handful from yet another bundle, he threw it on the fire. A subtle scent began to fill the tirot, bitter-sweet, making Caldar feel drowsy and lively at the same time. He fought to stay awake for a while, then slipped into a dream-filled sleep.
He was in a tent, with two large poles holding up the roof. A woman picked him up and held him in her arms. He was immensely comforted by her nearness, her smell, her voice. Then he was outside, still in her arms, bouncing along above a huge expanse of grass, which stretched away to the horizon. Gradually the images came faster. Days and nights of journeying and dwelling in the tent: a man who held him also, who made him feel safe: another presence in the tent, a crying baby: gatherings of lots of tents, where he ran about with other children: learning stories by heart and singing long songs which were stories too: times of hunger: frightening dust storms: festivals full of dancing and exotic food: a young girl, his sister, his constant companion: the growing responsibility of helping to care for horses and flocks of sheep, finding grazing, finding water: and then girls, everywhere girls with dark flashing eyes and enticing bodies who sometimes frustrated him and sometimes did not. Suddenly the racing images stopped and began again slowly and with menace. He was asleep in the tent with his parents and his sister, yet he could see the riders who surrounded them in the dark. The flocks were being driven off, when he awoke and went outside. The riders surrounded him and beat him senseless. There was a pause full of foreboding.
He awoke again to pain. Pain in his body he discovered at once. It was forgotten when he found the tent burned and empty. He staggered along in the dark following the broad trail the raiders had left across the grassland, and at dawn came to their abandoned camp. His father's mutilated body he found at once, then his mother naked and stabbed to death. Of his sister there was no sign.
He buried his parents, and as he set off again walking along the killers' trace, the images again began to accelerate. Travelling, asking, gathering information, the certainty increasing all the time about the raiders and the conviction growing that his sister was also dead. Other isolated families had also suffered and none of those captured had survived. The raiders had eventually killed them all in terrible ways. Life gradually became normal again, but underneath it all was a void, an aching loss and a grief which had never been assuaged or released. Instead a scar had formed to cover it, a shell hard as iron which kept the pain at bay, a shell called vengeance. Then the dream faded and the welcome blankness of sleep enfolded him.
Caldar came slowly awake. The dream was still with him. It had been so real that he had to look round to be sure where he was. This was the domed Hamna tirot and there was the tinker still sitting by the fire. Settling down he turned on his side towards where Rasscu lay, and went rigid with fear. He was looking straight into a pair of huge yellow eyes that regarded him unwinkingly. In the dim firelight he could just make out the muzzle and the furry ruff of an enormous wolf, lying just a pace away.
An instant earlier Caldar had been grateful for the reassurance of the Hamna tent and the tinker's familiar figure after the aching sadness of his dream. Now he was terrified again. He sat up very slowly. The yellow eyes watched him, unblinking and unreadable. Very softly he called "Tinker." Silence. He did not dare take his eyes off the animal. Its presence so close was overpowering and his breath came short and fast. "Tinker," he called again a little louder. There was a long sigh from the fireplace, as if the old man had been dozing. Then at last the tinker spoke.
"Yes, Caldar? Oh, you're trying to stare out our wolf friend, are you? Well, good luck to you. He's a very patient starer."
The cheerful tone released Caldar from the stasis which had gripped him. He turned his head and tried to sound normal, as he said, "S'wolf . . ." His throat dried up. He swallowed and tried again. "This wolf is a friend?"
"Yes, he's come to help us. If you want to come over here by the fire, I'll tell you about it. Don't be afraid of him. He's not hungry and he's not frightened of you, so you're completely safe."
The wolf's muzzle was resting on the ground and its eyes were closed, when Caldar looked again. As soon as he started to get up, the eyes snapped open and followed him as he moved cautiously to the fire. Before he sat down he glanced over at Rasscu, stared for a moment, then collapsed weakly to a sitting position, feeling trembly, tearful and very sorry for himself. He didn't understand anything that was going on. There was another wolf on the other side of the patient, the pair of them lying so close that the herdsman was almost hidden by their fur. Had this fearsome old man lured them all away from the Hamna to let the wolves eat them? Or was he just trying to frighten them? Or perhaps he had been one of the terrifying raiders in the dream.
Caldar was in fact exhausted and his mind started to spin through a random series of fantastical fears. He was only half aware of the tinker handing him a steaming cup and saying, "Here. Drink this." Whatever it was, the liquid made him glow right down to his toes. His mind cleared. He still felt pleasantly tired, but his fears had now become questions and there was a lot he wanted to know.
