The Dark Is Rising (13 page)

“It's Hawkin, isn't it? Something to do with the reason why you brought him here?”

“The spell of protection for the Book,” Merriman said painfully, “was in two parts, Will. You saw the first, the protection against men — it was the pendulum, which would destroy them if they were to touch it, but would not destroy me or any Old One. But I wove another part into that spell that was a protection against the Dark. It set down that I could take the Book out past the pendulum
only if I were touching Hawkin with my other hand
. Whenever the Book was taken out for the last Old One, in whatever century, Hawkin would have to be brought out of his own time in order to be there.”

Will said: “Wouldn't it have been safer to make an Old One part of the spell, not an ordinary man?”

“Ah no, the whole purpose was to have a man involved. This is a cold battle we are in, Will, and in it we must sometimes do cold things. This spell was woven around me, as keeper of the Book. The Dark
cannot destroy me, for I am an Old One, but it could perhaps by magic have tricked me into taking out the Book. In case that happened, there had to be some way in which the other Old Ones could stop me before it was too late. They too could not destroy me, to stop me from doing the work of the Dark. But a man can be destroyed. If it had come to the worst, and the Dark had forced me by magic to take out the Book for them, then before I could begin, the Light would have killed Hawkin. That would have kept the Book safe forever, for in that case, I could not have worked the spell of release by touching him while taking out the Book. And so I should not have been able to reach the Book. Nor would the Dark, nor anyone else.”

“So he risked his life,” Will said slowly, watching Hawkin's sprightly walk as he crossed the floor to the musicians.

“Yes,” Merriman said. “In our service he was safe from the Dark, but his life was in hazard all the same. He agreed because he was my liege man, and proud of it. I wish that I had made sure that he really knew the risk he ran. A double risk, for he might also have been destroyed today, by me, if I had accidentally touched the pendulum. You saw what happened when at the last I did that. You and I, as Old Ones, were merely shaken; but if Hawkin had been there, under my touch, he would have been killed in a flash, unbodied like the Book itself.”

“He must not only be very brave, he must really love you as if he were your son,” said Will, “to do things like this for you and the Light.”

“But still he is only a man,” said Merriman, and his voice was rough and the pain back deep in his face. “And he loves as a man, requiring proof of love in return. My mistake was in ignoring the risk that this might be so. And as a result, in this room in the next few minutes, Hawkin will betray me and betray the Light and mould the whole course of your quest, young Will. The shock just now of actually risking his life, for me and the Book of Gramarye, was too much for his loyalty. Perhaps you saw his face, in the moment when I held his shoulder and took the Book from its perilous place. It was only in that moment that Hawkin fully understood that I was prepared to let him die. And now that he has understood it, he will never forgive me for not loving him as much — in his terms — as he
has loved me, his lord. And he will turn on us.” Merriman pointed across the room. “See where it begins.”

Music struck up brightly, and the guests began forming into couples to dance. One man whom Will had recognised as an Old One moved to Miss Greythorne, bowed, and offered his arm; all around them, couples joined into figures-of-eight for some dance he did not know. He saw Hawkin standing irresolute, moving his head a little to the beat of the music; and then he saw a girl in a red dress appear at his side. It was the witch-girl, Maggie Barnes.

She said something to Hawkin, laughing, and dropped him a small curtsey. Hawkin smiled politely, doubtfully, and shook his head. The girl's smile deepened, she shook her hair coquettishly and spoke to him again, her eyes fast on his.

“Oh,” Will said. “If only we could hear!”

Merriman regarded him sombrely for a moment, his face absent and brooding.

“Oh,” Will said, feeling foolish. “Of course.” It would take him some time, clearly, to grow accustomed to using his own gifts. He looked again at Hawkin and the girl, and wished to hear them, and could hear.

“Truly, Madam,” Hawkin said, “I have no wish to seem churlish, but I do not dance.”

Maggie took his hand. “Because you are out of your century? They dance here with their legs, just as you do beyond five hundred years. Come.”

Hawkin stared at her aghast as she led him into a set of couples. “Who are you?” he whispered. “Are you an Old One?”

“Not for all the world,” said Maggie Barnes in the Old Speech, and Hawkin turned quite white and stood still. She laughed softly and said in English, “No more of that. Dance, or people will notice. It's easy enough. Watch the next man, as the music begins.”

Hawkin, pale and distressed, stumbled his way through the first part of the dance; gradually he picked up the steps. Merriman said in Will's ear, “He was told that not one soul here would know of him, and that on pain of death he must not use the Old Speech to any but you.”

Then the speaking below began again.

“You look well, Hawkin, for a man escaped from death.”

“How do you know these things, girl? Who are you?”

“They would have let you die, Hawkin. How could you be so stupid?”

“My master loves me,” said Hawkin, but there was weakness in it.

“He used you, Hawkin. You are nothing to him. You should follow better masters, who would care for your life. And lengthen it through the centuries, not confine it to your own.”

“Like the life of an Old One?” Hawkin said, eagerness waking in his voice for the first time. Will remembered the tinge of envy when Hawkin had spoken to him of the Old Ones; now there was a hint of greed as well.

“The Dark and the Rider are kinder masters than the Light,” Maggie Barnes said softly in his ear, as the first part of the dance ended. Hawkin stood still again and stared at her, until she glanced round and said clearly: “I need a cool drink, I believe.” And Hawkin jumped and led her away, so that now, with his attention caught and a chance to talk to him privately, the girl of the Dark would have a willing hearer. Will felt suddenly sickened by the approaching treachery, and listened no more. He found Merriman, beside him, still gazing black into space.

