Pendragon Cycle - Taliesin Part 37

"Raising it will not be easy." Elphin pulled on his mustache and began pacing the perimeter of the ring. He returned a moment later with a limb of strong ash, which he wedged beneath the edge of the fallen stone. "Roll that rock over here," he instructed, and the two began levering up the slab.

The stone came up slowly, but by working the lever and moving the stone they were able to make steady progress and found that once it was lifted high enough for Elphin to gain a good handhold, he could tilt it up still further. Stripped to the waist, both man and boy strained to the task, and little by little the stone came up, higher and higher, until with a groan and a mighty shove Elphin felt it settle back onto its base.

They beamed at each other and gazed at the stone, s.h.a.ggy with moss. Stained dark by its long sleep in the ground and reeking of damp earth, it tilted slightly so that what little light filtered into the ring struck its pitted surface. Taliesin approached and put his hands on the symbols cut into its surface: intricate spirals and whorls, like circular mazes, all bounded by a border of snakes whose intertwined bodies formed the shape of a great egg.

"Is it very old?" asked Taliesin.

"Very old," said Elphin. He glanced down at the bare place where the stone had lain. "I see why the stone fell."

Taliesin followed his father's gaze and saw that he was nearly standing on the long, yellow bones of a man. The weight of the stone had crushed the skull and ribcage flat, but the rest of the skeleton was intact. A golden gleam caught his eye and he knelt down and carefully brushed the soft dirt away to discover a chain made of tiny, interlocking links-a chain which had once hung around the neck of the man beneath the stone. At the end of the chain was a pendant of yellow amber with a fly trapped inside.

"What have you found, son?" asked Elphin as he knelt down beside Taliesin.

"A pendant. And look!" He pointed to the thin wrist bone. "And a bracelet as well."

The bracelet was gold, inscribed with the same spiral and whorl designs as the standing stone around a blood-red car-nelian in the center. The bloodstone itself was carved with a figure, which could not be made out until Elphin gently freed it from the arm of the man who had worn it for so long. He rubbed the soil from the tiny grooved incisions and held it for Taliesin to see.

"The Forest Lord!" he exclaimed. He took the ornament into his hands and traced with his finger the outline of a man's head with antlers.

Between the skeleton's knees were shards of pottery where a vessel of some kind had broken. Beside one shoulder blade was a long flint spearhead, and just above the skull a bronze dagger, the blade corroded almost beyond recognition. The jet handle, though lined with a network of minute fractures, was still in good condition.

Taliesin stooped to retrieve the dagger and held it in his hand. He stood slowly and gazed at the stone, but it had changed: its corners were square and the designs on its face were sharp and freshly cut. The ditch forming the ring was sharp too, and deeper. A palisade of timber had been erected around the outer edge of the ditch and on every fourth stake the decaying head of a sacrificial victim, animal and human. Most of the heads were weathered, the flesh blackened and revealing white bone beneath. He could smell the death stench in the air.

He turned toward the gap in the ring and saw two pillar stones standing on either side of the gap which was the entrance into the ring. The stones were carved with niches, and in each niche reposed a human skull which had been daubed with a bold blue spiral.

As Taliesin watched, there appeared between the stone pillars a man dressed in a deerskin jerkin which reached to his knees. There were rabbitskins bound to his legs and deerskin boots on his feet. His face was a painted blue mask, and his hair was clipped very short except for a long braid which was folded and bound at the back of his head so that it stuck up like a horse's tail. He wore a small rawhide cap with antlers attached to its crown. In one hand he carried a small blue-stained earthenware pot, in the other a skin drum.

The boy stood transfixed as the shaman stepped to the standing stone and lifted a much-frayed stick which he had dipped into the pot of woad. With this crude brush he began to paint the symbols etched into the standing stone. As he finished, another shaman, dressed and painted like die first, entered the ring, carrying a stone-tipped spear. Behind him came two others in rough skins and between them a third, whose wrists were bound with a wide strap of braided leather. The bound man was naked but for the leather mask over his head and tied about his neck. The mask bore a whorled maze like the marks on the stone.

The bound man walked stiffly and was brought to stand before the stone, where the man with the horned cap waited with his twig brush. The captive stood pa.s.sively while the horned man painted his chest with blue spirals and then was made to stand with his back to the stone. A rope of braided leather was pa.s.sed between his wrists and then thrown over the top of the stone. One of the men pulled the rope, jerking the bound man's arms over his head.

