The Shadow at the Gate (67 page)

The fog hung in the streets. Their footsteps sounded muffled. Here and there, lights shone in windows. Jute hitched up his cloak, also bought from the innkeeper’s obliging wife, and wished he was still asleep in bed. The street became a carter’s track that headed out into the moors. The village vanished in the fog behind them.

“The coast road again,” said Ronan. “It’ll take us to Averlay, and then on to Harlech.”

“Harlech,” said the ghost. “Did I mention I once read something odd about Harlech?”

“Yes,” said Jute. “I’m sure you did.”

“Rest assured that I’ll tell you what it was in great detail. Once I remember what it was.”

“Is there no way, ghost,” said the hawk, “that I can convince you there are other things you could do rather than journeying with us? I’m grateful for what you’ve done for us. The advice about the sea and boats was timely, but, well—”

“I don’t need convincing on that account,” said the ghost. “I know full well there’re other things I could be doing. Rest assured that I choose not to do them. I like you. I like you all. Besides, it’s been about six hundred years since I’ve had a stroll in the country.”

“Is there no way to make you leave?” said the hawk mildly.

“Yes, of course there is. The fifth stricture of the causality of ghosts.”

“And what is that?”

“Oh, don’t worry,” said the ghost happily. “I won’t tell you.”

“Never mind,” said Ronan. “I’m sure he’ll keep his mouth shut when he needs to, won’t you?”

“Sir,” said the ghost. “I am the perfect painting of discretion.”

The fog burned away as the morning progressed. They were on a moor that, except for the sea far below on their left, stretched away on every side. The air smelled of the sea and of heather and it did more to clear one’s head than a mug of hot ale.

“We should leave the road,” said Ronan. “It meanders too much if we mean to make haste.”

“Aye,” said the hawk. “I was thinking the same myself.”

They headed straight off across the moor. Jute found the springy turf pleasant to walk on. The apparent flatness of the moor was deceptive, for there were deep ponds looking up at the sky with their clear, stony gazes and sudden gullies full of bulrushes and trickling streams. A covey of quail burst out of the grass at their feet and fled away. The hawk surged into the air and climbed high. Then, he dove.

“Quail’ll make a nice break from rabbit for him,” said Ronan. “I wouldn’t mind some myself for lunch.”

“Barbaric,” said the ghost. “I could never bring myself to eat a defenseless little bird.”

“Do you remember the last meal you ate?” asked Jute.

“What do you mean?” said the ghost. “Are you inferring I might’ve eaten something like that poor quail, which is, no doubt, being dismembered as we speak?”

“I meant no such thing,” said Jute, even though this was what he had meant. “I just wondered whether you remembered things like that.”

“I don’t remember things like that,” said the ghost. “I’ve so many more splendid and worthwhile things to remember that I don’t waste time on inconsequential memories.”

“I’d differ from you, ghost,” said Ronan. “It’s the little things that are worth remembering. A woman’s smile, the smell of porridge in the morning. The mane of a horse flying out in gallop.”

“I don’t remember porridge,” said the ghost. “I’m sure it’s nasty stuff.”

“My mother cooked porridge most every morning when I was a child. Porridge and honey.”

“I’d bet a great deal of gold, if I had any gold, that you don’t remember why there is a morning. You don’t, do you!” The ghost capered in triumph. “You see? You don’t know the important things. I know them, therefore I can remember them. I can even afford to forget them, if I want. Why, I’ve forgotten fabulous things. Dozens of things. Hundreds of things. We could start discussing them now and we wouldn’t be halfway through by the time we reached Harlech. Just think about that.”

This made no sense at all to Jute. If the ghost had forgotten all of these fascinating things, then how would it be able to discuss any of them?

The moor gave way to low hills. Looking back from the top of the first one that they crested, the sea was visible in the distance as a strip of dark blue.

“You’ll always be uncomfortable when the sea isn’t near,” said the hawk.

