Across the Face of the World (52 page)

'Yes, I'm safe now.'

Stella stood apart from the others, eyes hooded. When Mahnum addressed a comment to her, and when Hal tried to engage her in conversation, she turned towards them, raised her deep brown eyes and stared right through them with a frightening intensity. Her mind was filled with Wira crying out her name in warning, with the flash of sunlight on a swinging blade and him falling, falling to the ground, along with all her hopes and dreams... flash he cries her name, the blade falls and he crumples to the ground, her name on his dying lips ... flash he climbs to his feet and flings himself at the Bhrudwan in a final attempt to save her life ... flash he folds up like a withered flower and the world grows dark and cold, and she hears and sees no more ... and oh, Most High, her numb, self-betraying heart refuses to weep for him, thinking instead of a life locked up in a small northern village, paraded in public on feast-days by a brute of a husband, his coarse hands ... his hands... She shrieked and shrieked inside her head, but no one heard her, no one came to set her free, and her dread-filled vision of the future seemed all but a certainty.

An hour passed before Kurr finally made his way to where the Company awaited him. He took in the scene with one glance. Two bodies, one Bhrudwan, the other - Who is it? - the other Wira, a Bhrudwan captive, the others sitting patiently waiting, no serious injuries.

We've won! We've done it! Mahnum and Indrett alive and well, smiling at him, but looking right through him as though looking for someone else - Who? He did a quick count.

'Where is Leith?'

'We were wondering the same thing,' Farr replied.

'He went running after Wira, heading this way.'

'Yes, we saw him,' said Farr. 'He arrived just after Wira, and cut yonder Bhrudwan down from behind. Then he went back for you. We were too busy with Wira and the remaining Bhrudwan to pay much attention. Did you not see himi"

Kurr shook his head. 'The woods are very thick down by the riverbank. He could have passed within hailing distance and I would not have known.'

Farr stood. 'What now?' he said, indicating the dead with a sweep of the arm. 'We can't wait here forever.'

'Once Leith discovers I have left my place by the bridge, he will return swiftly,' the old farmer replied confidently. 'But first we must dispose of the carrion!' And before anyone could move, he grabbed the Bhrudwan leader's body by an arm and pulled it along the Westway towards the remains of the bridge. As the others watched, he dragged the body to the very edge of the gorge, then rolled it over the cliff with his foot.

'A fitting end for such a one,' he said when he returned, out of breath but with a smile of triumph on his face. 'I saw what you did not; how he pulled his fellow to his death on the wreck of the bridge in order to escape death himself. Now he lies broken beside the one he betrayed.'

'Then let us honour my brother,' Farr said. 'No matter how pressing the task that remains, we must pause and remember him.'

Solemn and silent, the members of the Company filed down the path, bearing the body of Wira above them on a bier of leaves and branches. Without a word, they lowered him on to the pyre, a pile of dry timber hastily gathered and laid out beside the sword embedded in the ground.

Numbly, Farr lit a taper and approached the pyre. He looks so peaceful, so beautiful, he thought. He who will now never grow older. What did you find in the forest? What answer has given you peace in so violent a death? If only you could speak, my brother, you could tell me what you know.

Reluctantly, Farr touched the taper to the pyre. A small flame took hold, spreading slowly along the branches.

The Company wept as the fire consumed their friend, their saviour. Stella alone could shed no tears; she leaned on Perdu's good arm as, uncomprehending, she watched the pyre burn. As the crackling died down, Kurr called out: 'Farewell, friend! Good speed on your journey!'

'I owe you my life,' spoke Perdu. 'It should have been me. Thank you.'

Hal stepped forward. 'Your death matched your life: valiant and single-hearted. We will meet again in that place where the light burns brightest.' The cripple saluted the flames.

Grief overwhelmed Farr, and he cried out: 'Wira! Wira! I told you to stay home. Oh, my brother! My brother, I'm sorry! Forgive me!' Then his voice broke and he fell to the ground weeping.

