Farnor Read online

  Rannick bent low towards Garren, his face twisted with rage.

  Nilsson moved his horse forward quickly. ‘Who's been into the castle while we were away?’ he asked. His voice was stern and commanding, but free of the rage that was consuming Rannick. It gave Garren the opportunity to turn away from Rannick's strange belligerence. Instinctively, he told as near the truth as he dared. ‘No one,’ he said, his voice wilfully quiet and courteous. ‘Gryss and Farnor set off there to see if there were any sick or injured who needed attention while you were away, but they never got there.'

  'What happened?’ Rannick intruded.

  Garren shrugged. ‘Gryss had an accident on the way. A fox startled his horse and it threw him.'

  Rannick stretched up in his saddle and stared at the wet rooftops of the farmhouse and its outbuildings.

  'Is this the truth?’ he asked without looking at Garren.

  'To the best of my knowledge,’ Garren replied, with some heat. ‘I wasn't there personally, but why should either Gryss or my son lie about such a thing? An old man falling off a horse is hardly a matter of any consequence, and Farnor was certainly hurt when he came back. He fell on a rock when he was trying to catch Gryss.’ He moved on to the attack. ‘What's happened, anyway, to bring you all charging into my yard in the pouring rain?'

  A good question, Nilsson thought, realizing that he himself did not know the answer to it, so preoccupied had he been in avoiding Rannick's rage.

  'My orders have been disobeyed,’ Rannick said. ‘You and everyone else will have to learn the consequences of such disobedience.'

  Garren's anger overmastered his bewilderment. ‘Rannick, I don't know what the devil you're doing here, or what cracked fancy these men have put into your head. I presume it's some private jest of their own, but if you're expecting to get any work from me this summer I'll thank you to moderate your tone.'

  A silence descended on the yard. Katrin appeared in the doorway. Her gaze moved across the watching men, but no reaction showed on her face.

  Nilsson felt the storm coming and, almost in spite of himself, moved to forestall it. ‘Farmer,’ he said, grimly, ‘you must understand that many things are changed about here now. You must not address the Lord Rannick thus, on pain of severe punishment. Whatever he may have been, he is now as he says he is: our Lord and our leader. It's no jest. As he orders, so we do.'

  'What?’ Garren's single word was filled with both amusement and disbelief. He was about to say more, but Rannick, the force of his anger deflected a little by Nilsson's intervention, spoke first.

  'Where's Farnor?’ he asked starkly.

  'He went for a walk over towards the west-side forest.’ It was Katrin who answered, her voice strong but without aggression. ‘He hurt his arm when he caught Gryss, and he can't do a lot about the farm. I sent him out because he was pacing up and down like a caged rat.'

  This was very nearly the truth, though in fact it was Farnor who had decided to go for a walk. He was bored with the enforced inaction, but mainly he felt that he needed time and silence in which to think.

  'He's probably sheltering somewhere until the worst of this rain has passed,’ Katrin went on. ‘We can send him up to the castle when he gets back if you want to speak to him.'

  Rannick hesitated. Katrin's manner was direct and open, and spoke of gentler, kinder times. It touched the humanity in him; the humanity that had always sat uneasily with his dark, sour spirit and which was shrivelling further day by day with his increasing use of the power. He teetered on the balance. But in the scales were his old life as a near pariah, a labouring malcontent, and set against them was the glorious, rich and powerful future that lay ahead. There was no true choice for him.

  'Speak when I speak to you, woman,’ he said contemptuously.

  Katrin's eyes blazed momentarily, but her hand went out again to restrain her husband. To no avail however. Garren stepped from the shelter of the doorway and, before anyone could react, his powerful arms had reached up, seized the front of Rannick's cape and dragged him from the saddle. As Rannick thudded on to the wet, hard ground, Garren retained his grip and began to drag him to his feet.

  Not by any definition a violent man, Garren's intention was probably to give this lout a good cuffing for his insolence. But he was among men whose knowledge of violence was utterly different and before he could set about his chastisement Nilsson had drawn his knife and, spinning it in his hand, had struck him a powerful blow on the head with its hilt.

