One Bright Star to Guide Them (5 page)

Tommy sighed, looked down, and asked, “Do you suppose her husband truly has the sign of the Evil Eye stamped on his brow?”

The cat looked up, unconcerned. “I only know she has the sign of the coward branded on hers,” the soft voice purred.

The churchyard of Easterwick was near the town hall, facing it across the town common green. The March sky was the hue of mother-of-pearl, striped white and blue with bands of cloud and clear sky, and the smothered sun shone wan. The last of the frosts were failing. New shoots could be seen through the gray winter grass, and green buds shyly showed on the naked branches of the trees. It was Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent.

Thomas walked out from the post office, past the town hall, and into the graveyard behind the little church. Under his arm was an oblong package, wrapped in brown paper and tied up with string.

He stood looking down at a gravestone. The stone was cut with an image of a ship in full sail under a stormy sea, with a many-rayed star before its prow. The prow was shaped like a swan, with its graceful head raised toward the star.

The inscription read.

PENELOPE ANGANIM OAKWREN 1940-1987

One brave soul to hold the key

To find the charm and learn it

One bright sword to smite the Dark

One bright flame to burn it.

One note of harp to free the fire

No dark cold glass could hide Him

One white ship to sail them far

And one bright star to guide them.

Tybalt was stalking through the tall grass among the gravestones. Occasionally a bumblebee or startled beetle would dart up, and Tybalt would hop up straight into the air, batting at the fluttering insect with his paws. Tommy opened the package. Inside was a leather-bound volume with brass hasp and lock and hinges, embossed with the image of a sword embedded in the roots of an oak tree.

Also in the package was a letter from Penny's nephew explaining how she had left a provision in her will that this book be given to any of her three childhood friends, Thomas Robertson, or Sarah Truell, or Richard Sommerville, whomever should first ask for it.

Slowly, Tommy walked over to a marble bench, which stood on little legs shaped like sphinxes. It sat at the edge of the churchyard, facing the green.

Tommy sat, and held the book on his lap, waiting.

The sun broke free, and the day brightened. At this, Tommy pointed the silver key at the sun, then at the padlock holding the book shut.
“Tome of light, thee now I task; no truth is hid from those who ask. Unlock, release, unbind, set free; knowledge is free to who holds the key.”

The book's lock popped open with a click.

Thomas undid the hasp and opened the massive book. The pages were all blank.

Now he tilted the book so that the sunlight was falling directly on the first page. The ink faded into view, huge curlicued calligraphy in uncial script, intertwined with pictures and diagrams, all knotted around the margins and woven in and out of the capital letters.

Most of the pages were sea-maps and star-charts, of coastlines and islands. Some of the coastlines were the lands of Earth; others were of worlds mystical and far, coasts unknown to mortal sailors, except, perhaps, in dreams.

There were diagrams showing the secret routes between worlds, and the star configurations showing when the gateways would open. There were illustrated diagrams of interlocking star-spheres, pointing out the whirlpools and monsters lurking along the celestial rivers and the Milky Way streams between the stars, or the river of Eridanus, with notes on the tides, and enchantments showing how to escape the dangers.

This was the book Myrrdin had given to Penny to guide them safely back home. The Well at Noss had been destroyed by the malice of the wolf-prince Monagarm, lieutenant of the Fell Winter King, and the children had no other way home. Myrrdin had given up all the secrets locked here inside by giving them the book.

Thomas remembered how Penny cried, clinging to the graceful neck of the ship's swan-shaped prow. The ship had driven through the final storm surrounding the earth, but had been broken on the rocks. With tattered sails, sinking, the white ship bravely carried them through, and appeared in the fog in the deep mountain lake just ten miles north of their homes. Even so, they barely made it to the rocks of the shore, for the night was stormy and wild. They clambered ashore, lucky to have escaped with their lives, but Penny clung to the broken prow, crying, and she would not let go, even though the ship was sinking.

She would have been pulled down had not Richard and he grabbed her away. The white ship sank out of sight in the water, her swanprow pointed up toward the sky. Years later, Penny's husband funded an archeological expedition to drag the bottom of the lake. They found many treasures the ancient peoples of Britain had thrown in the water as gifts to the spirits and elfs, including many coins, and fine gems. Perhaps they knew that this lake at times touched the other worlds, unseen. There were gold torcs and bracelets, and even a chariot inlaid with brass, driven by stallions into the water, a gift for the gods. But of the white ship there was no sign.

Thomas found writing in the margins, in Penny's careful hand, trailing through and around the dragons and griffins, sailing ships and sceptered kings, and the star-maidens dancing in the marginalia. The message stretched across numerous pages.

The note read:

TOMMY, I READ THE CHAPTERS IN THE BOOK WHICH DEAL WITH THINGS YET TO BE, AND I SAW THE PICTURES HIDDEN IN THE LETTERS WHICH SHOW YOU AS AN OLDER MAN SITTING AT A CHURCH, READING THIS. I WILL BE IN HEAVEN BY THE TIME YOU READ THIS, LOOKING DOWN. NEVER DOUBT THAT WHAT YOU DO IS RIGHT.

