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The Weirdstone of Brisingamen Text © Alan Garner 1960 The Moon of Gomrath Text © Alan Garner 1963

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9780007539062 (The Weirdstone of Brisingamen), 9780007539048 (The Moon of Gomrath)

Ebook edition © SEPTEMBER 2015 ISBN 9780008164386

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CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

The Weirdstone Of Brisingamen

The Moon of Gomrath

Keep Reading

About the Publisher

CONTENTS

Cover

Title Page

Map

Epigraph

The Legend of Alderley

PART ONE

1. Highmost Redmanhey

2. The Edge

3. Maggot-breed of Ymir

4. The Fundindelve

5. Miching Mallecho

6. A Ring of Stones

7. Fenodyree

PART TWO

8. Mist over Llyn-dhu

9. St Mary’s Clyffe

10. Plankshaft

11. Prince of the Huldrafolk

12. In the Cave of the Svartmoot

13. “Where No Svart Will Ever Tread”

14. The Earldelving

15. A Stromkarl Sings

16. The Wood of Radnor

17. Mara

18. Angharad Goldenhand

19. Gaberlunzie

20. Shuttlingslow

21. The Headless Cross

MAP

In every prayer I offer up, Alderley, and all belonging to it, will be ever a living thought in my heart.

REV. EDWARD STANLEY: 1837

THE LEGEND OF ALDERLEY

At dawn one still October day in the long ago of the world, across the hill of Alderley, a farmer from Mobberley was riding to Macclesfield fair.

The morning was dull, but mild; light mists bedimmed his way; the woods were hushed; the day promised fine. The farmer was in good spirits, and he let his horse, a milk-white mare, set her own pace, for he wanted her to arrive fresh for the market. A rich man would walk back to Mobberley that night.

So, his mind in the town while he was yet on the hill, the farmer drew near to the place known as Thieves’ Hole. And there the horse stood still and would answer to neither spur nor rein. The spur and rein she understood, and her master’s stern command, but the eyes that held her were stronger than all of these.

In the middle of the path, where surely there had been no one, was an old man, tall, with long hair and beard. “You go to sell this mare,” he said. “I come here to buy. What is your price?”

But the farmer wished to sell only at the market, where he would have a choice of many offers, so he rudely bade the stranger quit the path and let him through, for if he stayed longer he would be late to the fair.

“Then go your way,” said the old man. “None will buy. And I shall await you here at sunset.”

The next moment he was gone, and the farmer could not tell how or where.

The day was warm, and the tavern cool, and all who saw the mare agreed that she was a splendid animal, the pride of Cheshire, a queen among horses; and everyone said that there was no finer beast in the town. But no one offered to buy. A sour-eyed farmer rode out of Macclesfield at the end of the day.

At Thieves’ Hole the mare stopped: the stranger was there.

Thinking any price was now better than none, the farmer agreed to sell. “How much will you give?” he said.

“Enough. Now come with me.”

By Seven Firs and Goldenstone they went, to Stormy Point and Saddlebole. And they halted before a great rock embedded in the hillside. The old man lifted his staff and lightly touched the rock, and it split with the noise of thunder.

At this, the farmer toppled from his plunging horse and, on his knees, begged the other to have mercy on him and let him go his way unharmed. The horse should stay; he did not want her. Only spare his life, that was enough.

The wizard, for such he was, commanded the farmer to rise. “I promise you safe conduct,” he said. “Do not be afraid; for living wonders you shall see here.”

Beyond the rock stood a pair of iron gates. These the wizard opened, and took the farmer and his horse down a narrow tunnel deep into the hill. A light, subdued but beautiful, marked their way. The passage ended, and they stepped into a cave, and there a wondrous sight met the farmer’s eyes – a hundred and forty knights in silver armour, and by the side of all but one a milk-white mare.

“Here they lie in enchanted sleep,” said the wizard, “until the day will come – and come it will – when England shall be in direst peril, and England’s mothers weep. Then out from the hill these must ride and, in a battle thrice lost, thrice won, upon the plain, drive the enemy into the sea.”

The farmer, dumb with awe, turned with the wizard into a further cavern, and here mounds of gold and silver and precious stones lay strewn along the ground.

“Take what you can carry in payment for the horse.”

And when the farmer had crammed his pockets (ample as his lands!), his shirt, and his fists with jewels, the wizard hurried him up the long tunnel and thrust him out of the gates. The farmer stumbled, the thunder rolled, he looked, and there was only the rock above him. He was alone on the hill, near Stormy Point. The broad full moon was up, and it was night.

And although in later years he tried to find the place, neither he nor any after him ever saw the iron gates again. Nell Beck swore she saw them once, but she was said to be mad, and when she died they buried her under a hollow bank near Brindlow wood in the field that bears her name to this day.

PART ONE

CHAPTER 1
HIGHMOST REDMANHEY

The guard knocked on the door of the compartment as he went past. “Wilmslow fifteen minutes!”

“Thank you!” shouted Colin.

Susan began to clear away the debris of the journey – apple cores, orange peel, food wrappings, magazines, while Colin pulled down their luggage from the rack. And within three minutes they were both poised on the edge of their seats, case in hand and mackintosh over one arm, caught, like every traveller before or since, in that limbo of journey’s end, when there is nothing to do and no time to relax. Those last miles were the longest of all.

The platform of Wilmslow station was thick with people, and more spilled off the train, but Colin and Susan had no difficulty in recognising Gowther Mossock among those waiting. As the tide of passengers broke round him and surged through the gates, leaving the children lonely at the far end of the platform, he waved his hand and came striding towards them. He was an oak of a man: not over tall, but solid as a crag, and barrelled with flesh, bone, and muscle. His face was round and polished; blue eyes crinkled to the humour of his mouth. A tweed jacket strained across his back, and his legs, curved like the timbers of an old house, were clad in breeches, which tucked into thick woollen stockings just above the swelling calves. A felt hat, old and formless, was on his head, and hobnailed boots struck sparks from the platform as he walked.

“Hallo! I’m thinking you mun be Colin and Susan.” His voice was gusty and high-pitched, yet mellow, like an autumn gale.

“That’s right,” said Colin. “And are you Mr Mossock?”

“I am – but we’ll have none of your ‘Mr Mossock’, if you please. Gowther’s my name. Now come on, let’s be having you. Bess is getting us some supper, and we’re not home yet.”

He picked up their cases, and they made their way down the steps to the station yard, where there stood a green farm-cart with high red wheels, and between the shafts was a white horse, with shaggy mane and fetlock.

“Eh up, Scamp!” said Gowther as he heaved the cases into the back of the cart. A brindled lurcher, which had been asleep on a rug, stood and eyed the children warily while they climbed to the seat. Gowther took his place between them, and away they drove under the station bridge on the last stage of their travels.

They soon left the village behind and were riding down a tree-bordered lane between fields. They talked of this and that, and the children were gradually accepted by Scamp, who came and thrust his head on to the seat between Susan and Gowther. Then, “What on earth’s that?” said Colin.

They had just rounded a corner: before them, rising abruptly out of the fields a mile away, was a long-backed hill. It was high, and sombre, and black. On the extreme right-hand flank, outlined against the sky, were the towers and spires of big houses showing above the trees, which covered much of the hill like a blanket.

“Yon’s th’Edge,” said Gowther. “Six hundred feet high and three mile long. You’ll have some grand times theer, I con tell you. Folks think as how Cheshire’s flat as a poncake, and so it is for the most part, but no wheer we live!”

Nearer they came to the Edge, until it towered above them, then they turned to the right along a road which kept to the foot of the hill. On one side lay the fields, and on the other the steep slopes. The trees came right down to the road, tall beeches which seemed to be whispering to each other in the breeze.

“It’s a bit creepy, isn’t it?” said Susan.

“Ay, theer’s some as reckons it is, but you munner always listen to what folks say.

“We’re getting close to Alderley village now, sithee: we’ve not come the shortest way, but I dunner care much for the main road, with its clatter and smoke, nor does Prince here. We shanner be going reet into the village; you’ll see more of yon when we do our shopping of a Friday. Now here’s wheer we come to a bit of steep.”

They were at a crossroad. Gowther swung the cart round to the left, and they began to climb. On either side were the walled gardens of the houses that covered the western slope of the Edge. It was very steep, but the horse plodded along until, quite suddenly, the road levelled out, and Prince snorted and quickened his pace.

“He knows his supper’s waiting on him, dunner thee, lad?”

They were on top of the Edge now, and through gaps in the trees they caught occasional glimpses of lights twinkling on the plain far below. Then they turned down a narrow lane which ran over hills and hollows and brought them, at the last light of day, to a small farmhouse lodged in a fold of the Edge. It was built round a framework of black oak, with white plaster showing between the gnarled beams: there were diamond-patterned, lamp-yellow windows and a stone flagged roof: the whole building seemed to be a natural part of the hillside, as if it had grown there. This was the end of the children’s journey: Highmost Redmanhey, where a Mossock had farmed for three centuries and more.

“Hurry on in,” said Gowther. “Bess’ll be waiting supper for us. I’m just going to give Prince his oats.”

Bess Mossock, before her marriage, had been nurse to the children’s mother; and although it was all of twelve years since their last meeting they still wrote to each other from time to time and sent gifts at Christmas. So it was to Bess that their mother had turned when she had been called to join her husband abroad for six months, and Bess, ever the nurse, had been happy to offer what help she could. “And it’ll do this owd farmhouse a world of good to have a couple of childer brighten it up for a few months.”

She greeted the children warmly, and after asking how their parents were, she took them upstairs and showed them their rooms.

When Gowther came in they all sat round the table in the broad, low-ceilinged kitchen were Bess served up a monstrous Cheshire pie. The heavy meal, on top of the strain of travelling, could have only one effect, and before long Colin and Susan were falling asleep on their chairs. So they said good night and went upstairs to bed, each carrying a candle, for there was no electricity at Highmost Redmanhey.

“Gosh, I’m tired!”

“Oh, me too!”

“This looks all right, doesn’t it?”

“Mm.”

“Glad we came now, aren’t you?”

“Ye-es …”

CHAPTER 2
THE EDGE

“If you like,” said Gowther at breakfast, “we’ve time for a stroll round before Sam comes, then we’ll have to get in that last load of hay while the weather holds, for we could have thunder today as easy as not.”

Sam Harlbutt, a lean young man of twenty-four, was Gowther’s labourer, and a craftsman with a pitchfork. That morning he lifted three times as much as Colin and Susan combined, and with a quarter of the effort. By eleven o’clock the stack was complete, and they lay in its shade and drank rough cider out of an earthenware jar.

Later, at the end of the midday meal, Gowther asked the children if they had any plans for the afternoon.

“Well,” said Colin, “if it’s all right with you, we thought we’d like to go in the wood and see what there is there.”

“Good idea! Sam and I are going to mend the pig-cote wall, and it inner a big job. You go and enjoy yourselves. But when you’re up th’Edge sees you dunner venture down ony caves you might find, and keep an eye open for holes in the ground. Yon place is riddled with tunnels and shafts from the owd copper mines. If you went down theer and got lost that’d be the end of you, for even if you missed falling down a hole you’d wander about in the dark until you upped and died.”

“Thanks for telling us,” said Colin. “We’ll be careful.”

“Tea’s at five o’clock,” said Bess.

“And think on you keep away from them mine-holes!” Gowther called after them as they went out of the gate.

It was strange to find an inn there on that road. Its white walls and stone roof had nestled into the woods for centuries, isolated, with no other house in sight: a village inn, without a village. Colin and Susan came to it after a mile and a half of dust and wet tar in the heat of the day. It was named The Wizard, and above the door was fixed a painted sign which held the children’s attention. The painting showed a man, dressed like a monk, with long white hair and beard: behind him a figure in old-fashioned peasant garb struggled with the reins of a white horse which was rearing on its hind legs. In the background were trees.

“I wonder what all that means,” said Susan. “Remember to ask Gowther – he’s bound to know.”

