Текст книги "Quest for the Faradawn"

Автор книги: Richard Ford

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Текущая страница: 15 (всего у книги 23 страниц)

‘It is because Dréagg has blighted this place,’ Golconda said. ‘It belongs to the goblins who have no need for light nor for the power of the earth. Ashgaroth and his gifts are unknown here, it is an empty space for him and does not exist. Can you not feel the Evil One all around you?’

‘Why do you then stay?’ asked Warrigal.

‘I have told you; someone must show travellers across. There is no other way to the sea without going through an enormous detour over the high mountains and that would take far too long and be even more dangerous. In any case it is impassable in winter. And I can survive on what is to be found in the marshes. The goblins do not suspect that I work with the elves; I am a solitary bird and they leave me alone. I am too unimportant for Dréagg to waste his efforts on so I stay and no one bothers me. That is the way that it has been.’ He paused while they walked under the overhanging branches of a small oak tree which swept down almost to the ground. The trunk of it was covered in thick green lichen, and on the roots which stuck up out of the green sludge, grew hundreds of little orange fungi that contrasted strongly with the dull greens and browns all around.

‘But you,’ Golconda went on. ‘I know all I wish to know about your journey and your mission and I bid you the greatest of good fortune for you will need it. But tell me of your wood and of the animals in it, and of your early days, Nab; and the Urkku with you, who is of the Eldron: tell me of her. I see that she speaks to you in our tongue. I would like her to talk to me of the ways of the Urkku.’

The time passed quickly as they talked; they forgot the evil around them as they related the stories and legends of Silver Wood to the heron, and when Nab told him of the early days, sunshine and laughter seemed to fill his mind. But when they got to the end the heron stopped them and asked Beth to tell him of her life and they listened in fascination and amazement as she told them haltingly of how she had lived and of the ways of man.

They enjoyed talking to him for he was a good listener, only occasionally interrupting to ask a pertinent question or add some observation of his own. He reminded them all, in his stature and bearing, of Wythen and they wondered sadly if they would ever see the old owl again. Soon, before they realized it, the darkness began to fall and night started to set in.

‘We must press on, make haste,’ Golconda said when Warrigal asked him if they were going to rest for the night. ‘There is no knowing what the goblins are planning, and the sooner you are safely through the marshes, the better I shall feel.’

The swirling, writhing mist had not lifted all day but the darkness made it appear thicker and more dense so that it felt like a heavy drizzle and their coats once again became soaked with wet. They went in silence now, concentrating on following the heron as he walked ahead of them for they could see very little. Suddenly Nab, who was immediately behind him, heard a muffled thud and a little cry which was stifled almost as soon as it began so that he could not be certain whether or not he had imagined it. He stopped for a second and whispered to Warrigal.

‘Did you hear that?’

‘Yes,’ the owl replied quietly.

‘What was it?’

‘Just some creature, I would think. I heard a splash as well. Come on or we’ll lose sight of Golconda.’

Nab peered ahead through the murk. For an instant or two he could see nothing except the shapes formed by the mist but then to his relief he saw the familiar form of the heron, striding ahead, his tall white figure appearing almost wraith-like as it gathered shrouds of mist around it.

‘Hurry up,’ said Warrigal urgently and Nab felt the talons of the owl tighten on his shoulder. ‘He seems to have got a long way in front. Better not call him in case the goblins are around. Come on.’ Nab moved forward quickly and the others followed and soon they were once again trudging along in silence, sunk in thought, with the heron just visible in front. The little nagging feeling of panic which Nab had felt when he had heard that cry soon passed as he concentrated on following Golconda. Nevertheless there was still something bothering him and as time went on and the figure ahead of him kept going forward resolutely without ever turning around or getting any closer, Nab felt little prickles of fear creep up his spine until he felt as if the hair on the back of his neck was standing on end. Nomatter how quickly or how slowly they walked the heron always seemed to remain exactly the same distance in front of them. Why did he not wait for them to catch up? If only he would turn round and they could see his face or if he would just say something. The marsh seemed to be getting thicker and thicker and the smell of damp rotting vegetation was now so heavy on the air that they could almost see it lying like a cloud above the surface of the dark brackish waters and bog moss which lay on each side of their raised path. Around I them the swirling clouds of damp played tricks with their eyes, making it seem as if the dead stumps of the trees were moving; every so often one would loom up at them out of the mist like some malevolent creature of the hog.

