But then the infamous litany and suffrages of that rite began, when each Keeper in turn cried out to the Word to spare the Master from a succession of sins he might commit....
“From all evil and mischief; from sin; from the crafts and assaults of the Stone; from thy wrath... Spare us, good Word, and accept this the Master’s anointing!”
From the first of these pleas in the litany the waiting followers knew what their terrible role was to be. For as it was uttered Hay was dragged, struggling and angry, from the Duncton group and held helplessly against the Stone as Drule came out and stanced hugely over him.
Then Terce asked him, “Do you, mole of the Stone, accept the Word’s rule and this thy Master?”
“I do not!” cried out Hay, eyes blazing.
Terce turned to Tryfan and said, “Thou hast the power to save the life of this sinning mole: renounce in his name.”
“Do not do so,” said brave Hay as Drule readied his talons for a crushing strike.
“I cannot speak for anymole but myself,” said Tryfan.
There was no second chance. Terce nodded grimly to Drule and then was the Word’s way known, then was the power of its way seen. Back went the talons of dread Drule, and with a sudden intake of breath his talons thrust down: foul the crushing life-taking noise as he thrust hard into the snout and face of Hay.
But worse came then and evil was seen before the Stone.
“Holy Word, my mother and my father...” As the eldrene Wort whispered her obscene litanies a Keeper came forward, thrust his own talons into the still-living head of Hay and, taking his blood, anointed Lucerne across the brow.
“By this blood of Atonement thy sins shall flee, by this first sacrifice the Word shall be satisfied in thee as Master.”
No sooner was this rite complete than another Keeper came forward, another suffrage spoken, and another victim dragged forward to the Stone.
“From all blindness of mind; from pride and hypocrisy; from envy, hatred and malice; from desire of the flesh, and thy wrath... Spare us, good Word!”
So harmless Thrift, who had once stanced at this spot and saved Tryfan’s life, died. Then another Keeper, another demand for renunication of the Stone, another refusal, another death....
From lustful thought, from wrong fornication, from deceit, from plague of mind and spirit, from thy wrath... Spare us, good Word!”
Teasel, already half dead, had her head crushed by Drule against the Stone. Another Keeper, another victim....
Even the most steadfast mole who heard of that grim time finds that a pall of horror numbs his mind, and he sees the events that now followed with disbelief. Why did not Tryfan speak? Why did not a mole like Hay fight more? Why do such things happen at all?
A mole may be unable to answer such questions, but he cannot turn his back on them. If he is to reach the Silence that the Stone brings he must know that such obstructions to his getting there as evil, or wickedness, or greed, or the desire for power such as Lucerne had, cannot be bypassed. No route exists to Silence, nor tunnel be delved, that does not pass through the shadow of suffering, the mists of moles’ selfish ambition, and the bleak dark of evil.
Tryfan, who had seen and felt so much, now saw and felt much more than anymole should bear.
For constantly, in the hours that followed in the ritual ordination of Lucerne, he was asked, “Renounce the Stone, Tryfan, and these moles need not be sacrificed. The Word shall take your renunciation in place of the sacred anointing by their blood, the Word shall be merciful. Renounce.”
On and on they were brought to the base of the great Stone. While between each murder – or sacrifice as the Word liturgists would have us call it – Terce and other of the Keepers proceeded with the arcane and filthy rite of blood anointment which Lucerne chose, and all about, obscene in its growing rhythm, like the mating of two mutant grikes, the sideem on each side of the Master-elect, chanted their blood-lustful chant.
Madder, most pitifully calling out for his friend to forgive him, as if, after so long, Dodder had anything to forgive.
Then Dodder quickly followed.
“Do you...?”
“He is not of the Stone,” growled Tryfan.
“He is lax to be with thee,” hissed the eldrene Wort, the only words she said.
“I do not renounce, and nor must Tryfan for me,” said Dodder with dignity.
