The guide reined, pointing. ‘Follow the track,’ he said. ‘The way is clear enough. Beyond the woods, the Mere People have their towns. No Kermi deals with them; they are a jealous folk, not to be trusted. The Horse Warriors hold the south, from the Great Plain to the sea. If you must journey in their lands, journey by night. They love no strangers.’
He turned his horse. ‘I have brought you as the King ordered me,’ he said. ‘Here, Talsarno’s writ ends. Trust no man beyond the woods; and the Gods be with you.’ He raised his arm briefly in salute; and the Dragon staffs wheeled, the little escort clattered back the way it had come.
Rand clicked to his mount, moved on down the winding track. Matt followed, slumped unhandily in the painted saddle; Elgro, grumbling, brought up the rear.
They were leaving the high hills now. They crossed long slopes bright with speedwell, set with heather tufts and clumps of bilberry. Beyond, pines rose from thickets of rhododendron. There were no apparent signs of life; but twice Elgro turned, watching back fixedly at the skyline.
On the lower ground the pines gave way to a dense forest of beech. They rode an hour or more, through tilted green glades; it was early evening before they reached the forest edge, and reined. A last slope led to a meandering, shallow stream; beyond, a blue plain lifted to the horizon.
Elgro ranged his horse beside his lord. Rand turned, enquiringly; and the Dancing Man smiled. ‘We should camp there, by the stream,’ he said, pointing. He glanced once more over his shoulder. ‘I saw some mushrooms a little way back,’ he said, ‘that will make a tasty supper. I will be with you presently.’
He drove his heels at his pony’s sides, jogged back the way he had come. Rand stared after him with troubled eyes, but made no comment. He walked his horse forward, to the stream.
The Dancing Man waited, eyes narrowed, till his companions were out of sight. He turned his mount then, at an angle from the path, crashed into the undergrowth.
The rider came slowly, letting the pony pick its own way. To either side, the forest was still and warm; the late sun, slanting through the leaves, spread a canopy of gold.
At one point the track angled sharply beside a massive smooth trunk. A branch as thick as a man’s body hung above the way. The pony passed beneath; and a figure dropped with a swift thud. The animal squealed, kicking its heels with fright. Its rider, borne from the saddle, rolled threshing. She tried to rise; but the weight of the attacker kept her pinned. She writhed, desperate; and a broad-bladed dagger was pushed between her teeth. ‘Answer me quickly,’ hissed Elgro, ‘and tell no lies. Are you alone?’
She nodded, whimpering; and he twined his ringers in her short hair. ‘Now know,’ he said, ‘women are my bane. A Fairy woman it was that cursed my Lord, making him the child he is. Twice you have shamed me, and many more than twice times mocked my words. Now in your silliness you follow us again. Is it to mock?’
She moaned, terrified, and tried to shake her head.
‘Oh, la,’ said Elgro, ‘This is a different song. Who sent you, Rat? Was it your father, to spy?’
The merest headshake. She closed her eyes, panting.
‘Why then,’ said the Dancing Man, ‘perhaps you love the King. Is that the tale?’
She tried to cough, and choked.
‘I have seen this business of love,’ said Elgro. ‘And a curse and plague it is, when women get their hands on it. Love there is, as we Magicians know; it leaps between the stars, and drives the whole green world. Yet foolish men pine for a face or thigh, with bone beneath no prettier than their own, swearing for lack of them the sun will fade; and this you know full well. So you run to one and to the next, saying “Oh la, behold and worship me”; or, “You are a King, and this your Dancing Man; how quaint he seems”.’ He groped for her, with his free hand; and she groaned. ‘Now hear a Mystery,’ he said. ‘That these, and this, and this beneath your kilt, were given you by God. Yet women, who are bags of blood, are vain as little babes, and price the shape that Heaven only lent. So kingdoms fall, and men run mad, because you squat to piss.’
The knife-blade shook. ‘No man followed me, in all my life, and lived,’ he said. ‘Yet for my lord’s sake, I bear with you. This perhaps is love; and high above your understanding.’ He flung her from him, with a great heave. She rolled across the leaves, lay shaking. He sheathed the dagger, walked to stand over her. ‘You chose the road,’ he said. ‘Now follow it. Be faithful to my lord; or my ghost will find you, if I no longer breathe.’
She got to her knees, wearily; hung her head, and was very sick. When she had finished she raised an ashen face. She said in a low voice, ‘Dancing Man, now may I catch my horse?’