  Katrin screamed and ran forward as Garren dropped to his knees, both hands clasped over his head.

  Rannick staggered to his feet. Nilsson swung down from his horse to catch and support him.

  'Lord ...’ he began, but Rannick was intent on only one thing. He shook off Nilsson's supporting hand and delivered a vicious kick to the kneeling Garren. It was a form of assault that he himself had learned only the other day as he had watched Nilsson's men beating Jeorg. He had never seen, or even truly envisaged, such calculated and personal brutality, and it had exhilarated him. The use of the power was not the only corrupting influence in Rannick's life.

  Katrin, who was trying to help her husband, fell backwards as Garren was torn from her hands by the force of the impact.

  Stunned by Nilsson's blow and winded by Rannick's kick, Garren rolled over until he bumped into the wall of the house. Then, gasping, he began to claw himself upright against it.

  Nilsson went forward to take hold of him.

  'No!'

  Rannick's face was so contorted with rage that it was barely recognizable as human. Nilsson abandoned Garren and moved to one side with no pretence at either dignity or courage. He noted, but scarcely registered the fact, that Katrin had disappeared.

  Rannick lifted his hand to the stricken Garren. ‘You are the second person to defy my will these past two days,’ he hissed. ‘You have to understand, all of you, what such defiance will mean.'

  Garren looked at him, screwing up his eyes in an attempt to bring his tormentor into focus. He staggered forward, his arms nursing his chest. ‘You lunatic, Rannick,’ he gasped, painfully. ‘I think you've broken my ribs. I'm already having to do Farnor's work. How the devil am I supposed...?'

  'Your ribs, you pathetic sod-turner!’ Rannick shrieked. ‘Your ribs!’ He turned to Nilsson, who stood very still. ‘You see?’ he shouted. ‘I told you. They don't understand. They have to learn. And there's only one way they can do that.'

  'As you will, Lord,’ Nilsson said, though he knew that his words did not reach into the whirling maelstrom of ancient bitterness and hatred that had festered and rotted in Rannick's heart, any more than Rannick's declamation to him had been intended for his illumination. It had simply been a step in some obscene, self-imposed ritual that Rannick apparently found necessary before he could bring the encounter to its inevitable conclusion.

  Nilsson realized that he had not had his own way after all. Rannick was intent upon asserting his will in all matters, and in the treatment of the locals he had not been deferring to experienced counsel, he had merely been waiting for an opportunity.

  Talk about the old days. Saddre's words came back to taunt him.

  He had no time to ponder them, however, as Rannick had now gathered such resources as he needed.

  A violent, gusting wind suddenly sprang up. It blustered angrily around the farmyard, scattering great gouts of rainwater and further unsettling the riders and their mounts. Nilsson staggered under its force and reached for his horse's bridle, both to quieten it and to steady himself.

  But it seemed to him that the wind was merely incidental to what was happening. Or a precursor to something.

  'Learn! Learn! Learn!’ Rannick's scream rose to become one with the increasingly furious wind. Any semblance of discipline left the watchers and the yard became a frenzy of panic-stricken horses and men.

  Battered by the wind and by the hatred pouring from his new Lord, Nilsson clung to his mount, grimly determined to stand his ground co
me what may.

  He had a fleeting impression of Garren's face, alarm beginning to replace bewilderment, then, although nothing could be seen, a dreadful blow struck him, sending him crashing back into the farmhouse wall. So fierce was the impact that Nilsson heard Garren's breath leave him and his bones breaking even above the din of the wind and the uproar of the struggling men and horses.

  Talk about the old days. Yes, this was the way it had been.

  Rannick was motionless, though to Nilsson it seemed that he was the swirling focus of the chaos that was filling the farmyard. He was aware of another blow striking Garren. And another. The farmer slammed repeatedly into the wall like a child's doll, his limbs jerking lifelessly.

  It was like watching a man being trampled under an invisible cavalry charge.