“I'm not that old,” muttered Tommy, rubbing one hand across his balding head. The message continued:

THIS BOOK IS WRITTEN IN ELF-LIGHT INKS, AND THE DIFFERENT LETTERS WILL SHOW AT DIFFERENT TIMES. THE PAGES YOU CAN READ IN SUNLIGHT WILL TELL YOU FACTS AND LORE; THE SPELLS APPEAR BY MOONLIGHT; THE OMENS SHOW ONLY ON CLOUDY DAYS; THE STORIES ARE FOR CANDLE-LIGHT. THE DEEPER SECRETS ARE HARDER TO READ. SOME APPEAR ONLY BY THE LIGHT OF THE MORNING STAR, AND ARE INVISIBLE AT MIDNIGHT, OR BY THE LIGHT OF ORION, AND CANNOT BE READ DURING THE SUMMER. THE LOVE POEMS SHOW ONLY BY THE FIRELIGHT OF BURNING ROSE PETALS, BUT MOST OF THEM ARE SAD.

THE NAME YOU WILL NEED IS ON PAGE SIXTY-SIX, AND THE LIGHT OF THE SWORD WILL SHOW IT. NO ONE WHO CANNOT DRAW THE BLADE WILL KNOW IT. MANY TIMES I ALMOST FORGOT WHAT WE FOUR DID IN VIDBLAIN, SINCE IT WAS SO LIKE A DREAM, AND SO LITTLE LIKE LIFE. I HOPE YOU REMEMBER VIDBLAIN, KEY-BEARER, EVEN IF THE HARPIST IS FRIGHTENED AND THE SWORD-BEARER IS FALLEN.

I WAS SENT TO GUIDE US ALL ACROSS THE SEA TO THE WEST, IN THE ONE WHITE SHIP THAT THE WINTER KING DID NOT FIND AND BURN. THE WHITE SWAN OF THE PROW SPOKE ONLY TO ME, WHICH MADE RICHARD JEALOUS, I KNOW. BUT I TOLD YOU EVERYTHING IT REVEALED TO ME. EVERY SECRET I TOLD BUT THIS ONE:

I WAS TOLD THE PATH ACROSS THE SEA TO THE SUMMER COUNTRY. THERE WINTER IS UNKNOWN, AND DEATH NEVER COMES, AND LOSS AND SORROW HAVE NEVER FOUND THOSE BRIGHT SHORES. EVERYONE KNOWS THAT PATH: IT IS TAUGHT THEM BEFORE BIRTH. BE BRAVE AND JUST AND NOBLE, AND THE PATH WILL COME CLEAR TO YOU.

THE BOOK SAYS THE CHILDREN OF LIGHT WHO ABIDE IN THE SUMMER COUNTRY LIVE IN THOSE PALACES, NOT FOR ALL TIME, BUT ONLY FOR THEIR FEAST-TIMES, THEIR SOLEMNITIES AND CELEBRATIONS, OR WHEN THEY HAVE BEEN WOUNDED WITH SORROW IN THEIR LONG WAR AGAINST THE DARK. EVEN THEY NEED A TIME OF REST AND OF JOY. IT IS NOT THEIR FINAL RESTING PLACE, NOR THEIR FULLEST JOY. AND AFTER THEIR REPOSE, THE ANGELS OF WAR STREAM OUT AGAIN FROM HEAVEN TO URGE THEM ON, THE SONS OF LIGHT ARE CALLED TO MANY BATTLES ON MANY WORLDS, AND INSIDE THE SOULS OF SO MANY MEN.

WE FOUR WERE THOSE WARRIORS IN THAT TIME. SINCE YOUR CHILDHOOD DAYS YOU HAVE KNOWN REPOSE; PERHAPS YOU HAVE PARTLY FORGOTTEN. BUT THE HORN-CALL SOUNDS AGAIN, AND THE BATTLE AGAIN IS RENEWED. DO NOT BLAME YOURSELF THAT YOU RESTED, OR FORGOT. DO NOT BLAME RICHARD OR SALLY. THEY MUST REST LONGER THAN YOU, PERHAPS NOT TILL LIFETIMES HAVE PASSED WILL THEY ONCE MORE RECALL THE LIGHT WE SAW, AND BY IT BE RECALLED.

THE GREATEST BATTLES ARE ALWAYS FOUGHT WITH NO ONE BESIDE US. BUT NO ONE WHO WALKS IN THE LIGHT IS EVER ALONE.

Tommy closed the book slowly. “Thank you, Penny,” he said.

It was a May evening, forty days later. Tommy stood among a dozen birch and larch separating the museum house from Chilkwell street, which led past the Chalice Well and up Glastonbury Tor.

