by Jenny Nimmo
‘Wish you could tell me about it!’ Gwyn bit his lip. He realised that it was no use trying to force Alun to talk. He would have to wait until his friend was ready.
‘Aw heck!’ Alun scratched his head. ‘I dunno. It’s all so peculiar, like. I don’t really understand what happened. I was following your footsteps in that blizzard, and I got lost. So I turned round to come back – an’ I couldn’t. There was something there, like bars: ice-cold they were, but hard as anything. At first it was all cloudy, an’ I couldn’t see, but then it got brighter and brighter and I saw what I was caught in. It was a sort of cage, bars all round in a pattern, like a . . . like a . . .’
‘Cobweb?’ Gwyn suggested.
‘Phew!’ Alun looked hard at Gwyn. ‘You know, don’t you? It’s damn funny though. All those things you said; they were true, weren’t they?’
‘Yes, they were true!’
‘Well, I s’pose you know about the man, then?’
‘What man?’ Gwyn stepped closer. ‘Was there a man in there with you?’
‘A kind of man. He scared me. He had red hair and he was dressed all in kind of bright stuff: jewellery an’ that, with a cloak an’ a gold belt with a big sword in it. An’ he was beating at the bars with his fists, tearing at them, banging his head on them, an’ yelling. I was scared, I can tell you. But he didn’t see me. It sounds funny but I felt very small and kind of . . . like I had something round me, very warm and soft. Anyway he kept on an’ on at those bars for hours and hours. I fell asleep, and when I woke up he was still at it: moaning an’ crying, an’ then something awful happened!’
Gwyn waited. He could hardly bear the suspense but he dared not ask a question.
‘He began to disappear,’ Alun continued, ‘just shrank, sort of faded away, and so did the bars of ice, until there was nothing left there, except . . .’
‘Except what?’
‘That!’ Alun pointed to the broken horse.
Gwyn looked at it, lying on its side, black and disfigured. Poor thing! he thought. You want, so much, to get out: but I can never, never let you. It was all over, and suddenly he felt very tired.
There were sounds from above and Gwyn said, ‘They’ve been looking for you: your dad and mine.’
‘I bet!’ said Alun.
‘And Mr Davis came, and Gary Pritchard’s dad, and Mr Ellis and Mr Jones. T Gwyn, and people I can’t remember. Even Mrs Pritchard came, and she and my mam went out to look. And your mam was here with Iolo, I don’t know why she brought him, he was making such a racket.’
‘He always does,’ Alun nodded sympathetically.
Mrs Griffiths came into the kitchen and gasped at the sight of Alun, sitting there, so rosy and cheerful, but before she could utter a word the doorbell rang. The Lloyds had returned to resume their search.
Mrs Griffiths ran to open the door. ‘He’s back,’ she cried. ‘He’s safe, your Alun. Good as new and nothing wrong with him, as far as I can see.’
‘Where? Where?’ Mrs Lloyd tore into the kitchen and flung herself upon her son.
‘Come on, Mam. I’m OK,’ came Alun’s muffled voice from beneath his mother.
‘What happened? Where’ve you been? They went to search. We thought you’d freeze!’
‘I stayed where I was, didn’t I?’ Alun said, wriggling. ‘I didn’t want to get lost, did I? I got behind some rocks – in a sort of cave. It was quite warm, really.’
Mrs Lloyd began to wrap up her boy like a baby, though the mist had gone and the sky was brightening. She bundled him out into the passage talking non-stop and nervously, to her husband and Mrs Griffiths. And while she spoke, Alun looked back at Gwyn and said, ‘I found this out there, as well,’ and he put something cool into Gwyn’s hand – the snow spider.
Gwyn curled his fingers round the spider as Alun whispered hoarsely, ‘Don’t tell about . . . about what I said, will you?’
‘I won’t tell!’ Gwyn grinned. ‘One loony’s enough!’
Alun grinned back and gave the thumbs-up sign, before his mother whisked him through the door.
Mr Griffiths had his way and Eirlys stayed for Christmas. It was the sort of Christmas one always remembers. The trees were iced with snow and the sun came out to make the mountain sparkle. The biggest Christmas tree they had ever seen at T Bryn, was put into the front room, and decorated with lights like candles, with silver stars and home-made sweets wrapped in coloured paper.
