Authors: Brian Bates
I sat for a long time and Wulf made no effort to fore-shorten my recovery period. Eventually I begin to regain control of my trembling limbs.
‘What happened?’ Wulf said eventually, keeping his voice low.
In a whisper I tried to describe what I thought had occurred and Wulf nodded.
‘Spearwort is a cunning force. It lured you into a trap. If I had not returned to look for you, it might have killed you. You are very lucky, Brand.’
Wulf stood and looked into the shadowy forest in all directions, then motioned me to get to my feet.
‘This time, stay alert,’ he warned. ‘Spearwort may try again. No talking. Stay close to me.’
Wulf set off into the woods at a slower pace and I clung to him like thatch moss. Every animal sound and movement now seethed with threat and I stayed alert and vigilant.
After a short distance, Wulf stopped abruptly. I could not see his face but I could hear him sniffing I breathed in deeply; I could smell only the sweet coolness of the forest. Suddenly Wulf left the trail and made off at an angle to the right, walking in a crouch; I doubled over and stayed as close to him as possible. At one point I got my foot caught in matted ferns and had to resist the temptation to hang on to his cloak to avoid losing him.
Twenty paces into the undergrowth, Wulf stopped in front of a large shrub. I looked up at its black bulk and recognized the outline of a dog-rose, clusters of pink flowers looking like small faces in the shadows. Wulf dropped on to his hands and knees and peered cautiously between the lower branches. I squatted close to him, glancing nervously behind me.
Wulf eased himself forward on to his stomach and slithered through a small gap at the base of the shrub. For a moment I was alone in the darkness and in near panic I scrambled through the gap after him. He was crouching on the other side of the shrub, facing a small clearing. Carefully I crawled out of the shrub and rested next to him. Immediately I became aware of something strange about his posture, something that I sensed rather than saw; he seemed to be frozen into a half-bending, half-squatting position, staring at the trunk of a small tree. I focused my eyes in the direction in which he was looking and could just make out the trunk of an aspen. Almost immediately I felt a hot tingling sensation on my left cheek, as if I were sitting too close to a fire. I turned my head to the left and was met by the piercing stare of numerous gleaming yellow eyes. I tried to see some detail of spearwort’s appearance, but I could take in only the cold stare of the yellow eyes. My body tensed with alarm and I jerked back my head to look at Wulf; he remained stock-still, staring at the tree. I remembered that he had warned me to avoid the direct gaze of the spearwort. I looked at the tree, but still had to shift my gaze to the right to avoid the glare.
Wulf started to move again in the same strange, slow manner. He glided stiffly and silently towards the yellow-eyed plants, his head averted, staring at a space two or three paces to the right of them I tried to follow him, but my calf muscles were so tense that I had to roll forward to take some weight off my legs. At the same time I became aware that I had been holding my breath. I sucked in two long silent breaths; the air in the clearing smelled sour and oppressive. I crawled across the clearing, Wulf a few feet ahead of me, still moving almost imperceptibly towards the plants. As I watched him, his right arm glided behind his back and his knife slipped silently into his hand. I wiped my sweating palm on my cloak, reached out and took the weapon. With a wave of his hand, Wulf motioned me past him towards the plant. I swallowed hard, moving forward very slowly like a man swimming under water in a deep pool. I moved to within three paces of the spearwort. Suddenly a horrible, low moan came from the eyes and I froze in mid-stride.
‘Kill!’ Wulf screamed.
I shot forward, the knife flashed and plunged and the yellow eyes shuddered and reared back like an adder about to strike.
‘Run!’ Wulf yelled, sprinting past me to the dog-rose. I lurched after him, pursued by the low moaning and dived through the shrub, shutting my eyes against the slashing branches. Scrabbling desperately at loose soil, I catapulted myself out through the other side. Wulf was waiting for me and as I tried to get up to run, he pushed me down to the ground and held me there, signalling vigorously for me to keep still. He put his mouth near my ear and whispered:
‘When I tell you, go up slowly to the plant and dig it out with your fingers, making a ditch a hand’s-breadth from the stem. Pull out the whole root, with the knife still buried in it.’
Wulf put a finger to his lips and indicated that we were to sit in silence.