Nab’s eyes were fixed so much on the figure ahead of him that he failed to see the ending of the path. Suddenly his feet were enclosed in a mass of green sludge and when he tried to lift them out he found that it was impossible; the more he tried to free one, the further in did the other one sink. Warrigal had flown back on to the path and he called to the others to hurry up. Beth was only just behind but by the time she had arrived the quaking mire was up to his knees. Brock, Sam and Perryfoot ran the few paces to the spot where the path fell away into the bog and saw with horror the scene before them as Nab frantically waved his arms about trying to throw himself towards the bank, but the more he struggled the further he sank. He could feel himself being sucked down with a strength that was impossible to fight: soon he could not move his legs at all for the sludge was halfway up his thighs. Beth lent over as far as she could but still she could not reach his hand and then, through the haze of her memory, she recalled scenes from films and books in which someone had been caught in quicksand. Quickly she took off her cape and rolled it on the grass so that it formed a rope of cloth and then she lay face down on the path as near to the edge as she dared until the stench of the bog filled her nostrils.

‘Brock, let me hold on to you and Sam, you lie across my legs,’ she said.

The animals understood what she wanted and so with her left hand gripping Brock’s front leg as he stood at her side and with the weight of Sam holding her down she threw the cape out with her free hand, but it did not fall straight and dropped well short of Nab’s clutching hand.

‘Hurry,’ he shouted and as he did so he felt the sludge force itself up over his waist.

Beth drew her right arm well back so that the cape was stretched out straight on the path behind her and then with all the strength she could muster she flung it out across the bog. This time the whole of its length was used up and her arm lay out at full stretch. With her heart pounding beneath her she hardly dared raise her head to look, but when she did, to her enormous relief, she saw that he had just managed to grasp the end. Then she could feel him pulling on the cape and her arm felt as if it was being torn out of its socket. She closed her eyes and gritted her teeth as a wave of pain swept over her. The problem now was how to haul him out of the bog. She tried to bend her arm to pull him but it was impossible; she did not have enough strength. Then she felt her hand begin to slip on the cape but she managed to wedge her fingers against the lion’s-head buckle to stop it sliding. Next she began to wriggle back on her tummy in an attempt to drag him out but that also proved impossible. Desperately she thought for a second and then she called to Brock and Sam to grab hold of her by her legs and pull. They did so, gripping her jeans in their teeth and pushing away from the edge with all their strength. At first nothing happened but then slowly, inch by inch, Beth felt herself moving back.

‘We’re doing it,’ she yelled exultantly to Nab. ‘It’s working.’ She prayed that the cloth of her jeans would hold. Very gradually, Nab felt himself being pulled out of the mire. Soon only the lower part of his legs was left in and he was able to move his hands along the cape to heave himself out more quickly. He would never forget the delicious feeling of freedom as each part of his body fought itself free of the clinging mass that had engulfed it.

Finally he lay on the firm grass path with Beth at his side, panting breathlessly with the effort of her exertions. The joint where her right arm joined the shoulder throbbed terribly with a pulsating ache and the mouths of Sam and Brock were bleeding but they were almost delirious with relief. When he had recovered a little from his ordeal Nab got up slowly and, having thanked them all solemnly picked some handfuls of grass and began to wipe some of the foul ooze from his body. Everywhere was deathly quiet. Then suddenly, for in the drama he had just been through he had completely forgotten him, his thoughts turned to Golconda. Surely he must have missed them by now and turned back? But there was no sign of the great white heron. Nab peered desperately into the darkness but all he could see were the shapes in the mist, dancing joyfully. For a moment the tiredness of his eyes played tricks and he almost believed they were laughing at him. Had the heron been a figment of his imagination? No; they had all seen and spoken with him. Worse still then, had he been in league with the goblins; leading them all into the middle of the bog by gaining their confidence and then abandoning them to wander about for ever in this terrible place to be swallowed up one by one by the marsh as he almost had been?

