Authors: Robert Holdstock
Tags: #Fiction, #General, #Contemporary, #Fantasy, #Fantasy Fiction, #Great Britain, #Forests and Forestry
When I reached the garden gate I turned to look for her. She came scampering
out of the forest, head low, spear held firmly in her right hand while her left
clutched the scabbard of her sword, stopping it from bouncing about on her belt.
She raced past me, ran across the garden and into the lee of the house, turning
against the wall, looking anxiously back towards the trees.
I sauntered after her and opened the back door. With a wild look, she slipped
inside.
I closed the door behind me and followed Guiwenneth as she strolled through
the house, curious and commanding. She tossed her spear on to the kitchen table
and unbuckled her sword belt, scratching through her tunic at her taut flesh
below. 'Ysuth'k,' she said with a chuckle.
'Itchy too, no doubt,' I agreed, watching as she picked up my carving knife,
snickered, shook her head and dropped the implement back on the table. I was
beginning to shiver, thinking of a nice hot bath; but there would only be a
lukewarm one, the water heating in Oak Lodge being primitive in the extreme. I
filled three pans with water and put them on to the stove. Guiwenneth watched,
fascinated, as the blue flame sprang to life. 'R'vannith,' she said with a tone
of weary cynicism.
As the water began to heat I followed her through the sitting-room, where she
looked at pictures, rubbed the fabric covers of the chairs, smelled the wax
fruit and made an astonished, slightly admiring sound, then giggled and tossed
the artificial apple to me. I caught it and she made a gesture as in eating,
questioning, 'Cliosga muga?' And laughed.
'Not usually,' I said. Her eyes were so bright, her smile so youthful, so
mischievous ... so beautiful.
She kept scratching the belt sores around her waist as she explored further,
entering the bathroom and shivering slightly. I wasn't surprised. The bathroom
was a slightly modified section of the original outhouse, grimly painted in now
fading yellow; cobwebs festooned every corner; old tins of Vim scouring powder,
and filth-laden rags, were clustered below the cracked porcelain basin. It
amazed me, as I looked at the cold, unwelcoming place, that all through
childhood I had washed here quite contentedly - well, contented, that is, with
everything except the gigantic spiders that scuttled across the floor, or
emerged from the plug-hole of the bath with alarming frequency. The bath was
deep, of white enamel, with tall stainless steel taps that attracted
Guiwenneth's attention more than anything. She ran her fingers across the cold
enamel and said that word again: 'R'vannith.' And laughed. And I suddenly
realized that she was saying
Roman.
She was associating the cold,
marble-like surfaces, and the special heating techniques, with the most advanced
technology of society as she - in her time - had known it. If it was cold, hard,
ease-making, decadent, then of course it was Roman, and she, a Celt, despised
it.
Mind you, she could have done with a bath herself. Her odour was quite
overwhelming and I was not yet used to experiencing so powerfully that
particular animal part of a human. In France, in the last days of the
occupation, the smell had been of fear, of garlic, of stale wine, too often of
stale blood, and of damp, fungus-infested uniforms. All of those smells had
somehow been a natural part of the war, part of technology. Guiwenneth had a
woodland, animal aroma that was startlingly unpleasant, yet strangely erotic.
I ran the tepid water into the bathtub and followed her on her perambulations
towards the study. Here again she shivered, walking around the edge of the room,
looking
almost anguished. She kept glancing at the
ceiling. She walked to the French windows and stared out, then stomped around on
the floor in her open sandals before touching the desk, the books, and some of
my father's woodland artefacts. Books did not interest her in the least,
although she peered at the page structure of one volume for several seconds,
perhaps trying to puzzle out exactly what it was. She was certainly pleased to
see pictures of men - in uniform, it happened, in a book on nineteenth-century
army uniforms - and showed me the plates as if I had never seen them before. Her
smile proclaimed the innocent pleasure of a child, but I was not distracted by
anything other than the adult power of her body. She was no naive youth, this.
I left her browsing in the gloomy study and topped up the bath from the
freshly boiled pans. Even so, the water was only just lukewarm. No matter.
Anything to scrub away the revolting residue of algal growth and slime. I
stripped off my clothes and stepped into the tub, and became aware that
Guiwenneth was standing in the doorway, smirking as she stared at my grimy, but
essentially pallid and weedy torso.
'This is 1948,' I said to her, with as much dignity as possible, 'not the
barbarian centuries just after Christ.'
