The Spellcoats (32 page)

“Aunt Zara, I think you're marvelous,” I said. I do. I could kiss her, though I know I shall hate her again tomorrow.

The shadow of the One fell across my loom as I wove this. It is not so much a shadow as a shape of greenish light, with that bent head and nose I know so well. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Tanamil kneel and bend his head to the ground. That would have shown me who it was, even if Duck had not climbed just then over the edge of the turf. What Duck can see I have no idea, but he is shading his eyes as if against a strong light, and he looks as if he might have passed through death, like a mage.

While Duck stares, my grandfather has put a vision in my head. “Weave this, Granddaughter,” he seems to say, “and use the thread I gave you. It was Cenblith's.”

I saw the shadow of the One, Adon Amil, Orethan the Unbound, rise up in his steamy cave, and rise through the earth, through rock and through clouds, until he stood like a mountain, towering above us. Like this, he took the edge of the turf beside me and pulled it, as I would pull a rugcoat up round my shoulders, and he clothed himself in this and in the land that lay below. And as crumbs fall from a coat as you move it, the falls, the lake, and the green valleys beyond were spilled downward and tipped away toward the sea. With the land rolling and ruined, Kankredin and his mages were tipped, too, helplessly, until the grinding of the pulled earth grated them to powder, scattered them, and buried them. The River was tipped and spilled even after this, until it ran as a thread, which thread became a thousand streams, as many as the threads of my weaving. And the land was a new shape. Only then was my grandfather satisfied.

This vision I have woven with Cenblith's thread, knowing it will come to be. I thought the space of the vision was months, but when it was over, Duck still stared and people were in the middle of movements they had started when my grandfather's shadow fell. They are coming back onto my ledge in confusion, Robin, Hern, and all the army. Jay has his sword drawn. The mages are just below. It is time to finish my weaving and take my second coat through the River of Souls to put it upon the One. Then I will come back to see if my vision has come to pass. And if I have failed, I shall go back to the River of Souls for the third and last time.

Final Note

Spellcoats, as they are called, are mentioned frequently in folklore and legend, but these are the only two examples ever discovered. They were found in the marsh above Hannart, when the new fort was under construction on the mountain known locally as The Old Man. They are both preserved by the marsh to a wonderful degree. The colors are bright and clear, and the threads undamaged. The gold band at the hem of the second coat was slightly spoiled when a dishonest workman tried to pull the threads out, but this has now been restored.

The coats were known to be of immense antiquity, but they were not recognized for what they are straight away. We are indebted to Earl Keril for first pointing out that the designs bear strong affinity to letters of the old script. Since then both coats have been carefully studied and the foregoing translation made.

The story is largely self-explanatory, but certain obscurities in the text have been amended to avoid confusing the reader. The following remarks may be of use to students.

Hern Clostisson seems unquestionably to be the same as the legendary Kern Adon, until now thought to be first King of Dalemark. The nameless King is not known, nor is Kars Adon.

Duck/Mallard is dubiously identified with Tanamoril (the name means “youngest brother”), the piper and magician of many folktales. It is not known how far the tales confuse him with Tanamil.

Concerning Robin, we may point to the belief that a robin can answer the questions of those in trouble.

Gull seems to be the same as the Southern hero Gann, whom the witch Cennoreth went in search of.

The Weaver herself has been identified with the Lake Lady, the Fates, and with the southern cult figure of Libby Beer, but not satisfactorily. The witch Cennoreth is the most likely possibility. She is frequently called the Weaver of Spells. A drawback is that, like Gann, she figures only in stories told in the South. However, the name Cennoreth—which is a Southern form; the (unrecorded) Northern form would be Kanarthi—can be interpreted as River Daughter (Cenn-oreth), although another interpretation would make it Woman of the North (Cen-Noreth).

The places mentioned are harder to determine. Of several rivers which flow northward, the most probable river is perhaps the Aden, which has a tidal wave, or bore, on occasions, known as the Credin. It flows from its rising in Long Tarn toward the Rath Estuary in Aberath, but it is hard to make the Aden fit the Weaver's description unless we postulate some major upheaval in the landscape since the days of the story. It has been calculated that her account should give the river a source somewhere above Hannart, near where the coats were found, but no river flows north from there today.

Elthorar Ansdaughter,

KEEPER OF ANTIQUITIES

AT HANNART IN NORTH DALEMARK

D
IANA
W
YNNE
J
ONES
wrote more than forty award-wining books of fantasy for young readers. For her body of work, she was awarded the British Fantasy Society's Karl Edward Wagner Award for having made a significant impact on fantasy and the World Fantasy Society Lifetime Achievement Award.
www.dianawynnejones.com.

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Cover art © 2005 by Dan Craig

Cover design by Christopher Stengel

Cover © 2005 by HarperCollins Publishers Inc.

Maps by David Cuzic

The Spellcoats
copyright © 1979 by Diana Wynne Jones
First published in Great Britain in 1979 by Macmillan London Ltd.
Published in 1993 by Mandarin, an imprint of Reed Consumer Books Ltd.
First published in the United States in 1979 by Atheneum.
Published in 1995 by Greenwillow Books.

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EPub Edition © JANUARY 2012 ISBN 9780062200822

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