That he did, and continued to do, until the three of them came at last to the
head of the stair, and the loose screen that separated the world to which they
were returning from the one which they had fled.
Matthias Vaedecker drew the screen aside, and looked out into the space
behind the altar. Then he moved rapidly forward, so that he could look out into
the temple itself. Reinmar had not realised that the soldier was so tense and
tired until he heard the sigh the sergeant released when he saw that the
building was empty.
“We are fortunate, Master Wieland,” the soldier said. “If any alarm had been
raised in the living quarters they’d surely have set an ambush here. We still
have to pass the farmhouse, but that should be easy enough. By the time the monk
we left at the foot of the stair recovers, and goes into the underworld to see
what we have done, we shall be long gone. Even so, it will be best if we can
escape unseen.”
They left the temple by the same door they had used before, and hurried away
from it in the direction of Zygmund’s farmhouse. Vaedecker led the way in an
unhurried fashion, making careful use of whatever cover he could find. Reinmar
knew that it would not be easy to pass the farm buildings without being seen,
but it would not be a disaster if they were; even if Zygmund had labourers with
him they would think twice before attacking two men armed with bloody swords.
They stayed within the wood as long as they could, and were still hidden by
bushes as they came to the edge of the farmer’s fields. From that vantage point
Reinmar could see that there was a group of five men gathered on the path that
led to the farmhouse. They were standing still and seemed to be engaged in an
intense discussion. Two of them, who had their backs to him, were unrecognisable
save for the fact that they wore monastic robes—but one of those facing the
two monks, who towered above them both, was unmistakable.
“Sigurd!” Reinmar exclaimed, exultantly. “It’s Sigurd, come searching for
us!”
Vaedecker put out a hand to warn Reinmar to be still, and Reinmar obeyed the
injunction willingly enough—but Marcilla had recognised someone too, and
Reinmar had relaxed his grip on her hand sufficiently to let her pull away and
run out of the wood into the open ground ahead of them.
“Ulick!” she cried. “Ulick! I am here!”
Vaedecker cursed, but it was only habit and not alarm. Reinmar remembered
what he had been told about the valley being hidden from everyone except those
who had heard a call. If that was true, then he and Vaedecker had only been able
to find it by following the girl. Sigurd must, therefore, have needed a guide of
his own—and none but Ulick could have led him here.
For a moment or two Reinmar preserved the hope that the fifth and
partly-hidden man might be Godrich, but as soon as he began to run after the
girl, by which time all five faces had turned towards him, he saw that it was
Zygmund.
Matthias Vaedecker followed him. He moved in a more careful fashion but he
had given up all hope of remaining concealed.
As he drew closer to the waiting men Reinmar saw, not at all to his surprise,
that the two monks were Noel and Almeric. Theirs was by far the greater shock as
they recognised the figure running towards them as Marcilla. Almeric was white
with amazement, and Noel’s eyes blazed with alarm. The monks knew full well that
the gypsy girl had never been dead, but they certainly had not expected her to
emerge into the light of day again. When Ulick ran to meet his sister the two
monks stood still, rooted by confusion.
By the time Reinmar had drawn level with the girl again he knew that the
monks must have guessed how it had come about that the gypsy was here. The fact
that she was clad in a monk’s robe, whose drying stains were very obvious, had
told them that she had been won back by force, and that the fight had been
bloody. The monks could see as well as Reinmar, however, how severe their
disadvantage was. Even if they and Zygmund had been well armed, they would have
stood no chance at all in a fight against Sigurd and Vaedecker. Brother Noel put
a calming hand on Almeric’s arm, and whispered a command to Zygmund, presumably
instructing him to be still. By the time Marcilla had embraced her brother,
while the sergeant had arrived alongside Reinmar so that the two of them stood face to face with the
two monks, Noel had decided his policy.
“You do not understand what you have done, Master Wieland,” said Brother
Noel, quietly. “You would have been wiser by far to leave quietly, when you had
the chance. How many innocent men have you harmed?”
“I have saved an innocent girl from a horrible death-in-life,” Reinmar
retorted, having had just as much time as his adversary to make ready for a
battle of words. “I have harmed none who did not deserve to be harmed, and every
mortal blow I struck was in self-defence.”
