Gaylen tightened his knees against Marrow’s sides to keep them from trembling, and the horse shifted his hoofs uneasily. Spreading the notebook open on the saddle, he began to write down votes as the people shuffled slowly past him, but his hand shook and the ink smeared again and again. Veto stood close by, speaking quietly to people in the line, and for a time things went smoothly. Then a big man dressed in white moved up to register.
“I’m Winnow, the miller,” he said in a loud voice, turning to smirk at the crowd. “My choice is bread. Ha-ha! Bread, do you hear? The King will never ask anyone to do without bread. He can’t ruin me, at any rate!”
Instantly the fragile peace was shattered and the line dissolved. Somebody grabbed the miller around the neck and threw him down, and with shouts and cries the people were on one another. Marrow whinnied and spun round in a circle and the ink bottle resting on the saddle went flying off to smash on the cobblestones.
“Save yourself, boy!” yelled the Mayor. “Ride! Ride!”
Gaylen jammed the notebook into the saddlebag and banged his heels against Marrow’s ribs. The horse reared, spun again on his hind legs, and shot off through the mob, galloping, galloping away across the town and out into the countryside, with his ears flattened against his head and his mane flying. And Gaylen hung on with his arms wrapped tight around Marrow’s neck, sobbing into the wind.
It was dusk when marrow stopped running. They had left the road far behind and had come instead to a stream at the foot of the mountains. The horse waded in, his sides heaving, and began to drink noisily. Gaylen slipped exhausted from the saddle and stood in the water, leaning against Marrow’s hot flank. Then he stooped and pulled off his boots, tossing them to the bank. The current gurgled around his ankles and he dug his toes thankfully into cool mud, where here and there smooth pebbles glimmered in the fading light like coins in a wishing well. He stood for a long time and then he waded out, threw off his rumpled clothes and, running back to the middle of the stream, threw himself down with a splash. The key around his neck, shiny and mysterious in its new wetness, lifted and stirred a little as the current washed over his chest. Gaylen lay there and let the water finger through his hair and spill around his forehead and nose. He opened his mouth and it trickled in at the corners. He drank deeply in this backwards fashion and lay with the water lapping over his tired body until he felt soothed and clean. Then he waded to the bank and slapped his clothes against a tree trunk to clear out the dust, putting them on again afterwards without drying himself.
There was still a good bit of Mrs. Copse’s bread and cheese in his saddlebag, and this he ate for his supper, stretched out on the bank to listen to the water. Marrow stood nearby, munching among the grasses. After a while the moon rose, and Gaylen watched its wavering reflection in the stream. Soon he was sound asleep.
In the morning he was as pleased to see the stream again as if there were a chance it might have wandered off during the night. He took two of the last few apples from his saddlebag and gave one of them to Marrow. The other he ate himself, sitting with his toes in the water. When he had finished, he pulled on his boots, climbed onto the saddle, and rode his horse to a field nearby to look about.
Marrow had brought him well away from the main road in their wild flight of the day before, but, studying the map, Gaylen discovered that they were not so far from their route as he had feared. In the distance the ground rose sharply into steep hills and then heaved higher to form the southernmost arc of the mountains which ringed the kingdom. Somewhere ahead among the lower hills stood the third town. Gaylen’s heart drooped at the thought of it, but he had a mission, he said to himself. He would carry it through one way or another. He turned Marrow toward the hills and started off across the field.
He had not gone far when he heard a familiar squawk. Looking up, he saw a white dot in the sky. Of course! It was Saturday. A few moments later the cockatoo was panting on his shoulder and he was reading another letter from the castle:
Vaungaylen: Finish poll as fast as possible. All seems to be falling to pieces. We are told kingdom splitting, Crisps against Squashies and both against King. Hemlock sure to be in on it somehow. Watch out for him. Hurry home. The sooner vote is tallied and posted, the sooner trouble will be over. And please—be careful.
The P.M.
Gaylen sent the cockatoo back with an anxious reply:
Hemlock riding ahead of me telling the people lies about the King. He’s trying to start a war because he wants the kingdom for himself. I will be careful.