They left the shimmering road for the green wood, and The Wizard was soon lost behind them as they walked among fir and pine, oak, ash, and silver birch, along tracks through bracken, and across sleek hummocks of grass. There was no end to the peace and beauty. And then, abruptly, they came upon a stretch of rock and sand from which the heat vibrated as if from an oven. To the north, the Cheshire plain spread before them like a green and yellow patchwork quilt dotted with toy farms and houses. Here the Edge dropped steeply for several hundred feet, while away to their right the country rose in folds and wrinkles until it joined the bulk of the Pennines, which loomed eight miles away through the haze.

The children stood for some minutes, held by the splendour of the view. Then Susan, noticing something closer to hand, said, “Look here! This must be one of the mines.”

Almost at their feet a narrow trench sloped into the rock.

“Come on,” said Colin, “there’s no harm in going down a little way – just as far as the daylight reaches.”

Gingerly they walked down the trench, and were rather disappointed to find that it ended in a small cave, shaped roughly like a discus, and full of cold, damp air. There were no tunnels or shafts: the only thing of note was a round hole in the roof, about a yard across, which was blocked by an oblong stone.

“Huh!” said Colin. “There’s nothing dangerous about this, anyway.”

All through the afternoon Colin and Susan roamed up and down the wooded hillside and along the valleys of the Edge, sometimes going where only the tall beech stood, and in such places all was still. On the ground lay dead leaves, nothing more: no grass or bracken grew; winter seemed to linger there among the grey, green beeches. When the children came out of such a wood it was like coming into a garden from a musty cellar.

In their wanderings they saw many caves and openings in the hill, but they never explored further than the limits of daylight.

Just as they were about to turn for home after a climb from the foot of the Edge, the children came upon a stone trough into which water was dripping from an overhanging cliff, and harmigh in the rock was carved the face of a bearded man, and underneath was engraved:

DRINK OF THIS

AND TAKE THY FILL FOR THE WATER FALLS BY THE WIZHARDS WILL

“The wizard again!” said Susan. “We really must find out from Gowther what all this is about. Let’s go straight home now and ask him. It’s probably nearly tea-time, anyway.”

They were within a hundred yards of the farm when a car overtook them and pulled up sharply. The driver, a woman, got out and stood waiting for the children. She looked about forty-five years old, was powerfully built (“fat” was the word Susan used to describe her), and her head rested firmly on her shoulders without appearing to have much of a neck at all. Two lines ran from either side of her nose to the corners of her wide, thin-lipped mouth, and her eyes were rather too small for her broad head. Strangely enough, her legs were thin and spindly, so that in outline she resembled a well-fed sparrow, but again that was Susan’s description.

All this Colin and Susan took in as they approached the car, while the driver eyed them up and down more obviously.

“Is this the road to Macclesfield?” she said when the children came up to her.

“I’m afraid I don’t know,” said Colin. “We’ve only just come to stay here.”

“Oh? Then you’ll want a lift. Jump in!”

“Thanks,” said Colin, “but we’re living at this next farm.”

“Get into the back.”

“No, really. It’s only a few yards.”

“Get in!”

“But we …”

The woman’s eyes glinted and the colour rose in her cheeks.

“You – will – get – into – the back!”

“Honestly, it’s not worth the bother! We’d only hold you up.”

The woman drew breath through her teeth. Her eyes rolled upwards and the lids came down until only an unpleasant white line showed; and then she began to whisper to herself.

Colin felt most uncomfortable. They could not just walk off and leave this peculiar woman in the middle of the road, yet her manner was so embarrassing that he wanted to hurry away, to disassociate himself from her strangeness.

“Omptator,” said the woman.

“I … beg your pardon.”

“Lapidator.”

“I’m sorry …”

“Somniator.”

“Are you …?”

“Qui libertar opera facitis …”

“I’m not much good at Latin …”

Colin wanted to run now. She must be mad. He could not cope. His brow was damp with sweat, and pins and needles were taking all awareness out of his body.

Then, close at hand, a dog barked loudly. The woman gave a suppressed cry of rage and spun round. The tension broke; and Colin saw that his fingers were round the handle of the car door, and the door was half-open.

“Howd thy noise, Scamp,” said Gowther sharply.

He was crossing the road opposite the farm gate, and Scamp stood a little way up the hill nearer the car, snarling nastily.

“Come on! Heel!”

Scamp slunk unwillingly back towards Gowther, who waved to the children and pointed to the house to show that tea was ready.

“Th – that’s Mr Mossock,” said Colin. “He’ll be able to tell you the way to Macclesfield.”

“No doubt!” snapped the woman. And, without another word, she threw herself into the car, and drove away.

“Well!” said Colin. “What was all that about? She must be off her head! I thought she was having a fit! What do you think was up with her?”

Susan made no comment. She gave a wan smile and shrugged her shoulders, but it was not until Colin and she were at the farm gate that she spoke.

“I don’t know,” she said. “It may be the heat, or because we’ve walked so far, but all the time you were talking to her I thought I was going to faint. But what’s so strange is that my Tear has gone all misty.”

Susan was fond of her Tear. It was a small piece of crystal, shaped like a raindrop, and had been given to her by her mother, who had had it mounted in a socket fastened to a silver chain bracelet which Susan always wore. It was a flawless stone, but, when she was very young, Susan had discovered that if she held it in a certain way, so that it caught the light just … so, she could see, deep in the heart of the crystal, miles away, or so it seemed, a twisting column of blue fire, always moving, never ending, alive, and very beautiful.

Bess Mossock clapped her hands in delight when she saw the Tear on Susan’s wrist. “Oh, if it inner the Bridestone! And after all these years!”

Susan was mystified, but Bess went on to explain that “yon pretty dewdrop” had been given to her by her mother, who had had it from her mother, and so on, till its origin and the meaning of the name had become lost among the distant generations. She had given it to the children’s mother because “it always used to catch the childer’s eyes, and thy mother were no exception!”

At this, Susan’s face fell. “Well then,” she said, “it must go back to you now, because it’s obviously a family heirloom and …”

“Nay, nay, lass! Thee keep it. I’ve no childer of my own, and thy mother was the same as a daughter to me. I con see as how it’s in good hands.”

So Susan’s Tear had continued to sparkle at her wrist until that moment at the car, when it had suddenly clouded over, the colour of whey.

“Oh, hurry up, Sue!” said Colin over his shoulder. “You’ll feel better after a meal. Let’s go and find Gowther.”

“But Colin!” cried Susan, holding up her wrist. She was about to say, “Do look!” but the words died in her throat, for the crystal now winked at her as pure as it had ever been.

CHAPTER 3
MAGGOT-BREED OF YMIR

“And what did owd Selina Place want with you?” said Gowther at tea.

“Selina Place?” said Colin. “Who’s she?”

“You were talking to her just before you came in, and it’s not often you see her bothering with folks.”

“But how do you know her? She seemed to be a stranger round here, because she stopped to ask the way to Macclesfield.”

“She did what? But that’s daft! Selina Place has lived in Alderley for as long as I con remember.”

“She has?”

“Ay, hers is one of the big houses on the back hill – a rambling barn of a place it is, stuck on the edge of a cliff. She lives alone theer with what are supposed to be three dogs, but they’re more like wolves, to my way of thinking, though I conner rightly say as I’ve ever seen them. She never takes them out with her. But I’ve heard them howling of a winter’s night, and it’s a noise I shanner forget in a hurry!

“And was that all she wanted? Just to know how to get to Macclesfield?”

“Yes. Oh, and she seemed to think that because we’d only recently come to live here we’d want a lift. But as soon as she saw you she jumped into the car and drove away. I think she’s not quite all there.”

“Happen you’d best have a word with yon,” said Bess. “It all sounds a bit rum to me. I think she’s up to summat.”

“Get away with your bother! Dick Thornicroft’s always said as she’s a bit cracked, and it looks as though he’s reet. Still, it’s as well to keep clear of the likes of her, and I shouldner accept ony lifts, if I were you.

“Now then, from what you tell me, I con see as how you’ve been a tidy step this afternoon, so let’s start near the beginning and then we shanner get ourselves lost. Well, you place wheer you say theer was such a grand view is Stormy Point, and the cave with the hole in the roof is the Devil’s Grave. If you run round theer three times widdershins Owd Nick’s supposed to come up and fetch you.”

And so, all through their meal, Gowther entertained Colin and Susan with stories and explanations of the things they had seen in their wanderings, and at last, after frequent badgering, he turned to the subject of the wizard.

“I’ve been saving the wizard till the end. Yon’s quite a long story, and now tea’s finished I con talk and you con listen and we needner bother about owt else.”

And Gowther told Colin and Susan the legend of Alderley.

“Well, it seems as how theer was once a farmer from Mobberley as had a milk-white mare …

“… and from that day to this no one has ever seen the gates of the wizard again.”

“Is that a true story?” said Colin.

“Theer’s some as reckons it is. But if it did happen it was so long ago that even the place wheer the iron gates are supposed to be has been forgotten. I say yon’s nobbut a legend; but it makes fair telling after a good meal.”

“Yes,” said Susan, “but you know, our father has always said that there’s no smoke without a fire.”

“Ay, happen he’s getten summat theer!” laughed Gowther.

The meal over, Colin and Susan went with Gowther to take some eggs to an old widow who lived in a tiny cottage a little beyond the farm boundary. And when they were returning across the Riddings, which was the name of the steep hill-field above Highmost Redmanhey, Gowther pointed to a large black bird that was circling about the farmyard.

“Hey! Sithee yon carrion crow! I wonder what he’s after. If he dunner shift himself soon I’ll take my shotgun to him. We dunner want ony of his sort round here, for they’re a reet menace in the lambing season.”

Early in the evening Colin, who had been very taken with the legend of the wizard, suggested another walk on the Edge, this time to find the iron gates.

“Ay, well I wish you luck! You’re not the first to try, and I dunner suppose you’ll be the last.”

“Take your coats with you,” said Bess. “It gets chilly on the top at this time o’day.”

Colin and Susan roamed all over Stormy Point, and beyond, but there were so many rocks and boulders, any of which could have hidden the gates, that they soon tired of shouting “Abracadabra!” and “Open Sesame!” and instead lay down to rest upon a grassy bank just beneath the crest of a spur of the Edge, and watched the sun drop towards the rim of the plain.

“I think it’s time we were going, Colin,” said Susan when the sun had almost disappeared. “If we don’t reach the road before dark we could easily lose our way.”

“All right: but let’s go back to Stormy Point along the other side of this ridge, just for a change. We’ve not been over there yet.”

He turned, and Susan followed him over the crest of the hill into the trees.

Once over the ridge, they found themselves in a dell, bracken and boulder filled, and edged with rocks, in which were cracks, and fissures, and small caves; and before them a high-vaulted beech wood marched steeply down into the dusk. The air was still and heavy, as though waiting for thunder; the only sound the concentrated whine of mosquitoes; and the thick sweet smell of bracken and flies was everywhere.

“I … I don’t like this place, Colin,” said Susan: “I feel that we’re being watched.”

Colin did not laugh at her as he might normally have done. He, too, had that feeling between the shoulder blades; and he could easily have imagined that something was moving among the shadows of the rocks: something that managed to keep out of sight. So he gladly turned to climb back to the path.

They had moved barely a yard up the dell when Colin stopped and laughed.

“Look! Somebody is watching us!”

Perched on a rock in front of them was a bird. Its head was thrust forward, and it stared unwinkingly at the two children.

“It’s the carrion crow that was round the farm after tea!” cried Susan.

“Talk sense! How can you tell it’s the same one? There are probably dozens of them about here.”

All the same, Colin did not like the way the bird sat hunched there so tensely, almost eagerly, and they had to pass it if they wanted to regain the path. He took a step forward, waved his arms in the air, and cried “Shoo!” in a voice that sounded woefully thin and unfrightening.

The crow did not move.

Colin and Susan moved forward, longing to run, but held by the crow’s eye. And as they reached the centre of the dell the bird gave a loud, sharp croak. Immediately a cry answered from among the rocks, and out of the shadows on either side of the children rose a score of outlandish figures.

