Buried Fire (20 page)

Michael turned in shock. The limp body was motionless, the white hairs on the skull twitched not an inch. Had it spoken? Had the voice sounded in his head? Impossible to tell. He looked across the hollow, but Mr Cleever was busy marking distances. Already Comfrey and Sawcroft were standing ready, and Pilate was adopting his position to the North. He felt a sudden urge to run, but as soon as he made a step, Mr Cleever felt the string go slack and waved him back. His jaw locked, his hands damp, Michael resumed his place by Joseph Hardraker's side.

At last, Mr Cleever fixed his own place to the west of the Wirrinlow. He marked it with a stick and walked over to Michael, rolling up the string and grinning amiably.

"I hope you are ready, Michael," he said. "When you feel the power around you, focus it downward into the earth. We keep it up until we get results, which judging by the heat of the ground, won't be very long. Good luck."

He turned away. "Good luck to you all!"

The same salute was echoed from every side.

A whisper from Sarah. "Michael. Don't do this. They're mad. You're not the same."

And at that moment, an attack from Stephen – a childhood scene, a family, his mother . . .

"Shut up," Michael said. "Both of you, just shut up."

'Michael,' said the thin voice in his ear, 'hold my hand.'

'Don't be a fool,' said Stephen, faint and far away, and Sarah ground her nails into the hot earth with the agony of her pleading: "The dragon is evil, Michael, can't you see it? Look at these creatures! Do you want to become one of them?"

"I am one of them, goddamit!" Michael snarled. "It's too late!" And the thin voice said again, "Hold my hand, Michael, and feel our power."

"If you are all ready," called Mr Cleever, "we shall begin."

'Michael—'

"Michael—"

'My hand, Michael.'

"Oh God—"

Then he reached out and took it, and the calling of the voices faded into nothing.

It began with a flicker, which Stephen, crouched among the rocks and gorse of the head of the crag, felt like a tap at the base of his skull. It was fearful in its gentleness; it seemed to have no source and no direction, but at that moment he was swept away from his brother's mind as if carried by a great wave. For a moment he was dizzy and confused. Then consciousness steadied itself, and he raised his head and looked down into the Wirrinlow.

From the platform of the rocks, he had a view into three-quarters of the hollow. The young willowy man with the sandy hair stood nearest. His back was turned, his shoulders hunched, and his head, which radiated a baleful concentration, was bowed towards the earth. Stephen did not have to see his eyes to know that he was using the sight, sending it downwards at an angle under the hollow.

A moment passed. The vibration of the sight spread around the circle. The other participants, rigid with attention, waited in silence. At the centre, beside the chair, Michael stood as if carved from stone.

Now a new vibration, discordant with the first, sprang up. Its source was Geoffrey Pilate, the Fordrace grocer. His hands were together as if in prayer, but with their fingertips pointing outwards, towards the centre of the circle. As Stephen watched, the tips rotated down. Then, with a violence that stung the air, a silent flame of dark orange sprang from them. A few tendrils leapt eagerly inwards towards the two figures at the centre, but Pilate, his face white, eyes turned upwards, seemed anxious to keep the fire under his control. It remained steady, flickering about his fingers, while the frequency of its note passed around the hollow, rebounding off rocks and earth walls and growing in strength. Stephen rubbed his ears, which were growing sore, as if he was diving deep into a bottomless pool.

A little further forward, squeezed down between two upright stones, Tom lay on his stomach with the spear pressed close beside him. One rust-covered curve of the spear-head was so near that it brushed against his cheek; he smelt the sharp metal tang, saw its unfocused reddish-blackness in the corner of his eye as he looked down on Sarah crumpled fifty yards away on the floor of the hollow. His heart thudded painfully against the ground, his mouth was clagged with dry spittle.

Oh God, help me, he thought. Tell me what I must do.

His head moved slightly. The old iron pressed against his cheek, marking it with a brown scar.

Now the note of the Third Gift echoed round the hollow. Vanessa Sawcroft, standing opposite the grocer with his hands on fire, stiffened where she stood. Her bad arm was pressed against her chest, the other was rigid by her side. Slowly she rose from the ground, at first with a fluid ease, and then with sudden checks and judders. Stephen noticed a spasm of pain break over her face, and felt her thought suddenly lash out across the gathering music of the circle.

'George,' it said. 'Quickly. The pull is terrible.'

Immediately came the response. The Fourth Gift, the internal eye, was all around them, seeing into their every doubt and fear, rolling over the pain of their effort and reassuring them with its presence. Mr Cleever's energy was unleashed. He flooded the hollow with it, immersing and cradling each one of the other three, nursing their reserves ready for the final summoning.

Tom felt the iron burn cold against his cheek, and at that moment, Mr Cleever's presence passed over him between the stones, ignored him, and was gone.

