The Moon of Gomrath (15 page)

He clashed his own sword against the bracelet, and let Susan's arm fall. But as Atlendor did so, there was a gasp from one of the elves below the quarried wall, and he slid round his horse's neck to the ground, a spear between his shoulders.

“One life to save a man,” said Atlendor quietly, but before anyone could move, a voice spoke from the hill behind the ruins.

“We come. Have patience. We come.”

“That's the Morrigan!” said Susan.

“Where is she, Hornskin?” said Atlendor.

“Behind the bushes,” said Uthecar. “I cannot see her.”

“Hadn't we better get inside the walls?” said Susan. “We're sitting targets here.”

“And where should we be but under crushing stones, if the moon rose, and we not knowing?” said Albanac. “If we go to the front of the house we shall be safe from spears, since only on the hill above can they come close.”

The lios-alfar had all turned to face outwards. Those who, like the dead elf, had not already put on their shirts of mail hurriedly unrolled their packs.

Susan, Uthecar, and Albanac crouched below the lawn near to what had been the main door of the house.

“It is good to know where she is,” said Uthecar. “Think you if we put our swords to the bracelet it will be proof against her magic?”

“It would not kill,” said Albanac, “but its virtue may corrupt and gall the wound a sword makes, and I think the arrows will stop her from trying to gain the house by shape-shifting.”

“If the house should come with the moon,” said Uthecar, “Susan and I shall find Colin within. Do you keep the door here, Albanac.”

They waited through the hours to moonrise. Atlendor guarded the fires. There was no move to extinguish them – just the reverse: they seemed to burn faster than holly, and Atlendor was put to it to keep the fires high, and the pile of wood on the lawn began to dwindle. At this rate it would not last long. Atlendor stopped in the act of throwing a branch into the flames. The Morrigan had nearly won. He hurried round, raking the fires together, sacrificing every other one for the sake of the hours left to the night. But after this the Morrigan seemed content to wait. The fire was normal, no bodach sent spears.

The moon rose a long time before it was seen, and it shot high from a cloud, an ugly slip of yellow, taking the watchers by surprise. And though the light it gave was
small, and could not even dim the fires, the moment it touched the ruins they shimmered as in a heat haze, and dissolved upwards to a house. The windows poured their dead lustre on the grass, making pools of white in the flames.

“Now!” cried Uthecar, and Susan and he threw themselves up the bank and put all their weight to the door. It swung easily, and they fell over the threshold, and as she stumbled, a spear passed over Susan's head and skidded along the hall. Uthecar kicked the door shut, and the wood rattled under an impact that was made of many separate blows delivered at the same time; points of bronze stood out like teeth. But the door was closed, and even while the echo was still loud, Uthecar and Susan were running up the stairs.

“He will not be near to the ground,” said Uthecar, “and we must hurry, since he will not be unguarded, either, and the fire and our coming will be plain to any.”

They went from room to room, throwing open the doors, but all were empty. The house rang with their search.

They reached the end of a landing, and Susan was about to charge the door, when Uthecar stopped her.

“Wait! I am not liking this.”

He pointed to the upper panel of the door. A design
had been painted on it in black, and there were strange characters grouped around the design.

“It is a witch-brand,” said Uthecar. “Come away.”

“No,” said Susan. “It's the first thing we've found. I'm going to look.”

She tried the handle carefully: the door opened, and Susan stepped into an enormous room. It was as bare of furniture as any other she had seen, but on the floor a circle had been drawn, about eighteen feet across. It had a double rim, round which were more characters similar to those on the panelling, and in the circle was a lozenge, and a six-pointed star was near each of its four corners. In the centre of the lozenge stood a squat, long-necked bottle, which held a black substance that writhed as though it was boiling, though the cork was heavily sealed
with wax, and two points of red light swam inside the bottle, always the same distance apart.

Susan approached the circle, and the red sparks stopped their drifting, and hung against the glass. Susan felt compelled to pick the bottle up, but as she reached the circle, the room was filled with a buzzing, like the whine of flies, and the circle rims began to smoke. She stepped back quickly, and at the same time Uthecar caught her by the shoulder and pulled her out of the room. He slammed the door.

“The Brollachan! She has penned it here!”

“
That?”
said Susan “Then we must stop her from getting in here, or she'll set it loose!”

“Small wonder it could not be found,” said Uthecar.

“Listen!”
whispered Susan.
“Somebody's coming!”

There was one door they had not yet opened at the end of the landing. It was smaller than the others, and from behind it they heard footsteps drawing near.

“Back,” said Uthecar. “Give room for swords.”

He braced his legs apart, balanced for flight or attack. The running footsteps checked, the door opened, and Uthecar gave a shout of gladness, for in the doorway was Pelis the False, sword in hand, frozen by surprise.

Uthecar sprang, but Pelis was as quick, and the sword bit into the door as it was snatched shut in Uthecar's
face. He pulled it open, and ran along the short passage beyond. At the other end Pelis was disappearing up a staircase in great bounds.

“Do not follow,” shouted Uthecar to Susan. “Guard here.”

The stairs were not long, and at the top was a single door. Pelis was fitting a key into the lock, but he did not have time to open it before Uthecar reached him.

He was no coward. Without a shield he stood, his sword in both hands, his back to the door, and there was not a stroke or a thrust that Uthecar made that was not parried and answered. But the advantage of the shield began to tell, and Uthecar worked Pelis away from the door and to the stairs, and once there, Pelis had to give ground.

