Farnor Read online

  Rannick shook his head. ‘That was Captain Nilsson's jest, Gryss,’ he said, smiling again. ‘All that nonsense about the army. He and his men are no more King's men than I am. They are fighting men, to be sure, but they are what you might call ... independent. They fight for themselves rather than for some distant king.'

  His manner became suddenly friendly and explanatory. ‘They have a fascinating history.’ He looked significantly at Nilsson, whose face became expressionless. ‘If you knew it, you would never close your eyes in sleep again. Certainly not venture out at the sound of hooves in the street in the early morning. But now they have decided to pledge their swords to me. It is an arrangement for our mutual benefit.’ He drew closer to Gryss and his voice became a hissing whisper. ‘Just tell the villagers about me, Gryss,’ he said. ‘Tell them that I am their leader now, and that I require their absolute obedience in all things. Tell them that the penalty for disobedience will depend on my fancy at the time, but is unlikely to be pleasant. And tell them that I have instructed the Captain here to kill out of hand anyone who tries to leave the valley.'

  Despite himself, Gryss asked, ‘Why did you kill Garren and Katrin?'

  Nilsson's eyes narrowed nervously, but there was no outburst from Rannick. Instead his face became thoughtful.

  'Garren was insolent,’ he said, quite casually, after a moment. He jerked his head towards Nilsson. ‘And it was my able new ally who killed Katrin.’ He held out an acknowledging hand to Nilsson. ‘Or, rather, she killed herself as I remember.’ He gave Gryss a look of injured explanation. ‘But she was trying to kill me, so he could do no other. Had he not done so then I would have had to when I had finished with Garren.'

  Gryss shot an anxious glance at Farnor as Rannick gave this brief and callous account, but the young man, leaning on Harlen, seemed to be barely conscious.

  Then Gryss felt Rannick's hand close about his arm. It gave a confidential squeeze. He started violently. ‘But there was another reason, I see now. A much deeper reason.’ Rannick's voice was almost wheedling in its self-justification. ‘Why should I waste my time brushing an insect like Garren Yarrance from my path?’ He looked at Gryss as if he truly expected an answer. Gryss found that he was holding his breath, so awful was Rannick's presence. His arm was released.

  'But strange powers are moving here.’ Rannick peered at Gryss intently, as if his gaze would give his words greater meaning. ‘Powers that are focused on me. Powers that have perhaps been focused on me all my life. Powers that bring my destiny to fruition.’ Again the hand closed intimately about Gryss's arm. ‘Why else should I have been born with the gift?’ A buffeting wind suddenly filled the courtyard, blowing up clouds of dust again and making both men and horses look about them uneasily. And, as suddenly as it had begun, it stopped. Gryss trembled as memories of the wind that had almost trapped him and Farnor, returned.

  'Why else should I be drawn to...?’ He fell silent and his eyes drifted northwards filled with a strange, smiling secretiveness.

  Then he straightened up and continued with the air of an academic carefully following a line of reasoning to a satisfactory conclusion. ‘And why else should Nilsson and his lost band of men turn into this of all valleys but to serve my ends?'

  Gryss remained silent.

  Rannick looked down at his hands. ‘And why should Garren have provoked me so needlessly?’ His eyes fixed Gryss's again. ‘Why should he have elected to provoke me and thus die by my hand?’ He curled his fingers so that they looked like talons, then he stretched them out fully and Gryss could feel the tension radiating from his whole body.

  'So many questions, Gryss. So many questions.’ Rannick bent forward and his voice became intense. ‘But only one answer. All this was so that as I made Garren learn what it meant to oppose me, so Katrin would make her sacrilegious assault on me and so, thus, I too would come to a great learning. I would see beyond the totality of my learning thus far. See that it was merely a key to a greater knowledge, a greater strength, a greater power.’ His voice fell to a whisper. ‘I would be transfigured.'

  Sickened and frightened, Gryss could not move away from Rannick even though his arm was no longer held.

  'Watch,’ Rannick commanded softly.

