The Rings of Poseidon (7 page)

To give them time to catch up with us we lit
a roaring campfire and rested. We'd brought a bit of peat with us
and we threw that into the embers along with some greenery, to make
sure there was enough smoke for them to see - I didn't want them to
miss the fire!

In spite of all the help we gave them, it was
still the afternoon of the next day before they caught up with us
enough for me to see them, and then we almost lost them. They
really are lacking in tracking skills and seem stupid in battle
too. We would beat them easily if they weren't so numerous. We led
them steadily towards the ambush I had planned at the Ring of
Brodgar, and arrived there about a hour and a half or so before
sunset. I stopped the tribe briefly to pay our respects to the
Goddess - to the big people it must have looked as if we were
giving thanks for a victory - then I led the attackers out of the
other side. The big people saw us going and thought it was safe.
They marched straight into the ambush waiting for them. I didn't
realise how many there were. I knew they were numerous, but there
must have been around a hundred men, all fighters with armour and
so on. Even though my people were well hidden and gave a good
account of themselves there were only two survivors and my little
force was depleted.

We waited until nightfall to go back for the
dead and took them under cover of darkness. We carried them to the
village and laid them in the empty houses, lighting fires they
wouldn't feel. We left some cattle in the byre and put the rest out
near the village. I would have lit a fire but it began to rain and
the wind got up a bit. The big people camped inside the temple,
mounting guards behind the standing stones. It was a miserable
night for camping with a thin drizzle soaking everything through
and a chilly wind. I thought of the comfortable houses with only
the dead in them more than once, but I stuck to my plans.

Morning came and through the infrequent
breaks in the cloud it didn't look at all promising. There was a
stormy redness, squally rain from time to time and the wind had
risen more.

The big people found our village and fell on
it with a venom that made a body think they had spent an
uncomfortable night. They lost a few more to our arrows before they
stormed underground. They cleaned the place out! They brought out
everything right down to the heather bedding and the dead bodies.
As they piled up the bodies we attacked again and then those chosen
to lay a false scent let themselves be seen with the boats - but
not so close that the big people could recognise the straw dummies.
By now there was a near gale and I rather doubted the wisdom of
trying to sail to one of the low islands to the north, even the
nearer ones. Still it was too late to change plans.

The rest of our tribe - and only sixteen of
them remained - went to the place where we had hidden the boats for
the crossing to the high island. The wind was really up now, if
anything, even fiercer and I thought that we perhaps should lie low
until it dropped. The small group had survived our battles were
terrified of remaining within the vengeful reach of the big ones
and wanted to cross to the high island. They were sure our boats
would survive a short journey across sheltered water and, against
my better judgement, I gave in to their pleading.

I am sorry to say that I was right and they
were wrong. The boats were no more than hides stretched over frames
of thin branches. They soon broke up in those seas and those winds
and most of my people are not swimmers. The wind screamed at the
water and I only stayed afloat because I had a paddle to hold on
to. It screamed at the heather and the rocks as I dragged myself,
dripping, from the water to shelter under the overhang of a
boulder.

I was wet through and the overhang presented
me with little enough cover from the wind. While it wasn't really
cold the force of the gale made it seem so and I was wet in the
extreme. The rain was driven horizontal and it even tasted salty,
there was so much spray in it.

Miserable as my condition seemed, I was
exhausted and I must have dozed for a while. When I woke, which
might just as easily have been a fleeting moment or two or a much
longer period, the wind had shifted a little and my boulder was not
protecting me as much. I crawled to the lee side of it and found
not only less wind but more of an overhang and two sheep
sheltering. I crawled in behind the sheep and felt a bit warmer as
we snuggled up together. Beyond the rock the wind was more than a
gale. It tore small bushes up by the roots and flattened the grass;
it drove rain and sand before it like a solid wall and a regular
little stream ran down the side of the rock. With better shelter
and a little warmth I was more comfortable. I scraped a little
hollow in the sandy ground for my hip and fell into a fitful
sleep.

I woke once with thirst which I quenched from
the water streaming down by the rock and again as the sky
lightened. I thought the storm had eased a little, but the wind
still howled like a boar in agony, trying to raise the dead from
their graves. I thought I would stay in the shelter a bit longer,
and must have fallen asleep again.

When the elements had calmed still further
and the wind dropped to something like a mere gale, I crawled out
from the shelter and began to walk somewhat stiffly along the shore
of the high island. I knew there was a village close to the beach
on the sheltered side, I had even been there a time or two. I hoped
I could find it now.

The waves were still angrier than I had ever
seen them, white topped, grey and rasping viciously on the shore. I
wondered that I had survived them and thought that few would have
done likewise. I walked on. Walked is an inadequate word,
suggestive of a stroll on a sunny day. The wind had dropped only
slightly and the rain was still a torrent. I struggled, stumbled,
fought, staggered, lurched, limped in a near stupor.

At length I came to the village. I almost
missed it but for the smoke from only one house and the lowing of
some cattle down in the byre.

I was so glad to get underground and away
from the storm that I didn't notice at first how empty it was. I
just went into the first house and there she was, keeping a fire
burning high, the girl who had been my mate in the great
marriage.

"Come under the blanket and warm up," she
said practically, "You must be frozen as well as drenched."

I stripped off my sodden clothes and climbed
into the bed with her. She may have sounded practical when she
invited me to warm myself, but she was other things too. Afterwards
I slept in the dark warmth.

I was woken by the smell of cooking - a stew
and some cakes of bread - and realised I was starving. I was part
way through the meal before it struck me how quiet the village was.
With five or more nursing mothers and several young children it
should not have been so silent and still.