A log fire was lit and they all played Monopoly and Scrabble, and even made-up games, so as to prolong the fun. Mrs Griffiths played carols on the out-of-tune piano with damp hammers, and it did not matter that the soloists were sometimes out of tune too. The children were allowed to drink punch which made them giggle at Nain, who had drunk too much and looked like a Christmas tree herself, all bedecked in coloured beads and bangles.
Just before they went to bed, Eirlys looked out of the window at the white, moonlit mountain and said, ‘It reminds me of home!’ Only Gwyn heard her. He knew that she was not talking about Wales and it occurred to him, for the first time, that she might not stay with them forever.
On New Year’s Day, the children decided to walk in the fields. It was a cold day and, while the girl waited in the garden, Gwyn ran up to fetch the gloves his father had given him for Christmas. They were blue and silver, lined with fur, and Gwyn cherished them even more than his black watch.
When he opened his drawer he saw Arianwen and the silver pipe. They looked so innocent, who would guess what they could do? One that had travelled a million miles or more, the other from somewhere in the distant past. They would always be with him now, he knew that. As he turned away the pipe whispered something; it sounded like, ‘Don’t go!’ Gwyn smiled and drew on his gloves, ‘I’m not going anywhere!’ he said.
His parents were outside, in the garden, with Eirlys. They were standing by the gate, talking quietly while they stared up at the mountain. They did not see Gwyn when he came out, nor hear him close the front door.
‘I have to go soon,’ he heard Eirlys say. ‘I have to go back to where I came from.’
His parents did not speak immediately. They seemed to have been frozen by her remark, and then Mrs Griffiths put her hand out and gently tucked the girl’s hair into her hood, saying, ‘Do you have to go, Eirlys? Can’t you stay?’
Eirlys shook her head.
‘Were you happy there, where you came from?’ Mr Griffiths asked.
‘Oh, yes! Very happy!’
They did not ask where she lived; they did not seem to want to know. And then Gwyn broke into their thoughts. ‘Come on,’ he cried, ‘I’ll race you to the trees!’ and he ran past them, through the open gate.
Eirlys followed, and they ran to the circle of hawthorn trees, where Gwyn had released Arianwen. The snow had melted and the grass was smooth and green. There was nothing to show that the earth had shaken or that icicles had flown from it, like stars.
‘Why couldn’t she escape without my help?’ Gwyn thought aloud. ‘She has her own power.’
‘She has nothing without you,’ said Eirlys. ‘She needs your thoughts to help her.’
‘She’s just an ordinary spider, then?’
‘Oh, no! No creature from my place is a common-or-garden thing!’
My place! There it was again. ‘Are you leaving here?’ He put the question cautiously.
‘Today!’ she answered.
‘What? So soon? You can’t!’
‘They are coming for me!’ She looked up at the sky. ‘Even with your magic, I only had until today.’
‘Do you want to go?’
‘Oooooh, yes!’ Her reply came like a deep contented sigh.
‘But Mam and Dad?’
‘They understand. I said I had to go back to where I came from.’
Gwyn nodded. ‘They wouldn’t want to know the truth,’ he said.
‘I think they do know. But they’re too old now to be able to talk about it.’
‘And they don’t mind you going?’
She shook her head and smiled at him. ‘It’ll be all right now between you and Dad. He knows I’m safe. That’s all he wanted.’
‘And the Herberts?’
‘I’m just a number that got muddled up. They think I’ve gone already.’
They had begun to walk up the track without his really being aware of it. When they had passed the first bend and the farm had disappeared from sight, Gwyn suddenly stopped to look at a kestrel hanging motionless in the air. Cloud shadows raced across the snow-capped mountains beyond the bird, and a lorry, piled with golden hay, made its way slowly across the green fields below.
‘Won’t you miss all this?’ Gwyn asked.
‘No!’ she said. ‘I like it where I’m going.’
He noticed the cold before he saw anything, ‘I don’t think I’ll come any further,’ he said.
‘Come on! Just for a bit, to keep me company!’ She took his hand.
Her fingers seemed colder than ever, but he allowed himself to be led away from the track and through the fields of sheep. And then he saw the light, glinting now and then, through the billows of a great, grey cloud. And he felt an icy breeze on his face.