Almeric winced when he heard the word “mortal” but Noel had already turned
his head to meet Matthias Vaedecker’s eyes. “And you, I suppose, are Machar von
Spurzheim’s man? You have come out of hiding to assist this fool in his mistaken
endeavour.”
The fact that Vaedecker had managed to enter the valley, Reinmar deduced,
must have been the substance of the whispered message that had changed Noel’s
attitude to him. Perhaps one of Zygmund’s labourers had been sent out to
investigate Reinmar’s account of the broken wagon and had stayed long enough to
learn—presumably from one of the gypsies who had come to collect their kin—how many passengers it had carried, and how many had followed the bemused girl
when she wandered off.
“I am a soldier,” was Vaedecker’s calm reply to Noel’s taunt. “I do my duty,
to Reikland and the Empire, and the good gods.”
“Duty that compels you to spill the blood of unarmed men,” Brother Noel
observed, somewhat inaccurately. “Well, we all have our obligations. You had
better go back the way you came, since we cannot stop you—but you had better
tell the witch hunter that he will never find this valley, though he searches
for a century—and you would be very wise to leave the girl and boy with us,
where they belong.”
“No!” said Reinmar, anxiously.
Vaedecker was not about to make any concession to a man he regarded as an
enemy and an agent of evil. “I think not,” the soldier said. “While they are in
our care we might be better equipped to find this place again than if they were
not—and I certainly intend to return when I can, with an army at my back.
There is work to be done here.”
Reinmar could see the bitter anger in Brother Noel’s bright eyes, but the
monk was well in command of himself and his voice remained quite level. “You
have not the slightest inkling of what you have done here,” he said, “or what its
consequences will be. One draught of the wine of dreams might have been enough
to save you, Master Wieland, but I fear that it may be too late now.”
Wait until you find out what I have done to your precious stores, Reinmar
thought. You will understand then that it is later than you think. But what he
said aloud was: “One draught was all it took to send Marcilla to horrid
damnation—or would have been, had I not loved her enough to prevent it.”
“Is that what you think, Master Wieland?” Noel countered. “If so, you’re a
fool and worse. You have not even begun to understand the world in which we
live, or what it means to live at all. I believe that you might now have
appointed yourself to that majority of the human race which is fated to die
young and wretchedly, when you might have joined the ranks of the chosen—and
in cheating the girl of her destiny you have robbed her of the kindest fate of
all. You came here as an invader, accepted our hospitality, told us lies and
then turned violently against us. I do not know how many you have hurt and
killed, but you should not have drawn your sword at all, and you will have the
penalty to pay. You have turned your back on hope, and there is nothing in the
world for you henceforth but suffering. You might have enjoyed a good life
enriched by the wine of dreams, but your inheritance now will be a desiccating
thirst that can never be properly slaked no matter how you try. You have one
last chance to do a virtuous thing, and I ask you one last time: leave the girl
and her brother here!”
Reinmar put his hand on the hilt of his sword, and it required a considerable
effort of his will not to release it from its scabbard. “I have seen
everything!” he said, waspishly “I have seen exactly what is done with those who
are chosen by whatever vile god you worship. I have descended into your little
hell, and I have come out of it a better and wiser man than I could ever
otherwise have been. I know now what life is worth, and how it must be defended.
I am ready to do what I must—and the girl will stay with me, until she and I
have yielded our last breaths in defence of our humanity. I have nothing more to
say.”
When Reinmar had concluded his bold speech he saw Matthias Vaedecker smiling,
albeit grimly, and he knew that he had pleased the soldier at last. Brother Noel
and Brother Almeric, on the other hand, wore expressions of a more thunderous
kind—but they seemed to have conceded that there was nothing more to be said.
“We should go now, Master Wieland,” Sigurd said, speaking for the first time.
“The gypsies are with Godrich. They will help him to defend the cart if anyone
or anything should attack it, so he is perfectly safe, but we ought to be on our
way. Your father will want us to see you safely home without further delay, and
I will not disappoint him.” Reinmar understood that the giant was issuing a
subtle warning to the monks.
