In The Grip Of Old Winter (19 page)

Peter understood Wulfwyn’s
reluctance, but if the manor stood close-by, why waste the chance to scout it
out? “I want to see. I don’t mind going alone, if you point the way.”

The outlaw hugged his knees
closer to his chest. “Much has gone ill this day. The hopes of all English men
have died. Our chance to hold this small part of land from the Normans has
failed. Eorl Bosa’s allegiance to the new King strengthens the King’s cause
against those that rebel against his conquest. Our numbers, already few, are
now diminished and soon there will be none.” He rubbed his chin from side to
side on his knees. “What is left for those like me? Swear allegiance to a
foreign man who soils this land with every step he takes, or live out my days
to be hunted like a beast in the field? I have no wish to die, but to be shackled
to a post, as a bear that dances to another’s tune, is an agony to my heart.”
His voice lowered to a whisper. “That is not to be endured. No, I will fight
and hard unto my last breath. It is the only way.” He faced Peter. “Let us
claim back this land with our blood.”

Peter swallowed. “I - I don’t
want to fight. I just want to see if there’s anything I can do to help.” He
swung the seal-amulet like a pendulum. “If I can learn how to use this, then of
course I’ll help in any fight - I think.”

Wulfwyn watched the seal-amulet
swing backwards and forwards. “Why not...”

A vicious low-pitched snarl
echoed from the ravine. Wulfwyn sprang to his feet, knife in hand. Peter
scrambled up and ran to the outlaw’s side.

The barghest, head lowered,
teeth bared, stepped into the glade. Its muscles quivered with strength. The
eyes blazed red and fixed their gaze upon them. Behind the monstrous dog came
the carrier who scuttled towards the nearest trees.

Another figure appeared,
shrouded by the ravine’s shadows and a grey dust that coiled and twisted as if
blown by some unseen wind. Lidless eyes stared; skin, thin and stretched, clung
to yellow bones. Wisps of long white hair trembled and the lipless mouth
grinned as a skull’s might of one who is long dead.

***

Peter grabbed his backpack
with one hand and held it against his chest. The seal-amulet burned crimson and
the silver marks flared and rotated in opposing circles. They made him dizzy to
watch.

Wulfwyn instructed. “Stay
behind me.”

With a single bound, the
barghest reached the middle of the glade. The carrier scurried between the
trees as he came towards them on their left.

The silver marks spun, but
not one emerged brighter than the others. Peter sobbed. “Why can’t I make it
work?” His heart pounded hard enough to make him sick.

The dark figure emerged from
the ravine and into the glade. Each limb jerked as if pulled by some unseen
string and the jaw jabbered, faster and faster, so that each time the teeth
struck, they
clack
ed.

Peter yelled. “What shall I
do?”

Wulfwyn, knees bent, ready to
fight, shouted. “Take hold of a weapon.”

The carrier leapt from the
trees and made straight for Peter. The barghest crouched, ready to spring. Without
time to think, Peter slipped the seal-amulet over his head.

A sensation, like falling in
a dream when it turned his stomach over and over, coursed through his body. His
blood flooded through every vein as swift as a running river and his fingers
tingled. No need to look at the seal-amulet, for two silver marks appeared in
his mind, one above the carrier and the other over the barghest; his choice to
decide which to use first.

With a great bound, the
carrier launched his deformed body into the air as if he meant to crush Peter
from above.

The silver mark in Peter’s
mind shone like a fist and he clenched his right hand and punched. His fist
didn’t make contact, but the airborne carrier doubled over, as if hit in the
stomach, and flew backwards halfway across the glade. He landed on his back in
the cold ashes and screamed.

Peter staggered as if he had
been hit, too. His whole body throbbed and his sight blurred.

The barghest sprang higher
than the carrier and came straight at Wulfwyn. The outlaw leapt aside and swept
the knife in a wide arc at the beast’s flank. The dog snapped at Wulfwyn’s arm,
but missed and the ground shook when it landed.

Wulfwyn sprinted behind the
barghest, knife raised, but the dog spun round quicker than an eye-blink,
crouched and then lunged with a ferocious growl. Saliva drops flew across the
glade.

The outlaw struck downwards
and a dull
clang
, like a muffled bell, echoed through the trees when the
dog’s teeth deflected the knife’s tip. Wulfwyn jabbed the knife left and right
as the barghest bit at his hand. The dog’s size forced Wulfwyn back, so that
defence, not attack, became his only chance of survival.

Peter’s vision cleared. The
silver mark throbbed before his eyes. Its shape, the same pronounced curve when
he’d rescued Oswald, might be a crescent moon, though a moon with a cracked surface
criss-crossed with dried up riverbeds. No clue as to how he might use it,
though before he just pointed.