The horned one picked up his drum and began beating it with a striker of carven bone-slowly at first and rhythmically but with ever-increasing speed. He chanted in a wild voice and the captive man began to writhe. The drum beat faster, the chant grew wilder. The second shaman stood close by and suddenly, as if p.r.i.c.ked into motion, whirled around once, twice, bringing the flint-tipped spear up over his head where it posed for an instant before plunging it into the side of the victim.

Blood spurted from the wound and the man jerked away from the spear point, only to have it thrust again, deeper and held while he twitched in agony. When he stopped moving, the rope was released; his arms fell slack. He sagged against the stone as his lifeblood gushed out upon the ground.

"No!" screamed Taliesin, horrified.

The dying man took a faltering step and then another. His legs buckled and he fell to his knees, doubled over his wound and toppled onto his side, where he thrashed feebly for a moment-all of this under the intense, rapturous gaze of the homed shaman.

The victim struggled to rise once more and then lay still, his blood already thickening as it oozed from the hideous gash in his side. No sooner was the man dead than the second horned figure leaped upon the body, tearing off the leather mask. With his bronze dagger he carved off the man's head and placed it upon the standing stone where its wide, staring eyes gazed blankly skyward.

The two horned men conferred briefly while the others lifted the corpse and laid it lengthwise before the stone. When this was done, the first horned man gathered up his drum and pot and strode from the circle.

"Taliesin!" The boy heard someone call his name and felt his arm being shaken. "Taliesin!"

He turned and looked at his father. Elphin's worried face came slowly into focus, and the strange men, their hapless victim, and lastly the wooden palisade faded, dissolving into the air.

"What is it, son? You have gone gray as death." Elphin gripped the boy's shoulders hard.

Taliesin raised a hand to his head. "Put it back," he murmured and then started, staring at his father with wild-eyed fear. "Put it back! Put the stone back!"

"Very well," said Elphin slowly. "We will put it back." He straightened and gazed back at the yellow bones in the uncovered grave. "Not everything that is found should stay found; some things are better lost and forgotten."

They worked at lowering the stone, which was only slightly less difficult than lifting it had been. All the while, Taliesin felt the oppressive atmosphere of the place as a stubborn force that resisted their efforts. But they wrestled and worked and the stone slowly gave way, sighing as it toppled back to its resting-place.

Only when the stone was once again put down did Taliesin breathe easier. "It was not the stone," explained Taliesin. "The Horned One wanted me to renew the sacrifices to him." He shuddered and glanced fearfully at his father. "That would be wrong."

Elphin nodded and took a last look around. "This is an unhappy place. I feel it too and have had enough. Let us go from here."

They returned through the woods the way they had come and eventually reached the stream. Their horses stood drowsing in the late afternoon light, and the dogs were curled at their feet, heads on paws. The hounds jumped up and began barking excitedly when they saw Elphin and Taliesin splashing across the stream.

"We must ride hard to reach the caer before dusk," observed Elphin as he climbed into the saddle. "We were in that circle far longer than it seemed. Ready?"

"Ready," answered Taliesin, resisting the powerful urge to take a last backward glance toward the forest. They snapped their reins and galloped away.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

The first tremors struck kellios just before sunrise. Charis had awakened in the dead of night, feeling the sultry, stifling air thicken to a suifocating blanket. When she could no longer breathe, she rose and went to her balcony to stand before the softly shimmering city. Ocea.n.u.s rolled restlessly in her bed; a smattering of stars shone red in the night-gray sky, and Charis knew that the end had come.

She accepted this with the icy calm of the bull pit and looked her last upon the sleeping city.

From out of the mountains far away she heard the deep, deep rumbling of summer thunder. So it begins, she thought. Dream on, Atlantis; the day of your death is upon you. Farewell.

She turned away as the rumble became a vibration, slight, insignificant. Dogs in the city began whining and howling. They knew. Soon everyone would know.

She dressed in the clothes she had chosen for this day-a simple, st.u.r.dy linen tunic with her wide leather Belt and sandals from the bullring. With practiced fingers she braided her hair and bound it in the white leather thong, put her favorite golden chain around her neck, and walked quickly from her room to sound the alarm-a Bell she had had installed in the center of the portico where it could be heard throughout the palace. With the last peals quivering on the air, Charis hurried on to Annubi's chambers.

She pushed open the door without knocking arid stepped inside. Annubi was within, sitting at his small table, the Lia Fail before him in its gopherwood box, his eyes red-rimmed and tired. "It is begun," Charis told him.