A nod and Drule killed him, and his warm blood was touched (this time) to Lucerne’s mouth and his sickening whispered prayers underlay the chant.
Flint. Crying. How great the Stone seemed over him, how shining now its face. Flint died.
Feverfew, and whispers.
“This is the mother of the Stone Mole, Master-elect.”
“Does she renounce?” Lucerne’s voice was indifferent to Feverfew and what she was, but driving on towards the climax of the ordination.
The very trees seemed stricken then, the crescent moon to bow its head, the wind to haunt among the roots, and flee.
For the first time Tryfan broke down, his head bowed low, and began to speak to save her life. But Feverfew, unafraid, her eyes filled with love as she looked at him, said, “Myn luve, do nat doe so. Wat wee yaf hadde, ytt was ynough, ytt yss far more yan thidde trublit moule Lucerne canne ever hav.”
Terce nodded, Drule thrust, and the very Stone seemed to shudder in the night as Feverfew slumped and died at the very place where she had given birth to the Stone Mole.
So the last anointing was performed and all was still, all chanting done for now.
Then Terce, who had begun the rite, now brought it to its conclusion with the concluding liturgy.
“Receive the Spirit of the Word here now, Lucerne of Whern, as I Twelfth Keeper place my paw upon thy head in token of the faith that all moles of the Word have in thee. Remember that thou strengthen the weak and faltering spirit which is in us by thy supremacy as exemplar of the power, wrath and purpose of the Word. Teach, exhort, and impose upon us the Word’s holy will by whatever means you choose and we shall be obedient to thy will. Minister discipline, show no mercy to the lax and to the wicked, or to the Word’s enemies. Lead us and we shall follow thee whom now at last, for the first time and forever, we call Master. Master Lucerne, Master of the Word!”
“Master Lucerne! Master!” The sideem joyously cried out his name, and the moles milled forward, reaching out to touch him. The guardmoles smiled, the Keepers nodded and looked pleased, and all talked and revelled, and were glad for the Master before the Stone.
But Tryfan, still close-guarded, could only stare blankly at the broken bodies of his friends, blankly at the blood-anointed thing that was his son, and blankly at the Stone. And weep for Feverfew.
The moon turned in the sky, Longest Night was long in its Word revelries by the Stone, until at last, in groups, the guardmoles and the sideem and the Keepers left to go back down through the night to the cross-under, leaving only three moles by the Stone: the new Master, the creature Drule, his talons red with gore, and fated Tryfan.
Lucerne came close to Tryfan, for the old mole seemed half dead.
“Father, I ask you one last time, renounce the Stone.” He whispered the words, and there was a pleading in them that only Drule would have been allowed to hear.
Tryfan shook his head, his eyes low.
“Look at me, mole. I am thy Master now. Thy Stone is dead. Look at me.”
Slowly Tryfan looked at him.
“I... I...” Then he struggled in Drule’s great paws to look at the Stone and cried out in anguish, “Forgive me, Stone, I cannot love him. He is of me, but love him I cannot. Take the sight of him from out of my eyes, for the burden is too great. Let me die.”
Lucerne stared at him, puzzlement giving way to an anger and hatred all the more horrible for being so controlled.
“The Stone shall answer your prayer, mole, in the form of Drule it shall do it. But not of death. There is no need for that. But thy Master whom you cannot bear to see, you shall not see ag
ain. Drule, blind him, just as my grandfather Rune should have done long ago.”
Then Lucerne turned from his father, turned from the Stone, turned from the clearing of Duncton Wood and, as Drule’s talons lunged down one last time, the Master left the place of his ordination behind. Then Drule pulled back from where Tryfan lay, his face all blood, looked up at the Stone with a sneer, stared at the blood and bodies that lay about its base, spat on them dismissively, and followed his Master out of Duncton Wood.
Cold, cold that Longest Night. The sky, the stars, the moon uncomforting. How slowly the darkness waned away to dawn. When it did, and light crept to Duncton’s Stone again, the bodies there were all turned white, white with frost.
