The Iron Grail (25 page)

Argo passed from sight along the river between the worlds and I was forced to contemplate the more pressing reality: how to return to Taurovinda before Jason and his mercenary crew reached the stronghold.

I had reckoned without Mielikki. She must have slowed progress down the river, perhaps because she was more sympathetic to me, a timeless creature like herself, than to Jason, whose agenda was personal, private, aggressive and abusive. In any event, after several days of running through the valleys, the forests and the narrow passes standing between Taurovinda and Ghostland, I finally saw the looming hill, with its fires and banners and totem figures rising above the high ramparts, the clear signal that Urtha was still in control of his home.

Taurovinda, however, was under siege.

I had been passed, during my journey, by a long column of what I believed to be the Unborn; they rode heavy horses and were cloaked in plain colours, reds and greens, rather than the elaborate patterns of the dead. Their swords were sheathed in gold-inlaid scabbards, and they carried single, thick-shafted lances rather than the clutch of slim javelins with which Urtha and his predecessors had become adept.

Their shields were narrow ovals, very plain, and carried at the horse’s flank rather than slung over the warrior’s back. I was learning enough about Ghostland to be able to recognise a squadron of the future warlords of the realm.

Though I had hidden from them as they’d passed, they conveyed no sense of danger.

Then a band of Dead, twenty or so, stripped and stained with colour, rattling with bronze and bone rings on their upper arms, ears and ankles, had scampered past on foot, pursued by the shadows of ravens, a flock keeping an eye on the men upon whose appetites it would feed. Cruel and crude, this band seemed to exist in a world of hidden sense, aware of me though not seeing me, passing through the forest like moisture on a cool wind. Almost as soon as they had come into view they had slipped away, but I was able to follow them for days; they left a trail of wildwood slaughter.

Somewhere in the besieging armies both Unborn and Dead had drawn into cover, encircling the hill, blocking all the paths and passages save for that which led from Nantosuelta, the winding track along which the wicker boats were carried bearing the corpses of the deceased.

This was my way back to Urtha, as indeed it would be the way into Taurovinda for Jason when Argo finally berthed at the rough wooden harbour.

Willow men, and hazel men and yew men and oak men encircled the hill in five ranks; sometimes elaborately constructed, mostly just two branches crossed and hung with human skin, these gaunt, grim idols would stop even scavengers from passing out of the fortress. In the long grass, the Dead moved like shadows. I circled them and came to the river. There were hundreds in the field, most of them curled up in sleep. Each breeze, each gust of wind was a passing ghost. The air was rank with decay. From the corner of my eye I could see the gleam of metal, the flash of plumage on a helmet. Tall horses and small ponies scampered in the half-light of near existence. When I opened my ears to the truth, there was the sound of laughter and battle practice, the crackle of fires, the baying of hounds.

These invaders from the Otherworld were intent on winning back Taurovinda; there was no doubt about that. They had left their own world and brought a little bit of Ghostland to surround the Thunder Hill.

But why? What could they hope to gain from possession of such a fortress?

Urtha’s defences were the closed gates, sacred fire and the images of men constructed out of parts of the Dead. No doubt he had had advice from the Wolf-heads and the Speakers. They seemed to be effective against the enemy. The Shadows of Heroes were vulnerable here, as I have pointed out before.

I was on the point of beginning my walk through the ranks of the Dead when I heard a girl’s voice, singing. For a moment I failed to recognise it, despite its familiarity, but when the soft song stopped and I heard the whispered words
I see it green, I see it bronze
I realised that Munda was somewhere close.

I called for her, but the strange singing continued. The sound led me to her and I found the girl crouched in the jaws of two grey rocks, staring out across Nantosuelta, her eyes locked in Foresight, blind to the world of the river.

I stepped inside her vision and she turned slowly to look at me; there was light in her eyes; she recognised me and smiled. There was no sound of the river, here, no sound of the wind.

‘Merlin,’ she whispered; she looked away. She said, ‘The warped man is very close. He will deal death. I see it, Merlin, but his face is so strange: it is both young and old. He is truly warped.’

‘That’s because he is out of his own time,’ I explained to the girl.

‘Is he? That accounts for it: I see him lost, I see him void; I see him angry; I see him crying.’