He nodded and closed his eyes "Yes," he whispered.

"Then gather your things and come with me to the harbor. We will wait for Belyn there."

"Belyn will not come," said Annubi. "I will stay here."

"No, I want you with me." The authority in her voice could not be argued with. Annubi shrugged and rose to his feet, hauling up a cloth-wrapped bundle. He thrust the Lia Fail into the bundle, gazed around the room one last time, and stepped toward the door.

The vibration had ceased, but the air still hung heavy and was now tinged with a sharp, metallic smell. The wailing of the dogs echoed through the palace like eerie music.

In the main corridor they met Lile, shaken and nervous, cradling a drowsy Morgian in her arms and holding tight to her courage. She rushed to meet Charis and, taking her hand, asked, "Is it time?"

"Yes," replied Charis. "Where is my father?"

"Why, asleep in his bed."

"Wake him and get on with your duties."

Lile hesitated. "Give roe the child," Charis told her, lifting Morgian from her arms. "Go now. And hurry."

Lile fled back through the corridor. "Take Morgian," Charis told Annubi, handing him the little girl. The seer recoiled with distaste but accepted the child, who began crying after her mother. "Wait with the wagons," Charis instructed. Annubi shambled out into the trembling night.

Charis saw to each of the arrangements she had made, moving from one task to the next with cold efficiency. The last weeks had been physically and emotionally exhausting- ama.s.sing a small mountain of supplies and tools and packing it all, sealing what she could against seawater; rehearsing the plans she and Lile had made for evacuation with scores of unwilling, often contemptuous, royal functionaries; selling off palace treasures for ready gold and silver; buying and outfitting a fleet of fishing boats to carry people and cargo to deeper waters should need arise; supervising the loading of wagon after wagon with the raw materials for survival-a monumental labor, a tapping of deep, unknown reserves of energy, tact, and will. Now that the final dread moment had come, she could be calm. The world might well crumble around her, but the end would not see her rushing around in undignified panic. She woke those of her overseers still asleep and set them about their prearranged tasks. "Do not stop to think," she told the fearful. "Do exactly what we have planned and do it quickly."

In this way, when the first tremors shook the palace hours later, loosing a rain of roof tiles that clattered noisily down in the courtyard, the wagons were already a.s.sembled in ranks-ten rows, four abreast-pa.s.sengers and drivers waiting. Horses reared, their eyes rolling with wild fright in the torchlight. Their handlers leapt forward to drag them down, blindfolding the animals with strips of cloth.

Charis stood on the steps, hands on her hips. "What can be keeping Lile? Must I do it all myself?"

"Princess Charis," came a voice nearby, "we should take the horses out. If the gates collapsed"

"I know, I know! We are waiting for the king. Go back to your place."

The man disappeared, and Charis stomped back into the palace to find Lile and Avallach. The second quake struck as she hurried through the long gallery to the king's chamber. The stone flagging trembled beneath her feet and she heard a distant grinding sound-as if someone were crushing grain between two tremendous querns.

She burst through the door of her father's room to find Avallach fully dressed and sitting in a chair, Lile at his feet, begging him to get up and come with her. He turned his head as she entered. Ignoring Lile, Charis said, "Father, it is time to go. Everyone is waiting for you to lead them."

The king shook his head. "I must stay here. My place is here."

"Your place is with your people."

"Take Lile and the others. Leave me."

"We will not go without you, Father," she said firmly.

"You must go or you will die."

"Then we will die!" she snapped. "But we will not go without you."

Avallach rose slowly to his feet; Lile handed him his crutch and led him to the carriage where Annubi and Morgian already waited. Lile and Avallach climbed in and Charis signaled the driver to leave. As soon as the king's carriage cleared the gate, the other wagons rolled ahead, pa.s.sing one by one through the outer gates as the ground trembled uneasily beneath the wheels.

Charis waited until the last wagon had cleared the gate and then mounted her horse, pausing in the darkness to look one last time at her ancestral home before leaving it forever. The wagons reached Kellios quickly but found the streets choked with people who had fled their homes and now rushed about in stark panic as one tremor after another shook the ground.

The sound of their wailing was deafening. Charis rode forth, slashing her way through the tumult with her reins, forcing a way through for the wagons to follow. She led her entourage to the harbor and out onto the stone quay, where they stopped to await the ships all desperately hoped would come.

