Weatherwitch: Book Three of The Crowthistle Chronicles (8 page)

Who mines within the mountain’s heart, beneath the flinty ground, And wakes the silence of the deep with hammer-tapping sound, Where precious stones and fossil bones in rocky tombs lie curled? Brisk knockers and quaint coblynau; wights of the Underworld.

 

Who winds distaff and spindle in caves hidden from the sky, Or in old courses, waterworn, now rockfall-dammed and dry, Where rivers subterranean through dim defiles once swirled? The spinning-crones, the busy wheel-wives of the Underworld.

 

What motley creatures lurk throughout those cold and sunless halls, Where limestone columns loom like wraiths, and gems encrust the walls?

Last midnight blue-caps flitted by, Fridean bagpipes skirled, And gathorns prowled with bockles in the eldritch Underworld.

 

To loiter near dark pools in hollow places is not wise.

There, comely damsels swim, watching with green, remorseless eyes.
They’ll beckon you and drown you, cruel seductive water-girls, Ye mortals, dare not venture down into the Underworld!

—“
THE UNDERWORLD,” A SONG FROM SILVERTON, IN NARNGALIS

The Northern Ramparts, beneath which the burrower stubbornly toiled, formed a natural barricade between the kingdoms of Tir to the south, and the so-called Barren Wastes to the north. In the west, the mountains joined the cold uplands of the Nordstüren, an alpine region whose boundaries seemed to mimic the shape of a dragon. The sinuous neck of the simulated beast stretched northwards along the rugged coast, while the serrated backbone, with crags jutting like pyramidal dorsal plates, curved down in a southerly direction between Narngalis and Grïmnørsland, ultimately coiling back on itself to form the Mountain Ring. That dragon’s-tail circle of mighty peaks, or “storths,” protected a high-altitude plateau at the heart of the Four Kingdoms, known as “High Darioneth.”

Leafy roads and lanes crisscrossed the farmlands between the untamed forests of this plateau, winding amongst orchards of nut trees, across swift-running streams, from hamlet to mill to schoolhouse to farmstead. Along one of these byways, late in the afternoon of Highland Mai Day Eve, several conveyances were being driven at a leisurely pace. A woman was directing one of the traveling-chaises, while a younger woman walked alongside. The latter was flanked by two children: a boy and a girl. As they walked the lad clapped his hands in time to some unsung tune that carouseled in his head, while the girl stared inquisitively at every passing butterfly and winged beetle, every miniature wren that darted in and out of crevices in the dry stone walls, every dipper that plunged into the fast-flowing alpine streams. In this she was encouraged by the young woman.

Across these high-altitude districts the warmth of Springtime arrived later than in the lowlands beyond the Mountain Ring. For this reason, Mai Day was traditionally postponed to a later date in the highlands. If not, too few Spring flowers would be found. Only now had the blossoms reached the commencement of their full abundance, and it was time to go maying in preparation for the annual festivities, the celebration of the new season. At this time eldritch wights both seelie and unseelie were prone to increase their activities; therefore it was deemed wise to simultaneously collect rowan and birch to repel the wicked and mischievous amongst them.

The convoy steering a course along Mill Lane included many of the young folk who dwelled at Rowan Green, the Seat of the Weathermasters, that vast
shelf of living rock jutting from the flanks of Wychwood Storth, more than three hundred feet above the plateau. The travelers were on their way to join some of the youths, damsels and children who lived on the steadings and crofts of the high plain. Plateau dwellers and cliff dwellers ever mingled freely, although to the outside world it would seem that the weathermasters’ status—like their abode—was far above that of the rest. The ethos of High Darioneth was such that variations in status and wealth made scant difference to friendships. Neither jealousy amongst the plateau-dwellers nor arrogance from those who lived at greater heights were tolerated.

