Whistler [A sequel to The Chronicles of Hawklan] Read online

  'You're a strange one, Allyn Vredech,’ the Whistler said. ‘Here we are, talking like civilized people about matters of great import; about the souls of men, and the roots of things evil, even about the flawed fabric of all things, and you start screaming and blathering.'

  Vredech's hands shot out to seize the broad lapel of the Whistler's tunic.

  He heard a soft, ‘Don't!’ then had a fleeting impression of the black flute appearing between his outstretched arms and, suddenly, though he felt no impact, he was briefly on his knees and then rolling on the grass.

  As he righted himself he saw that the Whistler was crouching some way away, watching him as though nothing had happened.

  'You've a deal of violence in you for a priest,’ he said. ‘I'm beginning to suspect you've chosen the wrong vocation.'

  'What do you mean?’ Vredech asked, adding hastily, ‘No, no! I don't want to talk about it. I don't want to get involved in another debate with myself. I'm not here. This isn't happening. It's at least two weeks since I left this place.'

  'Left?’ the Whistler said. He was sitting now, playing softly on his flute. The light was dangling from his hand and bobbing happily. ‘What do you mean, left?'

  Vredech stood up and walked over to him. Whatever was happening he had to get away from this place, get back to the real world, to the Haven Meeting House, and Nertha, and Cassraw.

  'Two weeks,’ he said, looking down at the cross-legged figure, strangely mobile in the flitting light. ‘Two whole weeks since I was here. People have died in a terrible accident in Troidmallos. The government's somehow managed to turn a small problem into one large enough to bring it down with who knows what consequences. Another young man's been murdered. And Cassraw seems to be going quite mad. Will you stop playing that damn thing!’ He reached forward angrily to seize the flute. It hovered momentarily in front of his hand then slipped away before he could grasp it. Drawn inexorably after it, Vredech eventually staggered several paces sideways before he regained his balance. He almost swore.

  'Definitely the wrong vocation,’ the Whistler said over the mouth-hole. He stopped playing and, like an unfolding plant, stood straight up. He held the light out towards Vredech who stared at him uncertainly. ‘You're a warrior, Allyn,’ he said. ‘Not a priest. Did you know that? You resort to violence very easily.’ His tone was mocking.

  'No, I don't. Look ... I'm not going to discuss it,’ Vredech said, unnerved by the Whistler's observation.

  'Don't worry about it,’ the Whistler said. ‘You're not the first. And there's not a great deal of difference between a priest and a true warrior. You both care about people after your fashion. Come on.’ He threw the small lantern into the air and, twisting round and round, ran after it as it arced through the darkness. He blew an incongruous trill on the flute with one hand as he caught the lantern with the other.

  'Where?’ Vredech demanded, in spite of himself.

  'There's a cave over here. Nice and dry. And warm when we get a fire going.'

  'But ...'

  'Come on.'

  Vredech looked towards the horizon, where a dull purple marked the resting place of the sun. His gaze moved upwards. The sky was full of stars, clear and brilliant, but the patterns they formed were unfamiliar. And there were so many. They were not the stars that shone over Troidmallos.

  He stared, at once spellbound and deeply afraid.

  'Come on!’ The Whistler's voice was distant now. Vredech tore his gaze from the sky and peered into the darkness. The only sign of the Whistler was a light in the distance, jigging to and fro and occasionally soaring into the air.

  'Wait!’ he shouted as he started running after it. The light paused and became brighter. As he ran towards it he recalled the old Madren tales of benighted travellers drawn into the marshes by malevolent sprites with their flaming lanterns.

  He was breathing heavily by the time he reached the Whistler.

  'You'll need to be fitter than that when you take up your new vocation,’ he said.

  Vredech ignored the remark. He was fighting back panic and forcing himself to adjust to the reality of this mysterious place once again. It was no dream, of that he was certain. For now he knew that he had touched the dreams of others; had been both himself and the dreamer. And dreams had an insubstantial quality at their heart, like reflections in water. Their realities, however vivid, were shifting and ephemeral. They had no hold on him, no control, for he was not truly there. Here, on the contrary, everything was solid and true—the grass under his feet, the scented evening cool becoming the night's coldness under the sharp clear sky, his panting breath as he strode out to keep up with the Whistler's rangy gait.