I shook my head. ‘The man has no tears left. He didn’t cry when his eldest son rejected him at the end of a blade.’

‘I see no sons, only brothers. Two angry men with two pale ghosts who wear their faces.’

Munda never ceased to astonish me, though that may reflect only my sense of her as being very young. The young can see the spirit world with great facility, but it is a narrow vision, hindered by lack of life. Not so Urtha’s daughter! She had seen Jason’s two sons with their tenuous companions: each brother, separated in the world when their mother had hidden them in the future, had been given the echo of his sibling, to keep him happy, to stop him grieving. Thesokorus was in far-off Greek Land, an echo of Kinos dogging his tracks. Munda had seen them nevertheless. I was very impressed.

‘Come out of the
imbas forasnai
,’ I said to her softly, and she shivered, drew in a deep breath and at once came back to the world of stones, trees and autumn breezes.

‘Merlin! Merlin!’ she cried with genuine delight, clapping her hands to my face and jumping up to embrace me. ‘Where have you been? You’ve been gone so long! We’ve all missed you.’

‘I’ve been across the river.’

‘We’re under siege,’ she said darkly. ‘Only a few of us can get through the army. We follow the old track…’

I smiled. ‘I’d guessed as much.’

‘But my father is furious with you for abandoning him! He’ll have some harsh words for you! But the sooner bruised, the sooner healed, so come on, come on.’

And with that, the girl grabbed my hand and dragged me after her, away from Nantosuelta and through the spirit-ridden Plain of MaegCatha.

*   *   *

Urtha saw me coming. He sent men through the fires that blocked the winding approaches to open the gates. Munda, her grip on my hand like a tiny claw, dragged me through bull, stag, wolf, man and horse and almost flung me towards the welcoming cordon of chariots and grinning warriors, Urtha and Ullanna prominent among them.

Save that Urtha and Ullanna were not smiling.

Urtha grabbed his daughter by the shoulder, furious. ‘Where have you been? How did you leave the fortress? What have I told you? Do not leave the bounds!’

‘I can’t see in this place,’ she said. ‘It’s too confining.’

‘Too confining? We’ll see about confining. You have been forbidden to leave the walls. How many times have you done this before?’

Munda stared brazenly at her father. ‘I cannot
see
in this place. I have to go to the one who winds around us.’

‘You seem to be seeing me without difficulty.’

‘Not that sort of seeing! Let me go.’

But her father was too angry. Two High Women were summoned and Munda was marched, objecting, to the house where those guardians lived. She had broken her father’s law; she had endangered Taurovinda; that much was clear from the reaction of the High Women and the Speakers.

As she was dragged away she continued to shout angrily: ‘You don’t understand! If I can’t see clearly, I can’t help you!’

Urtha ignored her. He strode towards me, glaring at me before indicating the ramparts. I followed him to one of the towers where we could see the sprawl of the plain below, and the shimmering host who penned us in.

‘Where have you been? A quarter of a year, you bastard! A whole season! Look what’s happened to us in the meantime.’

‘I fell under a spell.’

He laughed sourly. ‘You fell under a woman! I know your tastes, Merlin. I spent time with you in the Northlands, remember? And on the way to Delphi. And I saw the way that skimpy creature Niiv dangled from your shoulders.’

‘It wasn’t quite like that.’

‘You were lovers, don’t deny it.’

‘I do deny it. The woman is after my secrets, not my kisses.’

‘What took you so long?’ he asked angrily, punching me hard on the arm. ‘Look at this host of men! Of ghosts! Of heroes! My ancestors are there. Probably the sons of my sons! They haunt us and taunt us, they pin us down. Only the druids can get to the river without interruption … and my daughter, apparently! We’re starving, depleted, and the bastards won’t engage us in single combat. And so I ask again: where in the name of Sucellus have you
been
?’

It took me a moment to summon the words; Urtha was clearly in a foul mood. ‘With a woman,’ I said.

‘Hah!’

‘But not just any woman.’

‘Well?’

‘Medea. She has run me ragged just as these heroes have run you down. We’ve both spent the last season under siege, only you knew it and I didn’t! She tricked me, Urtha. But it has opened my eyes.’