* * *

The weather cleared, spring made its first foray north to the dim holds of the Jawbone Mountains, and nothing remained to impede the Hermit and the Haufuth starting their journey to Instruere. They left Bandits' Cave as soon as the snow melted, with Wisent the aurochs laden with supplies, including dried food and pemmican. Finding the Westway quiet this early in the new year, they made good time through Withwestwa Wood. Here the road marked the northern border of Plonya, one of the Sixteen Kingdoms, though in truth it had been a long time since the kingdom extended any sort of sovereignty this far north. For all practical purposes the area was administered by the loose collec¬tion of fur trappers and woodsmen known as the Fodhram; stern of face and unwelcoming of outsiders, or so the stories went, though the four men the Company had met belied this description.

Travelling with the Hermit proved a sore trial for the Loulea headman, sorer indeed than that of nursing the man back to health, for the blue-robed man insisted on explaining details of obscure theology to him, whether he wanted to hear them or not. For the first time, the gregarious Haufuth found himself well and truly overmatched in a verbal battle.

Telling the Hermit the details of their quest had probably been a mistake, the Haufuth was ready to concede. Perhaps if he had kept quiet the flow of questions would have been less constant. Or perhaps not; the Hermit seemed willing to examine any subject at length. He recognised no hint that the Haufuth was tired of conversation, and even a comment to this effect, direct to the point of rudeness, did little to dampen his ardour for discussion. I suppose he has to make up for all those years alone, the Haufuth reflected. I just wish it wasn't with me!

He breathed an exasperated sigh; this latest conversation was faring little better than any of those previous to it.

'So you're trying to tell me that the future of Faltha depends on a shadowy figure of myth?'

The Haufuth was perplexed.

'Not shadowy. He's real. The Most High told me this years ago.' The enigmatic Hermit, sitting awkwardly on the back of Wisent, bobbed around above the Haufuth.

'But why he is so important?'

'You need to ask me that?' the Hermit replied. 'You who have told me that even now the Enemy of Faltha plans our destruction? You who have travelled across the northern wilderness, and have seen for yourself the decline of the once-proud First Men of Faltha into squabbling bands of villagers?'

'What could one man do about those things?'

'Not just a man. We speak about the Right Hand of the Most High, the man who the sages said would inherit the earth and all that is in it.'

'So he's got a fancy title. But he's still just one man. What can he do?'

The Hermit smiled, and for a moment he was human again. 'Perhaps he will make some great show of power, something that will mark him out as the one.'

'But will people be watching for him? I for one had never heard of this man until the start of our adventures. None of our sages say anything about him!' The Haufuth did not hide his scepti¬cism. Not that we have any sages, he added in the privacy of his own mind.

'Where I come from, the name of the Right Hand has not been forgotten.'

'And where is that?'

'I am from Mercium, a seaport and capital city of Straux. Remember? I told you this yesterday. There we remembered the words of the First Men.'

'Straux? Then how did you end up in a cave on the borders of Firanes, hundreds of miles away?'

'Hundreds of miles away the cave might have been, yet it has proved insufficiently far away to escape from life.' The Hermit laughed. 'Life has found me, and now it bears me away to Instruere on the back of a wild beast. With such momentum, how can it be stopped? Who can avoid the grasp of the Right Hand of God?'

'So what stories do they tell in Mercium of the Right Hand?'

'I know nothing of what they tell now. Twenty years and more it has been since I escaped from the City of Vice and made my way north to Bandits' Cave. Perhaps they still speak of the old prophecies, or perhaps' - here he frowned doubtfully - 'perhaps they have found new ones.

'Half a thousand years ago it was that a man came wandering through our city, a man friendless and without fortune, for he had been banished from Instruere for fomenting rebellion. This last the city fathers did not know at first, or they would not have allowed him to stay, nor would they have provided him a place from which he could address the people of Mercium as they went about their business. But allow him they did; and this stranger from the deep south preached a message of prophecy and hope, naming a deliverer who would save Faltha from her indolence and her many transgressions.

