Dreamwalker (15 page)

It was increasingly difficult to get time to himself, he had found. And that meant the short afternoons and evenings when he could make his way up to Jagged Leap were all too few. It was nice to see his mother happy. Hennas had let down some of her barriers and was a changed woman, Errol admitted. But it also meant that Godric was never far from the house, Clun his constant companion. After twelve years of being the outcast, it was nice to have a friend, but Errol had also grown used to his own company.

Jagged Leap became his sanctuary and Errol would head there whenever he could. Sir Radnor would query him about the goings on in the village, demanding a studious attention to detail and constantly goading him for yet more. Errol found himself remembering things he had not realised he had noticed. Only when the old dragon’s spirit was satisfied would he answer Errol’s own questions, and then only obliquely. More often than not he would instead begin the telling of some ancient dragon history so that, over the months, Errol became something of an expert on the exploits of Rasalene and Arhelion, the Seven Quests of Palisander and the tragic tale of Ammorgwm the Fair. What he had not learned was much in the way of magic, or so it seemed to him.

‘Sir Radnor,’ Errol asked one evening as the sun was settling red in the treetops to the west. ‘That night you called me, when I was sitting at the riverbank downstream. I came to you, but I can’t remember how. One moment I was standing there, the next I was here. I don’t remember walking up the path.’

‘That’s because you didn’t walk up the path,’ the dragon said.

‘So how did I get here?’

‘Did Palisander fly to Angharad’s side when he had completed all seven of his tasks? Did he walk there?’

‘No,’ Errol said, recalling the story. ‘He came to her side in a single step. At least, that’s how you told it.’

‘I do not make up these tales for your amusement, young Errol. Indeed I did not make up these tales at all. They happened and every detail is as important as the next. Once he had slain the boar of Caer Idris, Palisander knew that he had won his lady’s heart. He could not bear to be apart from her any longer and so, though half the world separated them, he was at her side in one step. You too took only one step from the riverbank a mile downstream to this rock. It is not something men have been able to do before. I know of only one other of your kind who has ever done such a thing, and she is more dragon in her spirit than even she knows.’

‘But how did I do it?’ Errol asked, excitement making him impatient though he knew from experience that there was no profit in trying to hurry a dragon.

‘That is something that you must remember for yourself,’ Sir Radnor said. ‘You have done it once, so surely you will do it again. I cannot show you how to do something that is so intrinsic to your self, only try to open your mind to the possibilities. But beware, Errol, for the world is a vast place and most of it is hostile.’

‘I…’ Errol started, then fell silent as he began to digest the words of the dragon. ‘Who else has done this? You said ‘she’’.

‘Do you still wish to join the Order of the High Ffrydd, Errol? To become a warrior priest for your king?’

‘I don’t really know,’ Errol said. ‘I used to. It was all me and Clun used to talk about. But there’s so much more to the world. I want to see Caer Idris and the Deepening Pools. I’d like to meet live dragons and learn more of magic.’

‘You could do all of that in the order,’ Sir Radnor said.

 ‘But I’d have to fight and kill other men just because I was told to,’ Errol said. It was the first time he had voiced the doubts that had been growing in him ever since he had begun to understand something of dragons. The Order no longer hunted them, that much was true. But the romance of being a great warrior had begun to wear off in the light of Sir Radnor’s tales. There was little that was great about the battlefield from his perspective.

‘There is more to the order than just killing,’ the dragon said and Errol wondered what his tutor was trying to do. It was almost as if the long-dead spirit wanted him to join the same group that had been responsible for the slaughter of most of dragonkind. ‘There is learning and the chance to master the ways of the Grym.’

‘And there’s the opportunity to be bullied by bigger boys, the chance to be taught yet more biased history, to learn how to use the power of the world for violent ends. To become a too-powerful weapon in the hands of a weak-minded king.’ Errol was surprised at the strength of his feelings on the matter. He had not really thought about it in great depth until now and yet Sir Radnor had drawn him out and forced him to consider the matter. It reminded him of the way old Father Drebble had encouraged him to read.