Vaungaylen
When the cockatoo had flown away again, Gaylen sat for a while thinking. Two more towns to register, and clearly the thing to do was to try to get to them before Hemlock did, in the hope that it was not too late already. That way he could spread his warning first and finish the poll more peacefully. But he would have to ride harder and longer than he had up to now. He patted the glossy side of Marrow’s neck and said, “Here we go, friend. It’s up to us.” He dropped the key down inside his shirt to keep it safe. “If ever I needed a good-luck charm, it’s now,” he said to himself. Then he touched his heels to the horse’s ribs.
The surest route seemed to lie along the base of the steep slopes, and soon they were cantering briskly through stony bracken past tumbled rocks and boulders where here and there blue bugles swayed. Overhead, brooding clouds hunched across the sun. The green peaks of the mountains went gray and patches of grass on the hillside bent under the cool breath of a fresh, low breeze.
But Gaylen was too preoccupied with the new urgency of his mission to feel the loneliness of the countryside. He did not even notice that it was beginning to rain. The third town still lay far ahead, somewhere among the hills, and bending low in the saddle, Gaylen urged Marrow forward ever faster. He felt that he and the horse had become one creature, tireless and fleet, rushing through the air on a wind of its own creation. They flew along smoothly for miles, and then, all of a sudden, they came to a patch of loose pebbles. The speeding horse slipped sideways, stumbled, and fell heavily. Gaylen went spinning out of the saddle and came crashing to the ground some distance away. He sat for a moment in a whirl of shock, but when his head cleared he stood up and found with relief that he was not really hurt. He ran back to where Marrow was scrambling upright, whinnying softly. The horse had not fared so well. His right front leg was shoeless, and lame.
For the first time Gaylen noticed the rain. He stood stroking the horse, wondering what to do next, while raindrops spilled down his cheeks like tears. Now they could never reach the third town before Hemlock. He gathered up the horse’s reins and started off, Marrow limping painfully behind him. A jagged glare of lightning suddenly split the heavy sky and thunder rolled. “Come on,” he said to the horse. “We’ve got to find some kind of shelter.” And he peered at the steep hillside. Not too far up, a flat boulder jutted out over a dim hollow. A cave, thought Gaylen, and he turned off the road and carefully led the horse up among the slippery rocks.
When he reached the mouth of the cave and looked inside, Gaylen found that it was dry and warm and much larger than he had expected. It was a cavern, really, with a great, arched ceiling. There was room enough on its floor for twenty boys and horses. Around its walls, huge boulders thrust up like jagged teeth, and at the back a tunnel yawned away into darkness.
Gaylen led Marrow in and, turning, leaned against the smooth stone at the entrance and looked out at the rain-smoked land. Lightning flared again and thunder crashed. As the noise mumbled off across the sky, Gaylen heard a new sound and peered out through the downpour. The way along which he had come lay below, dotted now with gleaming pools, and soon, splashing along from the opposite direction, a dark shape appeared. As it came closer, Gaylen saw that it was a horse and rider and that they were turning up the hill toward the cave. Behind him, Marrow whinnied and stiffened. Gaylen looked closer. The horse stumbling up through the rocks was Ballywrack and the rider was Hemlock. Gaylen turned and seized Marrow’s reins. He
pulled the horse after him behind one of the boulders, and waited, his heart pounding. A few moments later, Ballywrack thundered in at the entrance, Hemlock urging him on, and the two went past, down the dark throat of the cave, till they were swallowed up in blackness.
Gaylen sat behind the boulder and frowned. Everywhere he went, it seemed, Hemlock came after or had already been, weaving in and out of his path like an ill-intentioned wasp. He waited until the clang and echo of Ballywrack’s hoofbeats faded before he came out of the shadows. He wrapped the loop of Marrow’s reins around a loose rock, gave the horse a pat of reassurance, and stole away to the tunnel to follow. Feeling his way, he crept into black darkness down a twisting corridor of cool, smooth stone. The corridor was dry and fragrant—it smelled, surprisingly, of apples, like the cellar of a well-kept farmhouse. After a while it seemed to straighten out and Gaylen could see a glow of light at the end. Voices reached his ears and he hurried nearer to listen.