'"For there will come a day when the Most High will again have congress with the First Men,"

the prophet said. "And this shall be the sign: the Right Hand of the Most High will arise and gather men unto himself from every nation, and will set a table before them. At that table men will feast together in harmony, the First Men and losian together. From the east and from the west they will come, and will celebrate together the defeat of the Destroyer, the Undying One of Bhrudwo, and his Lords of Fear.

"And the Most High Himself shall descend to the world of men once again, and the fire will fall, and the long abandonment will be over. So be ready, watch with all diligence for the coming of the Right Hand, for he brings with him your deliverance." Thus the prophet spoke.

'Mercium was even then named an evil place, a seat of corrup¬tion and wickedness, built on the foolishness of speculation and the lure of the flesh, not on the rewards of honest toil. Thus it was that few listened to the prophet, and after a time he was banished from the great marketplace. Nevertheless, the seed had been sown, and in the days following his preaching many fright¬ened ones came to him, seeking to receive an anointing that might protect them from the sins of their neighbours and the judgement to come. Greater and greater the numbers grew, until the author¬ities sought to disperse them, seeing in their number a threat to public order. The prophet they imprisoned, and some of his followers were struck down and killed by the mobs. But still this revival of hope could not be quenched. Eventually the mayor of Mercium laid hands on the prophet and had him cruelly put to death in a public place, hoping thus to restore order. With his dying breath, the brave prophet bade his followers to forswear violence and to put their trust in the immanence of the Right Hand, who would deliver them.

'Yet his followers did not listen, and pitched battles were fought in the streets. The mayor pleaded with the King of Straux, who in those days had his throne in Instruere, to send his army. When the army came, it drove all before it, whether they were followers of the prophet or no, and many were put to the sword. The Right Hand of the Most High did not arise to save them from their plight, self-inflicted as it was. Thus the movement died, and for many years the memory of the prophet was anathema to the citi¬zens of Mercium, though the name of the Right Hand was not forgotten. And ever since that time, devout men have carried that name in their hearts, awaiting the time of their deliverance.'

'Hmm,' the Haufuth managed in reply. 'And did they say what that name was? It might make our task a little easier if we could hand the hard work over to a miraculous saviour.'

'You misunderstand the story,' said the Hermit patiently. 'His name is the Right Hand; none other was given by the prophet.'

'And from where did this prophet get his information, I wonder? Sounds like a rabble-rouser to me.'

The Hermit glanced sharply at the fat Firanese man. He had told the story as it had been told to him by his father; it had never failed to move him. Has the man no soul? Am 1 mistaken in what 1 see?

'Got his just deserts, in my opinion,' the Haufuth continued. 'If I'd been the mayor of Mercium, I doubt whether I'd have shown as much patience.'

'You speak flippantly of what you do not understand, my companion,' the Hermit said quietly.

'The coming of the Right Hand is nigh. He is nearer to you than you think. I wait only for permission to speak more plainly of this to you, yet this I can safely reveal: I know who he is, and I have met him.'

'Get many visitors to your cave, do you?' The Haufuth tried unsuccessfully to keep the sarcasm out of his voice. But his attempt to goad the Hermit misfired: the blond-headed man would say no more on the subject.

I suppose 1 should be grateful for the silence, the big man mused, thinking on the man's story.

AH nonsense, without a doubt. Yet he chose to stifle his memories of Kroptur the Watcher.

Silence again settled over the fastness of Withwestwa Wood. At the rate they were going it would be two, probably three, months before they made it to Instruere, and their food would barely sustain them with minimal rations. The Haufuth sighed and looked down at his belt; not only could he see it for the first time in years, he was appalled to notice that the well-used eyelet that used to measure his girth was now three whole notches too big for him. I hope the Hermit is right, he thought ruefully, when he says that the inhabitants of this wood are friendly. I'm in need of some generous help' ings of hospitality right now!

Eventually his thoughts wandered back to the fate of the Company. Surely by now their quest had succeeded or failed, and some sign on the road would point to their fate. Thus far there had been nothing. The Haufuth had tired of the mysticism of the Hermit, and longed to be back with the others.

Wira was now gone from among the Company, leaving the memory of a quick laugh, a kind word and bravery beyond measure. For a while everyone was left with his or her own thoughts.