‘Drebble was a kind-hearted man, as many who serve the Ram are,’ Sir Radnor said. ‘He used to come and talk to me from time to time.’

There was an almost wistful tone in the spirit-dragon’s voice and Errol felt the terrible, crushing loneliness behind it at the same time as he realised just how easily his thoughts leaked out.

‘Yes, that is another thing you will have to learn to do,’ the dragon’s voice said. ‘But I think you have done enough for one evening, Errol. It’s getting late and you will be missed. I do not think you would wish to be caught out here again.’

Errol realised then how dark it had become. Sometimes he thought he could see Sir Radnor, impossibly vast and regal, towering over the rock. Most days, and this was one of them, he could only hear the voice, booming in his head. Then he would retreat inside himself too, building worlds in his imagination so that the day could pass and night fall without his noticing. A few stars had begun twinkling in the indigo sky and a smear of red like distant fire silhouetted the treetops.

He did not want to go, but he knew when he was being dismissed. Thanking Sir Radnor, he jumped down from the rock and made his way along the path into the trees. He would have happily stayed out all night. The chances were that Godric would be at the cottage when he returned, sharing a meal and then most likely staying the night. That meant Clun would once more be sharing Errol’s room and at the moment he really wanted to be alone. Clun’s undiminished enthusiasm for the Order of the High Ffrydd had become increasingly difficult to reciprocate and now he began to understand why.

A strange sensation running down Errol’s spine put him on edge. He didn’t know how he knew, but he was convinced that he was no longer alone. It was almost as if someone had just popped into existence nearby and the faint echo of a memory tickled at his thoughts, like a delicate scent taking him back to an earlier experience he could remember only as feelings.

‘Who’s there?’ He asked the darkness, turning slowly to try and catch any movement. Something flitted across his vision a few yards further down the path, where a gap in the trees lit a small clearing with rising moonlight. For an instant he was afraid, then realisation dawned and with it a great, exciting joy filled him. ‘Martha?’

She stepped into the light like some ghostly spectre and for a terrible instant Errol thought he had been mistaken. The figure before him seemed taller than he remembered, and slimmer though she had never been fat. Her hair was no longer a short-cropped unruly mop, but hung over her shoulder in a loose ponytail. She was dressed in a pair of trousers that made her legs look longer  and a white cotton blouse that seemed almost to glow in the moonlight. A long cloak was clasped at her throat and though the moon washed it of all colour, he was sure it was dark green, to match her eyes. Could a person really change so much in a year?

‘You’ve been sitting up on Jagged Leap, Errol Ramsbottom,’ she said and at once Errol was certain, though there was a change to her accent, her words better pronounced, her speech less like the clipped brogue of the villagers. ‘You’ve been talking to old dragon Radnor.’

‘When did you get back?’ Errol asked, stepping closer and suddenly not sure what he should do. The last time he had seen her, Martha had been bedraggled, weak and cold. He had just pulled her from the river and breathed life back into her. True, she had annoyed him at times with her seemingly inane comments and awkward habit of turning up unannounced in the most unlikely of places. Yet he couldn’t deny that he had missed her company every single day since she had been sent away.

‘You’ve grown, Errol Ramsbottom,’ Martha said, and before he could say anything she had grabbed him in a fierce hug. She was warm and smelled of exotic, far-off places. Her hair was clean and soft against his cheek and in a flustered moment Errol couldn’t think where to put his hands. All too soon though the embrace was over and she stepped away.

‘Where’ve you been, Martha? When did you get back?’ Errol asked. He had a thousand more questions but these ones were the first to push their way through to his mouth.

‘Been with my aunt in Candlehall,’ Martha said. ‘Went to see the king in his stolen hall.’

‘Candlehall,’ Errol said, his curiosity piqued. ‘What’s it like? Is it as big as they say? Are the streets really paved with gold?’

