Unicorn Ring - Here There Be Dragonnes Part 6

I backed away a step or two and Moglet backed with me, her fur anxious. Out of the corner of my eye I could see Corby hopping up and down, luckily undamaged, and the movement of gra.s.s as Puddy crawled closer.

"Keep back," I thought-ordered them. "I don't like the look of this fellow . . ."

"You'd like him even less if you'd had a ruddy great rock up your a.r.s.e," was Corby's succinct reply. "And we're not abandoning you in a dangerous situation," he added. "Fellow like that means business. Where's your knife?"

"Words first," said Puddy. "Action second if necessary. You've never used that knife in anger . . ." No. It was the one I used for vegetables, peeling and slicing. But it was very sharp.

The swineherd had moved forward as I moved back, and now he was the same distance away as before. "No-harm-meant," he said ingratiatingly, and stretched out his free hand to my still half-covered chest. "Pretty-little-bubs- them. Shame-to-hide-them. Like-to-touch-them-I-would . . ."

I backed away again, looking away past him to where I had left our belongings, with Pisky's bowl in the shade of the wicker carrier. I received his anxiety and sent back a rea.s.surance, but inside I was panicking. I did not know what this man intended: did he mean to kill us for our paltry belongings? He could not know I had our remaining coins hidden away in a pouch in my breeches. Perhaps if I offered them to him he would let us go . . .

Frantically I dug down and his eyes followed my hand, his tongue pa.s.sing slowly over his lips.

"Getting-them-off-for-me-then?" the voice was suggestive, nasty.

I held out the coins. "That's all I have. Please take them and leave us alone . .

His eyes lit up and he s.n.a.t.c.hed the coins away from me and bit them. "Good- good . . ." He took another pull from the flask, pulling the cork with his teeth and spitting it to the gra.s.s. "Why-don't-you-speak-proper? Why-the-mask?

And-what-you-got-over-there?" and he gestured in the direction of our belongings.

He wasn't going to leave us in peace, he wanted everything. "Take it all," I said despairingly. "Except my little fish. Then please let us alone . . ."

He put down the flask and placed the coins atop, where they winked in the sunshine. "Don't-hear-you-right-girl. Ain't-answered-my-questions. Let's-see- what-else-you-got-in-there-" and he made a grab for me but I jumped back, and this time my knife leapt to my hand, glinting to match the coins.

"Let us alone, or I'll-I'll kill you!"

He couldn't reach me but unfortunately Moglet had not moved fast enough and he grabbed her and held her high by the scruff of the neck, his other hand flashing to his own knife. He made as if to strike her and I screamed, a scream that was echoed by a strangled wail from Moglet.

"Help me, Thing dear, help me!"

"No, no!" I yelled. "Anything you want, anything!"

Apparently this time he understood, for he lowered my kitten, but his knife was still at the ready.

"Don't-want-me-to-harm-your-pet? All-right-put-your-knife-down-over- there-and-I'll-let-it-go. That's-right . . ." For a moment longer he held her, then opened his hand and she dropped, choking and gasping, to crawl back to my side. I bent to stroke her, but a moment later a hand was at my throat and I was forced backwards to the ground and his other hand tore at my belt.

"Get-'em-down, get-'em-down," he muttered and pulled my trews past my knees. In hideous shame I tried to cover my red-pebbled belly with my hands and roll over, but he slapped my face till my head rang. "Lie-still-curse-you- or-it'll-be-the-worse-for-you-"

At that moment he broke off with a yell for all at once he was attacked by the spitting fury of Puddy, whose venom shot up into his face, the claws of an enraged Moglet, scratching blood from his hands, and the beak of an angry Corby, who tore at his rear.

"Run, Thing, run!" they yelled, but with a fist the swineherd punched Moglet from him, with a foot he kicked Puddy away and his knife flashed within an inch of Corby. I knew it was no use and called on them to stop.

"Go away, go away, my dear ones: you cannot help me now. Go into the forest where he cannot find you, and drag Pisky's bowl with you. I'll be all right, only please, please go!" But still they hesitated, crying and cursing, till I used the words of command. "Go, and do not disobey. I command you by all that holds the Earth, the Waters, the Sky in their accustomed places; the Now, the Then, the Hereafter . . ."

I heard them leave me, and the desolation of the abandoned tied my stomach in knots, spilt the tears from my eyes and cut at my heart as keen as any knife.

The sun went behind cloud and the figure standing over me a.s.sumed the proportions of a giant. Why doesn't he kill me, I thought, and get it over with?

And I sent a hope-call for my dear ones, to be left to fend for themselves. Let them be brave and resourceful, I prayed, let them find their own peace . . .