He stepped aside, impassively. She walked to where the animal stood; mounted and rode with icy dignity, down toward the Plain.
The sun rose, and set. They walked to the south, steadily. Rand led, his chin sunk on his chest; after him came Matt, jogging stolidly, gripping the saddle horns in front of him. The girl led the packhorses; Elgro Dancing Man brought up the rear. Duck and heron rose at their approach, honking and wheeling. They forded shallow streams, paced by the hour beside desolate fens, flecked all over with the fluffy white of marsh grass. Sometimes they passed rough settlements, once an entire lake city, built from the shore on a forest of stiltlike legs. The inhabitants of the region were numerous; but they neither approached nor offered harm. One and all seemed content to watch from a distance, standing in sullen little knots as the Sealanders passed.
The girl rode for the most part silently, bearing the discomforts of the journey without complaint. Each night she boiled the party’s drinking water, setting the pannikins carefully aside to cool. A pouch at her belt contained delicate bone hooks. She set traps for the water birds, tying the baited hooks to wooden floats; and once she stole some little wicker pots, with them caught a yard-long eel. The Sealanders wouldn’t touch it, to a man; she cleaned the fish and ate a part herself, sitting a little distance away, her dark eyes fixed on Rand.
The following day they came on an ancient road, its surface cracked and broken. In places chunks had been levered up entire by the springing of bushes and weeds. They were of stone chips set in a black, tarry matrix. Such roads existed here and there in Sealand, though the art of making them had long been lost. To Rand it seemed strange to come upon one here; but it ran south, straight as an arrow, vanishing into distance. He turned his horse on to it, calling to the others to follow.
The road dipped and rose, flooded for much of its length. The horses splashed knee-deep, sidling and snorting. Ahead the lake stretched to the horizon, dotted by clumps of reed, islands crowned with stunted, unhealthy-looking trees. The party rode in silence, eyes screwed against the dazzle of sunlight; till at midday the girl reined. Rand, glancing back, saw she sat the pony rigidly, staring down.
He walked his mount back, and stared in turn. Beside the road, the water was crystal clear. In it, pinned to the drowned grass, lay the body of a girl. She was naked, her flesh white as Midsea marble. Her eyes were open, watching up with a curious intentness; her hair, dark and long, flowed slowly round her face, graceful as fern. At knees and elbows, forked stakes had been driven into the earth to hold her firm.
Twice the King spoke, gently; but Rat, it seemed, could no longer hear. He took the pony’s bridle finally, led her away. She came unprotesting, staring back at the death place as it receded. He spoke twice more, receiving no answer. He shook his head, and let her be.
They camped, unhappily, on the driest part of a swampy islet. Rat moved about her duties quietly, cleaning and preparing the game they had brought with them, setting out her baited lines. Later she slipped away, walked to the water’s edge. She sat awhile, rocking dully on her heels, staring to the north while the sunset flared and faded. Then she reached to her belt, took out the little knife she carried. She laid her hand on the ground, pressed the blade without fuss into her palm dragged it down her forearm.
It was Rand who missed her from the camp. He walked, frowning, to where she still sat huddled. He stopped then with a cry, tried to take her arm; but she wrenched away. ‘Leave me alone,’ she said unsteadily. ‘It’s my blood; I can drop it where I choose.’
He scooped her up despite her struggles, blundered back shouting for Elgro and Matt. A linen shirt, her father’s gift, was brought from one of the packs, torn into strips for bandages. He washed the long wound carefully, binding her arm and wrist; when it was done, and the fire stoked and blazing, he regarded her sternly. ‘Why did you do it?’ he demanded. ‘Have we become so terrible to you, that you must creep off and take your life?’
She sat shivering, huddled in a blanket. ‘It wasn’t for me,’ she said bitterly. ‘It was to quiet a ghost. Myrnith would have known the proper way; but all I had was blood.’
‘Whose ghost?’
‘Bethan,’ she said. ‘Whom the Marsh Gods took.’ He stared, in dawning understanding. He said, ‘Was she a Kermi?’
She grimaced, cradling the injured arm. ‘We played together,’ she said. ‘Afterwards, we were in love. She vanished a month ago. We thought it was a wolf.’ She swallowed. ‘There was a storm,’ she said. ‘I took a boat. I hoped I would be drowned. But the Gods didn’t want me. The Horse Warriors caught me instead.’