The tinker anticipated his first query. "Your friend is already on his way back to us. But his body stopped functioning properly for a long time and he needs help to get his whole system working again. There's no better way to do that than contact with another body, and wolves have more than heat to offer. These two," he looked at the wolves affectionately, "don't really like being inside the tirot, but they agreed to come in for a while. That's one of the reasons I wanted to leave the camp. They're comfortable enough with the Hamna when they're out in the open; but they get uneasy in confined spaces with lots of people about, let alone the dogs."
In his new-found clarity, Caldar discovered that he could come to terms with these extraordinary statements quite straightforwardly. "D'you mean that you can talk to them?" He inclined his head at the wolves, not wanting to point.
"I don't exactly talk to my furry friends here, but we understand each other. We communicate. The Hamna do it too in their own way and to some extent anyone can." He gave Caldar a sly look. "Try it yourself. You'll never get a better chance."
"But what do I do?"
"Start by thinking wolf. Shut your eyes and start using your nose. Imagine yourself inside their skin, experiencing the world as they do."
Caldar tried. He really tried. But the images that formed in him were always vague and shifting and soon dissolved. After ten minutes he felt his attempts becoming more fragmented than ever and opened his eyes to find both wolves watching him.
"I can't. Every image and feeling slips away from me as soon as I touch it. I don't think I'll be any good at this. I don't see how I can even begin to experience what they do." The tinker had sat looking into the fire while Caldar made his efforts. He turned and looked quizzically at the boy. "It's hard at first. There’s another way, which is even harder, but let's give it a try as a little experiment. Look at the fire and withdraw your thoughts and your sensations into your body."
Everything inside Caldar went quiet all at once and his body seemed to start pulsating with life.
"Now find yourself inside there."
The instant the words were said, Caldar was aware of himself, a living presence that filled his body to the brim, from the tips of his toes to the hairs on his head. Unbidden he reached out to the wolves, both of whom sat up and looked at him. He found himself directly in touch with their thoughts and feelings and realised that he too was wide open to them without reservation or deception. It was uncomfortable not to be able to hide, but profoundly satisfying as well. And without sound words formed between them.
"Greetings young one we are in your tent to assist the oldest one are you his offspring"
"No."
"That is interesting he has great concern for you."
The other wolf joined in. "You are different tonight we met you on the hillside in the darkness and guided you to the fire you were frightened"
"Yes I was I had never met wolves before and I have never talked to any before tonight"
"That is remarkable young one we have not encountered another human so transparent as you except the oldest one now we must lie down again and attend to this sick human we will talk again."
As the wolves stretched out beside Rasscu, a voice said beside Caldar, "Interesting, isn't it?"
It took him a moment to realise that it was the tinker who had spoken. And as he began to respond, he found to his dismay that his own inner presence had vanished completely.
"The feeling inside..... it's gone. When you asked me to find myself inside, I did, but it's gone."
"Don't worry. It’s called ‘touching the ground’: sounds simple, but it's not a thing which stays around for long. Anyway our friends here are bringing Rasscu on very quickly. He turned the corner some hours ago and I think a couple of days will see him sitting up and talking."
"I can't believe it. He still looked like a corpse last night. Are you sure?"
"Yes, I'm sure." The tinker smiled. "It's a little difficult to explain how. Let's just say I had to go into Rasscu's dreamworld and find him and then arouse his own wish to come back into this world. You helped me yourself. That's why you're here."
"I helped you? That's why I'm here?", Caldar repeated stupidly. "You mean the dream. The dream was Rasscu's and you needed me to have the dream and….." His rush of words died away. "I don't understand."
"I’d be more worried if you did, you’re moving quite fast enough already,” the tinker said cheerfully. “Of the people here only you and your friend Berin had any contact with Rasscu when he was conscious. From that I was hoping that you could 'reconstruct' his life. And you did. The dream you had was of Rasscu's life. I wanted to know the whole texture of it and I also needed some experience from it strong enough to make a bridge into his dream world. The raid was ideal."
"Did it all really happen?"
"Oh yes. The dream was real."
"It was terrible. Not just frightening, like the avalanche or the wolves. The feelings went on and on, like a wound that never heals. I felt afraid and awfully sad and full of anger and hatred, all at the same time." Caldar fell silent. He looked straight at the tinker. "How can you use something so terrible, and say it's ideal? Isn't it better left undisturbed in the past?"
The old man looked back at Caldar gravely for a moment, then nodded his head as if in acknowledgment. "It's a fair question, Caldar; but another of those which would take far too long to answer properly tonight. I think we’ll have the chance to talk more often in days to come, you and I. For the moment just accept that that 'terrible' experience, as you call it, was exactly what was needed to reach Rasscu and that leaving such things 'undisturbed in the past' is not possible anyway. Those events provided a bridge tonight, but they were also imprisoning him. He didn’t want to come back and face those memories all over again; it was easier to let go and die. Enough. Enough." He raised both his hands, as the boy opened his mouth. "We've both had a tiring night. Let’s try to snatch a little sleep before dawn."