His thoughts were suddenly interrupted by the voice of Warrigal, who had perched on a stump at his side.

‘We have no guide,’ he said simply. ‘We have no alternative now but to go back along this path until we find another and then see where that leads us.’

‘Where is Golconda?’ asked Nab.

‘I do not know but I fear we shall never see him again. You rouse the others; we must be on the move.’

Beth’s eyes were closed and the other animals were asleep. It seemed a great pity to disturb them while they were still enjoying the exhilaration of success and before they realized the desperateness of their situation, but Nab agreed with Warrigal that they dared not delay.

Eventually, after Nab had woken them up gently, they started walking back along the path down which Golconda had led them that evening. The relative happiness of that earlier walk was difficult to believe in now; it was almost as if they had dreamt it. Suddenly, when they came to the spot where Nab had heard the cry, he stumbled over something on the ground and almost fell over, toppling Warrigal off his shoulder. He bent down and saw a bolt lying across the path; the shaft was made of rough wood and the head was a jagged rock. Then he looked up and saw that the others were all staring at a tree stump on the other side of the path. He followed their gaze and then he saw Golconda. His head had been severed and stuck on the top of the stump; the eyes wide and staring and the long sharp beak gaping open. The rest of his body had been dismembered and each part had been attached to a different part of the stump so that the whole represented some ghastly caricature. The snow-white feathers were speckled and streaked with deep crimson where the blood had run. They all stared for what seemed an age, transfixed with horror, and an icy fear gripped their hearts and froze the blood in their veins so that they were unable to move. Then the physical manifestation of that horror took over and they all began to retch violently, their stomachs heaving and churning till they were shaking with weakness. Beth, summoning up from within her a reserve of emotional strength she was unaware she possessed, pulled herself together and shouted at them to move and, when there was no response, she went round to each animal and shook him fiercely by the shoulder until the daze of horror was shaken free. Finally, they all began to move, slowly at first, stumbling as if in a dream but then as the fog in their minds cleared they walked faster and faster until they were almost running in their efforts to get away from that dreadful place. How long they went on for or how far they went they did not know, but finally, and all at the same time, exhaustion overtook them and they slumped down. The awful truth now occurred to Nab. The splash and the cry which he and Warrigal had heard had been when the bolt had struck home and the goblins had pulled Golconda off into the marsh. The figure that they had then followed had not been Golconda at all but some creature of the marshes controlled by the goblins; it may even have been the mist itself summoned up by the goblins to do their bidding and taking the animals further and further into the depths of the bog while they did their grisly work knowing that any survivors would be bound to come back that way. The thought came to him that they were being played with and a feeling of utter and complete hopelessness swept over him. He looked round at the others sitting or lying down on the sodden strip of ground which kept them from being sucked in by the bog. Their coats were saturated and matted with mud and on their faces Nab saw only utter misery and despair. Even Warrigal was staring down at the ground, his eyes dull and listless and his shoulders hunched over in an attitude of weariness and apathy. Beth lay face down with her head buried in her arms, and her body quivered slightly as she sobbed quietly to herself. Next to her sat Perryfoot, staring out over the marsh with his ears flat along his back and at his side lay Brock and Sam like two ghosts. They could go no further, thought Nab. This was it; the goblins had done their grisly work well. Any will to continue had been extinguished completely by the sight they had seen back along the path.

For some time, as these thoughts went through his mind, he had been growing gradually more and more aware of a sound coming over the bog. At first he thought it was no more than the wind blowing through the rushes but as it grew slowly louder he could distinguish an underlying conglomeration of noise which sounded very much like the murmur of low conversation and the splashing of footsteps. The others had also heard it for they had looked up and were staring in the direction from which the noise was coming; the expression on their faces having changed from despair to terror. Nearer and nearer the noise came until suddenly, abruptly, the murmur stopped and all they could hear were splashes as the footsteps continued over the marsh towards them. Then even those stopped and they saw through the darkness and the mist a long line of shadows standing silently and still, just within their sight but too far away to be able to distinguish any features.

‘Goblins, ’ Brock whispered to himself under his breath but so quiet f was it that they all heard him.