The swineherd unb.u.t.toned his trousers. Staring upwards, all at once I realized what he intended: he meant to use me as Broom used to punish our Mistress, for the great thing that poked out from his groin was smooth- k.n.o.bbed, and ridged and gnarled along its length like Broom, and it throbbed and pulsed and swelled like Broom, and like Broom it had a great bush of furze at its base the colour of dead heather, and it waved and nodded and beckoned just like Broom and any moment now it was going to thrust into my stomach where the pebble hurt and bring forth great gouts of blood and pain, and I began to whimper and cry.

"Oh, do not hurt me! Do not hurt me-I cannot stand more pain! Please, please!" I did not want to writhe and curse and bleed as she had done- The sun came out from behind the clouds, there was a thudding noise on the turf, a wild neighing, and all at once the swineherd was gone, clear over the top of the knoll, and soft horse-breath was sweet on my face.

"Come up, youngling, come up! He is gone and you are safe, for the moment.

Gather your things quickly, for he will be back . . ."

I stared up in bewilderment at the tattered, ragged-maned horse that stood over me.

"Gather your things quickly, before he returns," he repeated. "The others are safe: I will take you to them. Come!"

That night we had a fire, and ate at our leisure, and slept in the open. No looking for a tree to climb up, a hole to crawl into; that night we slept at peace for the first time since we had left on our great adventure. It is difficult to explain just why we all felt this sense of security-and we all felt it, not just me-except that the finding of the white horse, or rather his finding of us, was at the root of it all. Not then nor after did we ever question his unerring sense of direction, his knowledge, his warm benignity: we just accepted them, and him as something special.

Not that he was a splendid white stallion of some eighteen hands, like the great chargers I seemed to recall from some other time, some other place; he was small, perhaps a little larger than pony-size, with cloven hooves and tatty feathers, a long tail and mane, curly and tangled, and large, soft, brown eyes.

It was probably those eyes that set the seal on it: they seemed brown most of the time, but in sunlight they were blue-green, in shade brown-green and they beamed-there is no other word for it. Rea.s.surance, comfort and a strange other-worldliness shone from those eyes, and yet they were not happy . . .

He promised us nothing that first day, except that he would take us to a place of safety: he had carried us all smoothly and swiftly through the forest, stopping as twilight fell in a particularly pleasant glade to let us down. After gazing at us rea.s.suringly for a moment or two he went to lie down a little distance away, leaving us, as I said, feeling so calm and confident that I had lighted a fire without further thought, and we slept in the open that night all wrapped under my cloak, for the nights were chill-all that is except Corby, who preferred to roost off the ground.

In the morning the white horse was still there, quietly cropping the sweet gra.s.s that still lingered in the hollows. He seemed shy of approaching us, so I went across with one of the small russets I had bought the day before.

"Please have one: they are nice and juicy."

Lipping the apple gently from my palm, he scrunched it with evident enjoyment. "Thank you."

"Talking of thanks, I quite forgot to offer mine-and ours-for the rescue and the ride and-and everything."

"I had been near you for some days: I thought sometimes you realized I was near."

"I thought someone, or something, was following us, but I wasn't sure. And if you hadn't, I don't know what would have happened to us. That-that man, with his-his-" I still wasn't sure what it had been.

"I followed you because you seemed a small and vulnerable party to be making your way in such a determined manner, and I was curious. Besides, you are a maiden, and even in my present state I have not forgotten my duties."

"Duties?"

"To defend all maidens and the pure and unsullied from Evil, in whatever form that may come . . ." The answer was confident as if it came from a much bigger animal, but my eyes must have mirrored my astonishment, for the white horse blew softly in my ear. "Things are not always what they seem," he said. "I was not always the wretched thing you see me now . . . No more of that. Now tell me, youngling-"

"My name is Thing," I interrupted. "And may I know just whom I have the honour of addressing?" I knew that was the correct way to ask someone's name because I had overheard two gentlemen meeting on the road one day, and they had addressed one another in just that way. I had crept away and practised it.

"You may, but not just now. Give me a name of your own: whatever you would call a white horse."

I thought of all the things that were white: clouds, linen, daisies, dough (sometimes); swan-feathers, chalk, marble, eggwhite; snow-Snow. "Would you mind if we called you 'Snowy'?"

"I would not mind being called Snowy at all," he said gravely. "I do not think I should have liked 'Doughy' or 'Eggwhitey' as much . . ." He had been reading my mind! That was another thing: all of us could understand him perfectly, but none of us considered this strange, although we had been used to our own methods of conversation for so long. And he seemed to sharpen our understanding of all the other creatures we met along the way, as if he were a catalyst through which all tongues became one. What surprises me now is that we accepted it without question at the time, but perhaps that was all part of his magic, too.

