Once Upon an Autumn Eve (31 page)

Shortly thereafter, Gwyd came riding Pied Agile up and over a slope on the plateau.
Ah, that’s why I didn’t see him.

As the Brownie reached Liaze, he asked, “Ye hae found a way adown?”

“Twk and Jester did,” said Liaze, switching the packhorse tethers to Pied Agile. She took the food sack and one of the water bags from a gelding and lashed them to Nightshade’s saddle, saying, “We’ll need these if the packhorses can’t come down laden.” She mounted and looked at Gwyd. “I’ll ride down first, and if I deem the geldings can get through, I’ll blow three short calls on Luc’s horn, and then you follow. If I blow many long calls, it will mean I think the path too narrow for the horses and their packs; in that case, unlade the geldings—all but the remaining water bags and the crystal decanters and bridge; those we must have.”

“Aye,” said Gwyd. “If need be, I’ll drop the rest o’ the gear here. Now be off wi’ ye, f’r the moon yet be sailin apace through the skies and gettin darker by the day.”

Liaze wheeled the stallion, and down the path she went. Soon she was lost to Gwyd’s sight as she passed under the overhang.

The path broadened, yet to the fore loomed a dark hole in an outjutting projection in the stone flank of the precipice, and into the gape the path plunged.
What’s this? A tunnel?

She reached the opening and dismounted, for the way was quite low.
I will have to pull Nightshade’s head down to enter.
“Steady, my lad,” she murmured to the stallion, praying to Mithras that he would not balk, and into the opening she stepped.

Nightshade followed without shying.

“Whoever trained you, boy, he had to be a horse-man
extraordinaire
.”

On they passed, the light fading as they went, Liaze cautiously in the lead, making certain the footing was sure.

Around a gentle curve they paced, and ahead Liaze could see light, and soon they were again in the open, a looming cliff face to the left, a sheer drop to the right. Yet the way was wide, and Liaze mounted once more and on down they fared.

It took most of a candlemark for them to reach the bottom, and Twk on Jester called out, “Welcome, Princess. Where’s Gwyd?”

“Waiting for my signal,” said Liaze. “I had to make certain the laden packhorses could walk the entire route.”

Twk clutched at his heart in mock distress and cried out, “You doubted?” And then the Pixie broke into giggles.

Liaze laughed and dismounted and raised Luc’s horn toward the precipice above and blew three short calls. High up and leftward she saw Gwyd wave, and then the Brownie stepped back out of sight.

Shortly, they saw the horses and Gwyd begin the descent, and Liaze murmured to Twk, “I just hope he can figure out how to get the horses through the tunnel.”

“Why is that?” asked the Pixie.

“The ceiling is quite low,” said Liaze.

“Not for me and Jester,” said Twk, and he broke into giggles again. But then he sobered and said, “I recked you would find a way, Princess.”

Now Gwyd came to the passageway entrance. Liaze watched as he dismounted Pied Agile. The Brownie stood looking at the opening and scratching his head.

Liaze took Nightshade’s reins in hand and turned the horse sideways to the cliff, and then she knelt and pulled the stallion’s head down.

After a moment, Gwyd took Pied Agile’s reins and pulled her head down and led her within the opening. The following gelding balked.

Gwyd reappeared and pulled that horse’s head down and started inward, but the packhorse would not go. Gwyd turned to the horse, and a moment later he led the gelding within.

“What did he do?” asked Twk.

“He either sweet-talked the animal, or he slapped it in the jaw,” said Liaze.

Once more Gwyd reappeared, and he led the second packhorse into the gap, this one without any trouble whatsoever. Then he led the third and the fourth ones through.

The sun had set and twilight had fallen when the Brownie finally reached the foot of the cliff.

They rode on a bit till full night came, and they paused to give the animals a drink from the river, and they fed them some grain. Then they waited for the moon, four days past full, to rise and light their way. Onward they fared, yet finally they stopped for the night. As they set camp, Liaze said, “I think I know the answers to Verdandi’s rede.”

“You do?” asked Twk, his eyes flying wide in amaze.

“What be they, lass?” asked Gwyd, looking up from the fire he was laying.

“Well, part of it we already know,” said Liaze, dropping the gear from the second packhorse to the ground and turning to unlade the others.