‘You go on,’ he said. ‘I’m staying here!’ He tried to pull his hand away, but she would not let him. They were approaching the flat field where Bethan had gone to rescue the black ewe, four years before.
‘Let me go!’ cried Gwyn.
Her fingers tightened on his wrist. He twisted and turned but her grip was like steel, her strength irresistible. He could see the ship now, falling slowly through the clouds, the great sail swelling, the dancing creatures sparkling on the hull. Icy fragments spun earthwards, and terrified sheep swung away from the field and scattered in a great wave past the children.
‘Let me go!’ Gwyn begged.
‘Come with me!’ Her soft voice floated above the moan of the wind, ‘Come!’
‘No!’ Gwyn screamed. ‘I want to stay. No! No! No! Leave me!’
‘Come!’ She looked back at him and smiled, but her fingers bit deeper into his wrist. ‘Please!’ she sighed. ‘I need you, Gwyn. We need you – out there!’
‘No!’ Gwyn began to shake, and through his tears, saw the ship as a huge, glittering cloud behind the girl’s pale shape. Then a voice inside him suddenly burst out, ‘Gwydion lives HERE!’ and he tore from her grasp and flung himself to the ground.
He lay there, with his eyes closed, nursing his aching hand, and when the bitter cold and all the threatening sounds had vanished, he got up and saw something where Eirlys had been – the yellow scarf, frozen into the snow, and the seaweed beside it. He picked them up and put the seaweed into his pocket, but the scarf was stiff with frost, like a strange, twisted stick.
He wandered slowly through the fields until he came to the track and there, on the last bend, he found Alun standing by the drystone wall.
‘What’s that?’ Alun asked.
‘Someone’s scarf,’ said Gwyn. ‘Look, it’s still frozen!’
‘Where’s the girl?’
‘She’s gone!’
‘Phew!’ said Alun.
They walked back to the farm in comfortable silence. Mr Griffiths was standing in the porch when they arrived, ‘She’s gone, then?’ he said.
‘Yes!’ Gwyn replied. And then, before his father could turn away, he said, ‘I’m not going, Dad. I’m not ever going!’
‘I know!’ Mr Griffiths smiled, ‘And I’m glad of that, Gwyn! Very glad!’
They went into the house. A house that was not empty any more.
For my mother
1 The boy from the chapel
2 A promise – broken
3 The woman in the moon
4 A fight
5 The curtain
6 Cold flowers
7 A visit to Nain Griffiths
8 The wrong reflection
9 Children after midnight
10 Orchard of the Moon
11 Soldiers at dusk
12 A masterpiece
‘Don’t go into Llewelyn’s chapel!’ they told Nia. ‘No good will come of it. Something happened there!’ But Nia disobeyed. If she hadn’t, nothing would have changed. She’d still be plain Nia, dull Nia, Nia who couldn’t do anything!
It all began on the day they left T Llr. The children, tucked between boxes in the back of the Land Rover, were waiting for their mother to lock up. Nia was propped on a rolled mattress at the open end of the car. She was gazing at a red geranium in the kitchen window, the only bright thing left. And then the flower was lifted out of the dark window by unseen hands. It reappeared in the doorway, perched upon a pile of towels in her mother’s arms.
‘I nearly forgot it!’ Mrs Lloyd beamed over the geranium.
Nia wished she had forgotten the flower; just for a day or two. At least there would have been something left alive in T Llr. If a house could look forlorn, then that’s how T Llr seemed to her: curtains gone from the windows, the farmyard bare and tidy, and a stillness so unnatural it almost hurt. A stray feather drifted in the sunlight, the only reminder that chickens had once inhabited the yard. It was May but the ewes and their lambs had gone, and the only sounds came from bees in the giant sycamore tree.
Even the children in the Land Rover were silent. Leaving their home had ceased to be an exciting idea; suddenly it had become a rather shocking reality.
Mrs Lloyd climbed up to sit beside her husband. The engine started. The spell was broken. An excited shouting and chattering broke out.
Nia was the only one to look back and see the boy beneath the sycamore. He was standing so close to the shadowy tree- trunk that she could barely make out his shape. But she knew it was Gwyn Griffiths by the mass of dark hair and the way he stood, hands in pockets, so very still and thoughtful. No other boy could do that.
