The Various

by Steve Augarde

  Maglin. He must find Maglin. He jumped, swooped, fell down through the trees – flinging aside the cumbersome forage bag on the way and scratching his cheek as he did so – swung from a branch that was too big for him to grasp, and landed with an undignified thump among the hard protruding roots of the tree he had slept in, banging the side of his head in the process. Part of one of the roots came away in his hand as he struggled to sit up, and he found himself looking at a truffle.

  I see you are up betimes, Woodpecker. Or are you still at your revels?

  From the nearby coppices stepped the winged horse, his coat dappled grey and white in the hesitant sunbeams of early dawn.

  ‘Pegs!’ Little-Marten dropped the truffle and got back onto his feet. ‘Pegs, I be so glad you’re here! I’ve seen a terrible thing – you must help – ’tis Henty, Pegs, she’s gone to the Gorji! And Scurl – he’s gone after her!’

  Henty? Is that the . . . Tinkler’s daughter? And Scurl? Tell me your story – what is it that you have seen?

  Little-Marten explained as best he could while Pegs listened gravely – puzzled as to the meaning of it all. For the Tinkler maid’s actions there seemed to be some possible explanation – but none for Scurl’s. What did he hope to gain? What did he seek?

  This gift of Henty’s to the Gorji maid – Celandine’s Cup, by your guess – did Scurl know aught of it?

  ‘I don’t reckon. Though he might have seen it when he . . . aye, he might have seen it, for she carried it down to the stream . . . but he wouldn’t know what ’twas. Some little tinsy thing – wouldn’t be nothing to him – and I don’t reckon he knows aught of Henty at all. Can’t see that he would.’

  Carried it to the stream? When was this?

  Little-Marten told of his encounter with Scurl, and how he and Midge had been threatened with their lives. The horse seemed unsurprised at this – as though it confirmed that which he already knew – yet his manner now became more agitated, and his speech more urgent.

  Scurl may be visiting the Gorji settlement for reasons more connected with the Gorji maid than with Henty, I believe – though both their lives may be in danger. We must act quickly. Pegs glanced over his shoulder, seemingly towards the bushes from where he had appeared, then began to move away. Come, we will find Maglin and speak with him.

  Little-Marten came to a decision. ‘You find him, Pegs – and as quick as you like – but I be going down there. Maglin’ll have none o’ me, as I suppose. Scurl would kill that Gorji maid if he sees her – and has vowed so. And I reckon that’s why he’s there – couldn’t find me, so he’ll do for her instead. But Henty’s in amongst it – and I don’t care about nothing else. And if she’s stood between Scurl and a felix, well, she won’t be stood there alone, and me standing here listening to Maglin. So you go and tell him what you like, and maybe he’ll do something about it, and maybe he won’t. But I’m away.’ And Little-Marten took a couple of steps backwards, hopped up into the tree he had lately tumbled out of, and began to climb.

  Woodpecker . . .

  The youth glanced briefly down at the white horse.

  I shall come. Tell the maid that, for me, if you see her. Whatever Maglin decides, I shall come.

  Little-Marten grunted, and continued to climb. It was a fair distance to the settlement, and his wings were small. He would need as much height as he could get. The sun shook itself free from the purple horizon – and the long hot day began.

  It took Pegs a little more time to find Maglin than he had anticipated – the Ickri leader had sat up deep into the night talking with Aken, and then, finding himself unable to sleep, had decided upon a thorough tour of the boundaries to include a personal check on all the exit tunnels.

  The weary General was not in the most receptive of moods when Pegs finally discovered him and told him the news of the various expeditions to the Gorji settlement. Henty had gone, then the West Wood archers, and now Little-Marten. Maglin was at first disbelieving, then furious – but when Pegs declared his own intention of adding to their number, the Ickri General fairly boiled over.

