by M S C Barnes
more.
“So how far is the Ancient Place?” he asked, breathless.
“A bit of a ride,” The Head called as he vaulted a fence and Seb realised they were heading across the sports field of the school.
Mr Duir led them to an old shed behind the gym and disappeared through the creaky door. Seb and Alice followed. Inside it smelled of old wood and furniture wax, which was masked briefly by the smell of musty canvas as Seb, his eyes adjusting to the darkness, watched Mr Duir pull a dust cover off a shiny, old-fashioned-looking trap.
“We’re riding in that?” Seb asked, surprised. He had expected a car, would have accepted a minibus, a motorbike even – but a cart? “Where’s the horse?”
Mr Duir, stowing the cover on a shelf, walked to the door and gave an ear-piercing whistle.
“Come and see,” he said.
In the distance Seb heard a drumming sound, the pounding of hooves. Okay, a horse. Suddenly a huge shape flitted in front of the doorway. Seb pulled back. A horse indeed, but this horse was huge. As black as night, its shoulder reached the roof of the shed, its head stretched at least three feet above it. Seb looked back at the trap. No way was it going to fit inside the harness.
Stopping in front of Mr Duir the animal seemed skittish, nervous, stamping the ground and whinnying. The Head looked down at Seb.
“He is wary.” He sounded surprised and moved towards the animal.
“Wary of what … of me?” Seb asked Alice and the horse reacted, snorting and rearing.
“What, you mean you with your light-hearted, friendly personality? That you, you mean?” Alice laughed. “Possibly!”
Mr Duir calmed the horse with a few quiet words. Its eyes, however, stared almost madly at Seb.
“Seb, you need to stay away from him, he will be unpredictable,” The Head said.
Seb felt embarrassed he had provoked such a reaction in this beast. He found it amazing, beautiful and was sad that it didn’t seem to like him.
Alice made him feel worse. “This is a spirit stallion. They willingly serve the Custodians. I’ve never seen one behave this way.”
Mr Duir, leaving the horse, entered the shed then re-emerged pulling the cart into the sunlight. Dropping the yoke he lifted the harness from the carriage seat and approached the horse. Waving his left hand he spoke a word.
“Tordimin.”
Silver sparkles danced around the animal and as Seb watched, the beast shrank to the size of a normal horse. It still stared wildly at him. As Mr Duir harnessed it and arranged the reins it stamped and chomped and bucked. A firm word from him and the beast became still. He hitched it to the carriage then, with a lithe movement, leapt onto the running board of the cart. He indicated for Seb to sit beside him and without waiting for him to be comfortable flicked the reins. The horse, ears upright and alert, head tossing in its bridle, trotted across the bumpy field and into the woods. Minutes later they emerged onto a back road of the village, the clip-clop of the hooves drumming the tarmac.
Their progress was speedy as they zipped past parked cars, overtook a cyclist and kept pace with a white van that zoomed through the residential streets. The beautiful, shining carriage with the stunning horse pulling it drew glances and waves from young children. Mr Duir didn’t seem to notice, intent on the road ahead.
“Can you contact the others yet?” Seb asked Alice who was perched on the back of the seat. Mr Duir glanced over his shoulder at Alice who shook his head.
“Can you communicate with Dierne?” he asked.
Alice shook his head again. Mr Duir frowned but turned to watch the road. They had reached the outskirts of the village and trotted on to the A road towards Royston. The speed of the traffic shocked Seb; he worried their small cart would get wiped out by a passing truck. Looking back he expected to see a line of vehicles held up by their slow progress, but was surprised to see they had actually left the traffic behind.
Mr Duir gave the smallest flick of the reins and Seb was thrown back in his seat by a sudden additional spurt of speed from this magnificent horse.
The Ancient Place
Seb soon settled as the trap continued its journey. Mr Duir was a skilled driver and the horse was undisturbed by the whoosh and sweep of passing vehicles.
Within thirty minutes they were passing Royston town police station and Seb saw a brown sign bearing the words Royston Cave.
Mr Duir brought the trap to a standstill in the middle of the road and waited for a pause in the oncoming traffic, then, pulling the right rein he directed the horse to turn under a semi-squared archway. The clattering of its hooves and the trundling of the wheels echoed loudly and then scrunched on gravel as the trap continued past rusty iron gates pinned against the wall.