"And now," he said. "Would you like to trust me with your purpose in journeying so far and so poorly attended? I can see you have a tale to tell-but perhaps you would prefer it if we talked as we went? I am afraid I am not strong enough to carry you far in one go, but if you can manage to walk a league, say, and then travel on my back for the same distance, we could probably manage double your usual journeying."

"You go our way, then?" I said, delighted.

"For want of a better, my road lies with yours for a while, yes," replied the gentle creature.

It was a day of sun and shadow, wind and the falling of leaves. As we went I told our new companion our story, right from the beginning. He questioned me closely about our Mistress, then sighed. "You are sure She is indeed dead?"

I was sure, and he sighed again. "Then that is that: no hope that it may be changed." He seemed to make up his mind. "Then, if you will have me, I shall be with you till your journey's end.

"You wanted to find a magician, a wise man: I heard tell of a great sorcerer who lived once in the arm of the west. I had supposed him dead or fled, but you have such faith that it is possible he is still there. If he is, I think I know the way.

"Come, my friends: the sooner we are there the better. I have an idea the hour-gla.s.s has been turned for the last time . . ."

The Gathering: One- Two-

Three- Four- Five- Six- Seven

The Rusty Knight

It had been a beautiful morning. For some days now we had been following the upstream course of a big river, which the white horse, Snowy, said was called the Tamesis. It was fordable, but he said the going was better on this side and we could make another seven leagues or so before crossing and striking more southward. We had woken that morning to the loud, sweet song of a little wren, and everything touched with frost fingers. It was near the end of the month of Leaf-Fall and soon we should be in the Moon of Mists, but the morning was sparkling and still and clear. We had spent the night cosily enough in an abandoned charcoal-burner's hut, but the sharpness of the morning turned my nose pink and snapped at my cheeks, or so Corby said.

"You look just like a ripe apple, m'dear," which was a generous compliment to my maskless face, for I now only wore this disguise if there was a chance of meeting other folk on the way. Not that this was a frequent occurrence, for we left the road if we heard steps on the way, and hid till they were past.

Snowy had made no comment on my disfigured face, for which I was grateful: he just seemed to accept it as the others had. I always considered this a peculiarly delicate gesture on their part, until I overheard Moglet one day remark to Corby: "I don't know why Thing bothers with that silly piece of leather: she looks all right to me," to which the gracious bird replied: "She could be as beautiful as Heaven or ugly as h.e.l.l, as the saying goes, and it would be all the same to me: humans all look alike, don't they? I can't tell one from t'other 'cept by their height and the length of their beaks, and hers is nothing to beat the drum for. Now mine, mine you would call a patrician beak . . .".

So much for vanity.

The road swung away from the river for a while and lay between high banks where beards of traveller's joy draped the bushes and blackbirds feasted from the last brambles and watched the haws ripen. We had climbed a little and now stood on an escarpment. To the left, down by the river, a few houses hugged its curves, smoke rising straight and thin into a pale sky. Below us in a clearing was a winter barn full of hay; the southering sun shone on gleaming pebbles on its roof, and only when I saw their restless shift and heard the bubbling chatter carried up to us on the still air did I realize they were those tardy travellers, house martins, adorning like pearls the rough surcoat of the barn roof. Beside the barn someone had planted a line of fruit trees and these, for rapture of the morning, had shed their last leaves to lie, discarded red petticoats, around their feet, and stretched bare silver limbs to embrace the shafted sunlight. Beneath our feet, as we trod the rutted road, fallen leaves leapt away like frogs from our intrusion, and somewhere amidst the smells of cold stone, damp earth and the sweet sweat-smell of Snowy, was the evocative scent of burning apple logs- "Listen!" It was Moglet, large pointed ears flickering back and forth.

We stopped and at first I could hear nothing, but as I watched the others their reactions told me what was afoot long before the faint sounds reached my ears. It was a stealth of ambush, a fight-back, a battle, and as we hurried towards the sound, half-afraid, half-curious, I found my heart beating with a rare excitement as if something special was about to happen. We rounded a corner, the road dropped away in a steep decline and there beneath us where the road banked high, river on one side, forest the other, a lone man in rusty chain mail was trying to fight off three sneak-thieves with his fists and a broken sword.

Even as we watched he was beaten to his knees then rose again, staggering, with scarce enough breath to call for help, and the next moment returned to the attack, in the name of one St. Patrick. He was a bonny fighter, but I could see he had no chance at all, and would be lucky to escape with a broken skull and the loss of his pack.

I turned impulsively to Snowy. "We must help him! We can't just stand by and let him be killed!"

