Bell Mountain (The Bell Mountain Series) (9 page)

They would have been astounded to know that as they stopped, hours later, for rest and a bite to eat, their names were on the lips of a very important personage.

Far away in Obann City, in the Temple itself, in a very nicely appointed private study with thick rugs and rich hangings on the walls, the First Prester, Lord Reesh, angrily rattled a sheet of reed paper in his hand.

“Do you know what this is?” he said. “It’s a letter from the burned fool who’s the prester at the new chamber house in a place called Ninneburky. It’s almost all the way up the river.”

“I know the town, my lord,” said the other man in the room—an unremarkable-looking fellow with a sad face and a little pointed beard.

“Good. Because you’re going there,” Lord Reesh said. “As soon as I explain this.

“Two children from Ninneburky have run away to climb Bell Mountain. You are to find them. If they are still on their way to the mountain when you overtake them, don’t interfere. Follow them. See to it that they get there. I want to know every single thing that happens to them, Martis. If they climb the mountain, climb after them. If they get to the top and find a bell, you are to prevent them from touching it, and no one is ever to see or hear from them again.”

The people of Ninneburky, even the prester himself, would have been appalled to learn that the First Prester had a confidential servant whose duties included killing people. For that is what Martis did, in addition to ferreting out secrets, spying, stealing, and arranging for certain persons to be accused of and punished for crimes they hadn’t committed. Not even the other oligarchs knew about Martis. To everyone in the city, he was only a clerk in the Temple. He even looked like a clerk.

But to Lord Reesh—who considered himself the first oligarch as well as the First Prester—he was a very necessary tool. And because he had served Lord Reesh for years, and never failed him, Martis enjoyed a certain liberty in speaking to his master.

“Do you think a pair of children might actually climb the mountain, my lord?” he said.

Reesh snorted, and dropped himself into the sturdy, well-padded chair behind his hardwood desk. He was old and fat, and the letter had jangled his nerves.

“Don’t tell me you haven’t made a study of the Scriptures, Martis,” he said.

“I am aware of the verse in Penda in which King Ozias speaks his intention to place a bell atop Mount Yul, sir. It’s not recorded whether he actually did so. I’m surprised Your Lordship takes it seriously.”

“I know the verse, and you know the verse,” Reesh said, “but there’s no way under the sun that an ignorant boy in an upriver village knows the verse! But then he didn’t get his idea from studying the Old Books. According to the prester in Ninneburky—who’s too scared out of his skin to lie—the curs’t boy dreamed it. He dreamed about the bell on Bell Mountain!”

“Surely someone at the chamber house put the notion in his head,” Martis said.

“Don’t be so reasonable, Martis. It irritates me. I’m the theologian here, not you. And I say that if a child has a dream like this, there’s a fair chance that he’ll get to the top of the mountain. Besides which—I’ve had the same dream myself.”

To this Martis had no answer, and was wise enough not to venture a foolish one.

“I’m an old man,” Reesh went on, “and I’ve seen and heard many things. Of course there have always been lunatics who tried to climb Bell Mountain. Most of them died trying. A few, madder than the rest, pretended they’d been to the top and come back down. My predecessors in this office silenced them.

“Even if I were convinced that these two children were as deluded as the others, now is hardly the time to indulge such fantasy. By this time next year, we shall have a major war on our hands, and we won’t want the people distracted by talk of Bell Mountain. But in this case, Martis, it’s not just idle talk and moonshine. The boy’s dream proves it.”

“My lord, that is an extraordinary thing for you to say.”

“Do you think it gives me pleasure to say it? I, who’ve believed in nothing all my life but the stability of the state and the mission of the Temple to hold the state together while we all try to claw our way out of barbarism?

“Until I received this letter, I dismissed my own dreams as the ramblings of an overworked mind in its old age. Now I suppose that if we made an investigation, we’d find that many people have had this dream—the very old, the very young; slaves and shepherds and servant girls; trappers alone in the woods. You know what I mean.”

Martis nodded. He knew. “There is a verse in Prophet Ika, I believe,” he said, “about such people having dreams.”

Lord Reesh glared at his servant, as if to pierce him with his pale blue eyes—tired and old and watery, but for a moment keen as steel.

“If there is a bell up on that mountain, Martis, I want to know,” he said. “And under no circumstances is that bell to be rung. If it is ever to be rung, that decision will be made here, in this office, by me or by my successor.”

Martis bowed. “I understand perfectly, my lord. You can rely on me.”

Lord Reesh was glad Martis hadn’t made a fuss about assassinating children.

This was the day Jack made his first kill with the slingshot. It was a lucky shot, right in the head.

“Jack, you got him! Our supper!” Ellayne cried. But Jack was already on the run, in case his prey was only stunned and were to get up and run away before he could lay his hands on it.

Jack had not shot a rabbit or a woodchuck, but a good-sized bird that ran about in zigzags instead of trying to fly away. It had long legs and a long neck, and it was like no bird Jack had ever seen or heard of. Its feathers were colored a dirty white with brown streaks and speckles. It had big orange eyes and a sturdy hooked bill that was more like a hawk’s bill than anything else—if there could be such a thing as a long-legged hawk that ran instead of flew. Certainly its wings looked like the bird ought to have been able to fly, if it wanted to. And it had a crest of long black feathers at the back of its head.

