The Giants' Dance (20 page)

As Will laid his head down he said, ‘I think you should tell me where we're going.'

‘To a place where we already know a battlestone may be stored in some degree of safety.'

‘Where? A castle?'

‘To the cave of Anstin the Hermit.'

He propped himself up on one elbow. ‘But you said the Plaguestone killed him.'

‘So it did.'

‘Then how would this stone be safe there with no one to watch over it?'

‘No one but the Sister who fetched Anstin's food knows he is dead. And she has pledged herself to silence.'

‘But if Maskull should learn about it, will he not be drawn there to tamper with it?'

Gwydion's expression hardened. ‘I hope he will not learn of it.'

‘But if he does?'

‘Maskull knows much, but he never knows as much as he believes, for he is arrogant. In the matter of the stones he has tried to follow me, then, whenever he thought it
possible, to leap one step ahead. But this has done him little good. He reached the King's Stone before us, yet he did not try to raise the battlestone or harness it to his will. He thought only to lay dangerous spells upon it to entrap me.'

‘Then you think he knows less than we do about the lorc?'

‘He does not behave as if he knows more. Perhaps fear is preventing him from using the harm he knows lies within the stones. Certainly he did not have the courage to lift the stone he had found at Tysoe.'

Will laced his fingers behind his head and lay back. ‘You once told me that Maskull knows where I came from. Is that true?'

Gwydion took a long time to answer. ‘He knows more than I.'

‘But how can that be?'

‘I cannot tell you that.'

‘Cannot? Or will not? Gwydion, I deserve to know.'

‘Recall what the rede says: “A little knowledge makes fools of most men, and is a danger to us all.”'

‘You think I'm unready? That I'll let whatever it is floor me? That it will lead me astray from my true path?'

The wizard shifted slowly. ‘Inappropriate knowledge often does lead people astray.'

‘But so does a lack of it! You've already told me that. I must know who I am and where I'm from.'

‘You are the third coming of King Arthur.'

‘But you know more about me, and you're not telling.'

‘Not yet. And you must hope that my decision is well judged.'

‘Gwydion, I'm not a child any more!'

‘Trust me, Willand. Trust to my judgment, as I trust to yours.'

He clamped his teeth together, angry now. He had
thought about telling Gwydion of the conversation he had had with Morann, but now he decided against broaching that difficult topic. The jewelmaster had said as much in one night as Gwydion and Gort had managed in six years. The next time he met Morann he would find out all he wanted to know.

‘Good night, Gwydion.'

‘Good night, Willand. Sleep well tonight and you shall rise tomorrow all the fresher.'

All the next day they moved the Aston Oddingley stone northward across a land of open heath that was dotted with gorsethorn bushes and distant meres shining silver under a milky pale sky. These lakes reminded Will of the false water he had often seen shimmering far ahead along hot summer roads, and served to remind him that not everything a man saw was what it seemed to be.

When he turned again to check the stone, he saw that it had certainly grown fatter around the middle. When he put his hand out to touch it he was forced to draw it away quickly. When he spat on the stone to test it, his spittle sizzled. That was enough.

‘Gwydion! The stone! It's boiling hot! If we don't do something the cart's going to catch fire!'

The wizard turned. ‘Take one of the empty casks and fetch water.'

‘I have a better idea: I'll empty everything we have over it now. Go on just a little further. We'll soon have all the water we need.'

Will had seen that up ahead the branch of the River Mease which they had been following drew nearer to the road. While he emptied their drinking water over the stone he told Gwydion to drive into the ford and then stop. The stone seethed and steamed as he made a pad of his cloak, and put it against the end of the stone to
protect his feet. He braced his back and pushed with his legs, until the stone began to slide towards the end of the cart.

Gwydion turned and saw what he was trying to do. ‘Stop! It must not be allowed to touch bare ground!'

Will stopped. ‘Why not?'

‘What would stop it feeding on the earth streams hereabouts? You say it is already active. It must have been close to fulfilling its destiny when we lifted it. Much closer than I thought.'