  ‘Has the world turned witless overnight?’ he roared. ‘Do we deliver ourselves to the Gorji holus bolus, now? I wonder, Pegs, that you let the Woodpecker go – that was foolishness enough – but to now reckon on taking the same path . . .! And the archers – my company! Do ’ee all think that I count for naught? Do ’ee? Well, maybe ’tis so – maybe I toil in vain – in which case, why come to me? Why tell me your mazy tales? If I no longer hold sway in the affairs of this place, then what would you of me?’

  Maglin, we agreed yesterday, you and I, that I would go to speak with the Gorji maid – but that I would do naught until today. Now, it seems, I may be too late – for I doubt that Scurl has any honourable reason to visit the settlement. He has vowed harm to the child. Her life is in danger – the life of one who has saved mine. And in seeking you out I may have already delayed too long. What would I of you? Come with me. Now. You are needed there. We go together.

  Maglin’s eyes opened even wider with astonishment. He looked as though he might explode.

  Chapter Twenty

  THE CREEPING DAWN had fallen, clammy and chill, upon the slight shoulders of Henty as she stood among the thistles and dew-soaked camomiles. She shivered as she looked through the rusty bars of the gate and saw the abandoned plough – the Gorji contraption that she had heard Pank speak of when recounting his ventures. That was where the woodlanders had hidden. Companions there had been for Pank – stout-hearted Tod, Spindra, an Ickri archer, and poor Lumst, of course. For her there was nobody. She was alone – all alone – and with no idea of how she was to achieve her purpose. Somehow she must retrieve the tinsy stoup, Celandine’s Cup, which she had so foolishly given to the Gorji giant. Why had she done such a thing? Reason had told her at the time that the maid who had visited the forest with Pegs could not have been Celandine – that story was old when her father was a boy. Yet she had half-believed – wanted to believe – that the good spirit of the woods had somehow magically returned once again, and that all would be well. She had wanted to be the one to give the gift so long overdue, although even as she had put it into the giant’s hands she had known it was wrong. Well, now she was paying the price for her impetuous gesture. The cup, unused and long neglected, was wanted once more. Her father, and all her tribe, would be furious to learn that she had given it away to the Gorji. She must find it.

  Henty recalled details of Pank’s astonishing and terrifying tale – of his entry into the very dwelling of the giants through a small door within a big door, of the byres where he and his company had hidden, and how one of those byres had contained the monster, the felix, and of this rot-metal contraption before her, from where the whole settlement could be surveyed. Giving herself no time to think – lest thinking should diminish her fragile store of courage – she scrambled through the bars of the gate and ran across the cobbles to the grassy verge where the plough stood. To enter the dwelling, find the giant, and either steal or beg the tinsy cup – this was the extent of her plan. She was well aware of how feeble it was, and so acted in haste before she had time to tell herself that she was heaping foolishness upon foolishness.

  A quick glance about the empty yard, then, and she left the plough almost as soon as she had hidden herself beneath it – running along the foot of the balustrade wall and peering round the end pillar to look along the flagstone path leading to the front door. She had to stand on tiptoe to see over the two deep steps that dropped from the path down to the level of the yard. Yes, she could see the little door and knew that it had to be but pushed in order to open it.

  Something lay on the grey flags – a huge Gorji boot – and, as Henty made ready to risk that long exposed dash to the dwelling, the boot suddenly seemed to stir, and some creature began to emerge from its depths. Henty stood, horrified, as the head of a felix appeared. She hadn’t been prepared for this. The ways of the Gorji were strange, it was known, but never would she have imagine
d that they kept felixes in their very footwear. The dreaded beast had not yet seen her, but peered, blinking, in the early light, showing its sharp fangs in a gaping yawn. It was perhaps not quite as big as Pank had claimed – being more the size of a young coney than the giant brock of his description – but it was big enough for her liking.

  Henty looked across the yard, beginning to feel the panic rising inside her. Where could she hide? The line of byres, she knew, had provided a haven for the woodlanders but they also housed the felix – when it wasn’t lurking elsewhere. At the end of the yard stood a larger byre, and she could see that one of the great doors was slightly ajar. Ducking low, beneath the level of the steps, she braved the gap at the end of the path and then sprinted down the full length of the yard, her bare feet soundless on the mossy cobblestones.