While before them on the ground lay Tryfan, his breath light steam before him. His face was encrusted with blood, and his back fur thick with rime, his breathing slow.
Dawn light touched the Stone above, but where Tryfan lay was a darkness blacker than the night.
PART IV
Beechenhill
Chapter Twenty-Six
Yet though the tide of the Word was running strong with the new crusade, and had spread across moledom once more and threatened to engulf the Stone for ever more, one place succeeded in rising above it that notorious Longest Night. There the Stone shone bright and its followers found growing hope and faith in themselves. That place was Caer Caradoc.
Already by the morning that followed Longest Night Word messengers were hastening from Ginnell’s emplacements on the Marches, and the news they carried would not well please the new Master when it reached him.
To make sure he got it, some went to Cannock, others by the south-western route to Buckland, but the message was the same: “Master, Caer Caradoc is taken, grant me permission to re-take it with all the freedom for severity and punishment at our command.”
Meanwhile, Ginnell was fretting and furious, unable to take his eyes for very long from the prospect that dominated his north-western view: the arduous incline of Caer Caradoc.
“Now, now we should attack,” he muttered angrily to himself. “Now!”
Yet he dared not, for his orders expressly forbade him making any assault at all along the Marches, for fear that it would be premature and might lead to a uniting of the Welsh followers and an action that would take matters out of control and divert attention from Lucerne’s main aim, which was not war but utter subjugation, death of the very spirit of the Stone.
In this Ginnell shared the frustration of all commanders in the field, who see battles and wars lost because they cannot act when they know they must.
“Sir, we must attack, we must!” said Haulke, one of his youngest commanders, and the best. “Each hour that passes means days, months and many more lives lost later.”
“I cannot allow you to do it, Haulke, right though you may be. The Master is Master of the Word, to disobey his orders is a blasphemy for which we would all be culpable.”
“But he’s only Master-elect, surely.”
“He was Master-elect until last night, but then he was ordained. I warned you what I would have to do, Haulke. He is the Word’s representative on earth, and I know what his orders are, or were when I saw him and Clowder in Cannock.”
“If he was here....”
“He is not, Haulke. When I was in Cannock he made as clear as anymole could what his strategy was: no attacks. A single strike would be made for now, a mortal blow upon the Stone. The killing phase of the crusade comes later.”
Haulke stared disbelieving at the harsh profile of Caer Caradoc and said, “The Master is a bloody fool.”
“Haulke, if you were not my best commander I would have you dismissed for that. But as it is...” Ginnell turned his battle-wearied gaze towards the object of their argument, “I agree that not taking it is a folly beyond my wish to start imagining. But as for bloody fools, I shall pretend I did not hear what you said.”
“Pretend what you damn well like, Ginnell Sir, but this failure will result in more dead to capture a position we could have taken without a struggle two days ago, and might have taken last night if those guardmoles had done what I damn well said.”
Haulke stormed off and stopped some way downslope, stared once more and then roared, “Shit! I’m looking at the biggest disaster in all the campaigns of the Word. If the Master...” But guardmoles were listening, and Haulke thought better of saying in public what he had already said in private to Ginnell.
Which was just as well, for had he done so, Ginnell would have had to have him killed.
Their argument had started over what had seemed a trivial thing, though one whose origins they could not have known.
At the conclave called by Alder in Siabod in the autumn years it had been decided that while Alder attempted to reoccupy the lower slopes of Siabod, Troedfach of Tyn-y-Bedw would travel east and occupy deserted Caer Caradoc, more as a matter of caution and pride than anything else.
So it had been, and the moles of the Marches had left Siabod cheerily, with great Alder saying that when he had succeeded in dealing with the “little matter of the grikes in lower Siabod” he would leave that system in the paws of young Gowre, and travel on to Caer Caradoc himself for old time’s sake – he felt he had started his Welsh campaign at Caer Caradoc and had a fancy to see the place again; and anyway, it was best to leave a mole like Gowre to do what he must alone, once he had been put in charge of Siabod itself.