The line of shadows stood like that for what seemed an age to the terrified animals and then, once again, it began to move forward. They could just make out, now, the separate figures as they walked. Then suddenly, like a shaft of sunlight, they heard a cry echo over the bog and shatter the dreadful silence. It was a pure liquid cry which pealed out through the darkness and seemed to fill the air with light and beauty so that the travellers felt their hearts instantly freed from the cold terror that had gripped them. In it was the happiness of the first call of the curlew after the winter and the warmth and comfort of the first sunshine in spring. Dawn was just breaking and in the golden iridescent light of the early sun as it shone through the mist the animals could see the dark ominous line start to break up and divide as a host of elves fell among them, their swords glinting and flashing in the sun. They watched spellbound as the goblins fell back in disarray and the air was filled with the sounds of battle; the clashing of sword against sword and the terrible cries of the goblins as they were wounded or killed, for they did not accept defeat easily and fought with a dreadful strength, their short squat bodies wielding massive swords and maces as if they were feathers. But they were slow and clumsy and the elves danced around them confusing and taunting them so that they became angry and lunged wildly until they grew tired and their strength left them. Then the elves would quickly and deftly finish them off. The battle raged all morning but eventually the last few goblins fled away over the marsh and the air was once again still. Then the animals saw the elves coming towards them out of the mist. They walked slowly for it had been a long hard fight and they were weary. They were also sad, for killing is not in the nature of an elf and they will avoid it if at all possible. Even the killing of goblins is to them an evil and victory in battle was never a glorious time for them.

Soon the elves were standing on the path and their leader spoke.

‘You are safe,’ he said. ‘Welcome to the land of Sheigra. I am Faraid, battle leader of the sea elves and I have come to take you to Saurelon, Lord of the Sea. It came to us that you were assailed by the forces of Dréagg and you were long overdue. Come now, drink this; it will revive you until you can rest and eat in the caves of Elgol.’

From under his garments of spun silver Faraid produced a flask and handed it to Nab, who raised it to his lips and drank deeply of the sparkling liquid inside. The colour he could not see but the flavour reminded him of the sweetness of sun-ripened clover and he could feel it coursing through his body, reviving and refreshing him. He passed it to Beth and then Faraid took the flask back and poured it into a large bowl-shaped shell inlaid with mother-of-pearl for the animals to drink from.

When they had drunk their fill and vitality and life had begun to appear once more in their eyes, Faraid led the little band out over the marsh with the elven army following behind. They shuddered with repulsion as they walked through the area of battle and saw the black blood seeping out of the goblins’ wounds and mixing with the stagnant oily waters of the bog. The whole area was now thick with the foul stench that escaped from these wounds and the animals found great difficulty in getting their breath. They picked their way between the fat ugly bodies lying where they had been felled and could hardly bear to look at the faces which in death were even more vile than in life. The hideous puffy features were twisted and contorted and the slavering viscous lips had pulled themselves into such an attitude of hatred and contempt that even in death they still made the animals feel afraid. The sight of death reminded Nab of Golconda and he told Faraid of the goblins’ treatment of the heron but the elves already knew because they had passed the awful spectacle on their way.

‘He is once again whole, and will rest content,’ said the elf, and Nab was relieved for he felt guilty that he had ever doubted Golconda’s allegiance and could not help feeling in some way responsible. This was yet another animal who had laid down his life for him and the thought of their love and faith made him feel intensely humble.

Slowly, as they walked, the mist started to become less dense and the ground less marshy and then suddenly they were dazzled by the sunshine of a warm March afternoon. The golden light seemed to bathe them so that all the evil and horror of the marsh was washed away and became a memory. Now they were standing on the edge of a small flat area of trees, heather and tall grass, a patchwork quilt of browns and greens, and at the far end of it they could see, glistening and sparkling in the sun, the sea. None of them except Beth had ever seen it before and that first magic glimpse of blue vastness was something that would live for ever in their minds. For Beth, to whom the sea was as precious as the land, it was like a homecoming, and her heart beat in excitement and anticipation as her memory was stirred by the cry of the gulls and the salty breeze that blew against their faces, and into her mind and soul came recollection of all the enchanted moments she had ever had by the sea in the past.