by Jon Jacks
‘Her? She’s way too old for him!’
Ah, so you had noticed her then?
Once again, Beth sharply observed the woman with the wild, red hair.
Once again, the woman was using every opportunity she had to lightly touch Galilee.
Every chance to laugh and toss her luxurious mass of hair.
Not that her hair needed much help to curl and flare in the wind like an uncontrollable flame. It bounced with a lively flourish with every smoothly-executed rise and fall of her body as she expertly rode her horse.
Even her horse was a remarkably beautiful thoroughbred.
‘Hardly the way for a woman of over forty to act, you ask me!’
Admit it Beth! You thought she was nearer thirty until you started searching for faults! And she’ll probably get younger, as Galilee gets older!
Beth thought back to how Heddy had appeared older than when she had last seen her. And her father had seemed younger.
She hadn’t been mistaken then.
‘How much younger? How much older?’
Oh, a wannabe young floozy like our flame-haired siren over there? Thirty, perhaps. Lover boy, being all so serious, so I’m-the-leader-around-here, more like thirty-five.
‘Galilee will be older?’ Beth gasped.
It could be worse. Who’s to say our little wildcat won’t be more than just a little tempted to give her looks a little help once she realises she can? I’m sure she’d like to transform herself into a delightful little twenty-something, don’t you think? Thing is, looking again at that wonderful head of hair – perhaps she’s already cottoned on to this, eh? Do you think she might be even older than we think? She could have been sixty before she set off down here for all we know.
‘Sixty! That’s gross!’
Gross? But how, darling? She’s not sixty anymore, even if she ever was. And if she wants to be nearer twenty than forty, why it’s as simple as me giving you a little help with your own hair and–
‘There’s nothing wrong with my hair! We’ve already been though all this!’
Suit yourself darling. Put yourself at a complete disadvantage to your love rival!
‘She’s not a lov– ahhrrggghh!’
Beth’s frustrated outburst startled Khalid. His shocked stare only served to make Beth more furious than ever.
‘Why do you hate me?’ she snapped at him. ‘Why does everyone hate me?’
‘Hate? I don’t think they hate you. I don’t hate you.’
‘Okay, but you don’t trust me then. Admit it. You don’t, do you?’
Khalid paused before answering, as if he were choosing his words carefully.
‘It’s so hard to tell who you really are. Well, who the person inside you is.’
‘That’s good, coming from a thief! Someone who’s proud to be a thief. Didn’t I hear Galilee say you could hide away, like you’re invisible?’
‘Only for so long; not forever. But…with you, it’s hard to get a sense of whether you’re ultimately good or bad. There’s just a sense, at best, of…confusion. Which is obviously unsettling in these uncertain, dangerous times.’
‘Confusion? At best?’
Khalid shrugged. ‘There are hints of…of something evil inside you.’
‘Evil? She was a water fay, that’s all! Yeah, okay, she was on the wrong side at first. Lynese admits that. But she changed sides!’
‘Ah.’ Khalid said it the way Galilee said it; like he wanted to imply he understood, but he doubted it anyway.
‘You’ve never heard of her, have you? How she tried to save Lyonessee?’
‘Lyonessee? Yes, I’ve heard of the island. But as for this water fay – I’m sorry, I don’t know of everyone.’
‘So the human encyclopaedia doesn’t bother with bothersome little water fay, right?’
Khalid was shocked by Beth’s anger.
‘Please, if I’ve upset you, please forgive me. But if you must know, the confusion you cause isn’t all down to this side-changing Lynese. Everyone we call human is now actually more spirit than flesh, yes?’
‘Yes.’ She said it uneasily, unable to work out why he had brought this up.
‘But that’s just it, you see.’
He sat straight up on his horse, as if he were preparing himself to say something he would rather not.
‘I can’t sense anything human in you!’
*
Chapter 55
Real charmer that one, isn’t he? Not human! The cheek of it! Perhaps you need my beauty tips more than you – or even I – think darling!
‘Don’t start on that again!’
Beth had irately spurred her horse forward to draw herself away from Khalid.
‘Have you any idea what he might mean by that? That there’s nothing human in me?’
Search me, darling. I can’t see how it would be possible for you not to be human, frankly.
Beth kept her voice low, as more people from the other groups had gathered around Galilee.
Some had ridden on ahead, at a gallop. They headed towards the squat, as if under some sort of order or request from Galilee to prepare for their arrival there.
If so, Beth wondered how that would go down with her crusty friends; guys on horses telling them that they would have to make room for a small army of new arrivals.
‘How come everyone isn’t introducing themselves to his majesty?’
Most people were still hanging back, remaining in their own groups. It appeared to Beth that only the self-appointed leaders – the one’s on horses, and the finest ones at that – were approaching Galilee.
So, even now, even after all these changes, we still have some people telling others what to do.
Hierarchy, darling. There’s always an hierarchy. You can’t just have everyone approaching lover boy now, can you?
‘I can’t believe he’s suddenly become so bigheaded! He’s acting like he really is some sort of king!’
