Isle of Glass (7 page)

They raced down a long level stretch. At the end, where the
road bent round a barrow, Alf slowed to a canter and then to a walk.

Jehan pounded to a halt beside him. “There,” he panted.
“Feel better?”

Alf bit his lip. “I’m being foolish, aren’t I?” He essayed a
smile. It was feeble, but it would do. “Yes, I do feel better. My body is glad
to be under the open sky. I’ll train my mind to follow suit.”

o0o

By night they had traversed close on eight leagues, fair
going for riders out of training. They slept in an old byre, empty and musty
but still sturdy, with ample space for themselves and their horses.

Tired though he was, Jehan did not go to sleep at once. He
prayed for a while, then lay down with his cloak for a blanket. Alf knelt close
by him, praying still. Moonlight seemed to have come through a chink in the
walls, for though it was pitch-dark in the barn, Jehan could see Alf’s face
limned in light, his hair a silver halo about his head.

But there was no moon. Clouds had come with the sun’s setting;
even as Jehan lay motionless, he heard the first drops of rain on the roof.

He swallowed hard. In daylight he could accept anything. But
darkness bred fear. He was alone here with one who was not human, who shone
where there was no light and stared into infinity with eyes that flared
ember-red.

They turned to him, set in a face he no longer knew, a
moonlit mask, white as death. But the soft voice was Alf’s own. “Why are you
afraid, Jehan?”

“I—” Jehan began. “You—”

Alf raised his hands that shone as did his face. The mask
cracked a little into a frown. “This happens sometimes. I can’t always control
it. Though it’s been years...” He closed his eyes. The light flickered and went
out.

Jehan sat bolt upright. “Brother Alf!”

Hands touched him. He started violently and seized them.
They were warm and solid. Keeping his grip on one, he reached into blackness,
finding an arm, a shoulder. Like a blind man he searched upward, tracing the
face, the smooth cheek, the flutter of lids over eyes, the fringe of hair around
the tonsured crown.

“Bring back the light,” he said.

It grew slowly, without heat. He stared into the strange
eyes. “I’m not afraid any more.”

“Why?”

Jehan paused a moment. “You’re still yourself. For a while I
was afraid you weren’t. You looked so different.”

Alf leaned close. They were almost nose to nose; their eyes
met and locked. It seemed to Jehan that he could see through Alf’s as if
through glass, into an infinity the color of rubies.

“Jehan.”

He rose to full awareness, as from water into air, and sat
staring. He still held Alf’s hand; it tightened, holding him fast. He shivered
convulsively. “How? How could I see like that? I’ve never—”

Alf looked away. “I did it. I’m sorry. I was looking at the
mettle of you; you saw behind my looking.”

“Has—has it ever happened before?”

Already Jehan had regained most of his self-possession.
“Pure gold,” Alf murmured. And, louder: “A few times. I think...some humans
have in them the seeds of what I am.”

Jehan’s eyes went wide. “I? Brother Alf, I’m no enchanter!”

The other almost smiled. “Not as I am, no. But something in
you responded to my touch. Don’t worry; I won’t wake it again.”

“Of course you will. I said I wasn’t afraid, and I’m not.
Show me what you can do, Brother Alf!”

Most of it was bravado, and they both knew it. Yet enough
was true desire that Alf said, “I can do many things, which probably will damn
me, if I can die, and if I have a soul to give over to perdition.”

“Dom Morwin said that you can do what saints do. That you
can heal hurts, and walk on air, and talk to people far away.”

“I can do those things. Though by them I may defy the
Scripture which commands that you shall not suffer a witch to live.”

“He also said that you could never use your powers for
evil.”

“
Would,
Jehan.
Not
could.
I can heal, but I can also kill.”

There was a silence. Jehan searched the pale face, although
the eyes would not meet his. “
I
can heal, Brother Alf. And I can kill.”
He lifted his hand. “This can stitch up a wound or make one, wrap a bandage or
wield a sword. Is it any different from your power?”

“Other men have hands, Jehan.”

“And others have power.”

Alf cuffed Jehan lightly. “Out upon you, boy! You’re death
to my self-pity. Though it’s true I’d no more threaten the powerless than you
would attack a handless man. There’d be no fairness in it.”