  Nilsson was indifferent to Garren's fate, but there was a demented quality in Rannick's wilful destruction of his body that sickened him.

  He's dead, Rannick! he screamed inwardly. You've made your point. You can let him be now.

  But he was powerless. This was a time when all he could do was watch. He was bound to this man who was filling his vision with his frenzy.

  But another agent intervened to prevent Rannick reaching whatever conclusion he was intending. An image of wild, purposeful eyes, flying hair and a screaming mouth came into Nilsson's distorted focus.

  And a knife! Glinting, keen-edged, even in the dull light that pervaded the yard.

  Its very sharpness cut through the unreality that was binding him.

  The wife!

  He swore.

  A reflex brought his arm out and his mind watched his hand closing about the sleeve of her dress. He felt its fresh, soft texture.

  Without a flicker of hesitation, Katrin yielded her gripped arm to him totally and in so doing remained free to move. Spinning round, she slashed the knife across her would-be captor twice. Again, old reflexes saved him as he released his grip and arched himself backwards away from the blade. He felt it cutting through his cape and jacket and drawing a thin, ice-hot line across his stomach. Only a shallow cut but a very sharp knife, he registered.

  A survivor of innumerable close-quarter encounters, he knew instantly that, reflexes or no, he was a dead man. He was off-balance and shaken by surprise, while she was so solid in her purpose, so well positioned and so fast. He felt his leaden limbs striving to gain control of themselves while at the same time he found himself waiting for the stroke that she would make next and against which he could not begin to defend himself; the one that he had waited for all his life; the one that would spring open his entrails and lay him in this cold, sodden yard. He fancied already that he could feel the wet stones on his cheeks and the cool rain dripping into his gasping mouth. He was strangely calm.

  But Katrin was no trained warrior with a catalogue of subtle fighting techniques and skilled slayings at her back. She was simply a woman who had read the signs foretelling the death of her husband and who had responded knowing that he had not her vision. She had little conscious thought about what she was doing. Her whole self knew only that she must strike directly at the source of the danger with all the speed she could rouse. Nothing could be allowed to stand in her way: not her own frailty; not this hulking foreigner.

  Thus as Nilsson staggered back he was forgotten, and Katrin returned to the heart of her intent.

  'Lord!'

  The urgency in Nilsson's distant cry penetrated Rannick's frenzy just as Katrin appeared before him. He glimpsed the upraised knife and her eyes pinioned him. Somehow, a miserable village labourer again, he managed to raise an arm as the knife came down.

  Garren's body, freed from its torment, slithered to the ground.

  Rannick felt the blow of the knife, but no rending pain; Farnor's edges were too sharp to allow such. But he felt a scream of fury and terror at this invasion rising within him.

  Katrin did not note what damage she had done. It was irrelevant. He was still there, still conscious, still breathing, still able to hurt her man. She raised the knife again...

  Rannick mimicked her movement, raising his own arm helpless for all his power against this primordial justice and fury.

  Then it was gone.

  Nilsson had recovered and launched himself at Katrin.

  His powerful grip closed around the hand that held the knife. Katrin made no sound, nor again did she fight him. Instead she slithered and slipped within his grasp, her focus ever on Rannick. Twice Nilsson swung the great fist of his free hand at her, but both times she was gone when the blow should have landed. Briefly they pirouetted in a grotesque dance, then Katrin twisted the wrong way and died with the merest flicker of pain on the blade that her son had so diligently sharpened.

  Nilsson felt the life leave her. It was no new sensation to him, but he hesitated for a moment, holding her like a bewildered lover, then he lowered her to the ground with peculiar gentleness, at the same time withdrawing the knife. A mysterious twinge of regret rose within him for this warrior who had bested then spared him. But it passed, although in its wake came a spasm of rage that he could not have begun to explain. Furiously, he hurled the knife away from him. It thudded into the stout wooden frame of the farmhouse door. A fine spray of blood left the blade and stained the painted timber.