With a clench of her knees, she spurred her mount to draw closer to Galilee.
‘Galilee – can I say something, please?’
Beth said it harshly, a demand rather than a request.
Galilee smiled when he saw her, like he was glad, almost relieved, to see her.
‘Beth! Sorry if you think I’ve been ignoring you.’
He gave a wave of a hand, indicating that he wanted the people crowding around him to give him a little space, a little time on his own.
‘There’s so much to organise and prepare for.’
Although, as requested, the riders surrounding Galilee drew away from him, they obviously felt aggrieved that they had been dismissed so casually.
They glared at Beth with even more revulsion than before.
The flame-haired woman in particular stared at Beth as if she were an intruder who had no right to be there.
‘Khalid says I’m not human!’ Beth hissed furiously once she thought no one would hear.
Galilee rolled his eyes.
‘Yarrkk! That’s not exactly the best way to put it!’
‘Not the best way to put it? What exactly is the best way to put it? So you’re saying I really aren’t human!’
‘No, no. It’s all to do, yet again, with what we can sense. Just because it’s hard to sense someone’s human qualities doesn’t mean they’re not there.’
‘You can’t sense my human qualities?’
As her horse manoeuvred around some branches strewn across their path, Beth felt Foal moving against her back.
‘So what are you saying? That I’m like this Fenir guy; more wolf than human?’
‘Fenri, you mean Fenri. And no, that’s not what I’m saying. You’re a hard person to read, Beth; but that’s what saved you, I reckon. That’s what confused the firemen who’d been sent to…well, t
o kill you.’
‘So I should be grateful for that? That they killed my mum instead of me by mistake?’
‘I thought we’d agreed that your mum would have preferred it this way?’
‘Sure, it’s really nice to know that my mum died because people on our side weren’t up to the job!’
‘Mistakes happen. Especially in wars.’
‘Easy for a king to say; not so easy for the people being sent to their deaths.’
‘King?’
‘Well, that’s what you are, isn’t it? All these people gathering around you, taking orders. Why did you get me involved if I’m so unimportant? If I’m not even human?’
Galilee sighed.
‘Once again Beth, the fact that we can’t sense human qualities doesn’t mean you’re not human. Fact is, it’s that that made me seek you out. There’s something about you that I do sense must be important to us; to the cause. And I’m not a king. I serve King Ardu. Like everyone else here!’
‘Ardu? Is he here too?’
‘No, he’s making his way south. He’s gathering more of our people around him. Until he arrives, our people in this area are making their way to me, responding to Machal’s call.’
‘And this King Ardu; you think he can save us? He can lead us to victory?’
‘He’s our only chance, if that’s what you mean.’
Galilee’s eyes were narrowed in concentration.
‘You probably know him better as King Arthur.’
*
As they arrived at the squat their numbers swelled. Even more people were descending on the farm from the opposite direction.
It was indeed a miniature army, one that automatically responded to the militaristic discipline swiftly imposed on them.
A number of people were immediately and universally recognised as commanders and section leaders. They had all done this before, thousands of years ago.
Buildings were quickly repaired and made inhabitable with an efficient use of spare wood and metal found lying in the outer buildings.
There was a surprising amount of regular carpentry and construction skills, supplemented with only a judicious utilisation of magic. Galilee had insisted that the use of magic should be kept to a minimum.
‘Conserve energy – our own and the energy we draw on – as much as possible. We need to keep as much in reserve as possible in case we come under attack. A huge depletion of energy could draw attention to us; it would make such an attack more likely.’
Soon, people were milling everywhere around the farm as they got to know each other. They chatted excitedly and noisily, either preparing the areas where they had chosen to settle down for the night, or gathering in the farm’s larger rooms set aside as meeting areas.
The crusties, Beth’s friends, hadn’t taken the arrival of so many people as badly as she had expected. In fact, for well over an hour they walked around with beaming faces, almost as if they had been – well, charmed.
Surely they hadn’t been…surely Galilee wouldn’t allow…?
By the time the unnaturally wide grins had worn off, everyone at the squat accepted the newcomers as if they had been there for years.
This casual acceptance was made easier by the simple fact that no one was going hungry. No one felt hungry.
Yet, as Foley had predicted, there were few of Beth’s friends who didn’t now crave the experience, the joy, of tasting something, anything.
Bacon, eggs, what remained of the bread; it was all eaten simply to relish the sensation of taste, the strange satisfaction of rolling something around in the mouth, rather than to assuage any hunger.
On Galilee’s advice, tinned and longer-lasting food had been set aside for later. Food from the now-defunct fridge would go off soon anyway, and so might as well be eaten as it would only go to waste.
For some, a blob of tomato ketchup or spicy sauce was enough to satisfy their craving. For others it was alcohol or a fizzy drink.
It just had to be something to swirl or chew in their mouth, even if it was only a blade of grass.
As always, Gerry had gone for a can of lager, one of a swiftly diminishing store. To make it last, she went round regaling her friends with a totally believable explanation for Foley’s disappearance; ‘Turns out, doesn’t it, that he had this incredibly evil demon inside him. It more or less just ate him up.’