A man dressed in a maroon fleece jumped up from a seat in the narrow entrance of a doorway as he saw them approach. A sign hanging on the black lintel of the stable-type door read OPEN.
“Is this the Ancient Place then?” Seb asked.
The horse bucked at the sound of his voice and Mr Duir, relaxing the reins, spoke soothingly to control it.
Alice put a hand on Seb’s shoulder. “You have to stop upsetting him!” He grinned.
Mr Duir pulled up at the end of the gravel driveway outside a cream-coloured building. Climbing down he stood in front of the horse and ushered it back until it and the trap were out of view of the road.
A ruddy-faced woman – white, wiry hair scragged back in a scruffy ponytail – came trotting up to them from the direction of the doorway.
“I’ve got him, sir. Mervyn said you had come. I’ve got him.” She seemed eager to help and grasped the reins, placing a hand almost reverently on the horse’s muzzle.
“Thank you, Janice,” Mr Duir said and headed back down the driveway towards the arch. The man in the maroon fleece was just turning the sign to read CLOSED.
“All day, Mr Duir?”
“All day, Mervyn. I am sorry about business.”
“Oh, don’t you worry, sir, needs must!” Mervyn half-bowed as Mr Duir stepped through the stable door and Seb noticed how alert and nervous the man appeared. “Go on, my lad, go quickly. I’ll close up behind you,” he said to Seb who followed Mr Duir through the dark doorway. Alice flitted in close to his shoulder.
Seb barely had time to note his surroundings as first the bottom and then the top of the stable door sections were closed behind him. Plunged into darkness he bumped into Mr Duir.
“Steady Seb, it’s steep here,” he said, then flamers appeared at his request.
Squashed in the small area of the entrance, Seb stared at the only opening, a long tunnel that dropped down to his right. It was indeed steep. Made of ridged chalky rock, the floor was wet in patches where water had dripped down the walls and spread through the furrows to collect, forming shallow puddles. Metal handrails ran along each side and as Seb followed Mr Duir, who had to crouch down to navigate the tunnel, he found he had to use them or risk slipping. Alice zoomed off ahead.
The track of the tunnel was uneven, roughly hewn out of the rock. To Seb’s relief it wasn’t long and within a minute they reached a small cave in which Alice now hovered. Dierne too had appeared.
Seb’s jaw dropped as he stared at his surroundings; the ceiling over him arched upward forming a bell-shaped cavern, cut from the same chalky stone as the tunnel, but with undulations, folds and indentations that reminded him of the surface of a brain. At the top, just off centre, was a small hole through which a thin shaft of daylight descended. To one side was a further, smaller shaft with a few red-brick tiles surrounding it, but what grabbed Seb’s attention most were the walls: from the level of the wooden platform on which they stood to three quarters of the way up, they were covered in carvings.
There were crude images of people: a crowned woman next to a wheel; a row of male figures in a line, with a further character behind, squashed between two of the foreground figures; a man with a child on his shoulder, which Seb thought looked l
ike a St Christopher; and among these human figures, swords, hands with hearts carved in them, something that could either have been a horse or a dog for all Seb could guess, a floating hand which seemed to be dropping, or letting go of what was such a poor image it could have been a bird or a fish.
Some of the images were grotesque: what looked like a bad attempt at a naked female figure with her private parts displayed; a floating head; someone being crucified.
Seb was captivated. Thousands of flamers lit the cave, and in their warm glow shadows from the carvings made them stand proud of the walls, like cardboard cut-outs. Within these childish and yet intricate carvings were holes and the odd recess. In one, to his left, by the tunnel entrance, Seb saw a skull. He was about to ask whose skull but remained quiet as Mr Duir murmured a word.
“Áwerian.”
As he spoke he lifted his hand, exposing the silvery lines in his palm. It was only for a second but Seb again caught a glimpse of the scorched line. The ineffectual beam of sunlight coming from the central shaft hit the silver threads on Mr Duir’s palm. A flash of light flew from his hand to one of the carvings, a figure with a drawn sword. The light hit the sword shaft and rebounded around the cave before extinguishing to leave just light from the flamers. Mr Duir visibly relaxed.
“Welcome, Seb, to the Ancient Place,” he said.
As soon as the bright illumination faded Seb became aware of dark shapes looming in the spaces between him and Mr Duir. He tried to ignore them but