Bell Mountain (The Bell Mountain Series) (23 page)

Martis woke up miserable, having been pursued all through the night by dreadful dreams. The only boon he enjoyed was that he couldn’t remember them.

All he could hope to do was to get up the mountain and try to carry out his mission. It was a fool’s mission, but he didn’t dare abandon it. Lord Reesh expected him to complete it, and without Reesh he was only a masterless assassin.

At least Dulayl seemed rested, ready and willing to go on. Martis forced down a cheerless morsel of bread and climbed back into the saddle.

Ahead lay the hills, green with trees in bud, and above them the mountains, and above them all Bell Mountain with its veil of clouds. Martis was moved to shake a fist at it, then laughed, having embarrassed himself. He patted the horse’s neck.

“Dulayl, I once knew a man, brave as a lion in all respects, but with a deadly fear of spiders,” he said. “I seem to be turning into such a man.”

Dulayl only snorted, and Martis kicked him toward the hills.

Obst helped to bury the slain trappers, a task that took the rest of the day. Jack and Ellayne had nothing to do; the three men didn’t want the help of children, and Ellayne didn’t want to go near the bodies. When the dead men were in the ground, Obst said a prayer over them.

“What are you doing?” Dunnic said.

“Magic?” asked his nephew.

“You heard me ask the Most High Lord to receive these men’s souls,” Obst answered. “It’s good to pray at a time like this.”

“If that was some kind of Heathen prayer, you’ve brought bad luck on us!” Tom said.

“Quiet, Tom. Old man, are you a prester, or maybe a reciter?”

After fidgeting and doing nothing all afternoon but watch poor Obst help these men dig holes, Jack couldn’t stand such foolish talk. He hopped off the stump he’d been sitting on.

“What’s the matter with you two?” he cried. “Haven’t you ever heard anybody pray before? This is a holy man, a hermit. He prays all the time! His prayers are twice as good as anybody else’s.”

The trappers stared at him, and Ellayne stared, too, and right away he felt his cheeks reddening. He turned away so they wouldn’t see.

“I left the Temple many years ago,” Obst said.

“There’s some in these hills who’ll put a curse on anybody for a penny,” Dunnic said, “and a few who say they can do much more than that. And the nearest chamber house is in Silvertown, so Tom and I don’t get much of a chance to go to Assembly and hear real prayers. You’ll pardon us for not understanding you were doing a kindness.

“We’ll spend the night here, and go back down the hill tomorrow. You’re welcome to come with us. We have much more food than we can use.”

“You’d spend the night here, after what happened?” Ellayne said.

“Why not? The Heathen won’t come back. They think they killed us all.”

They had a very small fire that night and they all wanted to eat. But the trappers couldn’t tell them the way to the top of the mountain.

“Nobody goes to the top,” Dunnic said. “Why should they? Why should anybody want to go to the top of a mountain?”

“You’d only fall off,” Tom said.

“Nevertheless, we have a reason to go,” Obst said.

“And we don’t ask to know it!” Dunnic said. “Don’t meddle, that’s my rule. If you want to go, that’s your business, not mine. All I can tell you is to keep on climbing. Once you’re up above the tree line, then maybe you’ll see the way. There’s hunters who go up that far for mountain goat. Maybe you’ll meet one of them and he can help you. But with Heathen scouts in the country, I don’t suppose you’ll run into any hunters.”

Tom gave them a long look. “The Heathen took our mule,” he said. “I wonder if you’d be willing to sell us that donkey of yours. You won’t be able to take him to the top.”

“He’s ours!” Ellayne said.

“We need him to carry our things,” Obst said.

“It don’t matter,” Dunnic said. “We’ll cache our furs and come back for them when it’s safe. We have more than one donkey can carry, anyhow.”

The trappers intended an early start, so they laid out their bedrolls and were soon asleep. Obst drifted off into one of his spells. The fire went out, but Jack didn’t care to restart it.