Jack’s lucky shot had killed it outright, and there it lay.

“What kind of bird is that?” Ellayne wondered.

“I don’t know. It looks like something that might be in that book of yours.”

“Do you think it’s fit for eating?”

“We’re going to find out by eating it,” Jack said. “It’s big enough to make a good supper.”

Wytt summoned them with a burst of chirps and whistles. He’d found the bird’s nest. It was just a hole in the ground, lined with soft feathers, and the large grey eggs looked like stones. Ellayne took all four of them for their breakfast.

They’d come far enough the day before to gain the next hilltop with time to spare. Like the first, its flattened top was a scattering of ruins, isolated bits of wall and cracked pavement. But what most interested them was the view from the top, facing south.

“So that’s Lintum Forest!” Ellayne said. “We ought to be there in another day or two. But please—no going in! It stretches for as far as the eye can see. If we ever got lost in there, we’d never find our way out.”

“It can’t be so bad, if King Ozias was born there,” Jack said.

“My father says it’s full of outlaws and rebels. And witches, too, I expect.”

“It is part of Obann, though. There must be settlers and foresters.”

“Only a fool would go in.”

They made camp under the shelter of a sturdy wall, had the bird for supper (rabbit was a lot tastier, Jack thought), and fell asleep by their fire. Wytt found water in the morning, and once they’d refilled their waterskin, they set off toward the forest.

Martis, having made excellent time on horseback by traveling straight through the night along the River Road, was already halfway to Ninneburky.

You could see the forest from the hilltop, but not from the plain. But knowing it was there made a difference. Ellayne didn’t think her legs were half as tired as they were yesterday. Funny, she thought, the forest had been there all along. Never having seen it, still they’d believed it was there; and so believing, they’d made a great march south across the empty plain. It made her think that King Ozias’ bell was really there, too, waiting for them atop the mountain.

“I think the grass is getting greener,” Jack said, after they’d hiked a long way without saying anything.

“I do believe it is,” Ellayne said. “And look—there are little yellow flowers in it.”

They went a little farther, devoting all their energies to the march, until an unexpected sound startled them—the clank of metal on metal.

A man appeared before them, with a donkey in tow, as startling a sight as could be imagined on that uninhabited plain. He must have come up from lower ground because they didn’t see him until he topped a rise right in front of them. He carried a staff and wore a broad-brimmed hat, and his donkey carried a massive pack that included some pots and pans that clanked against each other.

Jack and Ellayne stopped in their tracks. Wytt disappeared into the grass and underbrush. The man saw them just as he started down from the top of the rise, but he didn’t stop. He did grin at them.

“Well, well!” he said. “Who would’ve thought to run into any company out here? Hello there, my pups! What brings you out here to the middle of nowhere?”

Jack didn’t like being called a pup, and he didn’t know what to say. All he could think was that somehow this man would try to take them back to Ninneburky. He wondered if they ought to try to run away. The man was short and stout with short legs. He might not be able to catch them.

Before he could make up his mind, Ellayne answered for them.

“We’re on our way to Lintum Forest,” she said, “to visit the Seven Hags of Balamadda. Can you tell us how much farther it is?”

“Aye, that I can,” said the man. “But if we’re going to swap yarns and enjoy each other’s company, why don’t we settle down and have a fire? I’ll brew us some tea.

“Hesket the Tinker, that’s my name. This land is my land, as I’m the only one who makes use of it. Who might you be, and where do you come from? It’s been a long, long time since I’ve met anyone out here.”

“I’m Tom, and this is my brother, Jack,” Ellayne said. “We come from Obann City, and we’ve come a long way.”

Hesket whistled in his beard—black, shot through with grey. “Indeed you have!” he said. “Obann City, is it? Never been there myself. Always meant to go someday, but who knows if that day will ever come? But why are we standing here? Pick up some sticks, and let’s have a fire.”

Jack didn’t like him, but could hardly say so to his face. What did Ellayne have to go telling tales for? And there she was, already gathering fuel for a fire. All he could do was go along with it.

So they had a fire, and Hesket pulled a pot from the donkey’s pack and a couple of tin cups, and they had tea—when they should have been pressing on to the forest, Jack thought.

“What are you doing out here, Mr. Hesket?” Ellayne asked. “We’ve been walking on this plain for days and days, and haven’t seen a soul.”

“Oh, I wander about. That’s my nature,” Hesket said. “But I’m surprised that two lads like you should’ve come so far. And who are these seven hags? I never heard of them.”

“Well, they’re quite famous,” Ellayne said, as Jack marveled at her. “Everyone’s heard of them in Obann.”

“It seems to me I ought to go along with you, just to make sure you get there safe and sound,” Hesket said. “There are a lot of queer people where you’re headed.”

“But then you’d have to turn around,” Ellayne said. “There’s no need for you to go out of your way. We’ll be all right.”

“To me, one way’s as good as another. So it’s settled: I’m going with you. Here, now, have some more tea. Your brother Jack don’t talk much, do he?”

Hesket filled their cups again. Burn him, Jack thought. Ordinarily he liked a cup of tea when he could get it, and to be fair, Hesket’s tea was as good as any Jack had ever tasted. But they were wasting time; and besides which, he felt funny. He felt a great deal more tired than he had any right to be. It was an odd kind of tired, almost as if his legs were trying to go to sleep on him.