  She reached the great rust-coloured doors of the cider barn, and glanced, terrified, over her shoulder in case she was pursued, then, finding that she had apparently been unobserved, looked cautiously around the open door. Great metal stanchions loomed in the darkness at the far end of the barn, with a massive cross beam and various crates and wooden constructions, broken barrels, planks, stone jars as tall as she, and all the paraphernalia of an industry long abandoned. Stepping into the gloom, her nose wrinkled at the unfamiliar smell of cats and the ghosts of countless fermentations. A high ladder, she could see, fixed to a great upper platform that spanned the width of the barn and projected forward to perhaps a third of its length. This was the old apple store and to Henty it seemed as though it might provide a safe haven, although she doubted that she could scale the ladder – the rungs would be almost waist high to her. However, she wasn’t here to hide, but to find what she had come for and then return with all speed to the forest. She ran back to the door once more and looked down the yard. What she saw then made her gasp with fright.

  Emerging from beneath the broken door of one of the near byres, was the felix. The felix. Then she understood. Then she knew the terror of that recent night, when Lumst had lost his life. It was the biggest animal she had ever seen.

  Tojo stretched and yawned, extending his sabre claws to the full and displaying the fearsome capacity of his gaping jaws. He looked towards the barn. The door was open. With his great brush of a tail almost touching the ground, and his flat broad head held low, he began to make his way purposefully across the yard.

  Henty found that she was able to scale that ladder after all, and quickly. Throwing herself down on to the boards of the apple loft, she peered in terror over the edge, just in time to see the shadow of Tojo appearing in the doorway below. The monster slowly entered the barn, sniffing the ground, his baleful yellow eyes scanning the gloom. His wives and children were apparently absent. No matter. They would return. He sat in the doorway, a grim sentinel, occasionally squeezing his eyelids shut, tail ceaselessly twitching.

  Henty could feel her heart pounding against the dusty boards, her breathing painful and shaky. She was trapped.

  Chapter Twenty-one

  GEORGE WOKE BEFORE Midge, rolled over a couple of times, and finally sat up, resting his head and shoulders against the back wall of the tree house. He looked at his watch. Not even six o’clock, but already he could feel the heat of the sun, warm on his shoulders, through the rough wooden panelling.

  It was like sitting in a cinema. In the dim interior of the three-sided wooden house, the open end became a bright oblong screen, with all the early morning world showing in brilliant technicolour – a slow moving nature film, in real time. A bird or an insect would appear in the frame, play out its part, and then disappear off-screen once more. From his low position on the army camp bed, it was the upper branches of the cedar that were visible – foreign, they looked somehow, exotic, in searingly bright colours against the pale morning sky, the sun shining on the dewy branches and defining every powder-blue needle, every glistening cone.

  Midge was still asleep on the other side of the ammo box. He looked at the little metal bowl she had placed on the box the night before. When he had asked her what it was, she said that she would tell him some other time, he could have a look at it some other time – like it was some sort of mystery. She was tired, she said, and anyway it was too dark by the light of the tilly lamp to see it properly. Well, now was some other time, so, in that case, she wouldn’t mind if he had a look. He reached across and gently picked up the bowl, feeling the strange weight of it. It was engraved in some way, and he held it up to the light, frowning slightly as he tried to make out what it could be. He licked his fingers and rubbed them on the grubby metal surface. A crowd of tiny figures he could see – encircling the outside rim, like something from an old painting, mediaeval perhaps – in what seemed to be belted smocks, hoods, and tight leggings, or maybe just bare legs, and bare feet. All wore the same open-mouthed expression. George smiled. It looked as though the whole lot of them had just seen a ghost. He turned the bowl some more, made it wet again, and found a much larger figure, twice the height of the little ones. It was a girl – and she was different, not just bigger, but different in some other way. Strangely dressed, yet still more . . . modern. She too had her mouth open. Weird.