The barghest’s attack never
faltered as it dodged the outlaw’s knife. Wulfwyn’s breath came in ragged
wheezes. He flicked the knife first one way and then the other, but the
barghest moved faster. It avoided every strike and its eyes blazed red. When it
growled, the air in Peter’s ears vibrated and buzzed.

The barghest snarled, jumped
back on all fours and then reared up onto its hind legs. It towered over
Wulfwyn and its claws raked at his head.

Wulfwyn raised his arm to
protect his face, took bigger steps to retreat, stumbled over a tree root and
fell. The dog stretched to its full height and, with bared teeth, fell upon the
outlaw. Wulfwyn rolled away, but one of the dog’s paws landed on his jerkin, a
loose fold that flapped free as they fought and now stopped Wulfwyn’s escape
and left him trapped.

The barghest snarled louder
and saliva drooled as its jaws closed around the outlaw’s neck.

Peter swept his arm around in
a wide arc and pointed at the dog. “Get off!”

A detonation, like a canon’s
roar, erupted and knocked Peter backwards and he fell with a heavy crash. Stars
sparked in front of his eyes and his ears rang from the explosion. He stared up
into the trees, stunned and too shocked to move. Had he died? Time must have
stopped, for he didn’t hear anything. Wulfwyn’s face appeared and a sensation
of being lifted made him dizzy. His gaze angled down from the trees and into
the glade.

The barghest lay far away, on
its side, panting. The dark figure, caught underneath the dog’s bulk,
floundered. The carrier slithered on his belly as he used his arms to crawl
towards the ravine, his painful movements as slow as a swimmer’s in quicksand.

Peter’s vision blurred as
Wulfwyn carried him further into the trees. Dark mists swirled at the edges of
his sight and he guessed that he must be about to faint. He caught a last
glimpse of the barghest just before the trees concealed the glade, for the
figure trapped beneath it heaved the dog off and threw it aside as if it were
nothing more than an annoying blanket.

As it climbed upright, the
figure’s limbs thrashed in a mockery of co-ordinated movement. The skeletal
hands, tipped by long black nails that coiled like misshapen corkscrews, stabbed
the air and talon-like, clawed at their retreating figures. The jaw opened wide
and the legs jerked as it found its balance and gave chase.

Peter shut his eyes and the
black mists swirled, ready to envelope. He forced them open and the mists
receded, he didn’t want to faint. Wulfwyn hoisted him over one shoulder and the
ground leapt up and down beneath him as the outlaw ran.

The seal-amulet dangled from
Peter’s neck and bounced against Wulfwyn’s back. It glowed bright crimson and
the silver marks spun, though not one of them emerged into Peter’s mind. Did
they appear in his mind, or hover in the air above the target? It might be
both, but for now, he didn’t have the strength or the will to work out how. He
lifted his head to peer further back. With luck, if the figure still followed,
it might not find them. Wulfwyn ran fast, fast enough to leave the glade behind
before that creature reached the trees. Difficult to track too, for the outlaw
didn’t keep to any path.

The mind-numbing shock of the
detonation eased. His ears still rang, though the stars in his eyes stopped
shooting in all directions. What had he done to make that attack against the
barghest so powerful? Perhaps, because he wore the seal-amulet and that
increased its effectiveness? Why would he, an eleven-year old boy, be able to
do that? Fairy stories, computer games, they used magic, not any real person in
the twenty-first century, or the eleventh century. In real life, magicians,
sorcerers, witches, tricked people into believing that they possessed special
powers, but like the smoke that concealed King Rat in the pantomime and gave
him the cover to pretend to vanish, the apparent reality deceived the audience.

What he’d just done didn’t
trick or deceive. The seal-amulet’s magic happened for real and worked. He’d
saved Wulfwyn’s life and his own, but how did he make the magic work, or rather,
why did it work when he balled his hand into a fist or pointed his finger? That
it did work thrilled him, but that he didn’t know how, made him angry.

Wulfwyn slowed to a walk. He
panted long and hard as he gulped in great lungful’s of air and with care,
lowered Peter to the ground.

Peter staggered, still dizzy
and reached out for support until his palm rested against the hard, almost
sharp, bark of the nearest tree. Wulfwyn bent double, his hands on his knees as
he recovered.

As his head cleared, Peter
gazed around. The outlaw had brought him into a grove of enormous trees.

***

Each trunk supported a tree
of immense height. Thick roots burst through the ground and looped and coiled
before they plunged back into the soil. On some of the trees, where the trunk
had split, large chunks of bark stood proud, like the scale of some giant’s
armour that had worked loose. The lowest boughs stretched far out as if they meant
to take hold of their neighbour’s and intertwine. Snow lay piled in the boughs’
hollows and filled the dips between the roots.

Peter tilted his head back as
he tried to work out how high the trees stood. Higher than his house, which dad
said measured over fifteen metres, much higher. A few withered leaves still
clung to some of the twigs, though most had dropped and he sank his boot into a
huge pile that rustled and scraped as he pushed down deep.