We waited for an age, Wulf squatting next to the dog-rose and periodically peering through the branches. Eventually he signalled with a jerk of his head that we were to re-enter the clearing.
He crawled under the wild rose and I followed close behind. As soon as I emerged into the clearing the moaning again filled my ears in rhythmic bursts. The sound grew louder and I began to shiver as if caught in a biting wind. I pulled my cloak closer around me and stared at Wulf, hoping desperately for a signal to run, but he motioned for me to approach the plant.
Heart pounding I slowly uncurled from my crouch, rolled forward on the balls of my feet and crept towards the spearwort. Gradually the moaning died away to a whisper. From close up I saw that the yellow eyes were a tight array of petals in a daisy-like formation. The knife looked thick, solid, and deadly, buried to the hilt in the ground at the base of the plant.
With my fingers I began to work loose the soil around the base of the stem, avoiding the knife. The night wind crept around the clearing and sighed through the trees above us. In the distance an owl hooted: a melancholy, mournful call. Wulf remained behind me, squatting absolutely motionless.
Gradually I created a ditch surrounding the plant, about as deep as my hand and a hand’s breadth from the stem. Then I burrowed my hands beneath the root, as we had done days earlier when collecting plants on the plateau. I stood slowly and lifted the plant cleanly from the ground. Wulf leaned over and gently brushed away excess soil; the root glistened wet and white, shining through the darkness. It was dark and swollen, with a split on either side of the intruding blade.
Wulf took my arm and we began to back out of the clearing. His head swivelled from side to side, apparently scanning other spearwort plants further back under the trees. We crawled under the dogrose and Wulf took the plant from me. My hands tingled where I had held the wet root and I tried to wipe them dry on the grass.
Now Wulf took a linen sack from his belt, spread it on the ground and placed the plant on it with the root at the centre. The point of the knife blade protruded a few inches from the bottom of the root. Carefully, Wulf wrapped the bag around the root and then gave it back to me.
‘Take good care of it,’ he whispered. ‘It gave you trouble earlier, but now that you have captured it, spearwort will be a powerful ally.’
I followed Wulf back through the forest, cradling the plant protectively in the crook of my arm. It felt heavy and strong like a small, adult hunting animal. As we talked, I began to feel stronger. The chill left me and soon I was sweating under the heavy cloak. My thoughts came clearer and for a time I thought my soul had returned of its own accord. But occasionally the ominous feeling of emptiness returned to my body and I knew that my time was still diminishing rapidly.
We retraced our route along the river and eventually emerged on to the grassy bank of our camp. The fire was almost dead, so Wulf immediately set to work to save it, blowing into the embers and placing dry kindling carefully on the hottest part. I put the bundle containing the spearwort on the ground near the fire-pit and watched Wulf work.
In a short while the fire was healthy again. Wulf took the linen sack to a spot very near the stone perimeter of the pit and unwrapped it gently. When I saw the plant I was shocked. The large root had shrunk amazingly and the yellow eye lay pale and blind on the sacking a withered flower connected to the root by a flaccid stem.
Wulf settled into a crouching position next to the plant and motioned for me to do the same. I felt drained and exhausted, but not at all sleepy. I sat opposite Wulf and we watched the plant for hours. I was totally riveted by the white root as, through the night, it curled up gradually in a desperate attempt to accommodate the cruel bulk of the blade. life ebbed out of the spearwort slowly.
Occasionally my thoughts would wander and linger over events recent or long ago. The faces and voices of people dear to me drifted in and out, each as clear and bright as candle-flame. But always my attention returned to the spearwort, my ally, lying at my feet.
After a time, the night wind died down to a murmur and the sky streaked with dawn light. Suddenly the clearing around us took on an eerie luminosity; the spearwort eye seemed momentarily to glow brilliant yellow, then faded completely. Wulf placed his hand on the dead root and carefully withdrew the knife. I felt a tightness in my throat and hot tears coursed down my cheeks as if we had conducted a vigil over a dying friend.
Wulf gathered the shrunken root in his hands, carried it to the riverbank and immersed it in the water. He scraped lichen from a rock near the bank and packed it in clumps on the wet spearwort root. Then he collected and filled our two cooking pots with river water and dropped the spearwort into one of them. We returned to the fire-pit. There Wulf placed the spearwort pot on to the stones at the back of the fire, where it would receive gentle heat. He filled the other pot with vegetables from our store and put it on the fire. When they were cooked, we broke our fast.