  Gryss felt the air about him come alive with a tingling, unpleasant energy, as though a thunderstorm were about to break. He braced himself for yet another assault by the wind that seemed to guard this place, but instead he found himself trying to focus on a vague, luminous shape that had appeared in front of Rannick. Involuntarily, he made to step back, but Rannick caught his arm and restrained him.

  'Watch,’ Rannick said again.

  Gryss could do no other, so hypnotic was the eerie, dancing light growing in intensity before him. Then there came the fearful screeching that had filled the Yarrance farmyard, and the vague, shifting light became bright, flickering flames. They wove and twisted around one another, merging and separating like sensuous dancers, until they formed a tall column that rose high above the castle walls. The men in the courtyard retreated, as did Harlen and Yakob. Only Nilsson held his ground.

  Gryss could feel a heat beating on his face that was worse than any he had ever known. It seemed to him that even the village blacksmith's forge would be as a cool stream after this.

  He looked at his captor. Rannick's eyes were glistening in the light, the two tiny columns of flames reflected there seemed to be burning in the heart of the man.

  'This is the merest token,’ Rannick said. ‘Such knowledge I now have. So much more shall I gain. Now I am truly on the golden road to my destiny.'

  Every part of Gryss's body was now shaking. Whatever he had thought about Rannick since Jeorg's whispered message, his worst visions had been nothing compared to the reality of the power and the will that was being shown to him here. He knew that he should fall on the man and destroy him somehow before Nilsson or his men could interfere. He could do it; he was near enough. A swift lunge with his knife and he could sever the monster's windpipe. But he knew too that he could not. He knew that with such terror possessing him his hand would not obey any command it received, nor his feet, nor any part of him.

  And yet something must be done!

  Then he felt Rannick start.

  The flames were faltering.

  A flicker of anger passed over Rannick's face to be replaced almost immediately by an expression betokening enormous effort.

  Yet still the flames waned; slowly, but quite perceptibly.

  Sweat formed on Rannick's brow.

  Gryss willed himself to absolute silence and turned away from Rannick in an attempt to make himself wholly insignificant. If Rannick was about to fail at the heart of this monstrous boast, then his wrath would be appalling and could fall on anyone at the least provocation.

  Rannick began to breathe heavily.

  Gryss forced words into his mouth. Words that might perhaps enable Rannick to end this display without loss of face. ‘Your power is magnificent, Lord,’ he gasped. ‘Truly awesome. I'd never have thought to ...'

  But above his words and above the noise of the flames a faint, distant sound drifted into the courtyard. It was a terrible, nerve-shredding sound; a howling. It might have been a wolf or some wild feline, but it was both and neither. It was agonized and unnatural; an animal noise, but full of all-too-human malevolence.

  It was the creature, Gryss's reason told him; no animal he had ever known would have made such a sound. But he needed no logic; the ancient knowledge in every fibre of his body cried out in response to the sound.

  He found his gaze turning back to the flames. They burned less powerfully than before, and a bloody tinge tainted them. Further, there was an aura of struggling effort about them. He was aware of Rannick at the edge of his vision. His face reflected the struggle, grim-shadowed in the light of the flames and glistening with sweat.

  It gave Gryss no reassurance to realize that Rannick was not simply struggling to maintain an impressive illusion, but that he
was locked in combat with some other power.

  Some other will...

  * * * *

  Rescued by Gryss's intervention, Farnor leaned heavily on Harlen's shoulder. Some remnant of childish pride suppressed any outward expression of the inner turmoil that was racking him except for his arm clutched about his stomach and his mouth held tightly shut. Somehow it was enough to keep him from sinking to his knees and crying out at the pain and the fear; crying out for his father to come and take him away from this awful place, and the determined cruelty that had been let loose upon him; crying out for his father to make all well with the looming figure of Captain Nilsson ... He was sure that he and the big man could become friends and end this misunderstanding. Reproachful inner voices reminding him that it was Nilsson who had killed his parents were, for the nonce, lost beneath the pain.