“He’s right, Master Wieland,” Vaedecker said. “This argument is nothing but a
delaying tactic. We should not allow it to distract us.”
“Do you think we will chase you?” Almeric demanded, bitterly. “Shall frail
ascetics harass you with sticks and curses, while you cut us to ribbons with
your blades? Go—but never think that you are free. You have incurred a debt
this day that will not easily be settled.”
Reinmar reached out to take Marcilla’s hand again. “Come,” he said. “We must
go now. You too, Ulick. The call you heard was bait in a terrible trap, intended
to draw you to your doom. You must come with us, to Eilhart. It is the only
place of safety available to you.”
The monks said nothing to that, but Zygmund contrived a wry grin. Somehow, it
seemed more threatening than anything the monks had said, for they seemed hardly
human now in Reinmar’s eyes, while the farmer was a man like a million others in
Reikland.
“You who are chosen would do better to stay, child,” Noel said—but he
clearly did not expect his words to have any effect. It only required Sigurd to
extend a huge hand and place it on the boy’s shoulder to dispel any possibility
of hesitation.
“Did they hurt you?” Ulick asked Marcilla.
She shook her head, slowly. “It seems so,” she said, wonderingly, “but I
hardly know what was hurt and what was merely dreaming. I have seen this man in
my dreams, but it seems that he is real, and my deliverer.”
Matthias Vaedecker did not wait for this speech to be concluded. He had
hurried ahead to lead the way, leaving Reinmar to grab the girl’s hand and follow swiftly behind. Sigurd pushed the boy
gently ahead of him before he brought up the rear, looking behind him all the
while to make sure that no one came after them. The farmer and the monks would
have been fools to try, and they remained standing where they were, watching the
five hurry past the farmhouse towards the neck of the valley and the wood
beyond.
Reinmar looked back into the valley once while he was still able to see the
expressions on the monks’ faces. He found them still very sullen—but whatever
anger there had been had already ebbed away, to be replaced with perplexity and
anxiety. They were afraid, he supposed, of what they would find when they went
into the underworld—as they had every cause to be. They would have need of
their burial-ground now, not merely as a ruse but as a final resting-place for
at least half a dozen of their company—and when they went to inspect their
reserves of the wine of dreams, they would know the true extent of the blow that
had been struck against their trade.
While Reinmar was still looking back, Brother Almeric took something from his
pouch. Reinmar thought at first that it must be a weapon, but when the monk
lifted it a little higher out he saw that it was a crystal flask, half-full of
amber liquid. The troubled monk put it to his lips and took a sip, then passed
it to his companion.
Reinmar turned away—but even as he turned he heard a mysterious voice
whispering in his ear, which said: “You do not know what you have done. She is
already chosen. You may believe that you have saved her for another wedding, but
she can never be yours. And for what have you saved her, after all, but a short
and brutish life full of trials and tribulations, and an end in misery and
pain?”
The voice was sourceless, and Reinmar was certain that none of his companions
had heard it—but he was not afraid, and he felt no need to reply. He had done
what he had to do, and he was proud of himself for having done it. Marcilla was
his now, until she was Morr’s, and he intended to keep her.
They passed through the wood without incident, marching steadily in spite of
their wretched state. They found a dozen gypsies waiting with the mended wagon,
including Rollo and Tarn. The travellers were astonished and displeased to see
the manner in which Marcilla was dressed, but Godrich—seeing the parlous
condition that Reinmar and Vaedecker were in—asked them to wait for an
explanation.
Exhaustion caught up with Reinmar almost as soon as he reached the cart, but
he managed to give the steward a muttered and sketchy account of what had
occurred.
The sergeant confirmed his story at every stage with swift nods. “We must go,
and go quickly,” Vaedecker said, when Reinmar had finished. “The monk poured
scorn on the notion that they might chase us, but the attendants of the
underworld were only too ready to fight, even when they had no weapons to hand.
If they stay where they are it will be because they can work greater mischief
there. Can you persuade the gypsy and his chieftain to let us take his son and
daughter with us—or, better still, to come with us to Eilhart himself?”