Some greenery still thrived,
for moss hung in long tattered curtains from the lowest branches. They swayed
with a gentle drift from the slightest breeze and sparkled where frost formed
in the deeper folds.

Wulfwyn straightened up,
clasped his hands behind his head and stretched. Bones cracked as he released the
tension from his upper back. Then he bent double again and his breathing
sounded loud, though as he recovered, it quietened.

“What are these trees?” asked
Peter.

Wulfwyn, his hands on his
knees, gazed upwards. “They are oaks.”

Large snowflakes drifted to
the ground. Peter peered back the way they’d come.

Wulfwyn’s hand went to his
knife. “Do you hear something?”

The harder Peter stared into
the trees, the darker the shadows loomed. An attacker might be upon them before
they had a chance to react. If he and Wulfwyn found somewhere to shelter, then
the possibility of being surprised needn’t be so great.

Had he imagined that figure -
that torn skin - those terrible nails - the lidless eyes and the teeth that
clack
ed
like castanets made of bone? Impossible to believe that such a horror hadn’t
leapt out of one of his computer games and into real life. And now, out of
sight, it stayed as a memory which made it even less real. Easy to dismiss it
as imagination, but he didn’t allow such a comfort to glaze his mind, for that
turned life into a fantasy and ignored a real danger. Those skeletal hands,
with fingers bent like claws, meant to grasp and kill.

He faced Wulfwyn. “Was that -
thing, the spae-wife? Have you seen it before?”

The outlaw focused on the
distant trees. “I have never seen the like. Nor the beast that meant to rip out
my throat. The carrier I know, though not the actions that revealed such venom.
What is it that you hear?”

Peter closed his hand over
the seal-amulet and its heat warmed his palm. “I thought that figure gave
chase. It stood up and started after us, but it doesn’t walk very well and you
ran very fast, so it might have given up.”

They stood in silence. The
shadows darkened, but nothing moved.

Peter let go of the
seal-amulet. It still glowed, though not as bright as before. “I can’t hear
anything.”

Wulfwyn sheathed his knife.
“It is not wise to linger where all can see. Come.” He set off through the
trees and Peter followed.

The ground sloped in a gentle
decline. The oaks grew close and the curtains of moss hung in dense drifts, so
that they brushed them aside to pass. Clumps of moss grew on the exposed roots
and around some of the trunks. Not much snow covered the ground. Though still
cold, the air left droplets of moisture on Peter’s cheeks. An earth smell,
sharp and rich, strengthened as they went down and deeper into the ancient
wood.

Like the old house, Peter
wondered if the trees observed his presence. Nothing suggested that they did,
no eyes blinked or bough moved, yet the sensation of being watched, a wary
acceptance that they knew he passed, brooded amongst the shadows.

To their left, the ground
dropped away in a steeper slope and Wulfwyn placed one hand behind him to
steady his descent as he went down sideways. Peter copied the outlaw’s
technique and slithered and slipped into a flat open space at the bottom.

A single oak, long-dead, its
thick trunk split from the high crown to half its length, stood in a wide
stream of clear running water that sprang out of one bank and disappeared into
the opposite one through a tunnel of overhanging moss. Thin layers of clear ice
lined the edges of the stream. The dead tree’s roots shone white where the
water ran over them and the lower boughs, stripped of their bark, revealed a
cream-coloured skin.

Wulfwyn splashed through the
stream towards the dead tree. “We will take our rest here.” He reached up to
where one of the dead boughs curled over the water. “The chance of discovery at
this shelter is slight.” With his hands clasped around the bough, he swung his
legs up and then twisted round until he sat upright. He stretched out his hand.
“Come.”

Peter waded into the stream
and Wulfwyn grabbed hold of his wrist and pulled him straight up. He held on until
Peter found his balance and straddled the bough.

“Wait there,” said the
outlaw. With his hand against the trunk for support, Wulfwyn stood.

Knots or boles of wood stuck
out from the old tree and he used these to climb up to the next branch. He lay
down flat and curled his legs around it. “Can you climb like that?”

Peter shuffled along and when
he reached the trunk, he took hold of the same handholds as Wulfwyn. As he
stood, the outlaw reached down and gripped hold of his backpack to steady him
as he climbed up to the next branch.

Now level with the jagged
crack that split the oak, its width revealed a much wider space than appeared
from below; wide enough for a man to pass through. Peter gripped the branch as
he sat.

“Stay still,” said Wulfwyn
and he stepped over Peter. “This hiding place is hard to find. Our scent will
not be left on running water. We will rest here.” He turned sideways and
squeezed through the crack. His voice echoed. “Follow me. There are footholds.
I will guide you.”

Peter shuffled up to the
trunk and where the wood split, took hold of the sharp edges and stood. He
peered through the broken bark. A hollow space where once the tree’s stout wood
grew, reached for as high and as deep as the light allowed him to see.