  Nilsson's rage was still alive as he turned to Rannick, who was gripping the arm that Katrin had struck. Blood was oozing lavishly between his fingers, falling drops joining the rain and splattering into the puddles around his feet.

  But it was the look on his face that evaporated Nilsson's rage and replaced it with naked fear.

  * * * *

  In the woods to the west, Farnor sat fulfilling his mother's prophecy: sheltering under a tree and waiting for the rain to ease before he set off back home.

  His arm was sore and he was beginning to feel cold, and his mind was turning with relish to the prospect of the warm, welcoming kitchen, bright with light and bustle and savoury with the odours of his mother's cooking.

  He had spent the afternoon wandering idly about the fields and the woods, rejoicing in the soft scents that only the rain can bring forth. Part of the time he had debated recent events yet again, but, despite the violence and strangeness of the assault he and Gryss had experienced at the castle, he had come to no further conclusion than that which he had reached previously: he must watch and wait.

  But not here, he decided finally. A glance at the sky told him that the rain was not going to ease and that he should be on his way soon or he would be walking back to the farm in the dark as well as the wet.

  Then, suddenly, it was all around him. Stronger and more vivid than he had ever known it before.

  The creature.

  Its will pervaded everything.

  It must be nearby. The thought forced itself into Farnor's mind through the uproar, and froze him with terror.

  No, it was everywhere.

  And there was blood.

  And a demented fury.

  He was vaguely aware of the tree at his back. A host of voices whispered to him with a despairing urgency: ‘Home. Home.'

  His body took control of him and his legs began to carry him on, first staggering, then running. The creature was all around. It was filled with vengeance. And it was hunting. He must reach home. He must reach home.

  * * * *

  Nilsson turned away from Rannick as he looked up. His eyes saw still his new Lord, his arm bleeding and his bloodstained hand now reaching forward, clawed in savage reproach. But his inner vision felt the presence of the creature that had slaughtered his men and come near to slaughtering him. And, too, its spirit was everywhere, pervading and drawing strength from the frenzied mass of riders and horses struggling for escape. Somewhere in his consciousness he sensed men falling from their horses, horses bringing down the stone walls of the yard as they scrabbled over them, legs being crushed and twisted in the tight-packed panic at the gate. And, throughout, the rain fell and the wind blew.

  But these were f
leeting motes caught in the whirlwind that Rannick had now become. And he too, Captain Nilsson, leader and champion of his men, was no more than a mote. To remain where he stood would be to die.

  Yet he edged away with a primitive caution—full of fear that a sudden movement might draw this awful predator down on him.

  As he moved he saw Rannick's eyes become alive with an ancient malice. But they were not Rannick's eyes, he knew. They were the eyes of the creature.

  The turmoil in the yard grew further in its desperate intensity. Nilsson fended off animals and men alike as he tried to retreat from the farmhouse. Not once, however, did he shift his gaze from Rannick.

  Then, just as he had seen the creature in Rannick's eyes, so he heard the creature's voice as Rannick straightened up, threw his head back and roared. It was a fearful sound that wrapped itself around the battering wind and the din of the fleeing men and animals, and drew all together into a terrible focus.

  Nilsson's hands began moving to his ears, though the sound was ringing through his entire body, and even as he did so other noises reached him. He turned from Rannick to the farmhouse.

  With unbearable slowness, the windows were shattering and blowing inwards, guttering and tiles were being torn from the roof and hurled high into the grey sky, rafters and beams strained after them then quivered and splintered as they fell back.

  At the edge of his vision, Nilsson saw Rannick stumbling as if the impact of this destruction had rebounded on him. He caught him.

  'Lord,’ he said, perhaps in the hope that simple speech might bring back the man from this awful possession.

  But it was not yet over. The frenzied presence of the creature seemed not so much to have fled as to have been transformed into something yet more fearful. Rannick was himself again, and, too, not himself.

  He leaned heavily on Nilsson and began muttering ecstatically.

  'Yes. Yes. I have it now. I have it.'

  He pushed himself away from Nilsson and lurched forward, his hands extended towards the shattered farmhouse.