The Grey King (18 page)

“It's part of the floor. It must be.”

“The floor's made of slate,” Will said. He still sounded cross, almost petulant.

“Well . . . yes. No stones in slate, true. But all the same it's fixed, somehow. Bit of quartz. It won't budge.”

“It is a warestone,” Will said, his voice flat now, and weary. “The awareness
of the Grey King. I might have guessed. It is, in this place, his eyes and his ears and his mouth. Through it—just through the fact of its lying there—he not only knows everything that happens in this place, but can send out his power to do certain things. Only certain things. Not any very great magic. But, for instance, he is able so to paralyse Pen there that we can no more move him than we can move the warestone itself.”

Bran knelt in distress beside the dog, and stroked the head flattened so unnaturally against the floor. “But if Caradog Prichard tracks us here—he might, his dogs might—then he will just shoot Pen where he lies. And there will be nothing we can do to help.”

Will said bitterly, “That's the idea.”

“But Will, that can't happen! You've got to do something!”

“There is just one thing that I can do,” Will said. “Though obviously I can't tell you what it is, with that thing there. It means I shall have to borrow your bicycle. But I'm not too sure whether you should stay here alone.”

“Somebody's got to. We can't leave Pen like that. Not on his own.”

“I know. But the warestone . . .” Will glared at the pebble as if it were some infuriating small child sitting there clutching an object too precious for it to hold. “It's not a particularly powerful weapon,” he said, “but it's one of the oldest. We all use them, both the Light and the Dark. There are rules, sort of. None of us can actually be affected by a warestone—only observed. That wretched pebble can give the Grey King an idea of what I do and say here. A general idea, like an image—it's not as specific as a television set, mercifully. It can't do anything to harm me, or stop me doing what I want to do—except through the control it has over objects. I mean, it can't actually affect me, because I am an Old One, but it
can
transmit the power of the Dark—or of the Light, if it happened to belong to an Old One—to affect men, and animals, and things of the earth. It can stop Pen from moving, and therefore stop me from moving him. You see? So that if you stay here, there's no knowing what exactly it's able to do to you.”

Bran said obstinately, “I don't care.” He sat cross-legged by the dog. “It can't kill me, can it?”

“Oh, no.”

“Well, then. I'm staying. Go on, off with the bike.”

Will nodded, as if that was what he had been expecting. “I'll be as quick as I can. But take care. Stay very wide awake. If anything does happen, it will come in the way you least expect.”

Then he was gone out of the door, and Bran was left in the cottage with a dog pressed impossibly flat against the slate floor by an invisible high wind, staring at a small white stone.

G
ood day, Mrs. Jones. How are you?”

“Well, thank you, Mr. Prichard. And you?”

Caradog Prichard's plump pale face was glistening with sweat. Impatience swept away his Welsh politeness. He said abruptly, “Where is John Rowlands?”

“John?” said cosy Megan Jones, wiping floury hands on her apron. “There now, what a shame, you have missed him. Idris and he went off to Abergynolwyn half an hour ago. They will not be back until dinner, and that will be late today. . . . You want to see him urgently, is it, Mr. Prichard?”

Caradog Prichard stared at her vacantly and did not answer. He said, in a high tight voice, “Is Rowlands's dog here?”

“Pen? Goodness no,” Mrs. Jones said truthfully. “Not with John gone.” She smiled amiably at him. “Is it the man you want to see, or the dog, then? Well, indeed, you are welcome to wait for them here, though as I say, it may be quite a time. Let me get you a cup of tea, Mr. Prichard, and a nice fresh Welshcake.”

“No,” said Prichard, running his hand distractedly through his raw red hair. “No . . . no, thank you.” He was so lost in his own mind that he scarcely seemed to be aware of her at all. “I will be off to town and see if I find them
there. At the Crown, perhaps. . . . John Rowlands has some business with Idris Ty-Bont, does he?”

“Oh,” said Mrs. Jones comfortably, “he is just visiting. Since he had something to do in Abergynolwyn anyway. Just a call, you know, Mr. Prichard. Like your own.” She beamed innocently at him.