“But not all,” said Twk, darting into the food sack and fumbling about, then rushing back out bearing jerky.

As Liaze curried the animals, she said, “Remember the rede:

“The first four lines we think we know—”

“Yes, yes,” said Twk. “But what about the last six lines?”

“Well, back atop the precipice, as I looked at the twilight boundary ahead, I thought of what we know of serpents, and then I knew the answers to Verdandi’s rede.”

“What be it we ken o’ snakes?” asked Gwyd.

“They have no ears,” said Liaze.

“No ears?” blurted Twk. “What does that have to do with anything?”

“Their hearing is poor, and though they can detect airborne sound—some say through their jawbone—they hear mainly through their skin,” said Liaze.

Twk sighed in exasperation. “Yes, yes, but—”

“Twk, Twk, ma laddie,” said Gwyd, striking flint to steel and setting the tinder to light and putting it in among the dried grass, “j’st let the princess finish.” The Brownie began gently blowing upon the glowing ember.

“This means serpents can feel vibrations in the ground; it’s one way they track prey and avoid predators.”

Twk started to say something, but a glare from Gwyd silenced him before he could speak.

“Oui, Twk, I think I know what you were going to add: that they can also see and taste and some think they can sense the body warmth of their game. Yet, heed: Verdandi said, ‘Ground your lyre and ground it well / For you to cast the needed spell.’ But I am no spellcaster, so what might that mean? I think she is telling us that music will put the serpent asleep.”

“Will? Or might?” said Gwyd, looking up from the flames now consuming the dry grass of his campfire. “Remember, lass, Verdandi said, ‘Sleep must come, if it comes at all,’ and t’me that means she’s not certain.”

“Be still, Gwyd, and let the princess finish,” said Twk.

Gwyd smiled and began feeding twigs to the blaze.

“I think if I set the base of the harp well into the ground,” said Liaze, “perhaps even dig a small hole and tamp soil about the base, and if I pluck the strings hard—hard enough for the serpent to feel the vibrations through the earth—and play a soothing air, then the creature might fall into slumber.”

“I see,” said Twk, breaking his own admonition. “Sleep must come, if it comes at all, / For one to thrive beyond the wall.”

“Oui,” said Liaze, smiling at the wee Pixie. “And that one who will thrive beyond the wall is Gwyd as he goes after one of Mithras’ apples.”

“Why can’t it be me who goes after the apple?” asked Twk.

Gwyd roared in laughter. “What? Ye? Why, the apple might fall on ye and crush ye flat.”

“Then I’ll take Jester,” said Twk.

“No,” said Liaze. “Recall, the rede says for
one
to thrive beyond the wall, and you and Jester make two.”

“Aye,” said Gwyd, “The princess be right, laddie buck. It hae t’be me.”

Twk sighed and nodded glumly, then said, “What about the last two lines?”

“ ‘Take only one else one will die, / As will the one ’neath ebon sky,’ ” quoted Liaze. “That means for us to take only one apple, for were we to try to take two of them, I deem the serpent will awaken, and Gwyd will not be able to escape; and if he does not get away with an apple, then Luc will also die there on the black mountain, for we will have no golden draught.”

“Aye, Princess,” said Gwyd. “When I delayed e’en a scant moment on ma most recent apple-takin, the serpent almost made the last o’ me.”

Tears welled in Liaze’s eyes, and she paused in her currying. “Oh, Gwyd, ’tis a perilous thing you do, and I—”

“Hush now, Princess,” said Gwyd, “f’r this be the way o’ it: ’tis ye who must play the well-grounded harp, and I who must retrieve the apple. We’ll fare all right, I ween.”

“But what about me and Jester?” asked Twk. “What are we to do?”

“Nought that I can see at the moment,” said Liaze.

“Bu-but Verdandi said that I and mine—Jester, I think—would be needed at a critical time,” said Twk.

“Then, Twk,” said Gwyd, now feeding larger branches to the fire, “this be not the time.”

 

As he had done every day, Jester announced the coming of dawn, and shortly thereafter the trio was on the way. Down through the rest of the wide vale they rode, and in midmorn they passed through the twilight marge to come into an arid plain.

“Oh, Gwyd, have we missed the right point to go through the bound?”