Susan listened to the clash of iron, and the heavy breathing which was magnified by the stair well, and tried to believe that she could make herself use her sword.

When Uthecar and Pelis came into sight she flattened herself against the wall, and watched the glittering play of blades as they swooped, leapt, and sparked about the dwarfs with a cruel beauty that had the precision of dancing in it.

“To the room above,” Uthecar gasped as he reached the bottom step.

Susan nodded, and began to edge past the fight. Uthecar increased his attack, but even so, Pelis was able to make one vicious cut at Susan as she darted for the stairs. She threw up her shield, and the blow glanced off the rim, and dragged a long groove in the stonework of the wall, but it did not touch her, and she was through.

Susan looked at the key in the lock. Did Uthecar want her to open it? She examined the wood, but there were no marks or lettering visible, so she turned the key, and kicked open the door.

It was a cell of a room; windowless, empty of comfort as the rest of the house; and standing against the opposite wall was Colin.

P
elis the False hewed at Uthecar's shield. It was riven in two places, and if he could make it useless he would have more chance of halting the slow retreat down the corridor. As a swordsman he was Uthecar's match, but his disadvantage made attack nearly impossible, and though he had got past Uthecar's guard once, the wound was slight, and he himself was losing strength through a gash on the shoulder. The girl alone would be no obstacle as far as weapons were concerned, although he was still suspicious of her bracelet, but he had to finish the dwarf quickly, or the fighting would lose its purpose.

Therefore when he saw Susan appear behind Uthecar, supporting Colin with her arm, Pelis did not hesitate, but backed towards the stairs that led down to the hall. He knew that he would not go far if he turned and ran.

He arrived at the top of the stairs, and cunningly parried Uthecar in such a way that he seemed to be
weakening rapidly, and so when he faltered in his guard, Uthecar thought the moment was there, and he brought his arm down in a swing that had all his weight behind it, but Pelis threw himself sideways, rolled over the banisters, and dropped into the hall, while Uthecar pitched off balance helplessly down the stairs.

Pelis ran, not to the outer door, but to another that led off the hall. He was through, and the door closed again, before Uthecar recovered himself. Susan was the first to reach the door, and when she opened it she saw Pelis for an instant against a window that stretched from the ceiling to the floor, and through which the fires on the lawn could be plainly seen, then the dwarf hurled himself at the frame, and disappeared in a splintered cascade of glass.

“Come back,” said Uthecar from the hall. “If the liosalfar do not have him now his life is charmed. Let us go by the door.

“Colin, are you fit to run?”

“Yes,” said Colin. “I'm all right. I've not had anything to eat or drink since I got here, that's all, and I was a bit dizzy to start with, but it's passed off.”

“Were you hurt?”

“No: they just stuck me in there, and left me. I suppose you know it's the Morrigan.”

“Ay, we have crossed her. But you shall hear of that
later. Susan, take Colin by the hand, and when I open the door run close by the wall to Albanac. He will be somewhere near. Beware of empty ground. Are you ready?” He pulled open the door, and then clutched Susan's arm.
“Wait!”

“What's the matter?” said Colin.

Uthecar did not answer, but ran across the hall to the room from which Pelis had escaped, and when the children joined him they found him standing at the broken window, looking out into the night, which was as silent and impenetrable as the caverns of a mine.

“The moon is hidden,” said Uthecar.

“But the house isn't here unless the moon's shining on it,” said Susan, “and it still
is
here.”

“Ay, but where is ‘here'?” said Uthecar. “To the valley this house is ‘here' when the old moon is on it, and not at other times; but to the house the valley is ‘there' only in the moon. So I am asking what is out ‘there' now, and I am not wanting to know the answer. Let us watch for the moon to come, and then through this window as fast as we may.”

While they waited, Uthecar questioned Colin, but there was not much to be told. The Morrigan had done nothing with him; he had been taken straight to the room, and locked in.

“Your time would have come,” said Uthecar. “Susan was the chief intent, and through you they would bring her here – and so they have brought her, though not as they would wish!”

“But why didn't Pelis take me instead of Colin?” said Susan.

“He did not know how little of the power that is within you had been revealed: he could not presume to bring you by the sword.”

“Why's he doing all this?” said Colin. “We didn't think twice about trusting him, with him being a dwarf.”

“Ho! There is reason for you!” said Uthecar. “Why am I here if not for mischief? It is the nature of dwarfs to seek trouble, and with him it is the cause and not the cure that delights.”

But before he could say more there was a vibration in the darkness, and blurred lights appeared, which condensed into fires and with the light came noise – hoof-beats, and the clash of weapons.

Uthecar put his shield in front of him, and jumped through the window, the children following at his back, and all three landed together on a path that was between the house and the lawn. Uthecar knelt behind his shield to take in the situation.

The elves were holding their circle against both cats
and goblins. If any breached the circle they were not pursued, but were brought down with arrows, and, from the bodies on the ground, the fighting was not new.

The elves were outnumbered by at least two to one, and the cats were everywhere, a torment to the horses, and death to any elf that was unseated.

Despite her opinion of the lios-alfar, Susan had to admire their courage and skill. They were quick as hawks, yet they were calm in their speed, and they did not shout or cry. They must have eyes at the back of their heads, thought Susan.

“I do not see Albanac,” said Uthecar. “Let us find him.”

They ran to the corner of the house, and came upon Albanac guarding the door.

“How is it?” said Uthecar.