Pattern (15 page)

Poldarn frowned. He could see, intuitively, what the problem was; for some reason, Asburn was having trouble finding the minds of the rest of the household. He could think of several reasons why that might be, the likeliest being that since he'd been working in the forge, Asburn had had to get used to communicating in words, the old-fashioned way, and that was what had upset his inner eye or third ear, or whatever the proper term for it might be. My fault, like everything else around here, Poldarn told himself, though that was patently untrue.

The fire, he noticed, was drawing just fine on nothing more than dry coal and a handful of wood shavings. Why can't I get it to do that? he asked himself.

‘Same here,' he said. ‘All I've been doing all day is getting under people's feet, so I came in here to hide till it's all over. Need any help?'

Asburn thought for a moment. ‘The hinges are more of a one-man job, really,' he said. ‘If you felt like it, you could draw down a few dozen nails. They'll be needing them, God knows, when they come to fix up all this damage.'

He said
they
, Poldarn noticed;
they
, not
we
. He must really be out of touch. ‘Sure,' he replied. ‘Nails I can just about manage. Have you seen the header?'

‘There, under the bench. And there should be some stock the right size in the scrap if you don't mind rummaging about for it.'

Poldarn nodded, and knelt down beside the mountain of rusty iron and steel that filled one entire corner of the smithy. Mostly, looking through the scrap just made him feel depressed, because he knew perfectly well that he wouldn't even know where to start making most of the things that had ended up in there, and that anything he made would probably be inferior in quality and utility to the piece of broken junk he'd made it out of. How did one go about making a kettle, for example, or a door latch or a pair of tongs or a trivet or a candleholder or a pitchfork or an arrowhead or a spoon or a horseshoe or a sconce or a shovel or a ploughshare? He supposed he could figure it out if he absolutely had to, but he'd have burned a whole continent of coal and hammered the anvil bow-backed by the time he produced anything he'd be prepared to admit to being responsible for. And there, on the other hand, was the scrap; a thousand properly made articles, representing tens of thousands of hours of hard, skilled work by men who'd known and appreciated their craft, and they'd ended up here, defenceless prisoners awaiting execution at his hands. It was a tragedy.

(Except, he realised, that iron and steel are immortal. Men die and the damp gets into their bodies and spoils them, but iron and steel are too precious to waste. The broken tyre becomes a hinge, the broken sword becomes a cart-spring, the broken ploughshare becomes a spearhead, the broken pot becomes a ladle, the spindle that was once an axle that was once a beam becomes a handful of nails, and nothing ever dies. All that happens is that the metal is purged by the fire of the memory that had been pounded into it. The heat relaxes the constraints that hold it in one shape and the hammer eases it into some new form, a new life in a new setting – from field to house, yard to barn, war to peace, malignant to benign, lethal to helpful, like a man who wakes up one morning to find that his past has burned away, his identity scrubbed off like firescale. Fire and hammer impose the memory, fire and hammer grant pardon and amnesty; which may go some way to explain why superstitious people worship them as gods. It would, after all, be an easy mistake to make.)

A fat drop of water splashed on Poldarn's forehead, making the burnt skin sting.

Chapter Seven

T
he cinderfall stopped quite suddenly; and when the sun broke through they could see the mountain clearly, without any veils of smoke or steam. True, the landscape was an even dull black as far as the eye could see in every direction, but at least they could tell where it ended and the sky began. Things were looking up.

The first consideration, ahead of the house or even the barns and stores, was the livestock. The news wasn't good; a third of the sheep were dead, a quarter of the heifers, the horses had broken out of the stables in panic and bolted, and there hadn't been time to get the milch herd in, so God only knew what sort of a state they were in. The poultry and the pigs were all right, singed and distinctly offended at being cooped up for a day and two nights but still alive and productive. The bees had swarmed and cleared off, but that could happen at any time, end of the world or not.

Once the stock had been fed and secured, the next priority was patching up the buildings. When the drifts of cinders had been cleared away, the damage proved to be far less than anybody had any right to expect, in most cases little more than scorch marks and the filthy mess brought about by the hasty addition of water to piles of ash. Ugliness could wait for another day, however. Next on the list was clearing the yard, so people could get around the place without having to wade. Shovelling cinders into neat heaps wasn't exactly skilled work, and even Poldarn was allowed to join in (which, since it meant a holiday from the forge, he was delighted to do, until his grandfather spoiled it all by asking for more nails).