“I must talk to all of you right away!” Hemlock’s deep voice demanded.
“Can’t,” said a second, strange voice. “Bevel’s down in the mine and Thwart went off to sleep. I’ll talk to you. For a few minutes. Then I’ve got things to do. Lots of things to do.”
“Very well,” said Hemlock. “Then listen. I’ve got to have a whistle. A new whistle, just like the old one. A whistle for the spring house in the lake.”
“A whistle, is it?” said the strange voice. A ringing laugh echoed up the corridor. “Well, my friend, the first whistle was very special. Bevel made it with a fine drill and afterward the drill fell into the forge and melted. He could never make another whistle. Goodbye.”
“Wait!” cried Hemlock. “Don’t go! You’ve got to help me. It’s extremely important!”
“It’s not at all important to me,” said the strange voice, “and I’ve got things to do.”
“Listen,” said Hemlock. “I know about the first whistle being lost. The woldweller told me. But if you made the first one, you can make another. Then I can open the door to the spring house, and when she goes in to get her doll, I can lock her in. Only for a day or two, until the last piece falls into place. Then the kingdom will be mine. I’ll bring you apples, Pitshaft. All the apples you want. Make me a new whistle!”
“Go away,” said the strange voice wearily.
“Wait!” cried Hemlock. “All I want to do is make sure Ardis doesn’t interfere with the last step. I didn’t want to start so soon. My plans were not complete. But this proclamation of the King’s has set the stage too well—I can’t let my chance slip by. The people will be fighting any day and the war will wear them down and then I can…”
“Tra-la,” interrupted the strange voice. “What do I care for your wars and kingdoms? We have things to do here, many things to do. Bevel couldn’t make another whistle even if he wanted to. Not without the drill. And the drill melted in the forge. I’ve given you enough of my time already.”
“Then I’ll have to take my chances,” said Hemlock. His voice was low and cold. “But if she interferes, it will be the worse for her. Nothing must go wrong now.”
“Go away,” the strange voice said again. “It’s nothing to me, all this. People are so foolish. They waste their time. They waste their time even though they have so little of it. We have forever and yet we never waste a moment. Go away and let me get back to my work.”
There was the sound of light footsteps and a heavy, metal door clanged shut. And then there was silence.
Gaylen turned and made his way rapidly back up the tunnel. He could hear the hoofs of the gray horse Ballywrack clattering behind him. He raced toward the cave and slipped behind the boulder just in time to quiet Marrow’s nervous whinny. An instant later Ballywrack appeared, with Hemlock stiff and angry in the saddle. They went out through the mouth of the cave. The hoofbeats mingled with the drip of the rain and died away in the distance.
After hemlock had disappeared, Gaylen sat in the shadows close to Marrow and tried to piece together the things he had heard in the tunnel. Ardis, the doll, the lost whistle, and Hemlock’s words: “Nothing must go wrong now.” Gaylen chewed on a thumbnail and frowned. “Now, how am I to find out what he means to do,” he said to himself, “with a lame and shoeless horse?”
He was so lost in his puzzle that he didn’t hear footsteps padding up through the tunnel toward the cave. Then suddenly there was talking just beyond him on the other side of the boulder.
“Raining again. No mushrooms today.” It was the same strange voice he had heard in the tunnel.
“No mushrooms today,” echoed a second, higher voice. “What a shame! Well, we’ve plenty of roots still. Hear the thunder!”
“It’s fine,” said the first voice. “Just like the mines in the oldest days when we were all together.”
Gaylen peeped cautiously around the boulder and saw three small figures standing at the mouth of the cave. They were dressed simply, in gray and brown, and wore heavy leather belts around their waists. One had a head of short, tangled white hair, one’s hair was yellow, and the other was completely bald. Suddenly the white-haired figure put a hand on the bald one’s arm and cried, “Hist, Pitshaft! What do I smell?” Gaylen ducked down behind the boulder. “I smell apples, Pitshaft! Apples!”
“Apples it is,” the one called Pitshaft answered. “You’re right, Bevel. No doubt they belong to that boy there, hiding behind that boulder with his horse. We’ll go and speak to him.”