Surely, I said to myself, she couldn't expect me to bristle with muscle, not
a civilized man like me.
I washed quickly and Guiwenneth dropped to a crouch, thoughtfully silent.
Then she said, 'Ibri c'thaan k'thirig?'
'I think you're beautiful too.'
'K'thirig?'
'Only on weekends. It's the English way.'
'C'thaan perm avon? Avon!'
Avon! Stratford-upon-Avon? Shakespeare? 'My favourite is
Romeo and Juliet,
I'm glad you have
some
culture at least.'
She shook her head, that beautiful hair drifting about
her
features like silk. Dirty though it was, lank - I could see - and greasy, it
still shone and moved with a rich life of its own. Her hair fascinated me. I
realized that I was staring at it, the long-handled scrubbing brush poised
halfway to a position where I could get to my back. She said something that
sounded like an instruction to stop staring, then she rose from her haunches,
tugging down her brown tunic - still scratching! - and folded her arms as she
leaned against the tiled wall, staring out through the small bathroom window.
Clean again, and revolted by the appearance of the bath-water, I took my
courage into my hands and stood in the bath, reaching for my towel, but not
before she had glanced at me ... and sniggered again! She stopped herself
laughing, the twinkle in her eye quite infuriatingly attractive, and regarded
me, staring up and down at the white flesh she could see. 'There's nothing wrong
with me,' I said, towelling myself vigorously, slightly self-conscious but
determined not to be transparently coy. 'I'm a perfect specimen of English
manhood.'
'Chuin atenor!' she said, contradicting me totally.
I wrapped the towel around my waist, and prodded a finger towards her, then
at the bath. She got the message, and answered me with one of her own, her right
fist irritably struck twice towards, but not against, her own right shoulder.
She went back into the study and I watched her for a moment as she flipped
through the pages of several books, looking at the colour plates. I dressed
then, and went to the kitchen to prepare a pot of soup.
After a while I heard water being run into the bath. There was the briefest
period of splashing, coupled with sounds of confusion and amusement as an
unfamiliarly slippery bar of soap proved more elusive than functional.
Overwhelmed by curiosity - and perhaps sexual interest -I walked quietly to the
cold room and peered round the
door at her. She was
already out of the tub, tugging her tunic into place. She smiled thinly at me,
shaking back her hair. Water dripped from her legs and arms, and she gave
herself an elaborate sniff, then shrugged as if to say, 'So what's the
difference?'
When I offered her a bowl of the thin vegetable soup, half an hour later, she
refused, seeming almost suspicious. She sniffed the pot, and dipped a finger
into the broth, tasting it without much appreciation as she watched me eat. Try
as I might, I could not get her to share this modest fare. But she was hungry,
that much was clear, and she did eventually tear off a piece of bread and swirl
it in the soup pot. She watched me all the time, examining me, examining my eyes
in particular, I thought.
At length she said quietly, 'C'cayal cualada . . . Christian?'
'Christian?' I repeated, saying the name as it should be pronounced. She had
made it sound like
Kreesatan,
but I had recognized the name with
something of a thrill of shock.
'Christian!' she said, and spat on the floor angrily. Her eyes took on a wild
expression and she reached for her spear but used the haft to prod me on the
chest. 'Steven.' A thoughtful pause. 'Christian.' She shook her head as she came
to some conclusion. 'C'cayal cualada? Im clathyr!'
Was she asking if we were brothers? I nodded. 'I've lost him. He went wild.
He went to the woods. Inwards. Do you know him?' I pointed at her, at her eyes,
and said, 'Christian?'
Pale though she was, she went a touch paler. She was frightened, that much
was clear. 'Christian!' she snapped, and flung the spear expertly and
effortlessly across the kitchen. It thudded into the back door and hung there,
quivering.
I got up and wrenched the weapon from the wood,
somewhat
annoyed that she had effectively split through the grain, leaving a fair-sized
hole to the outside world. She tensed slightly as I pulled the spear out and
examined the dull, but razor-edged blade. It was crenulated, but not like a
leaf; the teeth were recurved hooks, running right around each edge. The Irish
Celts had used a fearsome weapon called the
gae bolga,
a spear that was
supposed never to be used in honour, for its recurved teeth would wrench the
innards out of a man it struck. Perhaps in England, or whatever part of the
Celtic world that had birthed Guiwenneth, no such considerations of honour were
important in the use of weapons.
The haft was inscribed with little lines at different angles; Ogham, of
course. I had heard of it, but had no idea how it worked. I ran my fingers along
the incisions, and queried: 'Guiwenneth?'
