The Way to Babylon (Different Kingdoms) (15 page)

‘Well, this Giant—Myrca was the name he called himself by, though he was called by many another—grew so full of pride and arrogance that he wanted to have his face stamped for ever into the faces of the folk in the valley. So he made them build a statue of him, and it was the same size as himself. The Dwarves of the mountains he forced into labour as well, for they were handier with stone, and hardier—but he forgot that they are also stronger in heart than most folk, and most likely to avenge an insult. So they built the statue, and a wondrous sight it was, towering over the Dale and darkening the houses of the people with its shadow—but what do you think, when he looked at it closer, did he see? He saw that the stone was shaped in his likeness, down to the very club he carried, and he was well pleased by that; but when he looked at the face he saw that it was hewn in the likeness of a great pig, with little eyes and drooling chops and a long snout. Then he was not pleased, and his roars flew down the valley to terrify the people. And what did he do? Well, he raised his club, long as a fair-sized tree, and he smote the statue so it crumbled into fragments—but did the fragments not then stand up and start to move around his feet? And did he not see then that everyone was a stern-eyed soldier with hands of stone? And they slew him there and then, and his bones enriched the soil, so that the Dale was ever afterwards one of the richest in the land. But the soldiers who slew him: they called themselves the Myrcans, and their great host split up among all the Dales of Minginish to guard the folk of the world from Giants. And so it is today that the Myrcans, a few to every people in the land, hold the Dales safe from the beasts that come out of the mountains.’

The fire rustled, and Bicker yawned. ‘Not much of a story, but it passes the time.’ He looked at the sky. ‘We’ll be wetter before the morning. Get some sleep, and I’ll do the watching for a while.’

But Riven woke up in the dead hour before dawn to find Bicker standing beside him with a drawn sword, and his head up like a hound’s on a scent.

‘What is it? What’s wrong?’

‘Nothing, I think. An odd smell on the wind. Nothing.’ He sheathed his sword. ‘But we’ll move out now, nonetheless, break our fast in some other place.’ And he helped Riven’s chilled fingers to pack in the pre-dawn gloom.

T
HE SUN ROSE
in a clear sky, drying out their damp clothes and warming Riven’s aching legs.

I’ll get metal fatigue if this goes on much longer.

He wondered how far they had walked in the past couple of days, and preferred to give up calculating when he found he was adding together miles walked on Skye and here, in this place, Minginish.

Just take it as it comes.

‘There’s smoke ahead,’ he said, noticing. He glanced at Bicker, who seemed pleased.

‘I see it. But don’t worry. We are expected.’ One raised finger halted his companion’s questions. Riven threw a few choice words around in his head, but held his peace.

Another mile, and they had reached a small camp fire with a group of figures gathered around it. Two were animals, built like large grey dogs, who sat on their haunches and eyed the newcomers warily, sniffing the wind. The other two were human. They stood up as Bicker and Riven approached, one huge and broad, the other slight—smaller than Bicker. They both wore grins on their faces as the travellers reached them.

‘Out of the misty island and looking twice as ugly as the day he was born,’ the smaller one said. He was dressed in a linen shirt with a coat of sheepskin and breeches of leather. A sword hilt rose up behind one shoulder, and in his brown face gleamed eyes blue as a lochan under a clear sky. The two wolves took their place at his side.

Riven frowned as he saw him.

‘Murtach, you smell like a dead sheep in high summer,’ Bicker rejoined, slapping him on the shoulder and sparing a hand for the two wolves to lick. They sidled round him and Riven, sniffing at the strange smells, their yellow eyes deep and eager. Riven froze as a wet nose was pushed into the palm of his hand.

‘And what about me, you spawn of a hill fox? Have you no word for Ratagan?’ The big man was also clad in sheepskins, but he wore a blue sash around his waist with the haft of an axe tucked through it. His face was blunt as a crag, written over with lines of mirth, and a red beard jutted out from it, the sunshine setting it alight. He picked Bicker up as though he were a child and shook him until his teeth rattled.

‘Hair of the dog!’ Bicker cried. ‘I would have spoken sooner if I’d known you were sober—’ and he was flung on the ground. He landed catlike, and the attention of the other two fell on Riven, so that he wondered if he were to be thrown around like a rag as well.

‘And you have brought the Teller of Tales with you,’ Murtach said. ‘He looks a mite healthier than when I last saw him.’ The small man came forward and bent in a low bow. ‘Murtach Mole at your service, Michael Riven. It is a while I have waited to see you in Minginish.’

‘Molesy!’ Riven cried.

Murtach grinned, showing teeth startlingly white against his brown face. ‘The very same.’ Then he bent like an old man, and said in a Highland accent: ‘So how are ye today, Mister Riven?’

Riven could only gape, astonished.

‘Are you on your own, or are there others out?’ Bicker asked Murtach.

‘Two Myrcans watch over us even as we speak,’ he replied. ‘Their woodcraft is woeful, but they are roving the hills around us to discourage pursuit.’

Bicker raised his eyebrows. ‘Myrcans. You must have had a well-oiled tongue to persuade them to join a party such as this.’

Murtach sobered. ‘Much has changed while you were away, Bicker. The snows have gone for the moment, but even so few venture into the hills at any time now. The easing of the weather has not lessened the attacks of the mountain creatures.’

Bicker grimaced. ‘We’ll talk of it later when we have a roof over our heads. I have much to tell the Warbutt.’

‘That will be no one-sided talk, I fear,’ Ratagan said, kicking out the fire. ‘He’s not been holding his toes since you left. There are changes at the Rorim, also.’