“Well,” said Caradog Prichard. “Thank you very much. Good-bye.”

Megan Jones looked after him as he swung the grey van hastily round and drove away down the lane. Her smile faded. “Not a nice man,” she said to the farmyard at large. “And something is going on behind those little eyes of his that is not nice
at all.
A very lucky thing it was that young Will happened to take that dog for a walk just now.”

W
ill pedalled hard, blessing the valley road for its winding flatness, and freewheeling only when his pounding heart seemed about to leap right out of his chest. He rode one-handed. He had said nothing about his hurt arm, and Bran had not noticed, but it hurt abominably if he so much as touched the handlebars with his left hand. He tried not to think about the way it would feel when carrying the golden harp.

That was the only thing to be done, now. The music of the harp was the only magic within his reach that would release Pen from the power of the warestone. In any case, it was time now to bring the harp to the pleasant lake, to accomplish its deeper purpose. Everything was coming together, as if two roads led to the same mountain pass; he could only hope that the pass would now be blocked by some obstacle able to hinder both at once. This time more than ever, the matter of holding the Dark at bay depended as much on the decisions and emotions of men as on the strength of the Light. Perhaps even more.

Broken sunlight flickered in and out of his eyes, as clouds scudded briskly over the sky. At least, he thought wryly, we've got a good day for it all. His wheels sang on the road; he was nearly at Clwyd Farm now. He wondered
how he was to explain his sudden arrival, and equally sudden departure afterwards, to Aunt Jen. She would probably be the only one there. She must have been there for Caradog Prichard's appearance earlier that morning, and the changing of his two mutilated tyres. Perhaps he could say that he had come to get something to help put Prichard off the scent, to keep him from finding Pen . . . something John Rowlands had suggested . . . but still he would have to leave the house with the golden harp. Aunt Jen would not be likely to let that sacking-swathed object past her sharp eye without at least enquiring what was wrapped up in there. And what possible reason could anyone have, least of all her nephew, for not letting her see?

Will wished, not for the first time, that Merriman were with him, to ease such difficulties. For a Master of the Light, it was no great matter to transport beings and objects not only through space but through time, in the twinkling of an eye. But for the youngest of the Old Ones, however acute his need, that was a talent too large.

He came to the farm; rode in; pushed through the back door. But when he called, no one came. He realised suddenly with a great lightening of the spirits that he had seen no cars in the yard outside. Both his aunt and uncle must have gone out; that was one piece of luck, at any rate. He ran upstairs to his bedroom, said the necessary words to release the golden harp from protection, and ran down again with it under his arm, a rough sacking-wrapped bundle of odd triangular shape. He was halfway across the yard to the bicycle when a Land-Rover chugged in through the gate.

For a second Will froze in panic; then he walked slowly, carefully, to the bicycle, and turned it ready to leave.

Owen Davies climbed out of the car and stood looking at him. He said, “Was it you left the gate open?”

“Oh, gosh.” Will was genuinely shocked: he had committed the classical farm sin, without even noticing. “Yes, I did, Mr. Davies. That's awful. I'm most terribly sorry.”

Owen Davies, thin and earnest, shook his flat-capped head in reproof. “One of the most important things to remember, it is, to shut any gate you have opened on a farm. You do not know what livestock of your uncle's might have slipped out, that should have been kept in. I know you are English, and no doubt a city boy, but that is no excuse.”

“I know,” Will said. “And I'm not even a city boy. I really am sorry. I'll tell Uncle David so.”

Taken aback by this implication of honest confidence, Owen Davies surfaced abruptly from the pool of righteousness that had threatened to swallow him. “Well,” he said. “Let us forget it this time, both of us. I dare say you will not do it again.”

His gaze drifted sideways a little. “Is that Bran's bike you have there? Did he come with you?”

Will pressed the shrouded harp tight between his elbow and his side. “I borrowed it. He was out riding, and I was . . . up the valley, walking, and I saw him, and we thought we'd have a go at flying a big model plane I've been making.” He patted the bundle under his arm, swinging his leg over the bicycle saddle at the same time. “So I'm going back now. Is that all right? You don't need him for anything?”