She stared at the fire. ‘If we go north,’ she said, ‘they take us to feed to Worms. If we go south, the Marsh is always hungry. The Sealanders raid from the west and the people from Green Island, who drink seal blood and cut their fingers off when their chieftains die. And all the time the Horsemen want our land. Soon, if my father doesn’t stop singing and being wise, there will be no more Kermi. The world will be at peace again.’ She turned to stare at Elgro, for the first time in days. ‘She did not ask to be nailed into a bog,’ she said. ‘But doubtless as a woman she deserved it.’
Rand frowned at her, shaking his head; and the Dancing Man rose, stalked off into the dark.
That night she lay beside the King, wrapped in his blankets. Twice in the still watches he woke to hear her sobbing. He drew her to him finally, stroking her hair. ‘You should not have followed us,’ he said gently. ‘Your debt was paid already; I go to the Land of Ghosts, where there is nothing but sorrow.’
In time her head grew heavy against his shoulder. He lay till dawn, watching the white mists crawl, hearing the sighs and gurglings of the marsh. He dozed at first light, woke bleary-eyed and heavy. The party saddled up and mounted, headed once more south. Rat looked as blenched as the water girl, while the usually silent Matt complained of pains in the head and back. Only the Dancing Man, splashing grimly in the rear, seemed unaffected.
By late afternoon they were clear of the marsh; but the Navigator’s condition was worse. He rode wild-eyed, ranting and muttering, breaking into snatches of song. They camped before nightfall, improvised a couch for him from the packs and their contents. The girl sat beside him, raising his head from time to time to drink. He moaned and shouted far into the night, talking nonsense about Crabland, and fishing, and drinking Midsea wine. A very little wine they had with them, brought from Talsarno’s Hall; they gave it him, and it seemed he dozed at last. To Rand’s anxious questionings, the girl shook her head. ‘He has a marsh fever,’ she said. ‘Twice I saw him drink bad water, in spite of what I asked; this has come of it.’ She stared at Elgro, with her disturbing eyes. ‘The time has come for your skill, Dancing Man,’ she said. ‘You who know the secrets of the stars.’
But Elgro turned away, his face set darkly. Later, while the girl slept, he spoke bitterly to Rand. ‘In Crabland,’ he said, ‘when I was your father’s man, I danced more fevers than my body has bones. I danced you into the world, though the midwives doubted your life. Now the power has gone. My legs no longer seem to belong to me, I see things several times over.’ He spread his hands, regarded them gloomily. ‘The Gods do this for shame, or mockery,’ he said. ‘Or this business of enchantment is more widespread than I thought.’ He spoke as if to himself, frowning at the fire. ‘What I said was true,’ he muttered. ‘And is true, through the world. And yet I sinned. How can this be?’
Rand reached to grip his shoulder. ‘It will come back,’ he said, ‘When we are out of this place, and breathe clean air again.’
But Elgro shook his head, his eyes opaque. ‘The times are altering,’ he said. ‘My Lord, I have the oddest thought; that one day Sealanders will own this country too. There will be no ghosts then, or need of Dancing Men.’ He rubbed his face, wearily. ‘It’s my conceit,’ he said. ‘We think as we grow old, the world is ageing with us. Get yourself some rest, my Lord; I will watch for now.’
By morning, Matt had fallen into a slumber from which none of their efforts could rouse him. They talked together, anxiously; then Elgro cut two saplings, lashed them to the harness of the packhorse, wove branches for a makeshift stretcher. On it the Navigator was tied, still breathing stertorously; and the grim march was resumed. They climbed steadily, into rolling green hills. By midday the sick man was awake, wresting with the straps that held him, calling on all manner of Gods and spirits. When they stopped, to give him water and breathe the horses, he barely recognized them.
Deep in the hills, they came on the Black Rock again.
Rand would have ridden forward; but the girl clung to his arm. ‘My Lord,’ she said, ‘there is death there. No one goes twice on the Rock, and lives.’ She appealed to Elgro. ‘Dancing Man,’ she said, ‘this isn’t for myself. But if you go on, then think of a promise you made. I would as soon rest here and sleep, as see the King with the flesh boiled off his bones.’
Elgro stared at her for a time, setting his mouth and pulling his hair; then he turned his horse. ‘My spirits tell me she is right, my Lord,’ he said. ‘Many demons live on the rock. We must pass it by.’
They turned east, thinking that offered the easier route. For most of the day the black band shimmered on the horizon. Finally it curved away, ending in a great ragged crest. They turned the horses thankfully, riding due south.