Troedfach and Gareg of Merthyr, the best of the younger leaders, had travelled east together with Caradoc in their company, and by the time they neared the Marches once more Gareg had persuaded Troedfach to let him and a few moles take Caer Caradoc.
“You can assess its defences and later we” ll privily send moles up there and occupy it properly,” said Troedfach. “No need to draw attention to ourselves or Ginnell will be up there in no time and our task will be hard. He’s no fool, that one: I know, I’ve been fighting him for years.”
So it might have worked out, but for the accident, unknown to the Welsh followers, of Ginnell’s absence in Cannock at that time. For Haulke had been left in charge and, as ambitious young commanders often are, he was critical of the command above him.
There had long been a tradition that neither side occupied Caer Caradoc. Because the Stones there were unattractive to more traditional moles of the Word, and because the Welsh moles of the Marches did not have the local molepower to garrison it, neither side had bothered with the place.
But staring up at it and in sole command, with that acquisitive abandon younger moles without responsibilities and a knowledge of the broader issues so often enjoy, Haulke decided that the traditional view was wrong.
He had therefore chosen an idle moment in early November to lead a few guardmoles up to Caer Caradoc and, finding not a solitary mole in sight, had there deployed them for a time. He called it “campaign practice” and replaced the first patrol with another, knowing well that when Ginnell returned he could call his moles down once more and matters could go back to normal. On the other paw, he might just persuade Ginnell that he was right, and the occupation could remain in place. The more he thought about it and got to know the site, the more certain he became of Caer Caradoc’s importance.
Naturally, having no reason to think that Caer Caradoc was other than unoccupied, as it always had been, Gareg began to ascend its western slopes, guided by Caradoc himself, thinking of the climb merely as an opportunity to see an Ancient System that was unlikely – whatever old Caradoc might think – to be colonised again. They took four moles with them and proceeded slowly, for Caer Caradoc is rough and steep and not a place moles go up fast.
It was Caradoc, who knew and loved the place so well, who first sensed that something was not right. Initially he simply scented uneasily ahead, thinking not of mole but predator and scanned the skies, for kestrel hover there and raven have been known to stoop on moles. Then he slowed, narrowed his eyes and looked all about.
“Something wrong?” said Gareg, signalling t
o his well-trained moles to keep an especially low snout.
“No, no,” said Caradoc, “I’m just getting tired, see? ’Tis old fears of mine surfacing. There’s surely nomole here.”
But Gareg, cautious, experienced and respectful of hunches, called a halt and snouted at the rising slope above.
“Tell me the way the ground lies on the top,” he said.
“’Tis more flat than sloping, though if there’s high ground it’s to the north where the Stones rise. The way we’re climbing will take us to the centre of the place.”
“Any cover there?”
“Not much, just grass.”
Gareg snouted about again.
“So any moles on top would see and hear us?”
“See – yes, but hear, that all depends. The wind can deafen a mole up there. As pups we used to make sure we were downwind on Caradoc, and not a mole can hear you come.”
“If there were mole up there, occupying moles, where would they be?”
“But....”
“Just supposing, Caradoc. Just supposing.”
“The Stones are near the high north end but the old system lies south of the Stones. There’s some shelter there they’d use.”
“And routes?”
“Central, like the one we’re using, and southern, but not to the north. Too steep, too dangerous. But why...?”
“Because I am a cautious mole who has never yet been defeated by the grikes. One thing I know is this: if we have thought of occupying this place all of a sudden, then somemole of the Word has done the same. If you sense danger ahead then I shall proceed with care until I know we’re safe. Anyway, I like this kind of ground and the grikes generally don’t. Eh, lads?”
His guardmoles, all of whom had travelled from Merthyr in the south with him, nodded grimly. They were small, dark moles, and between themselves spoke their own soft-accented dialect.