‘That can wait, though,’ Murtach put in. ‘We’d best be moving; there are miles ahead of us yet, though the day is not old.’

Bicker nodded. Ratagan and Murtach slung their packs, and the company set off briskly, the two wolves loping ahead. They made great speed, for the ground was good and the morning was still cool. Riven stumbled along in their midst, his mind reeling with questions which he knew better than to ask.

It’s Thursday. And yesterday it was Wednesday, and the day before that I was on Skye. I had bacon and eggs for breakfast. It was a nice morning. A nice morning.

These are the labours of your imagining.

But what is going on here? How can this happen?

What is happening to me?

SEVEN

T
HEY WALKED ALL
day at a pace that was punishing for Riven, and he began to feel like a hounded prisoner. He was glad to see the approach of dusk, but with it came the sight of a dark line across the horizon ahead.

‘Scarall Wood,’ said Bicker. ‘We have made good time. We will camp there tonight and be in Ralarth Rorim by evening tomorrow.’ He looked at Murtach. ‘What of the Myrcans?’

‘They rejoin us at dusk. If we camp on the southern edge of the wood, they should find us easily enough.’

They reached the eaves of the wood an hour later, and Ratagan immediately hefted his axe and stood guard whilst the others set up camp. Fife and Drum threw themselves on to the ground, panting like dogs. Their yellow eyes seemed to glow in the gloom.

Soon after they had the fire lit, there was a rustle of dead leaves, and two men stood in their midst as if they had sprung out of the ground. Riven bit back an exclamation of surprise and took a good look at his first Myrcans.

In his books they had been taciturn mercenaries who took service under the Dale lords. From what Bicker had told him, however, it seemed their role was more subtle than that. It was strange watching the characters of his imagination alive, walking and talking with him; almost like being on a vast film set. Both terrifying and exhilarating. Perhaps the weirdest thing was that these characters of his had a life of their own, sides to them that he had never imagined in his stories. They were, he supposed, necessarily more complex, as life was more complex than any man’s art. Two questions gnawed at him, however: first, had he brought Minginish to life, somehow, or was he merely tapping into it for his stories? And second, how?

The Myrcans who stood there were somehow more brutal in appearance than he had ever envisaged. Riven had never seen men who looked more solid, more part of the earth. They were short, broad-shouldered and powerfully built, and they seemed to crouch as though ready to spring. Their hair was black and cropped almost to the scalp, and they were clean-shaven. They wore close-fitting leather breeches, stout knee-high boots, and heavy jerkins of hide which seemed to be reinforced with glinting mesh at the shoulders, the chest and the groin. Around their waists were blue sashes like Ratagan’s. They bore in their blunt hands five-foot staves of dark wood which were bound all along their length with metal rings that glinted in the firelight.

Their faces were dark, their eyes like black stones. Both of them wore a stripe of white paint on their faces from ear to ear, running across the bridge of the nose. They might have been twins. No one spoke as they took their places by the fire. Eventually Ratagan broke the silence with a rumble from where he stood at the edge of the light.

‘What news, my friends?’

The metal-bound staff flashed as the Myrcan responded. ‘Naught to the rear of us. The land is empty. We saw winter wolves, but they are far off now. The melting of the snows has sent the beasts retreating to the High Ground.’

The Myrcan was staring at Riven with uncomfortable intensity. He shifted uneasily, and whispered to Bicker: ‘Tell him I’m friendly, will you?’

Bicker smiled. ‘Ord, this is Michael Riven, the Teller of Tales. He is the one Murtach has spoken to you about, who comes from the Isle beyond the sea to help us.’ Then Bicker turned to Riven. ‘These are Ord and Unish. They are of the Myrcans.’

‘I’m honoured,’ said Riven, partly because he felt he should say something, and partly because he wished to allay any suspicions these formidable natives might harbour about him.

The Myrcans regarded him unsmilingly, and then their gaze left him. He was tired and irritated, and no one would tell him anything. He pulled out his sleeping bag—which made the Myrcans stare again—and wrapped himself in it whilst the others prepared food.

The ground under him quivered for a moment, then was still. He frowned and sat up, felt the place with his hands.

‘What is it?’ Bicker asked.

‘Nothing. I thought I felt... something.’

‘In the ground?’

‘It was my imagination,’ said Riven, feeling a fool.

But Bicker and Murtach were exchanging glances. ‘Scarall is all right, isn’t it?’ Bicker was saying.

Murtach looked worried. ‘I thought so.’

Then the ground underneath Riven gave a heave, and sagged. He jumped to his feet. ‘Shit. There’s something under there. Something moved.’

The company stood up, weapons hissing out of sheaths. Fife and Drum began growling low in their throats, eyes luminous in the firelight.

‘What is it? What’s wrong?’ Riven demanded angrily.

And the ground erupted beside him.

A great clay-black shape sprang from the soil and launched itself at him. Stone-hard paws smashed him to the ground, and outlined above him by the fire was the head of a huge dog or hound, eyeless, black-mawed. Then the Myrcan staves crashed into its back, and it leapt at them with a howl. Riven crawled backwards, mind white with shock, and saw a black hound six feet long throwing the Myrcans about as though they were dolls, whilst the two wolves snapped uselessly at its heels. Bicker’s sword came whistling down on its flank with a crack, and bounced off, taking only a few chips out of the creature.

Chips?

It did not bleed, and where the sword had struck it was a shallow white scar the colour of new wood.

Wood? Something from a far memory hammered at the back of his mind. A subterranean, wooden hound—but there was no time to speculate.