‘You and my damned daughter! Always complaining you they can’t
see
properly! What am I to do with you?’

‘A drink would be very welcome. And meat. And cheese, and a small bowl of olives? And less of that glaring, baleful eye.’

Urtha smiled behind his long, dark moustache, his eyes crinkling with amusement. ‘A drink? We have Nantosuelta’s wine in abundance!’

He meant river water. Surely they’d managed to ferment
something
in this place: from apples, from grass, from thorn berries, haws or rose hips? It occurred to me that even if they had, they’d have drunk it all by now.

‘As for meat, with luck I’ll be able to oblige,’ he went on. ‘Here it comes now. Stand by at the gates!’ he added with a shout across the wall.

In the evergroves by Nantosuelta there was a sudden glint of light on armour, a swift movement out on to the Plain of MaegCatha and three riders came hurtling along the winding way, one with the flopping carcass of a doe tied across the withers of his mount.

From the grass of the plain, ghost riders erupted just as they had risen to tackle Jason in the hinterland. A long column raced alongside the three hunters, the air shimmering, almost drawing the human riders away from the track they followed. The three kept low, kicking the flanks of their mounts and beating left and right with long rods tied about with strips of coloured cloth, pierced at the ends with the curves of an animal’s bone. The ribs of a bull, I later learned; and the flapping rags were strips that had been taken from the bodies of the Dead. As a renegade wolf can be scared away by the grinning skull of its own kind, so the spirit riders shied away from the smell of their Otherworldly kin.

The Bull Gate was flung open and the three hunters galloped through to safety.

It was then that I asked Urtha about the rods. Ullanna answered me: ‘Charm sticks,’ she said. ‘I asked myself what
you
would suggest if we were to get our hunters back safely. And I’d seen something similar used when my father went to the oracle at Airan Kurga, in my own country. The passage to the oracle is dangerous because of the wandering lost, the dishonoured. They are beaten back by their own bones.’

‘A little bit of this and a little bit of that,’ I said, impressed, and she gave a little bow.

‘It’s often the best way. The Wolf-heads helped. They’ve had a long journey of survival. They’re charmless in one sense, but they have a good knowledge of the powers of enchantment.’

*   *   *

I had returned to a restless, unhappy citadel. The host from King Vortingoros’s Coritani, who had agreed a short spell as mercenary help, were now frustrated and confused by their extended stay. They were concerned for their families. They had seen that it was possible to escape from Taurovinda, through the shadowy siege-works, and only Urtha’s charismatic leadership had kept them rooted to the Thunder Hill.

Urtha’s powers of persuasion were wearing thin, however, as were supplies, and the co-operation in the manner of entertainment and games. Mock fights and challenges, combats and races, were increasingly turning lethal as tempers frayed and hearts became increasingly forlorn.

There was a good supply of food, however; Urtha had made sure of that. And as pacification on this particular day, and partly to welcome me back, the new kill was paunched and its liver grilled at a feast given for the men of rank among the mercenaries. Fourteen of us sat at the low benches, Ullanna included, Cathabach, and the Thoughtful Woman Rianata, who would need to hear my account of Ghostland. Urtha’s hall was richly coloured again; weapons hung from roof beams, shields gleamed on walls, and cloaks were spread between them to help cut out the draughts and sounds of the melancholy nights. The house was once more encircled by a deep ditch and thorn stockade, hung with the colours of the Cornovidi and the ancestral colours of the Tectosages.

The king’s feisty son Kymon was not present; Munda’s wailing objection to her incarceration could be clearly heard at times. The girl was furious.

As strips of deer flesh were beaten flat to make them tender, then held above the burning fire, so the conversation lightened and the spirits rose. There was a little apple cider, sharp and strong, pear wine, and a drink made from fermented milk, which was disgusting but which delighted the Scythian woman, whose concoction it was. She sat next to Urtha and made rude remarks about him, and even ruder ones about the bull-breasted, red-bearded Morvodugnos, brother of Gorgodumnos, to both men’s apparent amusement.

I was given a slice of the deer’s tongue, a chieftain’s cut, Urtha’s way of saying welcome, and perhaps: I was angry that you went away so long, but that’s that, it’s done. Now to work!