They stood about three feet high and were man-shaped, with thin, wiry bodies and limbs, and broad, flat feet and hands. Their heads were large, having pointed ears, round saucer eyes, and gaping mouths which showed teeth. Some had pug-noses, others thin snouts reaching to their chins. Their hides were generally of fish-white colour, though some were black, and all were practically hairless. Some held coils of black rope, while out of one of the caves advanced a group carrying a net woven in the shape of a spider’s web.

For a second the children were rooted; but only for a second. Instinct took control of their wits. They raced back along the dell and flung themselves through the gap into the beech wood. Fingers clawed, and ropes hissed like snakes, but they were through and plunging down the slope in a flurry of dead leaves.

“Stop, Sue!” yelled Colin.

He realised that their only hope of escape lay in reaching open ground and the path that led from Stormy Point to the road, where their longer legs might outdistance their pursuers’, and even that seemed a slim chance.

“Stop, Sue! We must … not go … down … any further! Find … Stormy Point … somehow!”

All the while he was looking for a recognisable landmark, since in the fear and dusk he had lost his bearings, and all he knew was that their way lay uphill and not down.

Then, through the trees, he saw what he needed. About a hundred feet above them and to their right a tooth-shaped boulder stood against the sky: its distinctive shape had caught his eye when they had walked past it along a track coming from Stormy Point!

“That boulder! Make for that boulder!”

Susan looked where he was pointing, and nodded.

They began to flounder up the hill, groping for firm ground with hands and feet beneath the knee-high sea of dead leaves. Their plunge had taken them diagonally across the slope, and their upward path led away from the dell, otherwise they would not have survived.

The others had come skimming lightly down over the surface of the leaves, and had found it difficult to check their speed when they saw the quick change of direction. Now they scurried across to intercept the children, bending low over the ground as they ran.

Slowly Colin and Susan gained height until they were at the same level as the pursuit, then above it, and the danger of being cut off from the path was no longer with them. But their lead was a bare ten yards, and shortening rapidly, until Colin’s fingers, scrabbling beneath the leaves closed round something firm. It was a fallen branch, still bushy with twigs, and he tore it from the soil and swung it straight into the leaders, who went clamouring, head over heels, into those behind in a tangle of ropes and nets.

This gained Colin and Susan precious yards and seconds, though their flight was still nightmare: for unseen twigs rolled beneath their feet, and leaves dragged leadenly about their knees. But at last they pulled themselves on to the path.

“Come on, Sue!” Colin gasped. “Run for it! They’re … not far … behind … now!”

The children drew energy from their fear. Above their heads a bird cried harshly three times, and at once the air was filled with the beating of a gong. The sound seemed to come from a distance, yet it was all about them, in the air and under the ground.

Then they ran clear of the trees and on to Stormy Point. But their relief was short-lived; for whereas till that moment they had been fleeing from twenty or so, they were now confronted with several hundred of the creatures as they came out of Devil’s Grave like ants from a nest.

Colin and Susan halted: gone was their last hope of reaching the road: the way was blocked to front and rear: on their left was the grim beech wood: to the right an almost sheer slope dropped between pines into a valley. But at least there was no known danger there, so the children turned their faces that way and fled, stumbling and slithering down a sandy path, till at last they landed at the bottom – only to splash knee-deep in the mud and leaf-mould of the swamp that sprawled unseen down the opposite wall of the valley and out across the floor.

They lurched forward a few paces, spurred on by the sound of what was following all too close behind, but then Susan staggered and collapsed against a fallen tree.

“I can’t go on!” she sobbed. “My legs won’t move.”

“Oh yes you can! Only a few more yards!”

Colin had spotted a huge boulder sticking out of the swamp a little way up the hill from where they were, and, if only they could reach it, it would offer more protection than their present position, which could hardly be worse. He grabbed his sister’s arm and dragged her through the mud to the base of the rock.

“Now climb!”

And, while Susan hauled herself up to the flat summit, Colin put his back to the rock, like a fox at bay turning to face the hunt.

The edge of the swamp was a mass of bodies. The rising moon shone on their leathery hides and was reflected in their eyes. Colin could see white shapes spreading out on either side to encircle the rock; they were in no hurry now, for they knew that escape was impossible.

Colin climbed after his sister. He ached in every muscle and was trembling with fatigue.

When the circle was complete the creatures began to advance across the swamp, moving easily over the mire on their splayed feet. Ever closer they came, till the rock was surrounded.

From all sides at once the ropes came snaking through the air, as soft as silk, as strong as iron, and clung to the children as though coated with glue; so that in no time at all Colin and Susan fell helpless beneath the sticky coils, and over them swarmed the mob, pinching and poking, and binding and trussing, until the children lay with only their heads exposed, like two cocoons upon the rock.

But as they were being hoisted on to bony shoulders it seemed as though a miracle happened. There was a flash, and the whole rock was lapped about by a lake of blue fire. The children could feel no heat, but their captors fell, hissing and spitting, into the swamp, and the ropes charred and crumbled into ash, while pandemonium broke loose through all the assembly.

Then, from the darkness above, a voice rang out.

“Since when have men-children grown so mighty that you must needs meet two with hundreds? Run, maggot-breed of Ymir, ere I lose my patience!”

The crowd had fallen silent at the first sound of that voice, and now it drew back slowly, snarling and blinking in the blue light, wavered, turned, and fled. The dazed children listened to the rushing feet as though in a dream: soon there was only the rattle of stones on the opposite slope; then nothing. The cold flames about the rock flickered and died. The moon shone peacefully upon the quiet valley.

And as their eyes grew accustomed to this paler light the children saw standing on the path beneath a cliff some way above them an old man, taller than any they had ever known, and thin. He was clad in a white robe, his hair and beard were white, and in his hand was a white staff. He was looking at Colin and Susan, and, as they sat upright, he spoke again, but this time there was no anger in his voice.

“Come quickly, children, lest there be worse than svarts abroad; for indeed I smell much evil in the night. Come, you need not fear me.”

He smiled and stretched out his hand. Colin and Susan climbed down from the rock and squelched their way up to join him. They were shivering in spite of their coats and recent exertions.

“Stay close to me. Your troubles are over though I fear it may be only for this night, but we must take no risks.”

And he touched the cliff with his staff. There was a hollow rumble, and a crack appeared in the rock, through which a slender ray of light shone. The crack widened to reveal a tunnel leading down into the earth: it was lit by a soft light, much the same as that which had scattered the mob in the swamp.

The old man herded Colin and Susan into the tunnel, and, as soon as they were past the threshold, the opening closed behind them, shutting out the night and its fears.

The tunnel was quite short, and soon they came to a door. The children stood aside while the old man fumbled with the lock.

“Where High Magic fails, oak and iron may yet prevail,” he said. “Ah! That has it! Now enter, and be refreshed.”

CHAPTER 4
THE FUNDINDELVE

They were in a cave, sparsely but comfortably furnished. There was a long wooden table in the centre, and a few carved chairs, and in one corner lay a pile of animal skins. Through the middle of the cave a stream of water babbled in the channel it had cut in the sandstone floor, and as it disappeared under the cave wall it formed a pool, into which the old man dipped two bronze cups, and offered them to Colin and Susan.

“Rest,” he said, pointing to the heap of skins, “and drink of this.”

The children sank down upon the bed and sipped the ice-cold water. And at the first draught their tiredness vanished, and a warmth spread through their limbs; their befuddled, shock-numbed brains cleared, their spirits soared.

“Oh,” cried Susan, as she gazed at their surroundings as though seeing them for the first time, “this can’t be real! We must be dreaming. Colin, how do we wake up?”

But Colin was staring at the old man, and seemed not to have heard. He saw an old man, true, but one whose body was as firm and upright as a youth’s; whose keen, grey eyes were full of the sadness of the wise; whose mouth, though stern, was kind and capable of laughter.

“Then the legend is true,” said Colin.

“It is,” said the wizard. “And I would it were not; for that was a luckless day for me.

“But enough of my troubles. We must discover now what is in you to draw the attentions of the svart-alfar, since it is indeed strange that men-children should cause them such concern.”

“Oh please,” interrupted Susan, “this is so bewildering! Can’t you tell us first what’s been happening and what these things were in the marsh? We don’t even know who you are, though I suppose you must be the wizard.”

The old man smiled. “Forgive me. In my disquiet I had forgotten that you have seen much that has been unknown to you.

“Who am I? I have had many names among many peoples through the long ages of the earth, and of those names some may not now be spoken, or would be foreign to your tongue; but you shall call me Cadellin, after the fashion of the men of Elthan, in the days to come, for I believe our paths will run together for a while.

“The creatures you encountered are of the goblin race – the svart-alfar, in their own tongue. They are a cowardly people, night-loving, and sun-loathing, much given to throttlings in dark places, and seldom venturing above ground unless they have good cause. They have no magic, and so, alone, are no danger to me; but it would have fared ill with you had I not known their alarm echoing through the hollow hill.

“And now you must tell me who you are, and what it is that has brought you into such danger this night.”

Colin and Susan gave an account of the events leading to their arrival in Alderley, and of their movements since.

“And this afternoon,” said Colin finally, “we explored the Edge, and spent the rest of the day on the farm until we came here again about half past seven, so I don’t see that we can have done anything to attract anybody’s attention.”

“Hm,” said Cadellin thoughtfully. “Now tell me what happened this evening, for at present I can find no reason in this.”

The children told the story of their flight and capture, and when they had finished the wizard was silent for some time.

“This is indeed puzzling,” he said at last. “The crow was sent to arrange your taking, and I do not have to guess by whom it was sent. But why the morthbrood should be concerned with you defeats me utterly; yet I must discover this reason, both for your safety and my own, for my destruction is their aim, and somehow I fear you could advance them in their work. Still, perhaps the next move will tell us more, for they will soon hear of what took place this night, and will be much alarmed. But I shall give you what protection I can, and you will find friends as well as enemies in these woods.”

“But why are you in danger?” said Susan. “And who are the – what is it? – morthbrood?”

“Ah, that is a long story for this hour, and one of which I am ashamed. But it is also, I suppose, one that you must hear. So, if you are rested, let us go together, and I shall show you part of the answer to your question.”

Cadellin led the children out of the cave and down a long winding tunnel into the very heart of the hill. And as they went the air grew colder and the strange light fiercer, turning from blue to white, until at last they came into a long, low cavern. An echoing sigh, like waves slowly rippling on a summer shore, rose and fell upon the air; and before the children’s eyes were the sleeping knights in their silver armour, each beside his milk-white mare, just as Gowther had described them in the legend, their gentle breathing filling the cave with its sweet sound. And all around and over the motionless figures the cold, white flames played silently.

In the middle of the cave the floor rose in the shape of a natural, tomb-like couch of stone; and here lay a knight comelier than all his fellows. His head rested upon a helmet enriched with jewels and circlets of gold, and its crest was a dragon. By his side was placed a naked sword, and on the blade was the image of two serpents in gold, and so brightly did the blade gleam that it was as if two flames of fire started from the serpents’ heads.

“Long years ago,” said Cadellin, “beyond the memory or books of men, Nastrond, the Great Spirit of Darkness, rode forth in war upon the plain. But there came against him a mighty king, and Nastrond fell. He cast off his earth-shape and fled into the Abyss of Ragnarok, and all men rejoiced, thinking that evil had vanished from the world for ever; yet the king knew in his heart that this could never be.

“So he called together a great assembly of wizards and wise men and asked what should be done to guard against the enemy’s return. And it was prophesied that, when the day should come, Nastrond must be victorious, for there would be none pure enough to withstand him since, by that time, he would have put a little of himself into the hearts of all men. Even now, it was said, he was pouring black thoughts from his lair in Ragnarok, and these would flow unceasingly about mankind until the strongest were tainted and he had a foothold in every mind.

“Yet there was hope. For the world might still be saved if a band of warriors, pure in heart, and brave, could defy him in his hour and compel him to sink once more into the Abyss. Their strength would not be in numbers, but in purity and valour. And so was devised the following plan.