"Are you sure you want to be involved? We could lie low till they have done . .

Somehow I knew this was no cowardice on his part, more a test of me, the biggest coward I knew. But- "Of course we must help him! We must draw them off, distract them-"

"I can imitate a horn," said Corby, hopping up and down.

"Hear me shriek!" said Moglet.

"Poison in their eyes," muttered Puddy.

"You can borrow my water," bubbled Pisky. "But only borrow, mind . . ."

"Right," said Snowy. "I shall gallop round through the trees and try to sound like a troop of horses, dropping you off, crow, to make your horn-calls on the other side of the road, with cat doing her screeches. Toad, you shall be left nearer to aim your poison, and the maid here shall hide in the trees with the fish and bang against a pan and shout 'A rescue! A rescue!' in as deep a voice as she can. Ready?"

We had no time to think. Up on Snowy's back, then away like the wind down through the trees and into action. It was wildly improbable, highly dangerous, wholly exhilarating-and it worked. A perfect cacophony of horn and trumpets sounded from the river side of the road, accompanied by ear- splitting screeches. A cavalcade of hors.e.m.e.n thundered through the woods; one attacker was half-blinded by an evil jet of poison that shot from the bushes at his feet and my clattering sounded like at least three men in armour blundering through the trees. In a moment the three attackers were flying for their lives down the road away from us, leaving a huddled figure heaped in the ditch, pack still intact by its side. We approached warily from our various concealments, one eye on the dust of the attackers' retreat, the other on the victim. The only one making any noise was Pisky, furious at not being allowed to help in the attack, sulking vociferously at the bottom of his bowl.

The knight lay on his face in the muddy ditch.

"He's awfully still," I said doubtfully.

Puddy hopped closer. "He's breathing, though."

"All b.l.o.o.d.y," said Moglet. "Not nice . . ."

"I've seen worse get up and walk," said Corby. "But not much."

Pisky decided to ignore the whole thing.

"Well," said Snowy, "we should get him away from here in case they come back; we should be safer under cover. If you will pull him on to my back and walk beside to keep him steady we can make a mile or two to an abandoned anchorite's cell I know of in the forest. Can you manage his pack as well?"

Somehow we did manage, though we were all exhausted when at last we laid him on the floor of the cell, a gloomy place that smelt of old bones and cat- p.i.s.s. I placed the knight's head on his pack, but carefully because the back of his head was sticky with blood, and covered him with my cloak. He moaned a little and moved his legs, so we knew they weren't broken; I flexed his arms: they were whole too, though his knuckles were broken and bruised with the fighting. He seemed to be whole in body, no holes or gashes, but I fancied from the bruising and his ragged breathing that a couple of ribs might be broken, but I dared not completely remove his rusty chainmail coat to confirm this. His head seemed worst hurt: it bled freely from a gash on his forehead, he had a black eye and a b.l.o.o.d.y nose, but these would heal; I was more worried about the injury at the back: a lump was already forming, though the blood oozed more slowly now.

I sat up from my examination. "Can we light a fire? He's very cold . . ."

"We're safe enough here," said Snowy.

Corby rattled off for some twigs for kindling, I found some larger pieces of branch and soon we had a fire blazing away in the corner. I remembered the so far unused piece of linen I had taken from our village, what seemed so long ago, and knew at last how to make my peace with Pisky as well. With dampened cloth, carefully dipped in his bowl, I wiped away the worst of the blood from the knight's head and bound up his wound as best I could; he moaned a little and grimaced but still remained unconscious, and I looked up anxiously at Snowy.

"Will he be all right?"

"Lift his head a little and give him half a cup of water from Pisky's bowl. Wait: put the cup on the ground," and I watched as he bent his head and covered it with his mane. I wondered for a moment whether he was checking for weed or snails, but when he nodded to me to take up the cup the liquid within was warm and cloudy and smelt of herbs. "Now, give him a drink."

I put the cup to his lips. "Drink, Sir Knight: you are in safe hands."

Obediently he swallowed the liquid and, as I held his head on my arm, a pair of autumn-brown eyes opened and gazed into mine. Too late I remembered I was maskless.

But he was whispering something. "Thank you, beautiful one . . ." His eyes closed and he was unconscious again, but he had looked at me, he had spoken, he would get better . . . He must, for at that look, those words, something in my middle had started galloping round like a colt in spring, ungainly and clumsy and untamed, and I knew I could not let him die, even if common sense told me that it was not me he had seen but some lady of dream.

"He'll do for the moment," said Snowy. "There's a spring down in the trees a small walk away. Make your suppers and put on some broth for when he wakens. I'll fetch herbs, and I think you'll find a flask of wine in his pack: put a cupful in the broth."