She said, 'Guiwenneth mech Penn Ev.' She said it with pride. Penn Ev would
have been her father's name, I supposed. Guiwenneth, daughter of Penn Ev?
I passed her the spear, and reached cautiously for the blade in its scabbard.
She moved away from the table, watching me carefully. The sheath was hard
leather with strips of very thin metal almost stitched into the fabric. Bronze
studs decorated it, but a heavy leather thread had been used to bind the two
sides together. The sword itself was totally functional: a handle of bone,
wrapped round with well-chewed animal skin. More bronze studs gave an effective
finger grip. The pommel was almost non-existent. The blade was of bright iron,
perhaps eighteen inches long. It was narrow at the pommel, but flared out to a
width of four or five inches, before tapering to a precise point. It was a
beautiful, curvaceous weapon. And there were traces of dried blood upon it that
testified to its frequent use.
I sheathed the sword again, then reached into the broom cupboard for my own
weapon, the spear I had
made from a stripped and crudely
shaped branch, with a large, sharp chipping of flint for the point. She took one
look at it and burst out laughing, shaking her head, apparently in disbelief.
I'm very proud of this, I'll have you know,' I said, with mock indignation. I
fingered the sharp stone point. Her laughter was bright and easy, a genuine
amusement at my paltry efforts. She seemed slightly humbled, then, covering her
mouth with her hand, even though she still shivered with amusement. 'It took me
a long time to make. I was quite impressed with myself.'
'Peth'n plantyn!' she said, and giggled.
'How dare you,' I retorted, and then did something very foolish.
I should have known better, but the mood of humour, of peace, was too
conducive to complacency. I made a pretend attack upon the girl, lowering the
spear, jabbing it easily towards her as if to say, I'll show you . . .'
She reacted in a split second. The mirth vanished from her eyes and mouth and
an expression of feline fury appeared there. She made a throaty sound, an attack
sound, and in the brief time it had taken me to thrust my pathetic child's toy
in her general direction she had swept her own spear down twice, savagely, and
with astonishing strength.
The first blow fetched off the spear head, and nearly knocked the haft from
my hand; the second strike snagged the wood, and the whole decapitated weapon
was wrenched from my grip and flung across the kitchen. It knocked pots from the
wall, and clattered down among the china storage vessels.
It had all happened so fast that I could hardly react. She seemed as shocked
as me, and we stood there, staring at each other, our faces flushed, our mouths
open.
'I'm sorry,' I said softly, and tried to lighten the mood. Guiwenneth smiled
uncertainly. 'Guirinyn,' she murmured by way of her own apology, and picked up
the severed spear head and handed it to me. I took the stone, which was still
attached to a fragment of wood, peered at it, made a sad face, and we both burst
into spontaneous, light laughter.
Abruptly she gathered together her belongings, buckled on her belt and walked
to the back door.
'Don't go,' I said, and she seemed to intuit the meaning of my words,
hesitating and saying, 'Michag ovnarrana!' (I have to go?) Then, head low, body
tensed for rapid flight, she trotted back towards the woodland. As she vanished
into the gloom she waved once and emitted a cry like a dove.
Five
That evening I went to the study and drew out the torn and tattered journal
that my father had kept. I opened it at random, but the words defied my efforts
to read them, partly, I think, because of a sudden mood of melancholy that had
surfaced at around the dusk hour. The house was oppressively quiet, yet echoed
with Guiwenneth's laughter. She seemed to be everywhere, yet nowhere. And she
stepped out of time, out of the years gone by, out of the previous life that had
occupied this silent room.
For a while I stood and stared out into the night, more conscious of my own
reflection in the dirty glass of the French windows, illuminated by the desk
lamp. I half expected that Guiwenneth would appear before me, emerging through
the shape of the lean, tousle-haired man who gazed back at me so forlornly.
But perhaps she had sensed the need - the need in
me,
that is - to
establish something I had come to know as a fact... in all but the reading.
It was something I had known, I suppose, since I had first skimmed the
journal. The pages in which the bitter details had once been recorded had long
since been torn from the diary, destroyed no doubt, or hidden too cleverly for
me to discover. But there were hints, insinuations, enough for the sadness to
have suddenly registered upon me.
At last I went back to the desk and sat down, slowly leafing through the
leather bound book, checking dates, edging closer to that first encounter
between my father and Guiwenneth, and the second, the third . . .