**
Sunshine woke Caldar early. It streamed in through the doorway and he could feel the warmth of it through the tirot walls. As recollections from the night came flooding back he sat up, eager to tell to Berin about the wolves. They were gone. So was the tinker. No matter, the story was good enough. He shook his friend’s shoulder.
"Hey, Berin, wake up. You missed the excitement last night. There were two wolves in the tent, over here next to Rasscu."
The effect on Berin was all he could have wished. His friend sat up, round-eyed with amazement. And then he began to smile. "No, you're pulling my leg. I don't . . ."
"No, really Berin. They were right here." Caldar pointed to the floor beside Rasscu's bed. "They were here to help Rasscu get better and the tinker said he'll be alright in a day or two."
Berin's smile had faded into uncertainty, still not believing, but Caldar felt it was a good start. He scrambled across to Rasscu’s side and saw at once that the patient's face was different.
"Hey, Berin, come here. Look at his face. He actually looks alive again."
"I think I can see him breathing." Berin bent right down. "Yes, I can hear him too."
Both the boys felt as if a great unseen weight had been lifted from them. They smiled at each other in pure delight for the first time for days.
"I'm going for a swim," Caldar announced for no special reason.
Within minutes a fine water fight was in progress, watched with some amusement by the tinker, who waited until the worst violence was over before making himself heard.
"Breakfast in half an hour. I'll need some water, but fetch it from further upstream, won't you?"
From then on it turned out to be a day spent doing nothing much, which would normally have driven the boys to distraction. This time they revelled in it. Lying in the sun, making a half-hearted attempt to find mushrooms in the forest, gathering more wood, and talking all the time about everything that had happened to them and everything which in wild imaginative leaps they guessed might happen. Rasscu was recovering and it gave them a deep contentment which made the smallest things pleasant, even washing pans in cold water after supper.
The tinker had spent most of the day in the tirot with Rasscu. Whenever they looked in, he had been sitting motionless with closed eyes next to his patient, and sometimes they heard him chanting something in strange breathy tones. Towards evening he had prepared a wonderful meal, consisting mostly of delicious fungi. Afterwards they sat outside again, watching the evening sunlight turn the peaks opposite to gold. There was a feeling of peace and the beginnings of something more between them: they had all shared in different ways in Rasscu's near-death and recovery and even the old man was no longer a complete stranger.
"Tinker," Berin broke the comfortable silence. "Are you a real tinker? And what's your real name? I heard Nyokhen call you Pithar."
"I am a real tinker, Berin. I’ve traded almost every kind of goods you can think of in places you’ve never heard of and I can make or mend almost anything in any metal you care to mention. It's not the only thing I do, it's just that people want a nice simple handle to grasp you by. Everyone knows what I am, and therefore who I am, and I can earn a meal anywhere in the world. In many lands people are not as peaceable as the
Lake folk or as honest as the Hamna, and it pays to have a straightforward identity. I’ve worked at different trades, but being a tinker has always served me well."
"Have you been beyond the mountains?" Caldar tried to butt in. But for once Berin was insistent.
"Hold on, Caldar. I still haven't got an answer I can understand properly. Do you go around pretending to be a tinker then? And if so, what are you, really?" It was unlike Berin to be so bold with someone much older, but there was a relaxed intimacy between them this evening and he was intrigued by the mystery which seemed to hang round this man.
The tinker looked at the boy.
"Well, Berin, what are you, really?"
The question was put quite ordinarily, as if he genuinely wanted to know. Berin was transfixed. He struggled to answer, but all the words which he would normally use to describe himself seemed inadequate or false.
The tinker gave a short laugh. "You see, my friend, it’s not so simple. So maybe you can see also why I like to keep a nice prepared identity to hand."
Berin was still struggling with the question which had been handed back to him, so this time he did not object when Caldar picked up the conversation.
"Have you been beyond the mountains, Pithar?"
"Pithar’s not a name, Caldar, it’s a sort of title the Hamna use for me, which roughly means 'venerable' or 'old'. Just ‘Tinker’ will do, as it does in most places I go, though I’ve used other names when it suited. As for going beyond the mountains, yes, I've crossed these mountains to north and east and west and I've crossed many other mountains in other countries too. This range is the biggest and highest in the world, even though it only fills one little corner of it. Elsewhere there are forests that take months to cross and grasslands and deserts which are just as large. I've travelled the world for a very long time, but I still haven't seen it all."
The Tears of Sisme Page 14