“Better not, if there are Heathen around,” he said. He’d never seen a Heathen, and wondered what they looked like. “I’ll be glad to get away from this place tomorrow.”

“You and me both!” Ellayne said. “I wish Wytt would come back. You don’t think he’s left us, do you?”

“He’ll show up as soon as those men have left us.”

“If King Ozias could take a bell up the mountain, we ought to be able to take a donkey. I read somewhere that donkeys are good on mountains.”

“You worry too much,” Jack said. “Go to sleep.”

Ellayne soon did fall asleep, and after a while, Jack did, too. It should’ve been too cold for them to sleep, he thought. Either the nights were getting warmer, or else they were getting used to sleeping out of doors. Jack tried to count the number of days since they’d left Ninneburky, and that was what put him to sleep.

By and by, a little noise woke him.

It was Dunnic and Tom, shouldering their packs and making ready to leave. The sky was just beginning to turn grey, and most of the stars had fled. A smoky mist hung over the camp.

“Hadn’t we ought to take the donkey?” he heard Tom whisper.

“That’d be stealing, Tom,” the uncle said.

“That old man’s a witch or something.”

“All the more reason not to steal from him,” Dunnic whispered.

“Burn it, they won’t be needing that donkey where they’re going.”

Tom started to move toward Ham, who was tethered to a log and asleep on his feet. Jack was just about to sit up and call an alarm when he heard a familiar angry chitter.

Tom cried out, “Aaah!” and fled the campsite babbling; and his uncle followed after him as best he could, cursing him and calling after him to stop, the both of them crashing through the underbrush. Jack sat up.

There stood Wytt on top of a stump, brandishing his sharp stick and showing his teeth.

“What is it?” Obst said.

“Jack? Jack!” from Ellayne.

Jack was laughing too hard to answer them.

Martis pushed his horse to get up into the hills. Dulayl seemed as anxious to get off the plain as he was, and toiled valiantly. It looked like they would be among the trees by sundown.

Fatigue took some of the edge off Martis’ fear. He saw no sign of the killer birds all day. Maybe they didn’t like the high ground.

He wondered how far ahead of him the children were. Short legs and old man’s legs wouldn’t make much speed up a mountain. He ought to be able to catch up to them well before they gained the summit.

Martis had never climbed a high mountain. He knew no one who had. There were men who swam across rivers, raced horses, boxed, wrestled, or bowled tenpins for sport; but no one climbed mountains. So he had no idea what to expect by way of obstacles—except, of course, the cold. There was snow up there even in the summertime. He’d have to do something about getting winter clothes, and probably some furs to wrap around him when he slept.

With his mind so occupied, he startled when Dulayl neighed unexpectedly. And then he saw a child coming toward him down the long slope.

He pulled up sharply, rubbed his eyes. It was a girl, and she was all alone. Was it his girl—Ellayne from Ninneburky? But it had to be. Why was she alone? What had happened to the boy and the old man? She walked slowly, stumbling.

He whistled to her, and waved.

“Hello! Little girl!” he called. “Don’t be afraid!”

She stopped, and stood staring at him. Martis dismounted, approached her on foot.

Oddly, she wore a dress of plain brown homespun, much stained and dotted with green burrs. Martis had expected her to be wearing boy’s clothes. Her face was dirty, her fair hair flying out in all directions.

“It’s all right,” he soothed her, lest she try to run away, and force him to chase her. “I won’t hurt you. But tell me who you are and what you’re doing here all alone. Don’t be afraid of me.”

She looked up and showed him deep green eyes. He was sure Ellayne had blue eyes. She looked into his eyes and spoke in a surprisingly clear and penetrating voice.

“There is a book missing,” she said.

Martis’ lips parted, but he couldn’t think of anything to say. He couldn’t seem to think at all.

“The book that was lost shall be found,” she said. Her eyes held him prisoner. “They shall hear all the words of the book. They shall hear my words again.”

And then her legs buckled and she fell.