  A disturbing and unhappy thought suddenly came to him. This was like Midge. This was like her story, about seeing little people. This was where the idea had come from. She had found this thing, picked it up from somewhere, and had invented a story about herself. It must have taken her ages to think it all up. That was even more weird.

  George looked inside the bowl. There was something else engraved around the inner rim – but his tongue tasted funny now, and he couldn’t be bothered with it any more. He felt sad, and worried – it just wasn’t . . . normal to make all that stuff up, was it? That was, like . . . what did people say . . . disturbed, wasn’t it? He quietly reached over to replace the bowl, pausing for a moment to look wonderingly at the sleeping form of his cousin as he leaned across the ammo box. She was huddled up in her quilt, her back to him, just the top of her head visible. Poor Midge. He’d never really thought about what it must be like to be someone else – what it must be like to be . . .

  There was a dry flapping sound, brief and startling, and a sudden rustle of foliage as something alighted in the cedar tree outside. George looked up, and felt his neck lock solid. His mouth fell open as if he might scream, yet his breath so failed him that he couldn’t even gasp. Some fantastic creature – like a winged monkey, an impossible thing – was clinging to the slim upper branches of the tree. The spiky blue cedar fronds swayed up and down in the framed oblong of brilliant colour, as the creature gained its balance and folded its wings. It had its back to the open end of the tree house – but there was no doubting what it was, and it was just as Midge had described. George was quite unable to breathe, or even to move, and remained frozen in the act of replacing the metal cup. He heard the thing sniff, and his amazement turning to creeping horror as the figure slowly turned, still swaying slightly on the cedar branch, to peer directly into the tree house.

  Its jaw was long and its mouth hung open slightly. The eyes, screwed up tight against the dazzling sunlight, were set low and deep, beneath a heavily jutting brow and a bedraggled crop of wispy hair. It lifted a skinny brown hand as a shade against the bright glare, ducked slightly, and stared straight at him. The dark eyes were open now, glints of light visible beneath the shadow of the small weather-beaten hand. George shrank back against the end wall, certain that his presence would now be obvious – yet the expression on the thing’s face remained dull, inanimate, the jaw still hanging slightly open. It turned away, and gazed in the direction of the farmhouse. George was astounded that the creature had apparently not seen him – but still he dared not, could not, move. The glare from the sun, shining above the roof of the tree house, must have made the dark interior invisible.

  Yet, from his perspective, every tiny detail was lit with amazing clarity. He could see the rough stitching on the greasy leather quiver that was slung over the miniature monster
’s back – the bat-like wings, folding and unfolding, flexing like a man might flex his shoulder blades, and the curious designs, coloured tattoos, that covered the semi transparent membranes. He saw the tiny orange hairs among the grey squirrel-tail cuffs that adorned the wrists and ankles, the small but sturdy looking longbow, hung with a tuft of magpie feathers at one end, the incongruous knee-length britches made of black corduroy, worn threadbare across the seat – which were held up, even more surprisingly, by a grubby elastic belt, black-and-white striped.

  At last George let out his breath, in as quiet and controlled a way as possible, and gently, gently replaced the bowl on the ammo box. This was something. This was . . . the most amazing something . . . He looked across at Midge and wondered how to wake her. Her fair hair was still visible above her duvet cover, and she slept on, peacefully. George saw in an instant all that she must have been through, and his heart went out to her. He hadn’t believed her. Thought she was crazy. Well, he believed her now – and would make up for his doubting her, if ever he could. Because this was something . . .

  The creature in the tree had stiffened, was now suddenly alert. It was staring intently into the distance – had obviously spotted some approaching danger. The body sank into a crouch, and the skinny brown fingers rested lightly on the branch, a pause, a slight raising of the head, quickly ducking down again, and then the wings opened out to full stretch.

  Dregg was not the brightest of the West Wood archers, but he recognized danger – when he could see it. He launched himself silently from the branches and was gone.

  George gaped in open-mouthed wonder at the now empty vista at the end of the tree house. The cedar tree ceased to sway, and stood, snapshot still, against the cloudless sky. He heard the slight crack and tick of the timber wall panel behind him as it expanded in the heat.