  Then they were walking amongst trees. The touch of the lantern-light turned the leaves and branches overhead into domed ceilings, and the trunks into solid columns. It was as though they were walking through a great cellar.

  'Here we are.’ The Whistler broke into his reverie. A slight slope had carried them up to the entrance to a cave in a rock face that rose sharply out of the ground to mark the end of the trees. He stepped inside and Vredech followed him. The rock walls had a reddish tint to them and, here and there, tiny polished facets bounced the lantern's light back in greeting. The cave was dry and fresh smelling as if the warm day was still trapped there.

  The Whistler took in a deep breath and smacked his stomach vigorously. ‘In such simple things lies true wealth,’ he said. Vredech looked at him sourly. The Whistler returned the gaze, his expression enigmatic. ‘Just a moment,’ he said, ‘and I'll find some wood for a fire. I won't be long. I'll leave the lantern.'

  'I'm not some child, afraid of the dark,’ Vredech snapped.

  'You're not?’ the Whistler said quietly. ‘I'll leave it, anyway.'

  Vredech sat down and leaned back against the rock. I'm in the Haven Meeting House, he kept forcing himself to think, over and over, as if repetition would make it so. The hard rock against his head and back, the lantern-light etching out the lines of the cave, and the distant sound of the Whistler, now playing, now talking to himself, denied this assertion.

  Then he was back and, very soon, smoke was crackling from a small heap of twigs at the mouth of the cave. Vredech watched indifferently as the Whistler's long hands coaxed the smoke into flames and then began to build a fire.

  As it flared up, he sat down, apparently satisfied, and motioned Vredech to sit opposite. Vredech did not move.

  'You're suddenly troubled, night eyes,’ the Whistler said. ‘In the blink of an eye you changed. One moment you were assured and coherent, the next, wild and rambling, even resorting to violence. Markedly more primitive. Interesting, but quite startling.’ He stared into the fire and then up at the smoke rising from it. A solitary spark drifted skywards. He raised the flute to his eye and peered along it at the dwindling speck. ‘I'm intrigued to hear what's happened. Do you know? Or am I talking to myself after all?'

  Vredech looked at him intently. ‘You must tell me something I don't know,’ he said. ‘So that I can test your reality when I return to ... my own world.'

  The Whistler's brow furrowed in puzzlement, then he shook his head. ‘If you hesitate about your own world, how much more so must I?’ he said starkly. ‘I don't know where it is—indeed, “where", like “when", means little to me now. And, of course, I don't even know if it is, or even if you are, so how can I answer such a question?'

  Vredech gritted his teeth. ‘Then, tell me what He will do. This spirit of evil of yours,’ he said, in some exasperation.

  The Whistler's fingers twitched along his flute and he lifted it slightly, then changed his mind. ‘Tell me first why you're suddenly different,’ he said. ‘You frighten me.'

  Vredech raised his eyebrows in surprise. ‘I frighten you? That seems unlikely. You didn't have any problem dealing with my violence, as you call it.'

  The Whistler made a dismissive gesture. ‘A detail. I took your actions to a consequence different from the one you intended, that's all
. You frighten me because your strangeness, your unsettling complexity, makes me doubt my sanity.’ His eyes narrowed menacingly. ‘It's occurred to me before that wherever I'm lying asleep, I'm mad. Maybe that's why I've locked myself here, like a child cowering under the blankets. Because here I can be sane. Moving from world to world of my own making, able to reason and think. But since you came, my control of events seems to have slipped away from me. I'm plunged into strange places ... places that are between the worlds. And you, black-orbed, haunted and haunting, now rational, now demented, come probing into the very heart of my dream. Bringing your plausibility, your bewildering complexity to twist and bend my thoughts. And bringing Him with you, damn you. All control goes when He comes.’ He levelled a quivering finger at Vredech. ‘If you are real, then what am I? And if you're not, then why should I have Him return and use such a creation as you to be His harbinger? Why should I test myself so? And if I stare into this boiling pit, if I judge myself mad here as well as mad wherever I truly am, then what is the point of all this?’ He waved an all-encompassing hand. ‘Will it crumble and fall? Will I wake to my true madness? Will I die?'