“What?” said Ronan. He turned red under his tan.

“What?” said the ghost. “What’s what?”

“I don’t recollect any human before you with the blood of the sea in his veins. Oh, don’t scowl like that, my friend. The mark of the sea is difficult to hide from anyone who has known her well, and I knew her well, many years ago.”

Ronan was silent as they walked along, though the ghost plied both him and the hawk with questions about the sea that they both ignored.

“Fair’s fair,” said the ghost indignantly. “I’ve generously shared my knowledge with you today. You appreciated my discussion of toads and their predators, didn’t you? So why won’t you share with me? If there was somewhere I could submit a formal complaint, I would.”

They descended into a little valley and the sea was no longer in sight. It was nearing time for lunch, and Jute’s stomach, along with the position of the sun in the sky overhead, confirmed this. They ate, sitting under the shade of an oak. The hawk tucked his head beneath his wing and dozed.

“Hmmph,” said the ghost, who had been maintaining a huffy silence for the last few minutes. “I don’t care if you’re all going to behave like selfish prigs. I probably know more about the sea than any of you, so there.”

“I fell into the sea once,” said Jute.

This thought made him scowl, and he eyed Ronan, but the man was intent on his bread and cheese and paid Jute no attention.

“Very interesting, I’m sure,” said the ghost, “but I daresay you know nothing about things like velocity, buoyancy, and the fact that seaweed, if boiled and then piled on the head, is an excellent cure for pneumonia, shivers, and several forms of madness.”

“What’s shivers?” said Jute. “Is that when you get cold?”

“Ah, shivers,” said the ghost, delighted to be asked a question. “Shivers is brought about when one comes too near a creature of the Dark. And not just any old creature, but horrible creatures such as shadowhounds or dropsies. Of course, the question you’re probably asking yourself is: what’s too near?”

“What are dropsies?” asked Jute. He didn’t like the sound of them.

“A dropsy,” said the hawk, popping his head out from under his wing, “is something rather dreadful. I hope you never have the misfortune to meet a dropsy. I doubt you ever would, for there weren’t many dropsies and I think most of them were killed a long time ago.”

The discussion of dropsies went on for some time, with the hawk doing most of the talking. The ghost occasionally offered its own ideas, but it was apparent it did not know what it was talking about and gravely made ridiculous claims and assertions that had nothing whatsoever to do with dropsies and had everything to do with the fact that the ghost liked to hear the sound of its own voice.

Dropsies, explained the hawk, were one of the earliest servants of the Dark. Not as old and as powerful as the sceadus, but terrible enough. They were creations of the Dark. Though the important thing to understand was that the Dark could not create of its own power. It could not make something out of nothing. Rather, it could only remake and twist things that already existed into shapes of its own device.

“The Dark is only a warped reflection of what is good in this world,” said the hawk. “Think of it like this: you cast a shadow as you walk along this path; the shadow cannot cast you. However, if the Dark somehow gained control of you, then it would slowly work its will in you until you were only a reflection of who you once were—a dim, ugly reflection.”

The ghost disagreed with this, pointing out that no one knew what things looked like from a shadow’s point of view, and perhaps they viewed people as being their shadows. The hawk snorted and did not bother responding. The ghost took this as a sign of capitulation and launched into an incomprehensible discourse on light and darkness and whether or not they were merely substances such as water or socks or cheese.

“If they are,” said the ghost, “then we must figure out what sort of container can hold them. If we can do that, why, we can corner the market. A hundred gold pieces for a pound of light. Twenty silvers for a swallow of darkness. We’ll be rich.”

“I don’t think anyone,” said Jute, “will pay for a pound of light when you can go outside and have as much sunlight as you want.”

“Oh?” said the ghost. “I hadn’t thought of that. Sunlight, you say? It’s free? What a pity.”

The sunlight, free or otherwise, shone on them. Down in the defiles between the hills, there was not a breath of wind and the air was warm. On every hilltop that they reached, however, they could feel the breeze, and the scent of the sea was still borne on it.