Every time she told it, even though he had now heard it countless times, Gerry’s new friend Barry would cackle gleefully.
He happily followed her around, listening patiently to her tale time and time again. Beaming and grinning, he would laugh all the more when Gerry introduced him.
‘Tsao Chun, a Chinese kitchen god,’ she would say. ‘Just what you need, eh, when we don’t have a use for kitchen’s anymore?’
Although Barry Cheung spoke with a Birmingham accent, he looked Chinese and was indeed Chinese if you traced his family back towards the end of the Second World War.
His dancing, too, was more Birmingham orientated than oriental. Stranger still, he danced to music that no one else could hear.
The more he unsuccessfully insisted on Gerry joining him to ‘dance, dance, to the beautiful music’, the more everyone thought he must be the one that was drunk, not Gerry.
Beth had gravitated towards her old friends, leaving the increasingly flustered Galilee to be monopolised by the newcomers.
There were girls who appeared to Beth to be approaching him simply to make eyes. There were also the more serious minded, however, who urgently drew diagrams in the air with their hands as they discussed strategy and anxieties.
Heddy and Drek followed Beth, hanging on close behind her. They giggled as they found excuses to lightly touch each other, blushing whenever they realised they had drawn too close.
Beth didn’t feel comfortable. Her skin prickled, she felt on edge.
She knew people were watching her. She could sense it. She could spot it, if she spun around quickly enough.
They would try to quickly avert their gaze, so as not to be caught staring. That is, they would unless they were Philip Tull or Richard Folster (Beth had at least had the satisfaction of hearing him being addressed as Richard by someone who appeared to know him).
These two obviously took great delight in the unease they were causing her. Their stares would intensify. They would each smile ominously.
With a self-satisfied smirk, Folster would draw slowly on his cigar, narrowing his eyes as the smoke curled around him. As he smiled, his face appeared to crack as its many creases deepened and extended.
Tull’s face, long, narrow and bony, glowed spectrally as the skin once again tightened across his skull. His eyes were dark points, his mouth nothing more than a shallow scratch.
There was another exception too.
The red haired woman simply ignored Beth. (Beth had only ever heard her being addressed by the name of her inner spirit, Epona.)
Epona didn’t stare. She didn’t even glance Beth’s way.
She moved around the rooms as if nothing concerned her. Least of all Beth, who might as well not have existed.
If anything, Beth was the one doing the staring.
Huh, she probably thinks I’m no competition for her!
Hmn, she looks younger, don’t you think?
Yes, Beth did think Epona was looking younger.
Much younger than I would have expected by now, if she were just letting things naturally take their course. You know what? I think she’s getting help.
Oh oh. I know where this is going!
She is looking good, though. Oh, but I suppose that is a bit unfair on you darling!
Beth ignored her, glad that a loud burst of laughter from the corner of the room gave her an excuse to appear distracted.
They were chuckling once again at Barry’s unsuccessful attempts to persuade Gerry to dance.
They cackl
ed and nudged each other as he swayed to a rhythm inaudible to anyone else.
Amongst all the people gathered in the room, only one other person swayed as if she were under the influence of the same, silent music.
She was half hidden in one of the old building’s many niches and alcoves.
Her back was to the room, the swaying so gentle and slow it was hardly noticeable. A long, heavy cloak almost veiled what little movement there was.
It also transformed the hunched woman into a virtually shapeless figure.
To get a better view of the woman, Beth had to move slightly to one side.
The woman wasn’t old, as the short, hunched pose had implied. She was young, pretty, with ridiculously long white hair.
She had seemed to be short because she was seated, perhaps on a stool covered by the draping cloak. She was hunched over and playing a small harp of polished whalebone.
No sound came from the energetically, speedily plucked strings.
The harpist suddenly looked up and around, her eyes latching on to Beth’s.
She didn’t appear to be either embarrassed or annoyed. She kept on playing, her expression melancholy.
The movement of her hands, however, was graceful and full of joy.
Her gaze shifted slightly.
Her eyes hardened, the look abruptly knowing and conspiratorial.
They were locked onto the similarly scheming eyes of Philip Tull.
*
Chapter 56
Despite a cold, early-morning mist, training started almost as soon as everyone was awake, which was only an hour after dawn.
This included even the normally late-rising crusties, who were both curious and insistent on taking part.
They had heard that one of the groups would be learning how to make a swift, sure kill with a sword.
They laughed uproariously as, taking the swords handed out to them, they discovered that the weapons were surprisingly heavy and unwieldy. The heavy blades pulled them off balance, even causing some of them to trip up.
Having witnessed the ease with which everyone else around them used the swords, cutting and thrusting in smooth, flowing movements, they had mistakenly assumed that the swords would be almost weightless.
Even as they at last began to familiarise themselves with the uneven weight of their weapons, revelling in the power they felt in each curving swing, they continued to make fools of themselves by treating the swords as if they were little more than toys.
They didn’t seem to realise that their exaggeratedly aggressive mock fights were actually life-threatening.