  Vredech flinched away from the pain in the Whistler's voice but he could do no other than reach out and help; the pastoral demand set his own concerns to one side. He snatched at Nertha's words. ‘Nothing can withstand that kind of scrutiny, Whistler,’ he said. ‘It's like a child asking “Why?” after everything you say.’ Then, half to himself, ‘Even healthy flesh becomes diseased if you pick at it long enough.’ He copied the Whistler's own dismissive gesture. ‘Play your flute. I'll tell you what happened to me.'

  The Whistler moved as if to speak, then turned his gaze back to the fire. Slowly the flute came to his mouth and he began to play the three notes that Vredech had heard at their first meeting. Over and over, each time different, sometimes poignant, lingering, sometimes angry, sometimes full of menacing anticipation. As the Whistler's music filled the cave, Vredech thought that he could hear other sounds, powerful and disturbing, weaving through the simple notes. He listened intently for a moment, then, quite undramatically, told the absorbed Whistler all that had happened since he had found himself back in his room in the Meeting House.

  The Whistler seemed to be more at ease when Vredech eventually fell silent. He stopped playing though his head was moving from side to side and he was waving the flute delicately as if he, too, were hearing music other than his own. He looked back into the cave. ‘The Sound Carvers lived in caves,’ he said. ‘Deep, winding, unbelievable caves, full of marvels you could scarcely imagine. I come and play in places like this from time to time, just in case they're here and might want to remember their old pupil. I sometimes think I hear them.'

  He gave a pensive sigh. Then his eyes widened lecherously. ‘I like the sound of your sister,’ he said. ‘Quite a woman. I wouldn't mind ...'

  Vredech's fist tightened and his jaw came out. The Whistler's hands rose in rapid surrender. ‘Sorry,’ he said, his voice full of mock abjectness. And, as suddenly, his manner was earnest and concerned.

  'You spin an excellent tale, but I've heard it before. Chaos and confusion in public, blood and terror in private. His hallmarks, night eyes. His hallmarks. Your friend must be a most apt host to have brought this about so quickly.'

  Being swept along by the panic-stricken crowd, and learning of the murder of the young men had shaken Vredech, but the implication that Cassraw had something to do with either of them shook him even more.

  'No!’ he protested heatedly. ‘No. You've no right to assume that Cassraw was involved in the murders. Or the panic. You can't possibly think ...'

  'I can think what I want, Priest,’ the Whistler interrupted. There was an unpleasant edge to his voice.

  Vredech retreated a little. ‘I meant ...'

  'You meant that you knew what I should and should not think,’ the Whistler said, suddenly very angry. ‘That's the way it is with religions and priests. They give you the authority to walk the easy way, to wallow in ignorance and bigotry and call it divine revelation—anything rather than admit that perhaps everything is not simple, that people might have to make their own judgements, think for themselves, delve into the wonders that are all around us, discover, learn, search out their own destinies, go to hell in their own way. You look down from your lofty pinnacles, with your god at your elbow, and inflict every conceivable kind of cruelty on anyone who has the temerity to ask, “Are you sure?"’ He kicked the fire savagely, sending up a spiralling cloud of sparks. ‘Ye gods, I hate the lot of you.'

  So vitriolic was the outburst that Vredech was stunned into silence. A flood of indignant replies piled up so chaotically in his mind that he could not give them voice.

  'That's unjust,’ he managed after a long silence, and with a softness that surprised him.