“When are you going to teach me how to fly?” said Jute to the hawk.

“When we get to Harlech, and only then. I would’ve considered it sooner, but not with such an unpleasant creature as a wihht on our trail. The power let loose in teaching you to fly would be like waving a flag and yelling, ‘Here we are!’”

“If I knew how to fly then we needn’t be trudging through these hills,” said Jute.

“Ah,” said Ronan. “And then I’d be left here with our ghost.”

“I’m not enthused about the arrangement either,” huffed the ghost. “I’ve met monosyllabic mice more talkative than you, sir.”

“No one’s flying except me,” said the hawk.

They came to the border of Thule and Harlech late that afternoon. At least, Ronan said it was the border as far as he knew. It was not a specific line such as the fence a farmer might put around his lettuce patch to keep the deer out. The hills sloped down into a valley that, as it stretched west and north, opened into a wide bay. The sea sparkled in the late sunlight.

“The northern end of the Scarpe Plain,” said Ronan. “It ends here at Averlay. Can you see the town? There, on the furthest curve of the bay.”

Far away but just visible along the furthest edge of the shore, Jute could see a town. Smoke hazed in the air overhead. A wharf reached out into the water, crooked around itself, and boats rocked at anchor within the shelter of the breakwater.

“A town,” said Jute happily. “Hot dinner!”

“You can’t see them at this distance,” said Ronan, “but straight out from the bay are the islands. The Flessoray Islands. Only a few fisherfolk live on them.”

They made their way down the last hill. The grasses of the plain were golden with summer days and the long autumn that had followed afterward to burnish them brighter and sharper. The wind was in their face, blowing in off the sea. They could hear the sound of the waves, even though they were still far from the shore. It was because of this, because of the wind’s direction, that they did not hear the horses until the herd was nearly upon them.

“Watch out!” called the hawk. He launched himself from Jute’s shoulder into the air.

They heard the gallop of hooves. The ground trembled. Around the edge of the hills thundered a herd of horses. They were galloping fast.

“Get out of the way!” shouted Ronan. He ran for the hill they had just descended. Jute scrambled after him. The horses were upon them. Jute smelled the tang of horse sweat. There was dust in the air. He was suddenly aware of how small he was in comparison to the huge horses. Ronan grabbed him by the collar and yanked him off his feet, up onto a rock slab. The horses split around them, not slackening their speed.

“Where’d they come from?” gasped Jute.

Ronan did not answer at first. The man stared tensely at the horses. His face looked shocked.

“I know them,” he said. “I know these horses. There’s the old gray with the blaze on his forehead. Surely he would’ve been dead of old age years ago. And the dappled mare. I’d know her anywhere. Her colts were as sure-footed as cats, and the duke of Dolan always bought them whenever we came to his court.”

Ronan made as if to step forward, to plunge off the safety of the rock and right into the path of the horses, but he flinched at the sight of a tall black stallion galloping at the rear of the herd.

“That’s his horse,” he said, insensible now to Jute’s presence. “I rode it when I was a child. Wynlic! Wynlic, don’t you know me?”

But the stallion pounded by in a flurry of hooves and mane. The horses were gone now, past them and veering across the plain and toward the hills along the bay, rising higher and more cruelly broken than the hills to the south.

“What’s going on?” said the ghost, who, for once, looked startled and unsure of itself.

Ronan jumped down from the rock and stood staring after the horses. They were lost to sight in a cloud of dust that drifted across the plain. The hawk landed on Jute’s shoulder in a flutter of wings. Ronan turned around, his face blank.

“I must go,” he said.

He walked away, stumbling at first but then moving more steadily as he went. He walked among the trampled grass and torn earth of the horses’ trail, heading south in the direction from where the horses had come from.

“He can’t just leave,” said Jute. “Wait! Ronan! Where are you going?”