“Some little rundown town in Somerset, he said,” Tommy muttered aloud. “Little town, my eye! Only the place where King Arthur is buried!”

At Tommy's feet, in the long grass beneath the slender trees, Tybalt was carefully watching a moth tumble past, the first one of the evening. He pounced on it, let it escape, and pounced again. “Here also are the hidden gates where pale queens came forth from the waters undying which flow from the mountains of Elfland.”

Tybalt then jumped up after the moth, using Tommy's pantsleg like a tree trunk to gain altitude. The little nails bit painfully through the fabric into Tommy's flesh. Without ado, Tommy shook the black cat free with a kick of his leg.

Tybalt spun gracefully and landed silently, on his feet, as was customary with cats. From his supercilious look, it was clear he did not deign to notice this rough behavior, but stepped back and forth in the spring grass, whiskers twitching, nose in the air. “All such paths are given in the Navigator's book. How is it that forty sunsets have come and gone while you tarried in study?”

“Penny always guided us well,” Tommy said, a little sadly. “I don't have her knack for puzzling out the little clues and signs hidden in the curlicues of capitals or little pictures in the margins. You could have helped.”

“I cannot read the letters of men,” sniffed the cat. “That is the art of Enoch, son of Cain.”

“We had to check every place, didn't we? There are a lot of maps, and some of them vanish under different moons.”

A leaf atop a nearby blade of grass wiggled temptingly in the sunset breeze, and the black cat jumped on it, slicing it neatly to bits with a military flourish of his fore and hind claws. “Nonsense,” said Tybalt dismissively, trampling little leaf fragments underfoot with a marching motion of his feet. “You looked in the least likely places first. Have men no instinct for the hunt?”

“I was expecting the Shadow Knight to hide the sword in a place that would be hard to enter. In the Tower of London next to the Crown Jewels, or buried in a gold vault beneath the Bank of England. A stronghold of some kind.”

“A stronghold? What do you think this is? The wards that Bleys and Myrrdin wove made this tor the heart of England, for it is the place where the King Who Did Not Die sleeps. And he is not the only King who scorns Death.”

“If you had told me all that a month ago, I might have figured it out then.” He sighed and shook his head “Well, if we had solved the acrostic too. And if we had known what a Bonnacon creature was, and knew the riddle's answer was 'burning dung.' You've got to admit that is pretty obscure. I had no idea Penny knew so much! All those books she read, all that useless trivia she knew… But it's a strange sort of stronghold. I don't even see a night watchman!”

“The Knight of Shadows knows well he cannot hide the sword, not anywhere in the world. Its light is so piercing that even if he cast it to the bottom of the sea, or piled mountains over it, those men who can see the light would one day follow and discover it. No, he could not hide it; he keeps it locked in a museum, under glass, for men to come and look at, but not touch. He knows men will soon forget the sword was meant for use, not admiration. They tell themselves the sword is no more than a relic fit only for the days long past. A childhood dream.”

The cat turned its yellow eyes, which were opening as the evening came like little yellow moons, upward toward Tommy's face, who was staring fretfully at the museum.

The cat purred softly. “What troubles you, Key-bearer?”

“You have counseled me, and I agreed, to break into the museum and to steal the Sword Reforged, thinking that any theft or ill done by me was excused by my great need. But that is the tyrants' plea, the excuse ever used by our enemy. Must I become like the enemy to defeat him?”

Tybalt licked himself carefully, washing his paws, his ears, and tilting his head far around to lick his shoulders and back. “It is no theft to claim what is one's own.”

“Then the sword is mine?”

“It belongs to any man who claims it, and to everyone and all, for the light from the sword is abundant, and denies itself to none. But each who would take the sword must shatter it, see of what it is made, and grow wise. One who comes after shall forge it anew.”

“I don't understand.”

The black cat yawned, its whiskers twitching. “Have you no teachers on this world? It is not for me to explain.”

“We might simply try to buy the sword.”

“It is not theirs to sell. And there is no coin of earth that will purchase that light, only blood.”

“What does that mean?”

But Tybalt only yawned again, showing his little pink tongue.

The last light of the setting sun was vanishing in the upper air. Storekeepers along the main street of Glastonbury came out of their little shops, locking them, drawing down the awnings, greeting their neighbors with nods or waves. Soon the streets were empty. As dusk deepened, the wrought-iron streetlamps all lit up, casting little pools of yellow light around their feet.

In the distance, the hour rang from a church steeple.

Tommy saw the librarian and the stooped figure of the museum curator come out of the main library doors together. They stood there a moment, as if exchanging pleasant words, before locking the library doors for the night. The librarian walked away to the left, across the lane and toward the Abbey. The museum curator remained a moment longer, peering around in the gloom, hunched near the door. Then he made vague pawing gestures in the air and stooped, to claw at the ground before the door. Tommy had the odd impression that he was snuffling or sniffing, like an animal casting about for a scent.