So they had known he was there all along! Gaylen stepped out from behind the boulder, feeling very foolish.
He found himself looking into the ruddy faces of three small, sturdy men. Their gaze, out of eyes gray as slate, was calm.
“Have you got apples, boy?” asked Pitshaft.
“Yes—excuse me—I have a few in my saddlebag,” answered Gaylen timidly. “I didn’t mean to be hiding—I came in to get out of the storm, and my horse has lost a shoe, and…”
“It doesn’t matter,” said Pitshaft. “How many apples do you have?”
“Three, I think.”
The white-haired Bevel smiled. “I would have guessed three exactly.” The third man sniffed and nodded his yellow head but said nothing.
“What can we do for you, boy, in exchange for your apples?” asked Pitshaft.
“I’ll give them to you gladly,” Gaylen said.
“Fair exchange only,” said Pitshaft. “Did you say your horse had lost a shoe?”
“Yes, and he’s lame, too.”
“Well, then, we’ll make him a new shoe while he rests his leg. A day or two at the most should do it,” said Pitshaft. “Bring your horse and your apples and come along.” Off went the three, back down the tunnel, and Gaylen followed, wide-eyed and unresisting, leading the limping Marrow behind him.
The room at the end of the tunnel was bright with the glow of many torches, and in the center stood a large brazier in which red coals throbbed with heat. Next to the brazier were an anvil and a big stone crock of water, and there were a great many tools and scraps of metal lying about. The room was roughly oval in shape, and Gaylen, looking around, dropped Marrow’s reins and gasped. The stone walls and ceiling were carved everywhere in low relief, carved so beautifully that Gaylen stood with his mouth hanging open in admiration.
There were forest scenes where the leaves of exquisite trees frothed low over all manner of animals busy among delicate weeds and grasses. There were underwater scenes with strange fish, tumbling waterfalls, and frondy plants on narrow stems. There were scenes which showed forges and mines far below the earth; and on the ceiling, clouds sailed before the wind across a starry sky and graceful birds dipped and wheeled. In the wavering light of the torches, the whole tableau seemed to breathe with motion and life. Here and there about the walls, benches and tables had been hewn out, and there were a number of arches, each fitted with a heavy metal door.
It was by far the most remarkable room Gaylen had ever seen. He turned round and round trying to look at all of it
at once and as he turned he caught sight of what was surely the most amazing part of all. In a ledge opposite the entrance, a sort of basin had been carved. Over the basin curved the graceful body of a mermaid holding a water lily with fragile, pointed petals, and out of the center of the lily, in steady, measured rhythm, shining drops of water from some underground stream fell and splashed into the basin.
“Take your horse and go and drink,” said Pitshaft. Gaylen drew Marrow across the room, and while the horse dipped into the water, he stood gazing up at the carving of the mermaid. She was very young, with a round, lovely face, and the hand holding the water lily had curling, graceful fingers. And he saw that in the other hand she held a little doll made of jointed stones with a bit of trailing fern for hair.
“Thwart carved her,” said Pitshaft, pointing to the silent little man with yellow hair. “He carved her long ago. She’s Ardis.”
Gaylen stared and stared at the mermaid. There seemed to be something marvelous hidden in the carving that he was seeing and yet not seeing—something extremely important. He bent to drink from the basin, straightened, and stared again, but whatever it was that was hidden there eluded him. He turned away and saw that Bevel was blowing up the coals in the brazier with a large bellows while Pitshaft, tongs in hand, held a rod of iron into the licking flames. When the iron was white-hot, Pitshaft laid it on the anvil and began to hammer. BONG bongity ping tap, BONG bongity ping tap—the hammer danced and the hot iron began to flatten. Into the flames again and out, and again the hammer rang, and the iron curved like a reluctant snake. Over and over, heat, hammer, heat, hammer, and bit by bit a perfect horseshoe was formed. Then, hiss-ss-ss! Pitshaft flung it into the crock of water. He turned and said abruptly, “Time for supper.” All three dwarfs looked at Gaylen. He took the last three of the King’s apples from his saddlebag and handed them round.