Will abandoned his efforts and jumped down into the sluggish, shin-deep stream. He cupped his hands and began splashing water up and over the back of the cart. Vapours swirled up from the stone like escaping ghosts. He kept on splashing until the bed of the cart was drenched and no more steam would rise. Then he filled their casks and watered the horse, watching silently as Gwydion stood once again over the stone and began to tighten the magical bonds that enclosed it.

The wizard seized his arm. ‘And now I must ask questions of it.' He climbed down and danced out interrogation spells in the river, splashing, muttering, crying out as his feet trod the slimy stones of the riverbed. The water rose dark up the hem of his robe as he whirled and kicked in a kind of rapture. At last he collapsed to his knees in the stream, arms raised above his head.

‘Let me help you.' Will reached out.

‘We must go on with all speed,' the wizard said intensely, taking his arm. ‘We must not linger here. I can feel Maskull's presence as surely as a sweathound picks up a day-old scent.'

‘Maskull?' Will looked around, feeling suddenly naked to the sky.

‘He is not here now, but he has been here lately. And he knows we are here now. The waters have told me that much.'
Gwydion's eyes seemed to track something in the middle distance, then they snapped back to Will's own. ‘We must get on!'

The wizard gave the dripping stone a dagger glance. ‘I was right. We did not lift this menace from the lorc soon enough. It is drawing close to the appointed time.'

Will rubbed at his mouth, knowing what Gwydion's words meant. ‘I hoped things wouldn't come to this.'

‘Unfortunately, they have. Courage, Willand! We can still reach safety, but we must attempt a draining the very moment we reach Anstin's cave. There we will have our best chance of success, for I know well the ground thereabouts.'

Gwydion unclasped his cloak. ‘Our casks are full. Let us soak our mantles and wrap the stone in them.'

When it was done, Will led the horse out of the stream, then he climbed up alongside the wizard and hoped his fears were not showing.

‘How far?'

‘Seven leagues, no more.'

Seven leagues! It seemed a very long way, but Will knew he must try to raise good cheer in his heart. He began to sing, not a great song of heroic deeds as told by the courtly balladeers, but a little ditty repeated by children to learn their measures,

‘Thirteen inches are a foot,

From three feet a pace is cut.

Two paces clear a handspan make,

Long as a fathom, pole or rake.

Eleven fathoms yield a chain,

Ten chains doth a furlong gain.

Of these furlongs, twenty-and-four,

Comes a league, and not an inch more!'

When the song was done he looked back along the road and told himself they had already come twice seven leagues so far. ‘We can do it!' he said. ‘We'll just take it like the horse does – four legs at a time!'

Gwydion smiled a chastened smile. ‘I can think of no better travelling companion than you, Willand. Though I presently wonder what might be the cause of your unreasonable optimism.'

‘There's nothing wrong with looking on the bright side, Gwydion.'

‘Indeed, there is not!'

Later that day the clouds parted here and there, showing patches of blue sky. Then the sun began to come in and out as if it could not make up its mind what to do. It patterned the farmland around with light and dark that moved across their path from left to right. Will found it unsettling travelling a road in the certainty that Maskull had come this way only a short while beforehand. And Gwydion had said the sorcerer knew where they were.

Will tried to clear his mind of that idea as if it was the stone's doing. To distract himself he watched a sparrowhawk hovering up ahead by a small hill. It plunged and vanished.

‘The men of a hated master are easier to confound,' Gwydion announced as the cart rumbled on northward across the quiet land.

The words had come out of the blue and Will repeated them. ‘“The men of a hated master are easier to confound.” Is that a rede of magic?'

The wizard shook his head. ‘Merely the inscription on one of the gold coins of common sense.'

‘And what's written on the tails side?'

‘Probably that men fight best for love.'

‘Is that true?'

‘Certainly. Why else is so much effort put into making them love bright banners? For once that is done they can be made to fight under them. The rede you are probably thinking of says: “He who rules by fear rideth the tiger cat.”'

Will thought about that for a while, then he said idly, ‘Are they fierce creatures, then, these tigers?'