He drew back, and his light died. His voice was soft in the
darkness. “Go to sleep now. We’ve talked enough for one night.”

Jehan delayed for a moment. “Brother Alf?”

The other paused in lying down. “What?”

“I’m really not afraid of you.”

“I know. I can feel it in you.”

“So that’s how you’d get around vows of silence.”

“Good night, Jehan,” Alf said firmly.

The novice wrapped his cloak about him and grinned into the
night. “Good night, Brother Alf.”

o0o

On the second day the travelers could barely move, let alone
ride. Yet ride they did, for obstinacy; with time and determination, their
bodies hardened.

By the fourth day Jehan had remembered his old sturdiness.
Even Alf was beginning to take a strange, painful joy in that ride, even to
sing as he rode, to Jehan’s delight. Hymns at first; then other songs, songs he
had learned a lifetime ago, that rose to the surface of his memory and clung
there. The first time or two, he stopped guiltily, as if he had been caught
singing them in chapel; then, with Jehan’s encouragement, he let his voice have
its way.

Sometimes they met people on their road, peasants afoot or
in wagons, who looked stolidly upon their passing. Once there was a pilgrim,
who called for alms and blessed Alf for what he gave, not seeing the tonsure
under the hood. And once there was a lord with his meinie, inviting the
strangers to spend the night in his castle.

Since it was early still, Alf refused, but courteously.
Their camp that night seemed rough and cold, even with a fire; and it had begun
to rain.

o0o

Open land gave way to forest, dark and cheerless. More than
ever Alf regretted his refusal of the lord’s hospitality; though Jehan laughed
and said, “Don’t be sorry. If someone had known me there, there’d have been a
huge to-do and we’d never have got away.”

“Maybe,” Alf said. “But our food is running low, and we
won't find any here. More likely, what we have will be stolen.”

“Do you want to go around?”

“It would add two days to our journey. But maybe we’d
better.”

“Not I!” Jehan cried. “I’m no coward. Come on; I'll race you
to that tree.”

He was already off. After an instant, Alf sent the mare
after him.

o0o

It was quiet under the trees, all sounds muted, lost in the
mist of rain. Leaves lay thick upon the track; the horses’ passing was almost
silent to human ears.

The travelers rode as swiftly as they might, yet warily, all
their senses alert. Nothing menaced them, though once they started a deer, to
Fara’s dismay. Only the high saddle and Alf’s own skill kept him astride then.

The farther they rode, the older the forest seemed. The
trees were immense, heavy with the memory of old gods. Elf-country, Alf
thought. But the cross on his breast made him alien.

Wild beasts moved within the reach of his perception,
numerous small creatures, deer, a boar going about its dark business; even the
flicker of consciousness that was a wolf. Nothing to fear.

o0o

Night fell, early and complete. They found a camp, a cluster
of trees by a stream, that afforded water and shelter and fuel for a fire.

When they had tended the horses and eaten a little, they
huddled together in the circle of light.

“I wonder how Alun is,” Jehan said after a while.

Alf glanced at him, a flicker in firelight. “Well enough,”
he answered. “Brother Herbal has had him up and hobbling about a little. And
he’s had Morwin bring him treasures from the library.”

“You talk to him?”

“Yes.”

Jehan tried to laugh. “What’s he wearing? You’ve got his
clothes!”

“He borrows mine. Though he says he looks a poor excuse for
a monk.”

“Does he fret?”

Alf shook his head. “Alun never frets. He simply follows me
with his mind.”

“Is he watching now?”

“No. He’s asleep.”

Jehan glanced about uneasily at the whispering dark. “Are
you sure?”

“Fairly.” Alf smiled. “Come, lad! He can’t see any secrets.
He’s a man of honor.”

“But he
follows
us!”

“Me, to be more precise. Sometimes he borrows my eyes.”

Jehan’s had gone wild. When Alf touched him, he started like
a deer. Those were Alf’s eyes upon him: Alf’s own, strange, familiar eyes. No
one else lived behind them.

They flicked aside before he could drown. He swayed; Alf
held him. “Jehan. Alun is like me. My own kind. As you and I share speech, so
we share our minds. It comforts him. He gave me all he had; should I refuse to
let him be with me?”

The other battled for control. “It’s not that.
It’s...it’s...I can’t see him!”