“The king chose the worthiest of his knights, and went with them to Fundindelve, the ancient dwarf-halls, where they were put into enchanted sleep. This done, the most powerful magicians of the age began to weave a spell. Day and night they worked together, pausing for neither food nor sleep, and, at the end, Fundindelve was guarded by the strongest magic the world has known, magic that would stay the sleeping warriors from growing old or weak, and that no evil could ever break.

“The heart of the magic was sealed with Firefrost, the weirdstone of Brisingamen, and it and the warriors became my charge. Here I must stay, for ever keeping watch, until the time shall come for me to rouse the Sleepers and send them forth against the malice of Nastrond.”

“But, Cadellin,” asked Susan, “in these days how can you hope to win a fight with only a hundred and forty men on horseback?”

“Ah,” said the wizard, “you must remember that the hour of Nastrond is not yet at hand. It was prophesied that these few could prove his desolation, and I have faith: the wheel may turn full circle ere that day will come.”

This cryptic reply was hardly satisfying, but by the time Susan had tried to make sense of it and found that she could not, the wizard had resumed his tale.

“Now it happened that, at the Sealing of Fundindelve, there were not more than one hundred and thirty-nine pure white mares, in the prime of life, to be found anywhere. Therefore I was forced to wait for that one horse to complete my company, and when at last such a horse came my way, I little knew that it would be so dearly bought.

“But now I must leave this matter and speak of Nastrond. Word of what we had done at Fundindelve soon reached him, and he was both angry and afraid: yet his black art was of no avail against our stronghold. So he too devised a plan.

“In the next chamber to that of the Sleepers had been stored jewels and precious metals for the use of the king to help put right the ills of the world, if he should conquer Nastrond. This treasure, since it lay in Fundindelve, was safe as long as the spell remained unbroken; and although Nastrond had no thought for the treasure, he did desire most furiously to break the spell, for, if this were achieved, the Sleepers would wake and become normal men, who would grow old, and die, and pass away centuries before his return, since there would no longer be magic left upon the earth powerful to hold them once more ageless in Fundindelve.

“To this end he summoned the witches and warlocks of the morthbrood, and the lords of the svart-alfar, together with many of his own ministers, and put greed and a craving for riches in their hearts by telling them of the treasure that would be theirs if they could only reach it. And from that hour they have striven to find a way to break the spell. At first I had no need to fear, for the sorcery of the morthbrood, though powerful, and the hammers and shovels of svarts could have no effect where the art of Nastrond had failed. But then, on the day that I found the last white mare, disaster fell upon me.

“This light around us is the magic that guards all here, and its flames are torment to the followers of Nastrond: and the source of the magic, as I have said, rests in the stone Firefrost. While Firefrost remains, and there is light in Fundindelve, the Sleepers lie here in safety. Yet each day I dread that I shall see the flames tremble and give way to shadows, and hear the murmur of men roused from sleep, and the neigh of horses. For I have lost the weirdstone of Brisingamen!”

Cadellin’s voice trembled with rage and shame as he spoke, and he crashed the butt of his staff against the rock floor.

“Lost it?” cried Susan. “You can’t have done! I mean, if it’s a special stone it should be easy to find if it’s lying around somewhere in here … shouldn’t it?”

The wizard smiled grimly. “But it is not here. Of that, at least, I am certain. Come, and I shall show you proof of what I say.”

He beckoned the children towards an opening in the wall and into a short tunnel not more than thirty feet in length, and halfway down Cadellin stopped before a bowl-shaped recess about six inches high and a yard above the level of the floor.

“There is the throne of Firefrost,” he said, “and you will see that it is now vacant.”

They passed through into a cavern similar to the last, and Colin and Susan halted in awe.

Here lay the treasure, piled in banks of jewels, and gold, and silver, which stretched away into the distance like sand dunes in a desert.

“Oh,” gasped Susan, “how beautiful! Look at those colours!”

“You would not think them so beautiful,” said Cadellin, “if you had run through your fingers every diamond, pearl, sapphire, amethyst, opal, carbuncle, garnet, topaz, emerald, and ruby in the whole of this all too spacious cave, in search of a stone that is not there!

“I spent five years labouring in this cave, and as many weeks scouring every gallery and path in Fundindelve, but without success. I can only think that that knave of a farmer was a greedier and more cunning rogue than he appeared, and that, as he followed me from here, laden as he was with wealth, his eyes fell upon the stone, and he slyly took it without a word. Perhaps he thought it was merely a pretty bauble, or he may even have seen me replace it after I had tethered his horse with sleep while he crammed his pockets here.

“Seldom have I need to visit these quarters, and it was a hundred years before I next came this way and found that the stone had gone. First I searched here; then I went out into the world to seek the farmer or his family. But, of course, by this time he was dead, and I could not trace his descendants; and although my quest was discreet the morthbrood came to hear of it, and they were not long in guessing the truth. Throughout the region of the plain they coursed, and even to the bleak uplands of the east, towards Ragnarok, but neither they nor the ferreting svarts found what they sought. Nor, for that matter, did I.

“Should Firefrost come into Nastrond’s hand my danger would be great indeed; for although he is powerless against the magic it contains, if he could destroy the stone then the magic, too, would die away.

“Firefrost was an ancient spellstone of great strength before the present magic was sealed within, and it would not readily suffer destruction; so while the light shines here I know that somewhere the stone still lives, and there is hope.

“There you have the story of my troubles, and, I trust, the answer to your questions. Now you must return to your home, for the hour is late and your friends will be anxious – and they may have ample cause for worry if we cannot solve this evening’s problems soon!”

They went back into the Cave of the Sleepers, and from there climbed upwards by tunnels and vast caverns till the way was blocked by a pair of iron gates, behind which the tunnel ended in a sheer rock wall. The wizard touched the gates with his staff, and slowly they swung open.

“These were wrought by dwarfs to guard their treasures from the thievish burrowings of svarts, but without magic they would be of little use against what seeks to enter now.”

So saying, Cadellin laid his hand upon the wall, and a dark gap appeared in the blue rock, through which the night air flowed, cold and dew-laden.

It looked very black outside, and the memory of their recent fear made Colin and Susan unwilling to leave the light and safety of Fundindelve; but, keeping close to the wizard, they stepped through the gap, and stood once more beneath the trees on the hillside.

The gates and the opening closed behind them with a sound that made the earth shake, and as they grew used to the moonlight the children saw that they were standing before the tooth of rock that they had striven to reach as they floundered in the depths of the beech wood, with svart-claws grasping at their heels.

Away to the left they could make out the shape of the ridge above the dell.

“That’s where the svarts attacked us,” said Colin, pointing.

“You do not surprise me!” laughed the wizard. “Saddlebole was ever a svart-warren; a good place to watch the sun set, indeed!”

They walked up the path to Stormy Point. All was quiet: just the grey rocks, and the moonlight. When they passed the dark slit of the Devil’s Grave, Colin and Susan instinctively huddled closer to the wizard, but nothing stirred within the blackness of the cave.

“Do svarts live in all the mines?” asked Susan.

“They do. They have their own warrens, but when men dug here they followed, hoping that Fundindelve would be revealed; and when the men departed they swarmed freely. Therefore you must keep away from the mines now, at all cost.”

Cadellin took the children from Stormy Point along a broad track that cut straight through the wood as far as the open fields, where it turned sharply to twist along the meadow border skirting the woodland. This, the wizard said, was once an elf-road, and some of the old magic still lingered. Svarts would not set foot on it, and the morthbrood would do so only if hard pressed, and then they could not bear to walk there for long. He told the children to use this road if they had need to visit him, and not to stray from it: for parts of the wood were evil, and very dangerous. “But then,” he said, “you have already found that to be true!” It would be wiser, he thought, to stay away from the wood altogether, and on no account must they go out of doors once the sun had set.

The track came to an end by the side of The Wizard Inn, and they had gone barely a hundred yards from there when they heard the sound of hoofs, and round the corner ahead of them came the shape of a horse and cart, oil lamps flickering on either side.

“It’s Gowther!”

“Do not speak of me!” said Cadellin.

“Oh, but …” began Susan. “But …”

But they were alone.

“Wey back!” called Gowther to Prince. “Hallo theer! Dunner you think it’s a bit late to be looking for wizards? It’s gone eleven o’clock, tha knows.”

“Oh, we’re sorry, Gowther,” said Colin. “We didn’t mean to be late, but we were lost, and stuck in a bog, and it took us a long time to find the road again.”

He thought that this half-lie would be more readily accepted than the truth, and Cadellin obviously wanted to keep his existence a secret.

“Eh well, we’ll say no more about it then; but think on you’re more careful in future, for with all them mine holes lying around, Bess was for having police and fire brigade out to look for you.

“Now up you come: if you’ve been traipsing round in Holywell bog you’ll be wanting a bath, I reckon.”

On reaching the farm Colin and Susan wasted no time in dragging off their muddy clothes and climbing into a steaming bath-tub. From there they went straight to bed, and Bess, who had been fussing and clucking round like a hen with chicks, brought them bowls of hot, salted bread and milk.

The children were too tired to think, let alone talk, much about their experience, and as they drowsily snuggled down between the sheets all seemed to grow confused and vague: it was impossible to keep awake. Colin slid into a muddled world of express trains, and black birds, and bracken, and tunnels, and dead leaves, and horses.

“Oh gosh,” he yawned, “which is which? Are there wizards and goblins? Or are we still at home? Must ask Sue about … about … oh … knights … ask Mum … don’t believe in farmers … farm – no … witches … and … things … oh …”

He began, very quietly, to snore.

On the crest of the Riddings, staring down upon the farmhouse as it lay bathed in gossamer moonlight, was a dark figure, tall and gaunt; and on its shoulder crouched an ugly bird.

CHAPTER 5
MICHING MALLECHO

The next day was cool and showery. The children slept late, and it was turned nine o’clock when they came down for breakfast.

“I thought it best to let you have a lie in this morning,” said Bess. “You looked dead beat last neet; ay, and you’re a bit pale now. Happen you’d do better to take things easy today, and not go gallivanting over the Edge.”

“Oh, I think we’ve seen enough of the Edge for a day or two,” said Susan. “It was rather tiring.”

Breakfast was hardly over when a lorry arrived from Alderley station with the children’s bicycles and trunks, and Colin and Susan immediately set about the task of unpacking their belongings.

“What do you make of last night?” asked Susan when they were alone. “It doesn’t seem possible, does it?”

“That’s what I was wondering in bed; but we can’t both have imagined it. The wizard is in a mess, isn’t he? I shouldn’t like to live by myself all the time and be on guard against things like those svarts.”

“He said things worse than svarts, remember! I shouldn’t have thought anything could be worse than those clammy hands and bulging eyes, and their flat feet splashing in the mud. If it’s so, then I’m glad I’m not a wizard!”

They did not discuss their pursuit and rescue. It was too recent for them to think about it without trembling and feeling sick. So they talked mainly about the wizard and his story, and it was late afternoon before they had finished unpacking and had found a place for everything.

Colin and Susan went down to tea. Gowther was already at the table, talking to Bess.

“And a couple of rum things happened after dinner, too. First, I go into the barn for some sacks, and, bless me, if the place inner full of owls! I counted nigh on two dozen snoozing among the rafters – big uns, too. They mun be thinking we’re sneyed out with mice, or summat. I’ve never seen owt like it.

“And then again, about an hour later, a feller comes up to me in Front Baguley, and he asks if I’ve a job for him. I didner like his looks at all. He was a midget, with long black hair and a beard, and skin like owd leather. He didner talk as if he came from round here, either – he was more Romany than owt else, to my way of thinking; and his clothes looked as though they’d been borrowed and slept in.

“Well, when I tell him I dunner need a mon, he looks fair put out, and he starts to tell me his hard luck story, and asks me to give him a break, but I give him his marching orders instead. He dunner argue: he just turns on his heel and stalks off, saying as I might regret treating him like this before long. He seemed in a fair owd paddy! All the same, I think Scamp had best have the run of the hen-pen for a neet or two, just in case.”

The wizard had told Colin and Susan to keep their windows closed, no matter how hot and stuffy their bedrooms might become, so the colder weather was not unwelcome, and they slept soundly enough that night.