  The Whistler made no acknowledgement, but began playing again; a bitter, hard-edged marching tune with a driving rhythm which he tapped out with one foot so heavily that Vredech could feel the vibration through the ground beneath his own feet. It rose into a shriek and stopped without resolution, though the Whistler's foot continued tapping, and a vague echo of the tune pulsed softly out of his pursed lips.

  'And all this business in your ... Troidmallos ... happened, between this and this.’ He snapped his fingers twice as he spoke.

  Vredech was taken aback by the sudden return to their previous conversation. Despite the gentleness of his first response, he was still burning with a desire to engage in angry debate about his religion, but a certain regret in the Whistler's manner prevented him. He could not resist one shaft, however.

  'You wanted to know, seeker after knowledge,’ he said icily. ‘And I told you. So spare me any more of your scorn.'

  The Whistler's foot stopped tapping and he slouched forward. Vredech deduced that that was as close to an argument as he was going to get and he remained silent.

  When the Whistler spoke, his voice was quite calm. ‘Do as I told you a few minutes ago,’ he gave a rueful smile, ‘or a few weeks ago, as you'd have it. Go to this friend of yours, this Cassraw, and kill him. Do it now, while you still can, and before any more innocent blood is spilt.'

  'Don't be ridiculous,’ Vredech replied viciously. ‘Canol Madreth is a civilized country. We have laws about such minor matters as random murder, not to mention procedures for properly determining guilt. And anyway, we don't execute people no matter what their crime. And, not least, there's the fact that I couldn't even contemplate such an act.’ The unspent anger at the assault on his vocation spilled out. ‘If you can't say anything sensible, shut up.'

  The Whistler did not respond to Vredech's anger. Instead, his voice remained calm. ‘That's still the most sensible advice I can give you, though I can see it's unlikely to be accepted. One of the problems for so-called civilized peoples is that they've usually forgotten the darkness from which they came, and have little or no resistance to it when others, less civilized, bring it down upon them. Barbarians have swept away golden temples and glittering cities, time after time after time. And the ignorant have yoked the learned, time after time after time.’ He picked up a few pieces of wood and began repairing the damage his kick had done to the fire. ‘You know what the dominant response is, of people so conquered?’ He raised a quizzical eyebrow and, for the first time since his diatribe about religion, he looked at Vredech.

  Vredech shook his head hesitantly, his anger fading and uncertain now.

  'Astonishment,’ the Whistler said, turning back to the fire. ‘It's bubbling under the surface in you, right now.'

  There was a long silence. Untypically, the Whistler sat very still, his flute lying idle across his knees. Vredech watched him. The scene, with its soft lantern-light and gently moving firelight, looked like a picture in a book. For a moment, he felt that if he reached out, he would turn over a page and find himself reading some old tale.

  Vaguely, he felt powers about him, contending for him, trying to draw him away. But he needed t
o speak further with this strange individual.

  'Answer my first question then,’ he said quietly. ‘What will happen? What will this evil spirit of yours do?'

  The Whistler did not seem to hear. Then, as Vredech was about to repeat the question, he said, ‘What will happen is up to you, I suspect. No—I know it will be up to you. You are near the heart. You're a pivot. A tiny thing about which great things will turn.’ He looked sharply at Vredech, angular and alert again. ‘These things I've seen. As to when, or where ...’ he shrugged, then pursed his lips and began whistling.

  The sound filled the cave instantly, sharp-edged and penetrating. Vredech felt it wrapping around him, cutting through him. Without being aware of any transition he was standing on a high vantage. There was a naturalness about the change that left him unsurprised, but it took him a moment to realize what he was looking at. It was a town, though bigger by far than Troidmallos, spreading out in every direction as far as he could see. Bigger even than one of the Tirfelden cities that his father had once taken him to as a child. And, also unlike Troidmallos, with its winding sloping streets and rows of stepped houses, it was flat. Born and reared amongst mountains, Vredech found the perspective unsettling. Far more unsettling though, was the realization that the whole city seemed to have been destroyed. The view immediately around him was jagged with shattered walls and blackened timbers and, in the distance, great fires raged, hurling flames and dense black smoke into a mocking blue sky.