Stephen was taken unawares. He had no time to mount a defence, and it would not have done him any good had he done so. He ducked, instinctively and vainly, but Mr Cleever's eye fell hard upon him. There was a raging and a buffeting all about him; he cried out in terror and despair – then the fury receded at a great pace, and Stephen, to his own amazement, was left alive, sprawled back among the boulders of the crag.

In an instant, Tom was with him, bounding back between the rocks with spear in hand.

"Stephen – what's happened?"

"It was Cleever; he was all over my mind. No, I'm all right. He pulled back, for some reason. Didn't he see you?"

"No. But if he's spotted you, we'd better move."

"There's no point – we're not the issue any more. Can't you feel it all around us? It's like a song."

"I don't hear anything."

"It's not a song in that way – but all the powers, used at once. I can't think straight. And it's getting worse – Oh God, too loud—!" To Tom's horror, Stephen fell back, clutching his head in clawing fingers. There was a sudden sound behind him from the hollow. Unwillingly, Tom turned.

The first stage was over. The gradual build up, of gift upon gift, power upon power, until the sky and earth were ringing with them, was now complete, and Michael knew his time had come. He had watched impassively, with a tiny voice always speaking in his ear, readying him for the task ahead.

'Yours is the finest of all powers (said the voice), equalled only by mine. Why do I whisper? So that George Cleever does not hear us. He is too busy concentrating, setting us free – we must not disturb him. Kind George. Brilliant George. I applaud his insight. But his power is dirt and dust and broken things before yours and mine. Ah, Michael, I have hung on waiting for you for such a time. My road was squeezed into a thread by the cursed trundling of those damned seasons. Bones and hide, I was, bones and hide. Softly – can you feel it? The woman struggles, George joins the harmony. Now, tighter, hold my hand. Empty your mind of all things. We must break the earth, Michael, you and I. Empty your mind. We shall receive all, and pass it to him.'

'Now— (Mr Cleever broadcast his thought)— All four of us – direct everything to the centre, and do not stop until I tell you, or be damned to hell. Curse Vanessa (this to himself); if she ruins this through her cursed weakness—'

Sarah saw the fire erupt with a savage joy from the grocer's fingertips. It crossed the circle directly over her in a yellow arc which sputtered tiny ropes of flame. Down into the centre it poured, and in an instant, her brother was consumed. She hid her face.

The fire was only one of the four powers which hit Michael at that moment. All four entered him, he felt himself a vessel, a hollow thing, which was being filled. Flames licked all around, the world scorched, but the cold hand in his own protected him. In the middle of the inferno, he shivered.

The vessel was filled. It burst. Michael's gaze, his mind, his soul was directed on the ground. All four powers tore into the earth. From beside him, unannounced, came a tremendous energy which joined the others, and augmented them, and seemed to Michael to have no limit.

The ground was ripped asunder.

At the Hardraker farm, the first stone fell from the topmost chimney. All along the sagging roofs, slates and tiles shuddered against each other, setting up a gentle chattering which echoed round the yards. Old doors, jolted off latches, swung themselves open with sudden violence. The people of Fordrace, who were clustered in the central yard beside the solid reassurance of their cars, were filled with panic, and moved closer to each other.

"An earthquake!" said one man, his voice hushed with awe.

"Don't be stupid – you don't get earthquakes in England," said a woman.

"It could be the wind," a large man added, in a small voice.

"We must go now." Mrs Gabriel spoke from the seat of the police car. "The place is giving us warning."

Some of the people were so much in agreement that they opened their car doors. But others looked worried.

"Joe and Lew are still inside," said one. "We can't go without them."

"Don't you believe it."

"Well, you go then. I'm staying."

There was a sudden shudder across the whole surface of the yard. Cobblestones here and there were shaken loose from centuries of dirt, and half rose from the ground.

"Christ, that does it!" said the large man. "I'm going." He sat heavily in his driving seat. "Anyone who's not stupid, get in."

More than one made ready to join him, but a young man raised his chin and shouted out at the top of his voice. "Joe! Lew!"

The farm took up the shout: mocking echoes resounded on all sides. A wooden cross-beam, somewhere in the great barn behind them, fell thirty foot with a crescendo of crashes.

A white shape moved in the gloom of the hallway.

"It's Joe!" cried a woman, "and he's carrying—" She broke off in bewilderment. Joe Vernon, his face suffused with red blotches of effort, appeared at the door. Behind him was Lew Potter, also staggering under the strain of the weight they carried.

"The cross!" said someone. "The missing piece."

"Help us take it!" Joe Vernon's voice was a croak. "We can't carry it any more."

A dozen hands reached forward. Joe collapsed to the side. Behind him, in the darkness of the hall, was a sudden roaring.