Not so Gowther. The furious barking of Scamp woke him at three o’clock. It was the tone used for strangers, high-pitched and continuous, not the gruff outbursts that answered other dogs, birds, or the wind. Gowther scrambled into his clothes, seized his shot-gun and lantern, which he had put ready to hand, and made for the door.

“I knew it! I knew it! The little blighter’s after my chickens. I’ll give him chickens!”

“Watch thy step, lad,” said Bess. “You’re bigger than he is, and that’s all the more of thee for him to hit.”

“I’ll be all reet; but he wunner,” said Gowther, and he clumped down the stairs and out into the farm-yard.

Thick clouds hid the moon, there was little wind. The only sounds were the frantic clamour of the dog and the bumping of frightened, sleep-ridden hens.

Gowther shone his light into the pen. The wire netting was undamaged, and the gate locked. In the centre of the lamp’s beam stood Scamp. His hackles were up, in fact every hair along his spine seemed to be on end; his ears lay flat against his skull, and his eyes blazed yellow in the light. He was barking and snarling, almost screaming at times, and tearing the earth with stiff, jerky movements of his legs. Gowther unfastened the gate.

“Wheer is he, boy? Go fetch him!”

Scamp came haltingly out of the pen, his lips curled hideously. Gowther was puzzled: he had expected him to come out like a rocket.

“Come on, lad! He’ll be gone else!”

The dog ran backwards and forwards nervously, still barking, then he set off towards the field gate in the snarling glide, keeping his belly close to the ground, and disappeared into the darkness. A second later the snarl rose to a yelp, and he shot back into the light to stand at Gowther’s feet in a further welter of noise. He was trembling all over. His fury had been obvious all along, but now Gowther realised that, more than anything else, the dog was terrified.

“What’s up, lad? What’s frit thee, eh?” said Gowther gently as he knelt to calm the shivering animal. Then he stood up and went over towards the gate, his gun cocked, and shone the light into the field.

There was nothing wrong as far as he could see, but Scamp, though calmer, still foamed at his heels. Nothing wrong, yet there was something … wait!… he sniffed … was there?… yes!!! A cold, clammy air drifted against Gowther’s face, and with it a smell so strange, so unwholesome, and unexpected that a knot of instinctive fear tightened in his stomach. It was the smell of stagnant water and damp decay. It filled his nostrils and choked his lungs, and, for a moment, Gowther imagined that he was being sucked down into the depths of a black swamp, old and wicked in time. He swung round, gasping, wide-eyed, the hairs of his neck prickling erect. But on the instant the stench passed and was gone: he breathed pure night air once more.

“By gow, lad, theer’s summat rum afoot toneet! That was from nowt local, choose how the wind blows. Come on, let’s be having a scrat round.”

He went first to the stable, where he found Prince stamping nervously, and covered with sweat.

“Wey, lad,” said Gowther softly, and he ran his hands over the horse’s quivering flanks. “Theer’s no need to fret. Hush while I give thee a rub.”

Prince gradually quietened down as Gowther rubbed him with a piece of dry sacking, and Scamp, too, was in a happier frame of mind. He carried his head high, and his din was reduced to a growl, threatening rather than nervous – as though trying to prove that he had never felt anything but aggressive rage all night.

Ay, thought Gowther, and yon’s a dog as fears neither mon nor beast most days; I dunner like it one bit!

In the shippons he found the cows restless, but not as excited as Prince had been, for all their rolling eyes and snuffling nostrils.

“Well, theer’s nowt here, Scamp; let’s take a look at the barn.”

They went into the outhouses, and nowhere was there any hint of disturbance, nor did anything appear to have been tampered with.

“Ay, well everywheer seems reet enough now, onyroad,” said Gowther, “so we’ll have a quick peek around the house and mash a pot of tea, and then it’ll be time to start milking. Eh dear, theer’s no rest for the wicked!”

The sky was showing the first pale light of day as he crossed the farmyard: soon another morning would be here to drive away the fears of the night. Already Gowther was feeling a little ashamed of his moment of fear, and he was thankful that there had been no one else there to witness it. “Eh, it’s funny how your imagination plays …” He stopped dead in his tracks, while Scamp pressed, whining, close to his legs.

Out of the blackness, far above Gowther’s head, had come a single shriek, too harsh for human voice, yet more than animal.

For the second time that night Gowther’s blood froze. Then, taking a deep breath, he strode quickly and purposefully towards the house, looking neither to the right nor to the left, neither up nor down, with Scamp not an inch from his heels. In one movement, he lifted the latch, stepped across the threshold, closed the door, and shot the bolt home. Slowly he turned and looked down at Scamp.

“I dunner know about thee, lad, but I’m going to have a strong cup of tea.”

He lit the paraffin lamp and put the kettle on the stove, and while he waited for the water to boil he went from room to room to see that nothing was amiss here at least. All was quiet; though when he looked into Susan’s room a sleepy voice asked what the time was and why Scamp had been making such a noise. Gowther said that a fox had been after the hens, or so he thought, but Scamp had frightened him off. He told a similar story to Bess.

“… and he started barking at his own shadder, he was that excited.”

“Ay? Then what is it as has made thee sweat like a cheese?” said Bess suspiciously.

“Well,” said Gowther, confused, “I reckon it’s a bit early in the day to be running round, at my age. But I’m not past mashing a pot of tea – er – I’ll bring you one: kettle’s boiling!”

Gowther sought the kitchen. It was never easy to keep anything from Bess, she knew him too well. But what could he say? That he, a countryman, had been frightened by a smell and a night bird? He almost blushed to think of it.

By the time he had made the tea, washed, and finished dressing, it was light outside and near milking time. The sun was breaking through the cloud. Gowther felt much better now.

He was halfway across the yard when he noticed the long, black feathers that lay scattered upon the cobblestones.

CHAPTER 6
A RING OF STONES

Thursday at Highmost Redmanhey was always busy, for on top of the normal round of work Gowther had to make ready for the following day, when he would drive down to Alderley village to do the weekly shopping, and also to call on certain old friends and acquaintances whom he supplied with vegetables and eggs. So much of Thursday was taken up with selecting and cleaning the produce for Friday’s marketing.

When all was done, Colin and Susan rode with Gowther to the wheelwright in the nearby township of Mottram St Andrew to have a new spoke fitted to the cart. This occupied them until teatime, and afterwards Gowther asked the children if they would like to go with him down to Nether Alderley to see whether they could find their next meal in Radnor mere.

They set off across the fields, and shortly came to a wood. Here the undergrowth was denser than on most of the Edge, and contained quite a lot of bramble. High rhododendron bushes grew wild everywhere. The wood seemed full of birds. They sang in the trees, rustled in the thicket, and swam in the many quiet pools.

“I’ve just realised something,” said Colin: “I felt the Edge was unusual, and now I know why. It’s the …”

“Birds,” said Gowther. “There is none. Not worth speaking of, onyroad. Flies, yes; but birds no. It’s always been like that, to my knowledge, and I conner think why it should be. You’d think with all them trees and suchlike, you’d have as mony as you find here, but, considering the size of the place, theer’s hardly a throstle to be found from Squirrel’s Jump to Daniel Hill. Time’s been when I’ve wandered round theer half the day and seen nobbut a pair of jays, and that was in Clockhouse Wood. No, it’s very strange, when you come to weigh it up.”

Their way took them through a jungle of rhododendron. The ground was boggy and choked with dead wood, and they had to duck under low branches and climb over fallen trees: but, somehow, Gowther managed to carry his rod and line through it all without a snag, and he even seemed to know where he was going.

Susan thought how unpleasant it would be to have to move quickly through such country.

“Gowther,” she said, “are there any mines near here?”

“No, none at all, we’re almost on the plain now, and the mines are over the other side of the hill, behind us. Why do you ask?”

“Oh, I just wondered.”

The rhododendrons came to an end at the border of a mere, about half a mile long and a quarter wide.

“This is it,” said Gowther, sitting down on a fallen trunk which stretched out over the water. “It’s a trifle marshy, but we’re not easy to reach here, as theer’s some as might term this poaching. Now if you’ll open yon basket and pass the tin with the bait in it, we can settle down and makes ourselves comfortable.”

After going out as far as he could along the tree to cast his rod, Gowther sat with his back against the roots and lit his pipe. Colin and Susan lay full length on the wrinkled bark and gazed into the mere.

Within two hours they had three perch between them, so they gathered in their tackle and headed for home, arriving well before dusk.

The following morning in Alderley village Susan went with Bess to the shops while Colin stayed to help Gowther with the vegetables. They all met again for a meal at noon, and afterwards climbed into the cart and went with Gowther on his round.

It was a hot day, and by four o’clock Colin and Susan were very thirsty, so Bess said that they ought to drop off for an ice-cream and a lemonade.

“We’ve to go down Moss Lane,” she said, “and we shanner be above half an hour; you stay and cool down a bit.”

The children were soon in the village café, with their drinks before them. Susan was toying with her bracelet, and idly trying to catch the light so that she could see the blue heart of her Tear.

“It’s always difficult to find,” she said. “I never know when it’s going to come right … ah … wait a minute … yes … got it! You know, it reminds me of the light in Fundin …”

She looked at Colin. He was staring at her, open mouthed. They both dropped their eyes to Susan’s wrist where the Tear gleamed so innocently.

“But it couldn’t be!” whispered Colin. “Could it?”

“I don’t … know. But how?”

But how?

“No, of course not!” said Colin. “The wizard would have recognised it as soon as he saw it, wouldn’t he?”

Susan flopped back in her chair, releasing her pent-up breath in a long sigh. But a second later she was bolt upright, inarticulate with excitement.

“He couldn’t have seen it! I – I was wearing my mackintosh! Oh, Colin …!!”

Though just as shaken as his sister, Colin was not content to sit and gape. Obviously they had to find out, and quickly, whether Susan was wearing Firefrost, or just a piece of crystal. If it should be Firefrost, and had been recognised by the wrong people, their brush with the svarts would at last make sense. How the stone came to be on Susan’s wrist was another matter.

“We must find Cadellin at once,” he said. “Because if this is Firefrost, the sooner he has it the better it will be for us all.”

At that moment the cart drew up outside, and Gowther called that it was time to be going home.

The children tried hard to conceal their agitation, yet the leisurely pace Prince seemed to adopt on the “front” hill, as it was called locally, had them almost bursting with impatience.

“Bess,” said Susan, “are you sure you can’t remember anything else about the Bridestone? I want to find out as much as I can about it.”

“Nay, lass, I’ve told you all as I know. My mother had it from her mother, and she always said it had been passed down like that for I dunner know how mony years. And I believe theer was some story about how it should never be shown to onybody outside the family for fear of bringing seven years’ bad luck, but my mother didner go in much for superstition and that sort of claptrap.”

“Have you always lived in Alderley?”

“Bless you, yes! I was born and bred in th’Hough” (she pronounced it “thuff”), “but my mother was a Goostrey woman, and I believe before that her family had connections Mobberley way.”

“Oh?”

Colin and Susan could hardly contain themselves.

“Gowther,” said Colin, “before we come home, Sue and I want to go to Stormy Point; which is the nearest way?”

“What! Before you’ve had your teas?” exclaimed Bess.

“Yes, I’m afraid so. You see, it’s something very important and secret, and we must go.”

“You’re not up to owt daft down the mines, are you?” said Gowther.

“Oh no,” said Colin; “but, please, we must go. We’ll be back early, and it doesn’t matter about tea.”

“Er well, it’ll be your stomachs as’ll be empty! But think on, we dunner want to come looking for you at midneet.

“Your best way’ll be to get off at the gamekeeper’s lodge, and follow the main path till it forks by the owd quarry: then take the left hond path, and it’ll bring you straight to Stormy Point.”

They reached the top of the Edge, and after about quarter of a mile Gowther halted Prince before a cottage built of red sandstone and tucked in the fringe of the wood. Along the side of the cottage, at right angles to the road, a track disappeared among the trees in what Gowther said was the direction of Stormy Point.