  Indeed, the pain and the effort that he was making to restrain this howling inner plea rendered him almost oblivious to everything that was happening around him.

  He could hear familiar voices; disputing, perhaps? But they were distant and unclear and there was nothing in them to draw him from his cocoon of pain.

  Until a peculiar unease disturbed him. An unease that was beyond himself. And, like the voices, it was familiar. How long had it been there?

  Then it was all about him.

  Now here, now gone; elusive. Flickering and intangible, it seemed to dance through and about him. Its touch was foul. A faint memory returned to him.

  A memory of the creature, ferocious and cruel. A memory of Rannick. A memory of the torrent of unrestrained emotion that had rolled over him as he had fled across the fields to find his parents slain and his home destroyed.

  And they were all one. Brought together in a loathsome totality that had somehow ripped its way into this place where it did not belong.

  And then the memories were gone. Swept aside by something stirring deep within him, as if from a long sleep; something like a faint, distant light. And then it was reaching out and forbidding this intrusion.

  The unease faltered and shifted, and then trembled.

  Then a will emerged to sustain it.

  Rannick's will! Farnor's mind thought faintly.

  Or the creature's!

  It did not matter.

  The light that had come from within him flared and, like a predator finding its prey, it assailed this opposition.

  Somewhere, the merest mote, Farnor watched, helpless, floating in a place that was both here and not here; aware of his beaten body, full of pain and fear and leaning still on Harlen, but unburdened by it; aware that the battle that had just been engaged had been at his will, though it was quite beyond his control.

  He was...

  What...?

  That, too, did not matter. He knew only that resolution was needed of him. Implacable determination. What had come here did not belong. In this alien clime, its ability to do harm was beyond measure. The terrible rent through which it had been drawn must be sealed.

  And the gift of this sealing lay with him.

  But the knowledge meant nothing to him.

  Yet he would not be defeated.

  He would not be defeated.

  He would hold.

  There was a timeless interval when all was balanced and still. Somewhere, Farnor knew, the battle was being fought, but he could do nothing other than wait and commit his will to denying this intrusion further entrance.

  Then the foulness faltered once again. At first slightly, then with increasing desperation like the scrabbling fingers of a climber at the edge of a rounded ledge.

  Was it dying? came the question.

  No. That could not be. But it was failing. It was being driven back.

  And now it was screaming. But to no avail. It must be returned from whence it came, and everything made well here.

  And, with a dwindling, spiralling spasm, it was gone. And there was stillness.

  Farnor felt the light, released now, washing back over him, returning him to himself. He felt a myriad sensations as his body closed about him again.

  Painful sensations!

  Like a dream, both the intrusion and the mysterious opposition to it had passed away. The light had become now the bright sunlight that was filling the courtyard and forcing its way through his partly closed eyes. And the painful sensations focused themselves in his ribs, and his back and his face and ... everywhere else that Nilsson had struck.

  He heard himself gasp with pain.

  The sound seemed to be abnormally loud. He became aware of the silence around him, a silence that rang with tension. He forced his eyes to open further.

  Everyone in the courtyard was staring at something, though there was nothing there that he could see.

  'What happened?’ he heard Harlen say, his voice soft and full of awe.

  'It vanished.’ It was Gryss replying, in an equally awe-stricken whisper. His hands were by his ears as if he had been covering them. ‘That terrible noise,’ he said in distress.

  'That colour,’ Harlen said. ‘Like blood. I've never seen flames like that before. Let's get away, Gryss, while we can. Something's gone wrong. Look at Rannick's face.'

  At the mention of Rannick, the eerie interlude that had possessed Farnor vanished from his mind utterly, to be replaced by the savage anger that had brought him to the castle in the first place.

  It returned to urge him forward to destroy this abomination, as if it had never been halted. Harlen seized him as soon as he started to move, however.

  'For pity's sake, Farnor,’ he hissed. ‘What are you doing? Look at him. We're dead men.'

  * * *

  Chapter 35

  'We're dead men.