Nia nudged her brother, wedged in beside her. ‘Look, Alun! There’s Gwyn!’
There was so much noise, so much movement amongst the seven children packed tightly together between boxes and cases, that Alun neither felt nor heard Nia, so she raised her own hand and waved, rather tentatively.
The boy beneath the tree responded.
‘He’s waving, Alun!’ Nia shouted above the rumpus.
‘What? Who?’
‘Gwyn!’
‘Oh!’
‘He’s come to say goodbye, Alun! Quick!’
Alun leant over his sister, accidentally knocking the sheepdog’s nose with his elbow. Fly yelped, the Land Rover lurched round a bend and Alun was flung backwards on top of his twin brothers. Siôn and Gareth were too happy to grumble.
Gwyn Griffiths disappeared from sight.
The Land Rover rattled on, down the mountain, gathering speed as the lane became steeper, and the chatter in the back increased to an hysterical crescendo of excitement; Catrin even broke into song.
Mr Lloyd joined in, humming gustily. He’d done it at last; broken free of the farm that his ailing father-in-law had begged him to take over. Iestyn Lloyd was a small, dark man, his face as weather-tanned as any hill-farmer, but he was too fond of his food and a good pint to stay as fit as he should, too gregarious to enjoy the solitary existence that suited his neighbour, Ivor Griffiths, so well. But he had tried, no one could say he hadn’t. For fifteen years he’d struggled with hard mountain earth, with ewes trapped in snow and lambs lost, and he had failed. He would never make a good farmer, his heart wasn’t in it, and with another child on the way, he had to find some way of earning a decent living. When the butcher’s shop in Pendewi came up for sale, it was like an answer to Iestyn’s prayers. He’d been an apprentice butcher, it was what he knew, what he could do best. He would succeed this time. He’d sold his stock and all his land to Ivor Griffiths, who had a magic touch when it came to animals, and a way of knowing the land that only a born farmer could have.
No one wanted the farmhouse though. No one wanted ancient T Llr, with its crumbling chimney, its family of bats, and the plum trees that curled their way under the w
avy roof.
‘Mae hen wlad fy nhadau yn annwyl i mi,’ sang Mr Lloyd, breaking out in a rare exhibition of patriotism, as he cheerfully sped away from the things that Nia loved.
Fly, the sheepdog, rolled her eyes and gazed imploringly at Nia. The dog, at least, felt as apprehensive as she.
There was nothing in Pendewi for Nia. She had neither the talents nor the aspirations of her brothers and sisters. In Pendewi there was a library for Nerys to browse in every day, if she wished. For Catrin, a music teacher only two doors away, and a disco on Saturdays. For the boys, shops stuffed with comics and bubblegum, with batteries and nails, glue and string. There they would all be, crammed into their little rooms above the shop, reading and singing, building, hammering and chewing, while the plums turned from green to gold in the orchard at T Llr, and strangers put them into baskets and carried them away.
No one would notice the wild Welsh poppies that Nia had nurtured in little places by the stream, or see the white roses behind the farmhouse. The garden would become a carpet of petals and then, when the wind came, the petals would scatter over the mountain like snow. And no one seemed to care, not even Mrs Lloyd, preoccupied as she was with thoughts of the baby who would come in summer, when the plums were turning gold.
Gwyn Griffiths’ sister had loved flowers, but she had vanished on the mountain, no one knew how.
‘I wish you had waved to Gwyn!’ Nia said to Alun, but she spoke half to herself, and did not expect him to hear.
The Land Rover slowed down before turning into the main road. Summer visitors had begun to arrive and the road was busy. Mr Lloyd swung in behind a caravan, and there they stayed, unable to pass the clumsy vehicle, and travelling so slowly that Nia could count the primroses on the verge.
At the top of the hill leading down into Pendewi, the caravan stopped without warning. Mr Lloyd jammed on his brakes and leant out of the window, mouthing oaths about visitors and caravans; he could see the owner in the driving seat of his smart red car, unconcernedly reading a map. Mr Lloyd banged his fist on the horn. The children pressed forward, anticipating a row, all except for Nia, who had noticed something far more interesting.