The children jumped from the cart, and ran off along the track, while Gowther and Bess continued on their way, dwelling sentimentally on what it was to be young.

“Don’t you think we’d better go by the path Cadellin told us to use? He said it was the only safe one, remember.”

“We haven’t time to go all that way round,” said Colin; “we must show him your Tear as soon as we can. And anyway, Gowther says this is the path to Stormy Point, and it’s broad daylight, so I don’t see that we can come to any harm.”

“Well, how are we going to find Cadellin when we’re there?”

“We’ll go straight to the iron gates and call him: being a wizard he’s bound to hear … I hope. Still, we must try!”

They pressed deeper and deeper into the wood, and came to a level stretch of ground where the bracken thinned and gave place to rich turf, dappled with sunlight. And here, in the midst of so much beauty, they learnt too late that wizards’ words are seldom idle, and traps well sprung hold hard their prey.

Out of the ground on all sides swirled tongues of thick white mist, which merged into a rolling fog about the children’s knees; it paused, gathered itself, and leapt upwards, blotting out the sun and the world of life and light.

It was too much for Susan. Her nerve failed her. All that mattered was to escape from this chill cloud and what it must contain. She ran blindly, stumbled a score of paces, then tripped, and fell full length upon the grass.

She was not hurt, but the jolt brought her to her senses; the jolt – and something else.

In falling, she had thrown her arms out to protect herself, and as her head cleared she realised that there was no earth beneath her fingers, only emptiness. She lay there, not daring to move.

“Sue, where are you?” It was Colin’s voice, calling softly. “Are you all right?”

“I’m here. Be careful. I think I’m on the edge of a cliff, but I can’t see.”

“Keep still, then; I’ll feel my way to you.”

He crawled in the direction of Susan’s voice, but even in that short distance he partly lost his bearing, and it was several minutes before he found his sister, and having done so, he wriggled cautiously alongside her.

The turf ended under his nose, and all beyond was a sea of grey. Colin felt around for a pebble and dropped it over the edge. Three seconds passed before he heard it land.

“Good job you tripped, Sue! It’s a long way down. This must be the old quarry. Now keep quiet a minute, and listen.”

They strained their ears to catch the slightest sound, but there was nothing to be heard. They might have been the only living creatures on earth.

“We must go back to the path, Sue. And we’ve got to make as little noise as possible, because whatever it is that made this fog will be listening for us. If we don’t find the path we may easily walk round in circles until nightfall, even supposing we’re left alone as long as that.

“Let’s get away from this quarry, for a start: there’s no point in asking for trouble.”

They stood up, and holding each other’s hand, walked slowly back towards the path.

As the minutes went by, Susan grew more and more uneasy.

“Colin,” she said at last, “I hadn’t run more than a dozen steps, I’m sure, when I tripped, and we’ve been walking for a good five minutes. Do you think we’re going the right way?”

“No, I don’t. And I don’t know which is the right way, so we’ll have to hope for the best. We’ll try to walk in a straight line, and perhaps we’ll leave this fog behind.”

But they did not. Either the mist had spread out over a wide area, or, as the children began to suspect, it was moving with them. They made very slow progress; every few paces they would stop and listen, but there was only the silence of the mist, and that was as unnerving as the sound of something moving would have been. Also, it was impossible to see for more than a couple of yards in any direction, and they were frightened of falling into a hidden shaft, or even the quarry, for they had lost all sense of direction by now.

The path seemed to have vanished; but, in fact, they had crossed it some minutes earlier without knowing. As they approached, the mist had gathered thickly about their feet, hiding the ground until the path was behind them.

After a quarter of an hour Colin and Susan were shivering uncontrollably as the dampness ate into their bones. Every so often the trunk of a pine tree would loom out of the mist, so that it seemed as though they were walking through a pillared hall that had no beginning, and no end.

“We must be moving in circles, Colin. Let’s change direction instead of trying to keep in a straight line.”

“We couldn’t be more lost than we are at present, so we may as well try it.”

They could not believe their luck. Within half a minute they came upon an oak, and beyond that another. The fog was as dense as ever, but they knew that they were breaking fresh ground, and that was encouraging.

“Oh, I wish Cadellin would come,” said Susan.

“That’s an idea! Let’s shout for help: he may hear us.”

“But we’ll give our position away.”

“I don’t think that matters any more. Let’s try, anyway.”

“All right.”

“One, two, three. Ca-dell-in! Help! Ca-dell-in!!”

It was like shouting in a padded cell. Their voices, flat and dead, soaked into the grey blanket.

“That can’t have carried far,” said Colin disgustedly. “Try again. One, two, three. Help! Ca-dell-in! Help!!!”

“It’s no use,” said Susan; “he’ll never hear us. We’ll have to find our own way out.”

“And we’ll do that if we keep going at our own pace,” said Colin. “If whatever caused this had intended to attack us it would have done so by now, wouldn’t it? No, it wants to frighten us into rushing over a precipice or something like that. As long as we carry on slowly we’ll be safe enough.”

He was wrong, but they had no other plan.

For the next few minutes the children made their way in silence, Susan concentrating on the ground immediately in front, Colin alert for any sight or sound of danger.

All at once Susan halted.

“Hallo, what’s this?”

At their feet lay two rough-hewn boulders and beyond them, on either side, could be seen the faint outline of others of a like size.

“What can they be? They look as though they’ve been put there deliberately, don’t they?”

“Never mind,” said Colin; “we mustn’t waste time in standing around.”

And they passed between the stones, only to stop short a couple of paces later, with despair in their hearts, cold as the east wind.

Susan’s question was answered. They were in the middle of a ring of stones, and the surrounding low, dim shapes rose on the limit of vision as though marking the boundary of the world.

Facing the children were two stones, far bigger than the rest, and on one of the stones sat a figure, and the sight of it would have daunted a brave man.

For three fatal seconds the children stared, unable to think or move. And as they faltered, the jaws of the trap closed about them; for, like a myriad snakes, the grass within the circle, alive with the magic of the place, writhed about their feet, shackling them in a net of blade and root, tight as a vice.

As if in some dark dream, Colin and Susan strained to tear themselves free, but they were held like wasps in honey.

Slowly the figure rose from its seat and came towards them. Of human shape it was, though like no mortal man, for it stood near eight feet high, and was covered from head to foot in a loose habit, dank and green, and ill concealing the terrible thinness and spider strength of the body beneath. A deep cowl hid the face, skin mittens were on the wasted hands, and the air was laden with the reek of foul waters.

The creature stopped in front of Susan and held out a hand; not a word was spoken.

“No!” gasped Susan. “You shan’t have it!” And she put her arm behind her back.

“Leave her alone!” yelled Colin. “If you touch her Cadellin will kill you!”

The shrouded head turned slowly towards him, and he gazed into the cavern of the hood; courage melted from him, and his knees were water.

Then, suddenly, the figure stretched out its arms and seized both the children by the shoulder.

They had no chance to struggle or to defend themselves. With a speed that choked the cry of anguish in their throats, an icy numbness swept down from the grip of those hands into their bodies, and the children stood paralysed, unable to move a finger.

In a moment the bracelet was unfastened from Susan’s wrist, and the grim shape turned on its heel and strode into the mist. And the mist gathered round it and formed a swirling cloud that moved swiftly away among the trees, and was lost to sight.

The sun shone upon the stone circle, and upon the figures standing motionless in the centre. The warm rays poured life and feeling into those wooden bodies, and they began to move. First an arm stirred jerkily, doll-like, then a head turned, a leg moved, and slowly the numbness drained from their limbs, the grass released its hold, and the children crumpled forward on to their hands and knees, shivering and gasping, the blood in their heads pounding like triphammers.

“Out – circle!” wheezed Colin.

They staggered sideways and almost fell down a small bank on to a path.

“Find Cadellin: perhaps … he … can stop it. I think that may be … Stormy Point ahead.”

Their legs were stiff, and every bone ached, but they hurried along as best they could, and a few minutes later they cried out with relief, for the path did indeed come out on Stormy Point.

Across the waste of stones they ran, and down to the iron gates; and when they came to the rock they flung themselves against it, beating with their fists, and calling the wizard’s name. But bruised knuckles were all they achieved: no gates appeared, no cavern opened.

Colin was in a frenzy of desperation. He prised a stone out of the ground, almost as big as his head, and, using both hands, began to pound the silent wall, shouting, “Open up! Open up! Open up! Open up! Open up!!!”

“Now that is no way to come a-visiting wizards,” said a voice above them.

CHAPTER 7
FENODYREE

Colin and Susan looked up, not knowing what to expect: the voice sounded friendly, but was that any guide now?

Over the top of the rock dangled a pair of feet, and between these were two eyes, black as sloes, set in a leathery face, bearded and bushy-browed.

“Rocks are old, stubborn souls; they were here before we came, and they will be here when we are gone. They have all the time there is, and will not be hurried.”

With this, the face disappeared, the legs swung out of sight, there was a slithering noise, a bump, and from behind the rock stepped a man four feet high. He wore a belted tunic of grey, patterned with green spirals along the hem, pointed boots, and breeches bound tight with leather thongs. His black hair reached to his shoulders, and on his brow was a circlet of gold.

“Are – are you a dwarf?” said Susan.

“That am I.” He bowed low. “By name, Fenodyree; Wineskin, or Squabnose, to disrespectful friends. Take your pick.”

He straightened up and looked keenly from one to the other of the children. His face had the same qualities of wisdom, of age without weakness, that they had seen in Cadellin, but here there was more of merriment, and a lighter heart.

“Oh please,” said Susan, “take us to the wizard, if you can. Something dreadful has happened, and he must be told at once, in case it’s not too late.”

“In case what is not too late?” said Fenodyree. “Oh, but there I go, wanting gossip, when all around is turmoil and urgent deeds! Let us find Cadellin.”

He ran his hand down the rough stone, like a man stroking the flanks of a favourite horse. The rock stirred ponderously and clove in two, and there were the iron gates, and the blue light of Fundindelve.

“Now the gates,” said Fenodyree briskly. “My father made them, and so they hear me, though I have not the power of wizards.”

He laid his hand upon the metal, and the gates opened.

“Stay close, lest you lose the way,” called Fenodyree over his shoulder.

He set off at a jog-trot down the swift-sloping tunnel. Colin and Susan hurried after him, the rock and iron closed behind them, and they were again far from the world of men.

Down they went into the edge, and came at last, by many zigzag paths, to the cave where they had rested after their meeting with Cadellin. And there they found him; he had been reading at the table, but had risen at the sound of their approach.

“The day’s greeting to you, Cadellin Silverbrow,” said Fenodyree.

“And to you, Wineskin. Now what bad news do you bring me, children? I have been expecting it, though I know not what it may be.”

“Cadellin,” cried Susan, “my Tear must be Firefrost, and it’s just been stolen!”

“What – tear is this?”

“My Tear! The one my mother gave me. She had it from Bess Mossock.”

And out poured the whole story in a tumble of words.

The wizard grew older before their eyes. He sank down upon his chair, his face lined and grey.

“It is the stone. It is the stone. No other has that heart of fire. And it was by me, and I did not hear it call.”

He sat, his eyes clouded, a tired, world-weary, old man.

Then wrath kindled in him, and spread like flame. He sprang from his chair with all the vigour of youth, and he seemed to grow in stature, and his presence filled the cave.

“Grimnir!” he cried. “Are you to be my ruin at the end? Quick! We must take him in the open before he gains the lake! I shall slay him, if I must.”

“Nay, Cadellin,” said Fenodyree. “Hot blood has banished cool thought! It is near an hour since the hooded one strode swampwards; he will be far from the light by now, and even you dare not follow there. He would sit and mock you. Would you want that, old friend?”

“Mock me! Why did he leave these children unharmed, if not for that? It is not his way to show mercy for mercy’s sake! And how else could despair have been brought to me so quickly? I am savouring his triumph now, as he meant me to.

“But what you say is reason: for good or ill the stone is with him. All we can do is guard, and wait, though I fear it will be to no good purpose.”

He looked at the children, who were standing dejectedly in the middle of the cave.