THE SUN rose slowly over the horizon into a pale blue sky streaked with thin wisps of cloud, like torn lace drifting high on the wind. I sat hunched against a tree on the edge of our camp, brooding blackly. Since dawn’s first light, in the quiet time before daybreak, my mood had plunged from exhilaration to despair. After we had eaten, Wulf had gone to walk alone in the forest and I had been left to my thoughts. Gradually I had become increasingly obsessed by my loss of the crucifix which had been knocked from my hand into the river by the same spirits who had stolen my soul. The Lord’s presence was not diminished, of course, for He watches over his flock always. But the crucifix was my tangible link with the Mission and especially Eappa, who had presented it to me. And I knew that this day might be my last. Wulf had predicted two nights of life at the most and we had spent one of them searching for spearwort. After the exertions of the spearwort hunt I now felt weak and lethargic and a dull ache set in behind my eyes. If I was to die this night, I wished to go to the Lord with the comfort of my crucifix.
As I tipped my head back, trying to ease the ache in my head, I noticed a lone hawk gliding high on the wind, barely a speck against the blue sky. Idly I wondered what unsuspecting creature would become the hawk’s next victim and share with me the same last day of life.
As soon as the early morning light turned from grey to silver, I went down to the river to look for the crucifix. I felt very light-headed and as I picked my way down the riverbank I slipped and stumbled repeatedly. The water was cold and clear and I paddled downriver as far as the bend, examining every inch of the riverbed within a foot of the bank. Then I tracked up and down the river, further and further from the bank, until I was submerged to the waist and could no longer see the bottom. There was no sign of the precious cross.
Finally, feet numbed by the cold water, I climbed on to the bank and walked dejectedly towards the shelter. I felt exhausted and twice I almost fell before I reached the camp. Wulf was squatting near the fire-pit, shredding plants with his knife and dropping fragments into the spearwort mixture which simmered slowly on the back of the hob. He looked up as I approached.
‘How do you feel?’ he said cheerfully.
‘Fine,’ I replied, my voice betraying the lie, as I sat down next to him. ‘Wulf, I can’t find my crucifix.’
‘Spearwort is doing well,’ he said, jabbing his knife towards the pot on the hob. I struggled up to look into the pot and saw the dark green spearwort preparation bubbling and churning. Dutifully I raised a smile of approval before collapsing again. I was no longer interested in spearwort. In the clear light of morning I did not see how a wizened plant could remove the dreadful feeling of emptiness from my chest and restore my missing soul. I wanted only the comfort of the crucifix.
‘I can’t find my crucifix,’ I said again, irritably. ‘I have searched the riverbed as deep as I can go and downriver as far as the bend. Wulf, I don’t want to die without my crucifix.’
Wulf stopped working hesitated, then put down his knife and walked around the fire-pit towards me. He crouched by my side and scrutinized me in silence. His eyes were bright and piercing and I dropped my gaze to look away towards the trees. I found his stare disturbing whenever he looked directly into my eyes he seemed to see into my heart.
‘Brand, you are shortly to be journeying to the Underworld, where you will see things never even dreamed of by your masters. After that, I hope you will be able to summon a guardian spirit who will take you to the spirit-world. If we fail and death takes you, then so be it. But do not plan for death as if the terror of it could thereby be avoided. Accept death as part of life and live for life only. Think of the tasks you need to perform before the next night is over and do not waste your energies worrying about a bronze amulet.’
I listened to him with a kind of detached interest. The events of the night, the attack by the creature I had mistakenly identified as Wulf, the emotional witness of the death of the spearwort plant, the failure to find my crucifix—all had left me feeling drained. I felt weak and shivery and I knew that I was sickening rapidly. I wished that I had the crucifix for comfort.
‘We have to prepare two wildfires,’ Wulf said loudly. When I heard him, I realized that it was at least the second time he had repeated the phrase. I nodded slowly. Wulf grasped me by the wrist and pulled me to my feet. As he stared into my eyes from very close, our noses almost touched.