A day and a half of intense activity broke the back of that job; and, since the mountain was quiet and the farm now just looked scruffy instead of doomed, Halder convened a general meeting to decide what to do next.

Understandably, full household meetings were extremely rare events at Haldersness. This time, however, nobody knew what was going on or what would happen next or what they were supposed to be doing, so there really wasn't any option but to talk to each other.

‘It's obvious what we've got to do,' Halder said. ‘It's going to be one hell of a job, but I can't see as we've got any choice in the matter. Right now, all the grazing and the plough is a foot deep in this shit; the animals can't feed, nothing's going to grow, and the bloody stuff isn't going to shift itself. It'll take us months, maybe even years, but it's got to be done, and the sooner we make a start, the sooner we'll finish.'

Someone at the back stood up. Poldarn was sitting near the front and couldn't get his head round far enough to see who it was. ‘That may not be the case,' this someone said. ‘Remember what Rook here told us, about what happened at Lyatsbridge when it rained.'

‘Bloody hell,' Raffen interrupted, ‘don't wish that on us, it's bad enough as it is.'

‘Let me finish, will you? All I'm saying is, what happened at Lyatsbridge proves one thing. When it rains, this stuff melts, like snow. Sure, it turns into filthy black mud and we really don't want to be around when that happens; but we can plan for that, we can figure out where these mudslides are going to go just by looking at the contours, and we can get the stock and our stuff well out of harm's way. What's the worst that can happen? The buildings could get washed away or buried in shit or whatever. So what? Big deal. We build new ones. So long as we're alive and safe and we've got our tools, we can do that, easy. Anyhow, it's not as if it's up to us, the mudslides'll happen whether we like it or not. All I'm saying is, rather than kill ourselves shovelling the stuff into big heaps and then seeing it turn into mud at the first drop of rain, we'd be better off spending our time getting ready, making sure we don't cop it like Lyatsbridge did; and when the rain's come and gone and it's all over, the grass and the plough'll still be there and we can get back to normal.'

A soft buzz of approval ran round the hall. Halder stood up again.

‘Fine,' he said, ‘assuming it's going to rain in the next few days. If it doesn't, what're the stock going to eat? And what are we going to eat in four months' time, when the crop's failed because we left it lying under a bloody great load of ashes?'

Someone else at the back – it might have been Seyward, or Torburn – called out, ‘It'll rain, count on it. You looked at the mountain? All the snow's gone. I'm no weather expert, but it stands to reason that the snow turned to steam and it's up there somewhere right now, waiting to come down in a damn great flood. It'll rain all right, you'll see, and then we'll have rivers of mud, just like they did at Lyatsbridge. And I for one don't want to be here when that happens.'

It's not just me, Poldarn thought, it's all of them, they're shocked. Hardly surprising. All the time he'd been there, he'd never once heard anybody deliberately separating himself from Halder's viewpoint like that. He could see it in their eyes, a definite spark of panic as they realised what the mountain could do to them, over and above burning, burying and killing.

‘All right,' Halder said, raising his voice even though the hall was deathly quiet, ‘it isn't going to come to that, and yes, you've got a very good point there, something we've definitely got to bear in mind. But we've got to think about all the possibilities.'

‘I agree.' This time it was one of the women – Aldeur, he was fairly certain, Scaptey's daughter; a tall, spare, gaunt-faced woman who washed clothes. ‘And there's one we haven't even mentioned yet, though if you ask me it's the best idea of the lot. Look, this is a huge island, it's so big there's a lot of it nobody's even been to yet. Who says we've got to stay here? After all, what's here? It's just a house, and feeling comfortable because we know every stone and blade of grass in the valley. What've we got here that we wouldn't have if we upped sticks and went somewhere else? I'll tell you what, shall I? A horrible bloody great fire-breathing mountain, that's what, and you know, I think we'd be better off without it. After all – no offence, Halder, but it's got to be said – it won't be all that long before we're pulling this house down and building another one anyhow; so why the hell build it here, up to our necks in hot ashes, never knowing from one day to the next if we aren't going to wake up one morning cooked like a chicken in a crock? I'm telling you, I don't think I'll ever feel safe again so long as we're here, I'll spend all day long looking over my shoulder to see if the mountain's on the go again. It's a nice place, but it's just a place. I've got kids to consider, and I think their lives are more important than a few old traditions.' She paused, and frowned. ‘There was more stuff I was going to say but I can't remember what it was now. Anyhow, that's what I think, and I'll bet you I'm not the only one.'