“Colin, Susan; you have witnessed the writing of a dark chapter in the book of the world, and what deeds it will bring no man can tell; but you must in no way blame yourselves for what has happened. The elf-road would have been but short refuge from him who came against you this day – Grimnir the hooded one.”

“But what is he?” said Susan, pale with the memory of their meeting.

“He is, or was, a man. Once he studied under the wisest of the wise, and became a great lore-master; but in his lust for knowledge he practised the forbidden arts, and the black magic ravaged his heart, and made a monster of him. He left the paths of day, and went to live, like Grendel of old, beneath the waters of Llyn-dhu, the Black Lake, growing mighty in evil, second only to the ancient creatures of night that attend their lord in Ragnarok. And it is he, arch-enemy of mine, who came against you this day.”

“No one in memory has seen his face or heard his voice,” added Fenodyree. “Dwarf-legend speaks of a great shame that he bears therein: a gadfly of remorse, reminding him of what he is, and of what he might have been. But then that is only an old tale we learnt at our mother’s knee, and not one for this sad hour.”

“Nor have we time for folk-talk,” said Cadellin. “We must do what we can, and that quickly. Now tell me, who can have seen the stone and recognised it?”

“Well, nobody …” said Colin.

“Selina Place!” cried Susan. “Selina Place! My Tear went all misty! Don’t you remember, Colin? She must have seen my Tear and stopped to make certain.”

“Ha!” laughed Fenodyree bitterly. “Old Shape-shifter up to her tricks! We might have guessed the weight of the matter had we but known she was behind it!”

“Oh, why did you not tell us this when we first met?” the wizard shouted.

“I forgot all about it,” said Colin: “it didn’t seem important. I thought she was queer in the head.”

“Important? Queer? Hear him! Why, Selina Place, as she is known to you, is the chief witch of the morthbrood! Worse, she is the Morrigan, the Third Bane of Logris!”

For a moment it seemed as though he would erupt in anger, but instead, he sighed, and shook his head.

“No matter. It is done.”

Susan was almost in tears. She could not bear to see the old man so distraught, especially when she felt responsible for his plight.

“Is there nothing we can do?”

The wizard looked up at her, and a tired smile came to his lips.

“Do? My dear, I think there is little any of us can do now. Certainly, there will be no place for children in the struggle to come. It will be hard for you, I know, but you must go from here and forget all you have seen and done. Now that the stone is out of your care you will be safe.”

“But,” cried Colin, “but you can’t mean that! We want to help you!”

“I know you do. But you have no further part in this. High Magic and low cunning will be the weapons of the fray, and the valour of children would be lost in the struggle. You can help me best by freeing me from worry on your behalf.”

And, without giving the children further chance to argue, he took them by the hand, and out of the cave. They went in misery, and shortly stood above the swamp on the spot where they had first met the wizard, three nights ago.

“Must we really not see you again?” said Colin. He had never felt so wretched.

“Believe me, it must be so. It hurts me, too, to part from friends, and I can guess what it is to have the door of wonder and enchantment closed to you when you have glimpsed what lies beyond. But it is also a world of danger and shadows, as you have seen, and ere long I fear I must pass into these shadows. I will not take you with me.

“Go back to your own world: you will be safer there. If we should fail, you will suffer no harm, for not in your time will Nastrond come.

“Now go. Fenodyree will keep with you to the road.”

So saying, he entered the tunnel. The rock echoed: he was gone.

Colin and Susan stared at the wall. They were very near to tears, and Fenodyree, weighed down with his own troubles, felt pity for them in their despondency.

“Do not think him curt or cruel,” he said gently. “He has suffered a defeat that would have crushed a lesser man. He is going now to prepare himself to face death, and worse than death, for the stone’s sake; and I and others shall stand by him, though I think we are for the dark. He has said farewell because he knows there may be no more meetings for him this side of Ragnarok.”

“But it was all our fault!” said Colin desperately. “We must help him!”

“You will help him best by keeping out of danger, as he said; and that means staying well away from us and all we do.”

“Is that really the best way?” said Susan.

“It is.”

“Then I suppose we’ll have to do it. But it will be very hard.”

“Is his task easier?” said Fenodyree.

They walked along a path that curved round the hillside, gradually rising till it ran along the crest of the Edge.

“You will be safe now,” said Fenodyree, “but if you should have need of me, tell the owls in farmer Mossock’s barn: they understand your speech, and will come to me, but remember that they are guardians for the night and fly like drunken elves by day.”

“Do you mean to say all those owls were sent by you?” said Colin.

“Ay, my people have ever been masters of bird lore. We treat them as brothers, and they help us where they can. Two nights since they brought word that evil things were closing on you. A bird that seemed no true bird (and scarce made off with its life) brought to the farm a strange presence that filled them with dread, though they could not see its form. I can guess now that it was the hooded one – and here is Castle Rock, from which we can see his lair.”

They had come to a flat outcrop that jutted starkly from the crest, so that it seemed almost a straight drop to the plain far below. There was a rough bench resting on stumps of rock, and here they sat. Behind them was a field, and beyond that the road, and the beginning of the steep “front” hill.

“It is as I thought,” said Fenodyree. “The black master is in his den. See, yonder is Llyn-dhu, garlanded with mosses and mean dwellings.”

Colin and Susan looked where Fenodyree was pointing, and some two or three miles out on the plain they could see the glint of grey water through trees.

“Men thought to drain that land and live there, but the spirit of the place entered them, and their houses were built drab and desolate, and without cheer; and all around the bog still sprawls, from out the drear lake come soulless thoughts and drift into the hearts of the people, and they are one with their surroundings.

“Ah! But there goes he who can tell us more about the stone.”

He pointed to a speck floating high over the plain, and whistled shrilly.

“Hi, Windhover! To me!”

The speck paused, then came swooping through the air like a black falling star, growing larger every second, and, with a hollow beating of wings, landed on Fenodyree’s outstretched arm – a magnificent kestrel, fierce and proud, whose bright eyes glared at the children.

“Strange company for dwarfs, I know,” said Fenodyree, “but they have been prey of the morthbrood, and so are older than their years.

“It is of Grimnir that we want news. He went by here: did he seek the lake?”

The kestrel switched his gaze to Fenodyree, and gave a series of sharp cries, which obviously meant more to the dwarf that they did to the children.

“Ay, it is as I thought,” he said when the bird fell silent. “A mist crossed the plain a while since, as fast as a horse can gallop, and sank into Llyn-dhu.

“Ah well, so be it. Now I must away back to Cadellin, for we shall have much to talk over and plans to make. Farewell now, my friends. Yonder is the road: take it. Remember us, though Cadellin forbade you, and wish us well.”

“Goodbye.”

Colin and Susan were too full to say more; it was an effort to speak, for their throats were tight and dry with anguish. They knew that Cadellin and Fenodyree were not being deliberately unkind in their anxiety to be rid of them, but the feeling of responsibility for what had happened was as much as they could bear.

So it was with heavy hearts that the children turned to the road: nor did they speak or look back until they had reached it. Fenodyree, standing on the seat, legs braced apart, with Windhover at his wrist, was outlined against the sky. His voice came to them through the still air.

“Farewell, my friends!”

They waved to him in return, but could find no words.

He stood there a moment longer before he jumped down and vanished along the path to Fundindelve. And it was as though a veil had been drawn across the children’s eyes.

PART TWO

CHAPTER 8
MIST OVER LLYN-DHU

Autumn came, and in September Colin and Susan started school. Work on the farm kept them busy outside school hours, and it was not often they visited the Edge. Sometimes at the weekend they could go there, but then the woods were peopled with townsfolk who, shouting and crashing through the undergrowth, and littering the ground with food wrappings and empty bottles, completely destroyed the atmosphere of the place. Once, indeed, Colin and Susan came upon a family sprawled in front of the iron gates. Father, his back propped against the rock itself, strained, redder than his braces, to lift his voice above the blare of a portable radio to summon his children to tea. They were playing at soldiers in the Devil’s Grave.

Nothing remained. This place, where beauty and terror had been as opposite sides of the same coin, was now a playground of noise. Its spirit was dead – or hidden. There was nothing to show that svart or wizard had ever existed: nothing, except a barn full of owls at Highmost Redmanhey, and an empty wrist where once a bracelet had been.

The loss of the bracelet was the cause of slight friction between the Mossocks and the children. Bess was the first to notice that the stone had gone, and Susan, not knowing what to do for the best, poured out the whole story. It was really too much for anyone to digest at once, and Bess could not think what to make of it at all. She was upset over the loss of the Bridestone, naturally, but what troubled her more was the fact that Susan should be so fearful of the consequences that she would invent such a desperate pack of nonsense to explain it all away. Gowther, on the other hand, was by no means so certain that it was all fantasy. He kept his thoughts to himself, but in places the story touched on his recent experiences far too accurately for comfort. However, the affair blew over and no one mentioned it again, though that does not mean to say it was forgotten.

Shortly before Christmas Colin discovered that the owls had left the barn, and for days after, the children were in a fretful state of anxiety over what the disappearance could mean.

“Either Cadellin’s got the stone back again,” said Colin, “or he’s lost the fight.”

“Or perhaps it’s only that he’s sure we’re out of danger, or perhaps … no, that wouldn’t make sense … oh, I wish we knew!”

And although they spent two whole days ranging the woods from end to end, they found no clue to help them. If there had been a struggle as fierce as Cadellin had predicted, then it had left no trace that they could see.

It was a young winter of cloudless skies. The stars flashed silver in the velvet, frozen nights, and all the short day long the sun betrayed the earth into thinking it was spring. And late one Sunday afternoon at the end of the first week in January, Colin and Susan climbed out of Alderley village, pushing their bicycles before them. They walked slowly, for it was not a hill to be rushed, and the last stretch was the worst – straight and steep, without any respite. But once they were at the top, the going was comparatively good.

They did not ride more than a hundred yards, however, for Colin, who was leading, jammed on his brakes so violently that he half fell from his bicycle and Susan nearly piled on top of him.

“Look!” he gasped. “Look over there!”

It could be only Cadellin. He stood against the skyline of Castle Rock, staff in hand, facing the plain.

At once all promises were forgotten: the children dropped their bicycles and ran.

“Cadellin! Cadellin!”

The wizard spun round at the sound of their voices, and made as if to leave the rock. But after three strides he checked his pace, stood for a moment, and then walked to the bench and sat down.

“Oh, Cadellin, we thought something must have happened to you!” cried Susan, sobbing with relief.

“Many things have happened to me, but I do not feel the worse for that!”

There was displeasure in his face, tempered with understanding.

“But we were so worried,” said Colin. “When the owls disappeared we wondered if you’d … you’d …”

“I see!” said Cadellin, breaking into laughter. “No, no, no, you must not look on life so fearfully. We called the birds away because we knew that you were no longer in danger from the morthbrood.”

“Well, we thought of that,” said Colin, “but we couldn’t help thinking of other things, too.”

“But what about the morthbrood?” said Susan. “Have they still got my Tear?”

“Yes, and no,” said the wizard. “And in their greed and deceit lies all our present hope.

“Grimnir has the stone. He should have delivered it to Nastrond, but the morthbrood and he intend to master it alone. Perhaps they believe Firefrost holds power for them. If so, they are mistaken!

“And here we have wheels within wheels; for Grimnir and Shape-shifter, as rumour has it, are planning to reap all benefits for themselves, and to leave the brood and the svarts to whistle for their measure. So says rumour; and I can guess more. I know Grimnir too well to imagine that he would willingly share power with anyone, and the Morrigan, for all her guile, is no match for him. And it may be among all this treachery that we shall find our chance; but for the present we watch, and wait. Firefrost is not in Nastrond’s hand, and for that we must be thankful.

“There! You have it all, and now we go our ways once more.”

Colin and Susan were so relieved to find the wizard unharmed that parting from him did not seem anything like so bleak an experience as it had been before.

“Is there still nothing we can do?” asked Susan.

“No more than you have been doing all these months. You have played your part well (if we forget this afternoon!), and you must continue to do so, for we do not want you to fall foul of that one again.”