"Dear God," said Lew. "The walls—"

Mrs Gabriel was suddenly amongst them. "We must take this back!" she cried. "Right now, back to the church. No argument. Sean, William, whose is the car with the door at the back?"

"What about the boys?" said a man. "They might be—"

Joe Vernon interrupted. "There's no one in there," he said. "We must leave. Now."

Three windows on the first floor shattered. Glass shards sprinkled down upon the courtyard. The crowd melted into their separate cars, and doors were slammed fast against the farm's destruction.

The fire bit into the earth. A cleft of flame and billowing smoke had been opened where Michael and Joseph Hardraker stood encased in flame. The black chair had turned to ash; now Mr Hardraker hung suspended like an unused puppet at the centre of the fire. His legs, arms and head were limp, his feet trailed over the deepening pit. Michael stood on a jutting promontory of soil, eyes closed, head bowed.

The earth below was turned to glass, which bubbled, hardened, cracked and shattered, then fell away in quick succession, consumed by the furnace-heat. Michael looked below it. His sight was clear beyond anything he had imagined; he saw diamonds and quartz stones, emeralds and lodes of gold, all at unknown depths and distances.

And there, right below him, the worm in the earth. Coil upon coil, motionless, trapped in its pore. He called out to it, looking for a response – but the stillness of centuries had to be unlearnt and the coils had fused.

So Michael summoned it with the third and fourth powers. He rose into the air, lifting the spindly Hardraker doll with him. 'Look up!' he thought. 'Remember the sky! The most marvellous of your gifts!' He directed his mind downwards, towards the mass of scale and spine. 'Look up!' he called. 'We have heeded you at last!'

On the edges of the circle, Mr Cleever, sensing the moment of crisis, exhorted his flagging troops to one final effort.

Among the rocks, with his hands to his ears, Stephen opened his mouth with a soundless cry. There were flecks of blood between his fingers.

The cords that bound Sarah's wrists blackened and snapped in the heat. Now she was on her feet, running away from the column of fire which extended into the sky. The soles of her shoes melted as she ran.

Tom began to run down the slope towards her. He held the spear up near the head, and the base of the handle bumped against the ground.

Then the dragon moved.

And with that movement, the power of all those linked to the dragon by its gifts was multiplied. For so long dependent upon the worm's remembered energy, its sudden real activity flooded new life into their fading souls, creating a profound effect: of dizziness, confusion and drunken joy. This was the greater the longer they had been linked, the longer their powers had waned and shrivelled towards the deathly stillness of their master. For Michael, three days linked, the effect was minimal; he felt he had been dealt a buffet to the head, he staggered in the air and steadied himself. Paul Comfrey felt tipsy, but the sharpness of his First Gift waxed – he caught a glimpse of the coiling thing below him, and broke his sight off in fear. For Vanessa Sawcroft and Geoffrey Pilate, the effect was more pronounced. They reeled where they stood, as years of gradual dulling and slowing of the mind were reversed in seconds. George Cleever's was the most severe experience. He screamed in pain. It was as if a knife were scouring him from the inside; he tottered and half fell, and as his controlling intelligence was broken off, the summoning powers rolled upon the burning grass of the Pit in disconnected ecstasy.

But Joseph Hardraker was engulfed by a blue fire. His hand was whipped away from Michael's, and he was curled and uncurled in mid air, surrounded by licking tongues of flame which obscured him from the sight of those below.

I come.

A new strength entered Stephen from outside him. The pain in his head subsided and he got groggily to his feet.

Michael looked down into the gulf, from where there came a crashing and a rending of rocks displaced. The fire conjured by Geoffrey Pilate had vanished with the breaking of the circle, but now a new fire, issuing from the ground, rose to replace it. Behind it, rising slowly, was a whiteness. Michael felt a surge of triumph; he hovered in the smoke and surveyed his companions, who rolled like swine upon the ground. He was the only one still upright, the only one fit to greet their master.

There was a movement at the edge of the hollow – something was trying to climb the slope. He narrowed his eyes and looked through the flames. A jewelled soul shaped like a dog's head was scrabbling on the soil, slipping backwards as it tried to ascend. Michael could not remember who this might be, and he found he could not refocus to find out. There was something else there too, just above the dog-shaped jewel; another jewel, shaped like a deer's head. It was bowed close to the other, as if in an embrace.

*

Beside him, the body of Joseph Hardraker jerked and contorted in its own blue nimbus. The fingers clenched and unclenched, the face blurred and changed.

On the lip of the Pit, Tom grasped Sarah by the hand and pulled her towards him up the slope. Both tried to speak, but the roaring of the flames smothered their words. Tom pointed back towards the path and pushed her away, but Sarah resisted, holding her ground. Then suddenly he had hugged her and was gone, down into the hollow with the spear head flaring against the fire.