They waited and the sky lightened to a ghastly, sulfurous dawn. From the temple district came the mournful lowing of the bulls. A pall of dust hung over the city like a fog, motionless in the dead air. Annubi strode up and down the quay along the row upon row of wagons. At last he came to stand beside Charis. "It seems to be abating," he said. "The tremors are losing strength and frequency."

Charis looked down at his face, pale in the earthly light. "Then we may still have time," she said.

With the sunrise the tremors stopped and the frightened populace promptly forgot their fear and began going about their normal activities. Those waiting on the quay-nearly five hundred people altogether, the entire population of the palace: masons, artists, carpenters, farmers and herders, stewards and servants and palace functionaries of various types, along with their families, all of whom Charis had promised places in the boats-grew restless as they gawked around at a world that now appeared as solid and permanent as ever.

Charis remained firmly resolved, and as the early hours of the day pa.s.sed she kept everyone busy transferring the cargo from the wagons to the fishing boats. The sun rose into a stark sky where it lingered interminably, pouring its white heat onto the baking earth Below; and as the burning disk began its downward slide toward the sea, the last of the cargo was secured and still there was no sign of the rescue ships.

The city-dwellers scoffed at the crowd on the quay, taunting, laughing outright, enjoying the spectacle. In the harbor, meanwhile, boats came and went as usual and Kellios itself behaved as if what had taken place only hours before were nothing out of the ordinary.

It was not until the shadows stretched long on the pier that Lile came to Charis and said, "The people are tired, Charis. Perhaps we should go back."

"No," Charis told her. "I am tired too, but we cannot go back."

"We could leave the boats, and if"

Charis turned on her. "Go back to the palace, Lile, and you go to your tomb! There is nothing there but death."

Lile retreated to keep uneasy vigil with the others, and the long afternoon progressed without event. They ate a simple meal and listened to the nervous wash of the sea back and forth among the footings of the pier as the stifling dusk gathered over the bay, deepening rapidly to night.

And there on the quay, the air thick, oppressive, clinging, they were waiting when they saw the sky suddenly torn with streaking fire as burning stars tumbled earthward, piercing the unnatural stillness with the terrible shriek of their pa.s.sing, smiting restless Ocea.n.u.s.

The blazing starfall continued, throwing pillars of writhing steam high into the sky. People from the city poured onto the wharf to gape at the sight. No one laughed now.

From out of the mountains far away came the sound of a mighty and ominous rumble, and the crowd turned to stare in horror at burning stars striking through the heat haze, smashing to earth in a dazzling and deadly rain. Curtained by falling fire, the people of Kellios fled to the sea, swarming the quayside in chaos, fighting one another for places in the small fishing boats that now filled the harbor, bobbing in the uncertain swell and streaming blindly out into the night-dark sea.

"The boats are not coming," cried someone from one of the wagons. "We have to get away."

"Silence!" Charis snapped. "We wait."

"We're going to die!" someone else whined.

"Then we die like human beings, not fear-crazed animals!"

They waited. Dank, steamy vapors wafted in off the sea, which heaved with an oily swell. Kellios shuddered with the horrid rumbling, shaking the buildings on their foundations, toppling columns from their bases. Many, fearing that the quay would give way, ran screaming back into the city, trampling those who could not avoid them.

By sheer force of her will, Charis kept order among her people, moving amongst them, exhorting them to courage as she had so many times with her dancers in the bullring. An-nubi found her pacing the quay, shouting down the fear mounting around her.

"If the ships do not come soon..."He paused.

"Yes?"

"We may have to go out to meet them."

"No," said Charis firmly. "We will wait here for them." She began pacing again.

Annubi fell into step beside her. "We have time yet, Charis. The boats are ready."

"Belyn will come," she said stubbornly.

"I do not doubt it. But he may not be able to reach us." He lifted a hand into the dead air. "There is no wind for the sails. The ships are floundering tonight."

Charis turned and peered into the darkness of the harbor and the jostling boats ama.s.sed there. "Perhaps you are right," she relented at last. "We have come this far; we can go farther if need be."

She turned and began shouting orders. The boats, ninety in all, had been lashed together in threes-two bearing cargo on either side of a pa.s.senger vessel. Under the direction of Charis' overseers the people dispersed among them. And one by one, as each pa.s.senger boat was loaded, they struggled into the harbor.

From out in the bay, the people looked back. They saw the sickly sky suddenly brighten in the west with a great light that flashed first yellow and then bloodred.

Silence descended over the land. The sea calmed.