“Oh, no,” Owen Davies said. “Nothing at all.”

“John Rowlands took Pen to Mr. Jones at Ty-Bont all safe and sound,” Will said brightly. “I'm supposed to be having dinner there, late-ish Mrs. Jones said—would it be all right if I took Bran back with me too, Mr. Davies? Please?”

The usual expression of alarmed propriety came over Owen Davies's thin face. “Oh, no, now, Mrs. Jones is not expecting him, there is no need to bother her with another—”

Unexpectedly, he broke off. It was as if he heard something, without understanding it. Puzzled, Will saw his face become oddly bemused, with the look of a man dreaming a dream that he has dreamed often but never been
able to translate. It was a look he would never have expected to find on the face of a man so predictable and uncomplicated as Bran's father.

Owen Davies stared him full in the face, which was even more unusual. He said, “Where did you say you and Bran were playing?”

Will's dignity ignored the last word. He kicked at the bicycle pedal. “Out on the moor. Quite a long way up the valley, near the road. I don't know how to describe it exactly—but more than halfway to Mr. Jones's farm.”

“Ah,” Owen Davies said vaguely. He blinked at Will, apparently back in his usual nervous person. “Well, I daresay it would be all right if Bran goes to dinner as well, John Rowlands being there—goodness knows Megan Jones is used to feeding a lot of mouths. But you must be sure to tell him he must be home before dark.”

“Thank you!” said Will, and made off before he could change his mind, carefully closing the gate after he had ridden through. He shouted a farewell, with just time to notice Bran's father's hand slowly raised as he rode away.

But he was not many yards along the road, riding awkwardly one-handed and slowly with the harp clutched in his aching left arm, before all thought of Owen Davies was driven from his head by the Grey King. Now the valley was throbbing with power and malevolence. The sun was at its highest point, though no more than halfway up the sky in that November day. The last part of the time for the fulfilling of Will's only separate quest had begun. His mind was so much occupied with the unspoken beginnings of battle that it was all his body could do to push the bicycle, and himself, slowly along the road.

He paid little attention when a Land-Rover swished past him, going fast in the same direction. Several cars had passed him already, on both journeys, and in this part of the country Land-Rovers were common. There was no reason at all why this one should have differed from the rest.

A
lone with the motionless sheepdog, Bran went again to the pile of rubble in the corner of the room and stared at the warestone. So small, so ordinary: it was just like any other of the white quartz pebbles scattered over the land. He bent again and tried to pick it up, and felt the same throb of disbelief when it would not move. It was like the dreadful splayed attitude in which Pen lay. He was looking at the impossible.

It occurred to him to wonder why he was not afraid. Perhaps it was because part of his mind did still believe these things impossible, even while he saw them clearly. What could a pebble do to him? He went to the door of the cottage and stood staring across the valley, towards Bird Rock. The Craig was hard to see from here: an insignificant dark hump, dwarfed by the mountain ridge behind. Yet that too had held the impossible; he had gone down into the depths of that rock, and in an enchanted cavern encountered three Lords of the High Magic there. . . . Bran had a sudden image of the bearded figure in the sea-blue cloak, of the eyes from the hooded face holding his own, and felt a strange urgent warmth in the remembering. He would never forget that figure, clearly the greatest of the three. There was something particular and close about him. He had even known Cafall.

Cafall.

“Never fear, boy. The High Magic would never take your dog from you. . . . Only the creatures of the earth take away from one another, boy. All creatures, but man more than any. Life they take. . . . Beware your own race, Bran Davies—they are the only ones who will ever hurt you. . . .”

The pain of loss that Bran had begun to learn to conceal struck into him like an arrow. In a great rush his mind filled with pictures of Cafall as a wobble-legged puppy, Cafall following him to school, Cafall learning the signals and commands of the working sheepdog. Cafall wet with rain, the long hair pressed flat in a straight parting along his spine, Cafall running, Cafall drinking from a stream, Cafall asleep with his chin warm on Bran's foot.