"Where are the others?" I asked her.

"Gone." she answered, not, I thought, very
helpfully. "I knew you would come here so I waited in the
village."

"Gone where?" I wanted to know.

"They saw the fires you started in the big
people's settlement. They saw it burn and celebrated your victory.
Then they thought it was safe to return."

"But I didn't send for them. What they saw
was just a distraction."

"They were distracted," she said with a flat
simplicity.

I wondered whether they got back to land
before the storm and whether they had survived the elements if they
had made it over the water. I was not at all sure of the little
ones and the oldest ones.

"When did they leave?" I asked.

"Just before the storm," she said. "I doubt
if they landed before the worst of it."

My heart sank. There was little chance that
they would have survived. She was practical about it.

"I am young. With luck I can bear several
children." she said, "The storm has hurt the homes of the big
people more than it has hurt us because they build above ground. We
can start afresh here."

I thought about this for a while. Perhaps she
was right.

When my hunger was assuaged I went to the
entrance of the village. The wind had dropped, but it still gusted.
There was sand partly blocking the way and I had to scrape it
aside. I knelt there, mostly shielded from the wind looking across
the grey and stormy waters, thinking. I could not recall a storm
like this nor had I heard my father or anyone else speak of such a
wind. There was no going out today even if I had any but the most
pressing of reasons - and I no longer seemed to have any reason at
all. I turned, rose and walked back underground. She was waiting
for me.

"Do we need anything from outside?" I asked
her.

"No. We have fuel for several days' fire and
food enough for as long or longer."

"Then we'll shelter until the storm ends," I
decided.

"I'll build the fire up," she said by way of
answer. Outside the weather was still foul - inside we were
sheltered and dry.

It was nearly two days later that the wind
dropped and the clouds let the sun through. I had no hope that any
of my people would have survived the storm but, all the same, I
felt I must look. I walked along the seashore - and this time I did
walk - but saw nothing. I could see the main island near and clear
and I found the wreckage of a boat, probably mine. However, most of
the other rubbish thrown up by the waves seemed to be natural. I
did not see any sign of any other person, big or little.

When I had gone past the boulder where I had
sheltered that first night, I turned back. There wasn't much point
in going further.

Something niggled at my mind and I think I
felt that all was not right, though I had seen nothing wrong. I
smelt the smoke of our fire before I saw the village. I knew
instantly that we had a visitor and I saw from the size of the
footprint in the sand I had scraped away that it was one of the big
people. I heard the sound of the hard stuff they make their weapons
from. The noise came from underground. So he was still there. I
couldn't see any others, so there was probably just the one, but he
couldn't be allowed to go back and tell others of his
discovery.

I could hear someone coming towards the
entrance, so I stood to one side. He stopped in the entranceway
blinking, stooped over because he was so tall. I didn't give him
time to get used to the light again or to recover himself, I
chopped down and then stabbed upwards. I cut off his sword hand at
the elbow with the first blow and I felt the sword strike home with
the second. Then a clump of damp sand hit my face.

A second one emerged with a spear as I
brushed the sand from my face and eyes, stabbing wildly at him as I
did so. He caught me with his spear and the head broke off,
allowing me to reach him with an upward stab of my sword. The two
of them staggered away, bleeding and dying. I collapsed on the
sand. I did not think they were going to make it to the main
island. In fact I saw one of them drop about a hundred yards
away.

"Lian!" I called, but she did not answer.
"Lian! I've been hit, come and help me." I called again, but she
did not come or even answer. From inside came a smell of
burning.

Chapter 6

Steve tugged the ring off his finger. "Phew!"
he said.

"Did we all share a dream?" asked Gill
cautiously. "I certainly felt I was watching something real."

Alicia was looking bemused but said
nothing.

"It was real," said Steve at length, looking
at the ring which he was still holding. "Or, at least, realistic.
How long did it last?"

Gill glanced at her watch. "I'm not sure.
About twenty minutes I think." She was about to say something else
but Steve interrupted her.

"When you say you shared the dream, do you
mean that you took part in it?"

"Not exactly. I ... well, stood by on the
sidelines, as it were."

"I'm off football images, if you don't mind,"
said Steve. "But the point is that I felt I was the owner of the
ring, Bend, or whatever his name was. I felt it was all happening
to me."

"Oh no, I wasn't in the dream exactly" said
Gill. "I shared it or I watched it."

"And did you pick up thoughts and
impressions?"

"How d'you mean?"

"Well I had the impression that the bloke who
killed me was looking for something. Not just looking for the
sunken village but looking for something in it. I just wondered if
you picked that up."

"I'm not sure. I don't think so," she said.
Then she added, "I could do with a tea or something. It wasn't a
shock but it was more than a surprise."

"The kettle's still here, though I could do
with the 'or something' I think." He put the ring down on the table
in front of Alicia and picked up the kettle to top it up from the
water barrel.

As he did there was a splatter of rain
against the window of the Portacabin. "Want a drink Ali?" he
asked.

Alicia picked up the ring and examined it.
"Your story was logical and not all that unlikely. The detail was
in keeping with what we know." She was still pensive, turning the
ring over and over as if she expected some sort of explanation from
it. A rather wet Frank Baxter banged in, carrying a pair of damp
jeans.

"My story?" said Steve.

"Well it did seem to be your story. I seemed
to be sort of sharing your dream."

"And you were wearing the ring, weren't you?"
added Gill. "Ali's right. It did seem to be your story."

"What've I missed?" asked Frank, dumping the
jeans over the back of a chair and then sitting down. "I was
writing home when I heard the rain. I went outside to try and
rescue the jeans I hung out to dry, but I guess I was too
late."