“So it will go,” Merriman said. “He will have a sweet picture of the Dark to attract him, as men so often do, and beside it he will set all the demands of the Light, which are heavy and always will be. All the while he will be nursing his resentment of the way I might have had him give up his life without reward. You can be sure the Dark makes no sign of demanding any such thing — yet. Indeed, its lords never risk demanding death, but only offer a black life. . . . Hawkin,” he said softly, bleakly, “liege man, how can you do what you are going to do?”

Will felt fear suddenly, and Merriman sensed it. “No more of this,” he said. “It is clear already how it goes. Hawkin now will be a leak in the roof, a tunnel into the cellar. And just as the Dark could not touch him when he was my liege man, now that he is liege to the Dark, he cannot be destroyed by the Light. He will be the Dark's ear in our midst, in this house that has been our stronghold.” His voice was cold, accepting the inevitable; the pain was gone. “Though the witch-girl managed to make her way in, she could have accomplished no scrap of magic without being destroyed by the Light. But
now whenever Hawkin calls them, the Dark can attack us here as elsewhere. And the danger will grow with the years.”

He stood up, fingering his white ruffled cravat; there was a terrible sternness in his fierce-curved profile, and the look that for a moment flared out from the lowering brows made Will's blood run thick and slow. It was a judge's face, implacable, condemning.

“And the doom that Hawkin has brought upon himself, by this act,” Merriman said, without expression, “is a dread matter, which will make him many times wish that he might die.”

Will stood dazed, caught in pity and alarm. He did not ask what would happen to small, bright-eyed Hawkin, who had laughed at him and helped him and been for so short a while his friend; he did not want to know. Out on the floor, the music of the second part of the dance jingled to a close, and the dancers made one another laughing courtesies. Will stood motionless and unhappy. Merriman's frozen look softened, and he reached out and turned him gently to face the centre of the room.

Will saw there only a gap in the crowd, with beyond it the group of musicians. As he stood there, they struck up once more “Good King Wenceslas,” the carol they had been playing when first he entered the room, through the Doors. Merrily the whole gathering joined in singing, and then the next verse came and Merriman's deep voice was ringing out across the room, and Will realised, blinking, that the verse to come was his.

He drew breath, and raised his head.

Sire he lives a good league hence
,

Underneath the mountain
. . . .

And there was no moment of farewell, no moment in which he saw the nineteenth century vanish away, but suddenly with no awareness of change, as he sang he knew that Time had somehow blinked, and another young voice was singing with him, the two of them so nearly simultaneous that anyone who could not see the lips moving would have sworn that it was one boy's voice alone . . .

Right against the forest fence
,

By Saint Agnes' fou — ou — ntain
. . . .

. . . and he knew that he was standing with James and Mary and the rest, and he and James were singing together, and that the music with their voices was Paul's lone flute. He stood there in the dark entrance-hall, with his hands raised before his chest holding the lighted candle, and he saw that the candle had not burned down one millimetre further than when he had last looked at it.

They finished the carol.

Miss Greythorne said, “Very good, very good indeed. Nothing like Good King Wenceslas, it's always been my favourite.”

Will peered past his candle-flame to look at her motionless form in the big carved chair; her voice was older, harder, more toughened by the years, and so was her face, but otherwise she was just like — her grandmother, must that younger Miss Greythorne have been? Or her great-grandmother?

Miss Greythorne said, “Huntercombe carol-singers have been singing 'Good King Wenceslas' in this house for longer than you or even I can remember, you know. Well now, Paul and Robin and the rest of you, how about a little Christmas punch?” The question was traditional, and so was the answer.

“Well,” said Robin gravely, “thank you, Miss Greythorne. Perhaps just a little.”

“Even young Will too, this year,” said Paul. “He's eleven now, Miss Greythorne, did you know?”

The housekeeper was coming forward with a tray of glittering glasses and a great bowl of red-brown punch, and nearly every eye in the room was on Merriman, stepping up to fill the glasses. But Will's gaze was held by the strong, suddenly younger eyes of the figure in the high-backed chair. “Yes,” said Miss Greythorne softly, almost absent-mindedly, “I did remember. Will Stanton has had a birthday.” She turned to Merriman, who was already moving towards them, and took from him the two glasses in his hands. “A happy birthday to you, Will Stanton, seventh son of a seventh son,” said Miss Greythorne. “And success in your every quest.”

“Thank you, ma'am,” said Will, wondering. And they held up their glasses solemnly to one another, and drank, just as the Stanton children did for the Christmas toast on the one day of the year when they were all allowed wine at dinner.

Merriman was moving round, and now everyone had a glass of punch and was sipping contentedly. The Manor's Christmas punch was always delicious, though no one had ever quite worked out what went into it. As the senior members of the family, the twins strolled dutifully across to chat with Miss Greythorne; Barbara, with Mary in tow, made a beeline for Miss Hampton the housekeeper and Annie the maid, both reluctant members of a village drama group she was trying to force into life. Merriman said to James, “You and your little brother sing very well.”

James beamed. Though plumper, he was no taller than Will, and it was not often that a stranger gratified him by recognising him as a superior older brother. “We sing in the school choir,” he said. “And solos at arts festivals. Even one in London last year. The music master's very keen on arts festivals.”

“I'm not,” said Will. “All those mothers, glaring.”

“Well, you were top of your class in London,” James said, “so of course they all hated you, beating their little darlings. I was only fifth in mine,” he said in matter-of-fact tones to Merriman. “Will has a lot better voice than me.”

“Oh come off it,” said Will.

“Yes, you have.” James was a fair-minded boy; he genuinely preferred reality to daydreams. “Till we both break, at any rate. Neither of us might be any good then.”

Merriman said absent-mindedly, “In point of fact you will become a most accomplished tenor. Almost professional standard. Your brother's voice will be baritone — pleasant, but nothing special.”