As she walked beside the chaise, lifting her skirts over the worst of the muddy patches in the road and satisfying the little girl’s enquiries about the ubiquitous wildlife, the younger woman surveyed her surroundings with evident pleasure. Shadows were lengthening, as if arising from their graves. The mists of evening were already ascending, curdling to opacity. They swathed the treetops and softened the distance with subtle veils. Overhead, between the evergreen boughs of snow-gums, clouds blew raggedly across the sweeping arch of the heavens. A flock of scavenging ravens soared and dived, possibly clustering above the site of a wolf pack’s kill.

Rocks glistened with condensation. There had been rain earlier that afternoon; all leaves were glossy, new-washed. The air itself was incense, each breath like a clear draught of water tinged with the flavour of eucalyptus, palest green and bubbled right through with the smoke-blue haze of misty mountains. And always, on the horizon’s rim, there reared up against the welkin like great glittering crystals suspended from above—watching, vigilant, seemingly eternal—the rugged, snow-topped peaks known as the storths.

The eyes with which this damsel looked upon the world were like the Summer sky’s pure essence. Her lids, when closed, resembled the two wings of the bluest of butterflies; it was as if the dust of powdered lapis lazuli had been brushed on to them. Her hair, mostly caught beneath a voluminous velvet cap whose color matched her eyes, was as black as an underground river, the locks wisp-ended and tapering. Long and narrow was her waist, and supple as a serpent. Her name, as given her by her parents, was Ast
riel, meaning “The Storm” or, literally, “The Storm Wind,” but on the day she had watched her father depart on his impossible quest she had declared to one and all that henceforth she would be known as “Asrathiel,” “The North Wind”—for, said she, it was the cold, strong wind from the north that would some day bring her father back, bringing also the precious prize he sought.

In the year 3491 the mode for everyday wear in High Darioneth tended
towards simplicity of design. Women and girls wore sleeveless surcoats that reached to mid-calf. Beneath the surcoat was an ankle-length, long-sleeved kirtle. A belt cinched the two garments at the waist. To keep out the chill of the highlands, women also wore soft leggings beneath their skirts; these were tucked into supple slippers for indoor wear, or boots, or pattens for walking on muddy roads. Their heads were warmly wrapped in the folds of woollen caps and hoods, often lined with fur. Sweeping, fur-lined cloaks draped from their shoulders. The grey and azure raiment of the blue-eyed damsel, however, sported no fur trimmings and was perhaps lighter and less cumbersomely voluminous than that of other women, as if she did not suffer from the cold as greatly as others. Even her hood was pushed back from her head and lay across her shoulders, revealing the pretty cap of velvet. The icy wind, sending shivers through the trees, lifted escaped strands of the damsel’s night-colored hair, and unfurled them along its currents.

The small boy trotting at her side—the son of her uncle Dristan—was dressed in thick trousers and sturdy boots, a tunic hemmed at mid-thigh and clasped with a narrow belt, a knee-length cloak and a hood of the type called the
cucullus,
often worn by shepherds and travelers. Beneath the hood his hair, like that of his sister and mother, was as brown as walnuts, glossy and well tended. His cheeks were red with the kisses of the glacial breeze as he made his way along the miry track, now forgetting about his silent tunes and turning his attention to the conversation.

“Well, if you insist upon hearing yet another story,” the blue-eyed damsel was now saying, as she ducked beneath the overhanging boughs of a beech, “I shall tell you a tale about my father’s impet.”

“Nay! Asra, prithee do not tell us of the impet,” protested the little boy. “I know all about it. Grandfather has told us many a time. Uncle Arran’s impet never did anything to be much frightened of.”

“We want a story to make us scared,” the boy’s twin sister affirmed earnestly. She skipped over a stone in the middle of the road. “Tell us about the field called Black Goat, and the wicked things that lurk there.”

“Your mother would not be well pleased with me, were I to give you nightmares!”

From the driver’s seat of the traveling-chaise, the children’s mother laughed. “Indeed I would not!”

“That story would not give us nightmares,” the lad declared boldly.

“In any case,” reasoned his sister, “everyone is forever telling us about drowners, and how they reach out their long claws and drag unwary children
into pools. That demonstrates we are allowed to hear about fearsome things.”