“Nae, Princess,” said Gwyd. “This do be the land o’ the garden.”

“But it is so sere,” said Twk. “How can a garden grow in such a place as this?”

“There be a bit o’ water, Twk, where the garden lies,” said Gwyd. Then he turned to Liaze. “Princess, head f’r that darkness low on the horizon; they be mountains adistant.”

And so, across the dry plain they ran, and dust flew up from galloping hooves. In sparse clumps here and there only thorny weeds grew, and the horses passed among them.

Galloping, walking, trotting, cantering, all day they fared toward the mountains afar, and Liaze wondered if the horses were making any progress at all. Often Liaze stopped to water the steeds, after which she fed them grain as they walked.

“You are certain there is water where we go?” asked Liaze, adding, “We will be bone-dry when we get there.”

“Aye, Princess, a small stream meanders down fra the mountains and into the garden. Snowmelt, I ween, f’r it takes y’r breath away wi’ its chill.”

“Ah,” said Twk, “that’s what feeds the apple tree among all this dust.”

“Indeed,” said Gwyd, and on they rode. “But who would hae thought t’plant it here t’begin wi’?”

“Mithras,” said Twk with finality.

On they pressed as the sun sailed up and across the sky and then fell toward the horizon. And then it set, and Jester fell asleep. They moved more slowly until the gibbous moon rose five days past full to shine brightly down upon them, and Liaze picked up the pace again.

But at last, ahead in the near distance a wall of stones loomed. “There, Princess,” said Gwyd, “there be the garden.”

“I see it,” said Liaze.

“Weel,” said Gwyd, “I think ye need t’leave the horses here, else they’ll be affrighted by the smell o’ the snake.”

Liaze haled the horses to a halt and dismounted. Gwyd jumped down and stepped back to Twk, and the wee Pixie dropped to the Brownie’s shoulder, leaving Jester asleep behind. Then Liaze and Gwyd with Twk aboard strode toward the rock enclosure, and as they neared, within the walls beyond they could hear the rustling of the great serpent, sleepless and standing ward.

34

L
iaze eyed the rough stone wall, some twelve feet high and perhaps forty paces in length from corner to corner, or so it was on this bound of the garden. “Are the other sides as this one?”

“Aye, lass,” said Gwyd. “It be square, though ’round the corner”—Gwyd gestured to the left—“there be a gate.”

“A gate?”

“Aye. Ye can look through and see the tree and beastie, though the bars are set too close f’r me t’squeeze through.”

“Could I get through?” asked Twk.

“Aye,” said Gwyd, turning leftward, “ye could. Howe’er, the snake’d snap ye up like ye was nought but a morsel.”

With the Pixie on his shoulder, the Brownie led the princess to a great bronze gate set midway along the stretch of the wall. Past narrow-set, heavy bars laden with filigree, in the moonlight Liaze could see in the center of the stone-walled garden a tall, yellow-leafed tree burdened with golden apples agleam in the argent glow. “Oh, Gwyd, how beautif—” Of a sudden, Liaze gasped, for coiled ’round the base of the tree lay a huge, great-girthed snake, its scales blotches of brown and tan held in a gold-laced pattern. And it raised its head and its long forked tongue flicked in and out as it
tasted
the spoor of these interlopers standing just beyond the portal.

“Oh, my,” said Liaze.

Twk edged a bit behind Gwyd’s collar. “Are you certain it won’t come over the wall, Gwyd?”

“Nothin be certain, Twk,” said Gwyd, “yet it ne’er did so in the past when I escaped wi’ the fruit.”

Liaze took a deep breath and said, “Well, I suppose there’s nothing for it but that we fetch the harp and see if we can put this monster to sleep.”

They turned and started back toward the horses. “Where lies the stream, Gwyd?”

“On the far side, Princess.”

“Since there is no wind, I would ride the horses ’round and tether them fast, if there are trees.”

“There be no trees, lass, but brush instead.”

“That will do. Besides, I would gather some of that brush for a fire.”

“A fire, Princess?” asked Twk.

“Yes, for though I can play the harp in total blackness, this night I would see the strings as I do so. Besides, I plan on having my bow strung and an arrow ready, and I would not wish to fumble about in the dark in the event they are needed.”