  The terrible, shaking fear in Harlen's words brought a final awakening to Farnor, heightening the racking pains of the beating that Nilsson had given him. He must have fainted, he decided hazily, and something bad had happened while he had been unconscious.

  But what?

  He looked at Gryss, who in his turn was staring fixedly at something. Following the old man's gaze Farnor turned to see Rannick. His face was a mask of bewildered fury.

  'Down,’ Gryss muttered frantically, dropping on to his knees and bowing his head. ‘Get down!'

  Compelled by the urgency in his voice, Harlen and Yakob also fell to their knees. Farnor had little choice: he staggered as the support he had been receiving disappeared, then Harlen's hand seized his arm and dragged him down. He managed not to cry out as the pain of his knees striking the hard paving added itself to the others that were vying for attention. He leaned forward to take some of his weight on his arms.

  'Lord Rannick, forgive us.'

  Despite his preoccupation with his pain, Farnor became aware of Gryss speaking. Cautiously he looked at the old man. Gryss's head was still bowed and, reminding Farnor of a beaten dog, he was conspicuously avoiding looking directly at Rannick.

  'We did not understand how great your power had become ...’ Gryss faltered momentarily then hastened on. ‘How great a power you had achieved, Lord. How could we have known of such a wonder as you've just deigned to show us?'

  Horror and shame filled Farnor. What was happening? He would not bow to this savage. This was Rannick, the murderer of his parents, the master of that creature...

  But Harlen's hand held him fast and tightened as he tried to move.

  Gryss was continuing. ‘We have seen the measure of your great power. Forgive us, Lord, we beg of you. Let us go now so that we may spread the news of your greatness through the valley that all may know what we now know.'

  There was a long silence. Farnor made another attempt to protest, but Harlen's grip became almost vicious and he could feel the man trembling.

  'Go, then. Get out! And see that I am not troubled further with your foolishness.’ Rannick's voice was strained and angry.

  'Lord,’ Gryss acknowledged, bowing lower.

  Still avoiding Rannick's gaze, he clambered awkwardly to his feet and motioned the others to
follow him. Harlen and Yakob exchanged a quick glance then they stood up quickly, yanked Farnor unceremoniously upright and, eyes lowered, dragged him towards the gate.

  'What are you doing?’ Farnor said, furiously struggling to keep his balance.

  'Shut up,’ Harlen and Yakob hissed simultaneously, hustling him on. Harlen's voice was shaking. ‘Let's get out of here before he changes his mind.'

  Before he fully realized what was happening, Farnor had been dragged through the shade of the gate arch and out into the sunlight again.

  He clutched at normality in an attempt to reach through to his two relentless guides. ‘Where are the horses?’ he asked.

  They did not relax their pace. ‘Over the hill and half way to the capital by now, I expect,’ Yakob replied acidly. ‘Judging by the speed they left the castle.'

  More gently, Harlen sought to reassure. ‘No, they'll be grazing their way back to the inn.’ Farnor, however, was indifferent to the fate of the horses. He finally gathered enough wit and strength to shake himself free. ‘What's going on?’ he demanded.

  A powerful push in the back sent him lurching forward. He cried out as the impact jarred every pain in his body.

  'Just keep moving,’ came Gryss's grim voice from behind. ‘We can slow down when we're out of sight of the castle.'

  Farnor turned on him angrily, but there was a look on Gryss's face that he had never seen before: a profound fear coupled with an equally profound determination. He held the old man's gaze for a moment, then faltered before it. Without speaking he turned away from him and began limping along the road. Harlen and Yakob came either side of him but he rejected their support.

  Nothing more was said for some time until, well away from the castle, they moved into the shade of some trees. ‘Let's get off the road,’ Gryss said. ‘I want to have a look at Farnor.'

  As they entered the trees the pace eased, as did also the discipline that had kept them stone-faced and silent.

  'What happened? What was all that?’ Yakob asked nobody in particular, a note near to hysteria in his voice. ‘Where did those ... flames ... come from ... or whatever they were?'