“My sweet Corisande, people only tell you about drowners in order to warn you against swimming in the wild pools and streams,” said Asrathiel.

Corisande reflected on this statement for a moment, then her eyes lit up. “If you tell us about goblins we won’t go near the places they dwell,” she ex-claimed. Turning to her brother for support she added, “Will we, Cavalon?”

“Never,” agreed the lad, shaking his head vigorously. “By talking about dangerous things you are in truth keeping us safe.”

With the reins held lightly in her hands the children’s mother spoke from her perch. “You know full well that goblins have been extinct since the Goblin Wars ended,” she said, swaying from side to side as the equipage rattled along the rutted track. “Since they are all gone, there is no need to warn children about them.”

Perceiving that the battle was almost lost, Corisande rested her small, gloved hand coaxingly on Asrathiel’s forearm and peered tragically into her face. “Prithee,” she crooned beseechingly, “Prithee, Asra, tell us a scary tale! We won’t be scared,” she subjoined in a reassuring manner, inadvertently contradicting her own words.

After glancing down at the hopeful countenances of her twin cousins, Asrathiel relented. “Very well,” she said, heaving an exaggerated sigh, “if you wish, I will tell you some fearsome tale to satisfy your unnatural cravings for dread.”

“Not too fearsome!” their mother admonished. “Dristan shall call me to question when he returns, if he finds out I allowed you to frighten them from their wits!” The woman was smiling as she spoke: her husband was the mildest of men and in any case, she had complete faith in Asrathiel’s judgement where the children were concerned.

“Give me a while to think of something,” Asrathiel said to her gleeful cousins. She ran a slim white hand, gloveless, through escaped strands of her hair as she examined a few of the old tales she held in her memory. After choosing one, she reviewed it, making mental notes of ways in which she might doctor the true history, taming the visceral horror of the events that had played out so long ago that they were now no more than tales for children.

“Goblins it is,” she began, in a tone of deliberate ominousness, and her cousins squealed. “The goblins,” commenced Asrathiel, “as you know, were the most malevolent of all unseelie wights, and they lived in dark, dirty holes deep beneath the ground. They were small and stunted—about the same size as our household brownies. About the same size as you two, in sooth!
And they looked somewhat like little men, but they were oh! so ugly, so grotesque that nobody who was unfortunate enough to set eyes on them could mistake them for true men at all. The wars started because the goblins were wicked and cruel, and longed to exterminate humankind. Many battles were fought. One of the greatest was the Battle of Silver Hill, and afterwards the bards made a song of it. . . .”

Her words danced on invisible waves, amongst tiny golden insects that hovered above the road like spangles of winged light. Sounds of laughter and chattering could be heard from ahead and behind, as the other Mai Day revelers joked and conversed amongst themselves. Tiny bells were ringing, as protection against unseelie forces, and someone was tootling happy tunes on a whistle. The horse clip-clopped onward, pulling its burden; the walkers stepped briskly, and the children became engrossed in the story. With the telling of the tale, time passed unnoticed.

Long crimson-gilt rays of the setting sun sliced through gaps in the clouds and reached out across the countryside. They emblazoned the westerly facets of the storths and stretched across the valley of the Canterbury Water many miles away to the east, before sliding their tines through the Riddlecombe Steeps and staining the walls of the Great Eastern Ranges, where the Marauder comswarms dwelled. Runnels of water trickled from the heights, finding their way into fractures and fissures. The runnels joined to form rivulets, which in turn became tributaries of underground waterfalls cascading down to subterranean streams. Converging, the streams created a river that flowed eastward beneath the Lake District of Slievmordhu. As it followed the inclines of vast slabs of buried strata, the river ran beneath the Riddlecombe Steeps, under the valley of the Canterbury Water and far, far below the Mountain Ring on its way to the sea. Wights of the water swam therein; some seelie, others wicked. Of the procession that went maying in High Darioneth that same afternoon, perhaps only one was a weathermaster powerful enough to be aware—albeit dimly—of such a great body of water flowing along so many fathoms down beneath their feet.