Martha laughed. ‘No silly. Gold’d wear away under all those feet.’ She took his hand in the dark. ‘Walk with me,’ she said, as if he had a choice in the matter. ‘Tell me what you’ve been doing since…’ she looked over her shoulder into the darkness and back up the path towards Jagged Leap.

‘Not a lot,’ Errol said. ‘You know what this place is like.’ Still he told her of his mother’s now open relationship with Godric, of how Clun had befriended him and how he had been teaching the older boy about the lines.

‘Why’d he want to know about that?’ Martha asked, her astonishment stopping her in mid-stride.

‘He wants to be chosen for the Order of the High Ffrydd,’ Errol said.

‘Dragon slayers!’ Martha said, dropping his hand. ‘How could you help them?’

‘I’m not… They’re not…’ Errol said. ‘They don’t kill dragons any more. They protect the Twin Kingdoms from invasion.’

Martha’s face was stern in the moonlight, but it softened as she looked at him. She held her hand out once more and Errol took it with perhaps a little too much haste.

‘I visited the old king in the Neuadd,’ she said as they resumed walking through the dark trees. ‘Dragons built that hall. They built most of the palace more’n a thousand years ago. They built the obsidian throne. It’s far too big for a man, makes the king look silly. But the men there’ve broken it all. They smashed the carvings and broke up the windows so you couldn’t see the pictures anymore. Only I could see their ghosts. They talked to me, told me all about it.’

‘All about what?’ Errol asked.

‘All about the trickery King Diseverin used to defeat the great dragon Magog. How they hunted down the others, one by one. How they cracked open their skulls and pulled out their jewels.’ Martha stopped once more, turning to face Errol, her features serious, sad and angry. They stood in the middle of a leaf-strewn clearing about thirty paces across, the shedding trees strangely well-defined in the monochrome light. At that moment he felt the first signs of the end of autumn, the first cold breath of winter on the way.

‘Errol they’ve got dungeons filled with the jewels of slain dragons,’ she said. Her distress was so intense that he didn’t even notice her omission of his surname.

‘But Sir Radnor says most dragons like their jewels to be laid together with their friends,’ he said.

‘Not unreckoned,’ Martha said. ‘These jewels are raw, not set. They bleed into one another, constantly in pain. The ghosts’re in torment far worse than any hell.’

‘I…’ Errol began, but he truly didn’t understand what Martha was saying.

‘Promise me you won’t go to the choosing, Errol,’ she said and this time he did notice.

‘I’m too young,’ he said. ‘I’d have to wait another year anyway.’

‘But you won’t go. Not even next year.’

‘No,’ Errol said, realising as he did that any desire he had once harboured to be a warrior priest, or for that matter a Coenobite of the Ram, had disappeared. He had never known anything but contempt for the Order of the Candle since Father Kewick had begun to strip the library of all its interesting books. ‘No, I don’t want anything to do with any of the orders.’

Martha smiled a great beaming flash of white in the moonlit darkness. Then Errol felt her pull him towards her. Before he knew what was happening she had grabbed his head in both hands and was kissing him full on the lips.

Errol was not totally naïve. At thirteen and having grown up the son of the village healer, he knew plenty about the facts of life. He had not, as yet, been in any particular hurry to investigate them further, partly because there was so much else to learn about, partly because of the steady stream of young women who came to his mother’s cottage in search of certain preparations. And so he was quite unprepared for the heady pleasure of that long, slow kiss. Neither was he prepared for the longing that began the instant it was over.

‘Da’ll be looking for me,’ Martha said as she broke away from their embrace. ‘I must go home.’

‘Me too, I suppose,’ Errol said. ‘Though it’s not as if mother will miss me. She’s too wrapped up with Godric these days to notice if I’m there or not.’

‘Meet me here tomorrow at midday,’ Martha said. ‘We’ll go and see old Sir Radnor together.’

‘Won’t your father be angry?’ Errol asked.

‘Not if he doesn’t know,’ Martha said, smiling in that mischievous way that made Errol’s heart skip. ‘Go now, quick.’