Gwydion raised his eyebrows. ‘Have you never seen one?'

‘You're becoming forgetful: we do not have them in the Vale.'

‘A pity! It would keep your Valesmen on their toes if they were to have the odd tiger stalking Pannage Woods. Perhaps I shall bring one for you. There are tigers in the king's menagerie in Trinovant. They are somewhat like brindled cats, only a dozen times longer, and fierce and delightful all at once.'

Will grinned. ‘Like stripy lions, you mean?'

‘And what do you know of lions?'

‘Again, you're forgetting – there are four of them caged at Ludford, by the gates of the castle. Gort told me they were brought out of the south, the gift of a sea merchant who hoped to win trade favours of Duke Richard at Callas port.'

‘The Wortmaster spoke the truth. They are a royal symbol, a living advertisement of the duke's continuing hopes that one day he will sit the throne of the Realm, that his blood shall be restored to its rightful—'

Suddenly, the wizard broke off and looked fixedly ahead. Though there was no threat that Will could see, he called the horse to a halt. Then he leapt from the cart and put his arms up like the branches of a tree.

‘What is it?' Will asked. He followed the wizard's eye. There was some cultivated land, a stand of trees to their right, the trace of a waterway, nothing very remarkable. ‘Gwydion, tell me what ails you!'

But Gwydion made no reply, and when Will turned round he saw vapour rising from the cloaks that they had wrapped around the stone. It seemed like vapour, but then he sniffed the air and realized that all the water had boiled away, and what was rising was smoke.

‘Oh, by the sun and moon!'

He leapt down and pulled the bung out of the nearest of the casks. Water gouted over the singed cloaks as he shook it over them. The stone underneath began sizzling and steaming again like a frying pan.

‘Stop that confounded noise!' Gwydion shouted.

‘The cloaks! Look, Gwydion! They're nearly afire!'

‘Never mind them!'

He looked in amazement to Gwydion, but the wizard only knelt down and pressed the side of his head to the ground.

‘What are you doing?' Will demanded.

‘Tshhh! Mounted men! Many hundreds. Coming…' he said, then he stared up at the sky and his eyes rolled up inside his skull and he fell backwards like a man who had been shot through the heart by a crossbow bolt.

‘Gwydion!' Will shouted. He looked around again, but he could see no sign of danger. ‘Gwydion!'

The wizard had fainted.

Will knelt over him, called loudly, slapped his cheek. But there was no response. He thought to untangle Gwydion's legs and lay him on his side, just as Wortmaster Gort had once showed him was best to do, but the wizard came awake and threw him off, before leaping up into a strange crouch.

‘Gwydion, what's the matter with you? Speak to me!'

There was no response. The wizard gazed back at him, slack faced and bewildered, hardly blinking.

Will tried to pull him upright, but he drew away and would not come out of his crouch. He splashed a little water
from the cask over the wizard's face, and instantly Gwydion took off in a crazy, squatting run, with one arm trailing behind him.

‘Gwydion!' Will's voice rose in panic now. ‘What's happening to you?'

He tried to master his fear, but now Gwydion was trembling and twitching, his lips opening and closing, his teeth grinding together.

Not knowing what else to do, Will pounced and grabbed the wizard around the waist. He lifted him up and laid him across the seat of the cart. Then he climbed up behind him and began driving the horse forward. ‘Gwydion, if mounted men are coming,' he said, ‘then we've got to get away from here! It's the baron! Oh, come on, Gwydion! Get up there! Hyah! Puull!'

The cart jolted forward suddenly. He urged the horse to pull faster, coaxing her out of a walk. A plan had formed in his mind. If he could get the cart to the nearest stream, this time he would push the stone in and hang the consequences. It would be hidden and cooled at the same time. Then he would unhitch the cart and ride off on horseback, taking Gwydion to the woods that hemmed in the stubble fields to the east. There they would have some chance of escape.

‘Wake up!' he shouted at the wizard. Gwydion's head lolled and his mouth fell open as he was shaken by the shoulder. ‘What's happened to you? Is it a spell? Is it some trap that Maskull's caught you in?'