“Would you like me to tell you when he’s here?”

“Please. I’d rather know.”

“Then you will. Sleep, Jehan. I’ll keep the first watch.”

He would have argued, but suddenly he could not keep his
eyes open. Even as suspicion stirred, he slid into oblivion.

o0o

The road wound deeper into the forest, growing narrower as
it proceeded, and growing worse, until often the travelers were slowed to a
walk. Jehan rode with hand close to sword hilt; Alf’s every sense was alert,
although he said once, “No robber, unless he’s desperate, will touch us: two
strong men, well mounted, and one big enough for two.”

Jehan laughed at that, but he did not relax his guard. Nor,
he noticed, did Alf. Even as that disturbed him, it brought comfort.

The second night under the trees, they camped in a place
they could defend, a clearing that rose into a low hill, and at the top a
standing stone. Jehan would not have chosen to stop here; but he glanced at his
companion and grimaced. Here he was, riding with an elf-man, a proven
enchanter, and he was afraid to sleep on an old barrow.

It did not seem to trouble Alf. He made camp quietly and ate
as much as he would ever eat, and sat afterward, silent, fixing the fire with a
blank, inward stare.

When he spoke, Jehan started. “Alun is here.”

The novice shuddered and closed his eyes. For a moment in
the fire he had seen a narrow hawk-face, a glint of grey eyes, staring full
into his own.

Alf’s voice murmured in his ear. “Alun sends greetings.”

Jehan opened his eyes. There was no face in the fire. “Is he
still...”

“No.” Alf rose and stretched, arching his back, turning his
face to the stars. Below, in the clearing about the mound, the horses grazed
quietly.

He laid his hand on the standing stone. It was cold, yet in
the core of it he sensed a strange warmth.

So it was in certain parts of St. Ruan’s: cold stone, warm
heart, and power that sang in his blood. The power hummed here, faint yet
steady. It had eased the contact with Alun, brought them mind to mind almost
without their willing it.

Yet there was something...

Jehan; the horses; a hunting owl; a wolf.

He called in all the threads of his power and looked into
Jehan’s wide eyes. The moon was very bright, turning toward the full; even the
novice could see almost as well as if it had been day.

Alf cupped his hands. The cold light filled them and
overflowed. Slowly he opened his fingers and let it drain away.

“What does it feel like?” Jehan’s voice was very low.

He let his hands fill again and held them out to Jehan. The
other reached out a hand that tried not to tremble. “It— I can feel it!”

Again Alf let the light go. It poured like water over
Jehan’s fingers, but he could not hold it. “I could make it solid, weave a
fabric of it. I tried that once. Moonlight and snowlight for an altar cloth. It
was beautiful. The Abbot wanted to send it to Rome. But then he realized that
it was made with sorcery.”

“What did he do with it?”

“Exactly what he did with me. Blessed it, consecrated it,
and put it away.” Alf lay down, propped up on his elbow. “But now I’m out. I
wonder what will happen to the cloth.”

“Maybe,” said Jehan, “Dom Morwin should send it to Rhiyana.
The Pope wouldn’t appreciate it, but the Elvenking would.”

Alf considered that. “Maybe he would.”

“He’d certainly appreciate you.”

For answer Jehan received only a swift ember-glance. They
did not speak again that night.

The third day in the forest dawned bleak and cold. They ate
and broke camp in silence, shivering. Jehan’s fingers were numb, his gelding’s
trappings stiff and unmanageable; he cursed softly.

Alf moved him gently aside and managed the recalcitrant
straps with ease. Jehan glanced at him. “You’re never cold, are you?”

“Not often,” Alf said. The task was done; he took Jehan’s
hands in both his own. His flesh felt burning hot.

Startled, Jehan tried to pull away. Alf held him easily.
“You don’t need to add frostbite to your ills.”

Jehan submitted. The warmth no longer hurt; it was blissful.
“You’re a marvel, Brother Alf.”

“Or a monster.” Alf let him go. “Come, mount up. We’ve a
long way to go.”

o0o

The cold did not grow less with the day’s rising. Jehan
thought the air smelled of snow.

Alf rode warily, eyes flicking from side to side. More than
once he paused, every sense alert.

“What is it?” Jehan asked. “Bandits?”