She weighed almost nothing. Martis scooped her up, realized he had nowhere to take her, and gently laid her back down. He sprinkled water on her face and rubbed away some of the grime. He kept doing it until she opened her eyes again. They were a much lighter green than they’d looked at first. Her eyes darted this way and that, and her body trembled.

“Shhh! You’re safe now; you’re all right,” Martis said. “Who are you, child? What’s your name? Can you speak to me?”

“Thirsty…” The word barely crawled out of her mouth.

Martis gave her a little sip of water, not too much. He had to minister to her for several minutes before she spoke again.

“Who are you?” she asked.

“Just a traveler. My name is Martis. What’s yours?”

“Jandra.”

He was sure this was not Ellayne. She didn’t fit the description.

“What are you doing out here all alone, Jandra?”

Tears filled her eyes. “Men came,” she said. “They burned down the houses. My daddy made me run away. So I just kept running.”

Martis understood. There were a few small settlements scattered among the hills. Heathen raiders must have burned one out. Or it might be something more than a raid. The Temple had intelligence that war was brewing.

“Listen, Jandra,” he said. “It’s almost nighttime. I’m going to take you with me a little ways on my horse, and then we’ll make a camp with a fire, and we’ll have something to eat. It’s not safe to stay out here in the open at night. But I’ll take good care of you. All right?”

She nodded. He picked her up and swung into the saddle. He wanted to be under the trees by nightfall, and he’d have to hurry.

She fell asleep in his arms.

What am I going to do now? he wondered. But he wondered even more about her first words to him:
there is a book missing
. He was sure he would be better off never having heard those words.

Ham’s load was a little heavier now, with a plentiful supply of the trappers’ dried meat and a pair of treated wolf pelts that would be a comfort on cold nights. But the thought of wolves prowling the woods made Ellayne uneasy.

“There might be werewolves, too,” she said.

“What are werewolves?” Jack asked.

“A werewolf is someone who can turn into a wolf. Sometimes there are whole tribes of them, and they hunt down regular people and eat them up. Abombalbap once had to kill a wicked queen who—”

“Peace!” snapped Obst, startling Ellayne into silence. The children had never seen him angry like that. His face seemed to have turned to stone. It was more than a moment before he softened.

“Peace, Ellayne,” he said, this time gently. “Our way will be hard and dangerous enough without giving in to pagan superstitions.

“There are no werewolves, and that book of Abombalbap stories has misinstructed you. Hundreds of years ago, there were many books like that. Few have lasted as long as your Abombalbap, but they all had this in common: more than half of what went into them was Heathen. I promise you, real wolves are dangerous enough; and men don’t need to turn into wolves to be more dangerous than wolves.”

Without another word, he turned and picked a path leading away from the trappers’ campsite. The children had no choice but to follow, Jack bringing up the rear with Ham. Wytt rushed ahead, in and out of the underbrush.

“Wait, Obst!” Jack said. “How do you know the way to go? The trees are so thick, we can’t see the mountain.”

“Our bodies will tell us the right way. It’ll be harder and harder, always uphill, and we’ll feel it in our legs. If it ever seems to be getting easier, we’ll know we’re going the wrong way.”

“Glad I asked,” Jack muttered.

Certainly the way Obst picked for them all day was hard enough, Jack thought. It was maddening, not being able to see the tops of the mountains. After a time they couldn’t ask Obst anything more because he was all wrapped up in prayer—in the ancient language of the Scriptures, so you couldn’t understand him. But he was right about one thing. It wasn’t long before your legs told you that you were climbing.

“I don’t see how he knows there’s no such thing as werewolves,” Ellayne said, when they were lucky enough to hit a trail that was easy enough to permit them to talk. “You said Tom thought Obst might be a witch. He isn’t, of course—but why would he say that unless there really were witches in this country?”

“I don’t know. What’s a witch?” Jack said.

“Really! Sometimes you talk like you don’t know anything. A witch is someone who can do magic. Nasty magic.”