Poldarn felt sorry for Halder; he looked like he was having a long, hard day. ‘Well,' he said, ‘there's definitely something to be said for that. Let's see who agrees with her. Right, anybody who thinks we should leave here and go somewhere else, stick your hand up.'

Aldeur's hand shot up straight away. Nobody else moved.

‘That's that settled, then,' Halder said. ‘It's a good idea, but let's try and come up with something else. Anybody?'

Nobody. Poldarn wriggled uncomfortably on his bench. He'd come very close to putting his hand up when Halder called the vote, but he'd been waiting for someone else (apart from Aldeur) to go first. By the looks of it, he hadn't been the only one to do that.

‘Fine,' Halder said. ‘So, basically we've got two options. One is to get stuck in and start clearing away this ash, the other is to wait and let the rain do it for us, assuming there's going to be any more rain – and yes, I grant you, it looks like it'll come tipping down any day now. The question is, do we all really want to bet our livelihood and our lives – same thing, really – on a weather forecast. Because you know what rain's like, it's an evil bugger; pisses down for weeks on end when you don't want it to, but when you need it desperately, it stays up there and will it hell as like come down. A week, we could probably manage. Three weeks, we're looking at losing the stock and next year's crop. It's a simple bet. Personally, if I was going to put everything I've got on a wager, I'd rather stick to the horse racing. It's easier to gauge form.'

Perhaps, Poldarn thought, I ought to form an opinion on this; after all, I'm part of this household, I should act like one and care. Of course, that would constitute getting involved—

‘Halder's right.' Eyvind was on his feet, and everybody was looking at him, for a change. It occurred to Poldarn, for the first time, that Eyvind was an outsider too, he didn't belong to Haldersness, he had his own house on the other side of the mountain. In which case, he asked himself, what's he doing here? Shouldn't he be back home scraping ash off his own fields, or packing up his own pots and pans? What's keeping him here?

‘Sure,' Eyvind was saying, ‘we've got to think about mud-slides. The worst thing anybody can say in a crisis is, I never thought of that. But sitting tight and doing nothing, or going and camping out while the sun shines, that doesn't make sense either. I say we've got to get the ash off the pasture and the ploughed ground first – keep an eye on the weather, I agree, but while we're waiting for it to rain, let's for God's sake do something useful.'

People were nodding their heads, muttering approval; even Aldeur, who'd wanted to leave the farm altogether just a moment ago. It was good to see the joint mind gradually coming back together, after the disconcerting spectacle of so many component parts starting to think for themselves. However— To his surprise, Poldarn found he was on his feet and about to say something.

‘All due respect,' he heard himself say, ‘but I'm not sure you've thought this thing through, either of you. You're saying, let's go and rake up the ash, like we raked up the yard. All right, now ask yourselves, how long did that take? All of you, working together, very hard? Now then. Any one of you knows a damn sight better than I do how large this farm is, how many head of cattle you're grazing, how many acres you've got ploughed and planted, so I'm not going to try and come up with any figures. You can do that for yourselves. How long's it going to take to clear the ash off enough ground to make doing the job worthwhile? A month? A year? Ten years? All right, you do the figuring. While you're doing that, ask yourselves this. If the whole household's out there dawn to dusk shovelling cinders, what about all the other work that needs to be done around the place? I've been watching ever since I got here, it takes all of you all of your time just to keep things running normally. That's fine; everybody's got work, everybody knows what to do, there's no waste of time or effort or materials. But everything's changed now – you can't just carry on doing what you've always done, you've got to deal with this new situation. And, to be honest with you, I don't see how any of the ideas that've been put forward is going to be enough, except maybe what she said just now: packing up and going somewhere else entirely. But you all agreed you didn't want to do that.'