He pointed with his staff. About the trees through which the Black Lake could normally be seen hung a blanket of fog. Elsewhere, as far as the eye could see, the sunset plain was free of haze or mist, but Llyn-dhu brooded under a fallen cloud.

“It has been there for over a week,” said the wizard. “I do not know what he is about, but my guess is that he is trying to seal Firefrost within a circle of magic to prevent its power from reaching Fundindelve. He will not succeed, and he has not the strength to destroy the stone. But then, I have not the power to take it by force, so the matter rests, though we do not.”

Cadellin walked with the children as far as the road, and they left him, lighter at heart than they had been for many a day.

The mist was still there the following morning. Colin and Susan had set out on their bicycles soon after dawn to spend the day exploring the countryside, and when they had reached the top of the “front” hill Colin had suggested taking another look at Llyn-dhu. So there they now were, sitting on Castle Rock, and gazing at the mist.

For a long time they were silent, and when next Colin spoke he did no more than put his sister’s thoughts into words.

“I wonder,” he said, “what it’s like … close to.”

“Do you think we’d be breaking a promise if we went just to look?”

“Well, we’re looking now, and we’d be doing the same thing, only from a lot nearer, wouldn’t we?”

That decided it; but then they realised that they had not the least idea of how to reach the lake. However, by picking out what few landmarks they knew, it seemed that if they made for Wilmslow, and there turned left, they would be heading in something like the right direction. So, without further delay, Colin and Susan rode to Alderley, bought a bottle of lemonade to go with their sandwiches, posted a view of Stormy Point to their father and mother, and within thirty minutes of making their decision were in the centre of Wilmslow, and wondering which road to take next.

“There’s the man to ask,” said Colin.

He had seen a small beetle of a car, from which was emerging a police sergeant of such vast proportions that he hid the car almost completely from view. It was incredible that he could ever have fitted into it, even curled up.

The children cycled over to him, and Colin said:

“Excuse me, can you tell us the way to Llyn-dhu, please?”

“Where?” said the sergeant in obvious surprise.

“Llyn-dhu, the Black Lake. It’s not far from here.”

The sergeant grinned.

“You’re not pulling my leg, are you?”

“No,” said Susan, “we’re not – promise!”

“Then somebody must be pulling yours, because there’s no such place of that name round here that I know of, and I’ve been at Wilmslow all of nine years. Sounds more Welsh than anything.”

Colin and Susan were so taken aback that, for a moment, they could not speak.

“But we saw it from Castle Rock less than an hour ago!” said Susan, and tears of exasperation pricked her eyes. “Well, we didn’t really see it, because it was covered in mist, but we know it’s there.”

“Mist, did you say? Ah, now perhaps we’re getting somewhere. There’s been fog on Lindow Common for days, and the only lake in the district is there. Do you think that’s what you want?”

Llyn-dhu, Lindow: it could be: it had to be!

“Ye-es; yes, that’s it,” said Colin. “We must have got the name wrong. Is it far?”

They followed the sergeant’s directions, and after a mile came upon an expanse of damp ground, covered with scrub, and heather, and puddles. A little way off the road was a notice board which stated that this was Lindow Common, and that cycling was prohibited. And in the middle of the common was a long lake of black, peat-stained water.

The children stood on the slimy shore. The air was dank, and the scenery depressing. The common was encircled by a broken rash of houses, such as may be seen, like a ring of pink scum, on the outskirts of most of our towns and villages today.

“Garlanded with mosses and mean dwellings.” Fenodyree’s words came back to the children as they looked at the brick-pocked landscape. But what was most obviously wrong was that they could see all this. For if they were indeed at Llyn-dhu, then, within the space of an hour, it had rid itself of every trace of the mist that had shrouded it for the last ten days.

“Do you think this is it?” said Colin.

“Ugh, yes! There couldn’t be two like this, and it’s a black lake all right! I wonder what’s happened.”

“Oh, let’s go,” said Colin, “this place gives me the willies. We’ve done what we set out to do; now let’s enjoy the rest of the day.

After a cup of coffee in Wilmslow to dispel the Lindow gloom, the children pedalled back towards Alderley. They had no plans, but the sun was warm, and there were a good six hours of daylight left to them.

They were crossing the station bridge at Alderley when they saw it. A light breeze, blowing from the north-east, trailed the village smoke slowly along the sky, but halfway up the nearer slope of the Edge a ball of mist hung as though moored to the trees. And out of the mist rose the chimneys and gaunt gables of St Mary’s Clyffe, the home of Selina Place.

CHAPTER 9
ST MARY’S CLYFFE

The room was long, with a high ceiling, painted black. Round the walls and about the windows were draped black velvet tapestries. The bare wooden floor was stained a deep red. There was a table on which lay a rod, forked at the end, and a silver plate containing a mound of red powder. On one side of the table was a reading-stand, which supported an old vellum book of great size, and on the other stood a brazier of glowing coals. There was no other furniture of any kind.

Grimnir looked on with much bad grace as Shape-shifter moved through the ritual of preparation. He did not like witch-magic: it relied too much on clumsy nature spirits and the slow brewing of hate. He preferred the lightning stroke of fear and the dark powers of the mind.

But certainly this crude magic had weight. It piled force on force, like a mounting wave, and overwhelmed its prey with the slow violence of an avalanche. If only it were a quick magic! There could be very little time left now before Nastrond acted on his rising suspicions, and then … Grimnir’s heart quailed at the thought. Oh, let him but bend this stone’s power to his will, and Nastrond should see a true Spirit of Darkness arise; one to whom Ragnarok, and all it contained, would be no more than a ditch of noisome creatures to be bestridden and ignored. But how to master the stone? It had parried all his rapier thrusts, and, at one moment, had come near to destroying him. The sole chance now lay in this morthwoman’s witchcraft, and she must be watched; it would not do for the stone to become her slave. She trusted him no more than could be expected, but the problem of how to rid himself of her when she had played out her part in his schemes was not of immediate importance. The shadow of Nastrond was growing large in his mind, and in swift success alone could he hope to endure.

With black sand, which she poured from a leather bottle, Shape-shifter traced an intricately patterned circle on the floor. Often she would halt, make a sign in the air with her hand, mutter to herself, curtsy, and resume her pouring. She was dressed in a black robe, tied round with scarlet cord, and on her feet were pointed shoes.

So intent on her work was the Morrigan, and so wrapped in his thoughts was Grimnir, that neither of them saw the two pairs of eyes that inched round the side of the window.

The circle was complete. Shape-shifter went to the table and picked up the rod.

“It is not the hour proper for summoning the aid we need,” she said, “but if what you have heard contains even a grain of the truth, then we see that we must act at once, though we could have wished for a more discreet approach on your part.” She indicated the grey cloud that pressed against the glass, now empty of watching eyes. “You may well attract unwanted attention.”

At that moment, as if in answer to her fears, a distant clamour arise on the far side of the house. It was the eerie baying of hounds.

“Ah, you see! They are restless: there is something on the wind. Perhaps it would be wise to let them seek it out; they will soon let us know if it is aught beyond their powers – as well it may be! For if we do not have Ragnarok and Fundindelve upon our heads before the day is out, it will be no thanks to you.”

She stumped round the corner of the house to the outbuilding from which the noise came. Selina Place was uneasy, and out of temper. For all his art, what a fool Grimnir could be! And what risks he took! Who, in their senses, would come so obviously on such an errand? Like his magic, he was no match for the weirdstone of Brisingamen. She smiled; yes, it would take the old sorcery to tame that one, and he knew it, for all his fussing in Llyn-dhu. “All right, all right! We’re coming! Don’t tear the door down!”

Behind her, two shadows moved out of the mist, slid along the wall, and through the open door.

“Which way now?” whispered Susan.

They were standing in a cramped hall, and there was a choice of three doors leading from it. One of these was ajar, and seemed to be a cloakroom.

“In here, then we’ll see which door she goes through.”

Nor did they delay, for the masculine tread of Selina Place came to them out of the mist.

“Now let us do what we can in haste,” she said as she rejoined Grimnir. “There may be nothing threatening, but we shall not feel safe until we are master of the stone. Give it to us now.”

Grimnir unfastened a pouch at his waist, and from it drew Susan’s bracelet. Firefrost hung there, its bright depths hidden beneath a milky veil.

The Morrigan took the bracelet and placed it in the middle of the circle on the floor. She pulled the curtains over the windows and doors, and went to stand by the brazier, whose faint glow could hardly push back the darkness. She took a handful of powder from the silver plate and, sprinkling it over the coals, cried in a loud voice:

“Demoriel, Carnefiel, Caspiel, Amenadiee!!”

A flame hissed upwards, filling the room with ruby light. Shape-shifter opened the book and began to read.

“Vos omnes it ministri odey et destructiones et seratores discorde …”

“What’s she up to?” said Susan.

“I don’t know, but it’s giving me gooseflesh.”

“… eo quod est noce vos coniurase ideo vos conniro et deprecur …”

“Colin, I …”

“Sh! Keep still!”

“… et odid fiat mier alve …”

Shadows began to gather about the folds of velvet tapestry in the furthest corners of the room.

For thirty minutes Colin and Susan were forced to stand in their awkward hiding-place, and it took less than half that time for the last trace of enthusiasm to evaporate. They were where they were as the result of an impulse, an inner urge that had driven them on without thought of danger. But now there was time to think, and inaction is never an aid to courage. They would probably have crept away and tried to find Cadellin, had not a dreadful sound of snuffling, which passed frequently beneath the cloakroom window, made them most unwilling to open the outer door.

And all the while Shape-shifter’s chant droned on, rising at intervals to harsh cries of command.

“Come Haborym! Come Haborym! Come Haborym!”

Then it was that the children began to feel the dry heat that was soon to become all but intolerable. It bore down upon them until the blood thumped in their ears, and the room spun sickeningly about their heads.

“Come Orobas! Come Orobas! Come Orobas!”

Was it possible? For the space of three seconds the children heard the clatter of hoofs upon bare boards, and a wild neighing rang high in the roof.

“Come Nambroth! Come Nambroth! Come Nambroth!”

A wind gripped the house by the eaves, and tried to pluck it from its sandstone roots. Something rushed by on booming wings. The lost voices of the air called to each other in the empty rooms, and the mist clung fast and did not stir.

“Coniuro et confirmo super vos potentes in nomi fortis, metuendissimi, infandi …”

Just at the moment when Susan thought she must faint, the stifling heat diminished enough to allow them to breathe in comfort; the wind died, and a heavy silence settled on the house.

After minutes of brooding quiet a door opened, and the voice of Selina Place came to the children from outside the cloakroom. She was very much out of breath.

“And … we say the stone … will … be safe. Nothing … can reach it … from … outside. Come away … this is a dangerous … brew. Should it boil over … and we … near, that … would be the end … of us. Hurry. The force is growing … it is not safe to watch.”

Mistrustfully, and with many a backward glance, Grimnir joined her, and they went together through the doorway on the opposite side of the hall, and their footsteps died away.

“Well, how do we get out of this mess?” said Colin. “It looks as though we’re stuck here until she calls these animals off, and if she’s going to do any more of the stuff we’ve been listening to, I don’t think I want to wait that long.”

“Colin, we can’t go yet! My Tear’s in that room, and we’ll never have another chance!”

The air was much cooler now, and no sounds, strange or otherwise, could be heard. And Susan felt that insistent tugging at her inmost heart that had brushed aside all promises and prudence when she stared at the mist from the bridge by the station.

“But Sue, didn’t you hear old Place say that it wasn’t safe to be in there? And if she’s afraid to stay it must be dangerous.”

“I don’t care: I’ve got to try. Are you coming? Because if not, I’m going by myself.”

“Oh … all right! But we’ll wish we’d stayed in here.”

They stepped out of the cloakroom and cautiously opened the left-hand door.

The dull light prevented them from seeing much at first, but they could make out the table and the reading-desk, and the black pillar in the centre of the floor.

“All clear!” whispered Susan.

They tiptoed into the room, closed the door, and stood quite still while their eyes grew accustomed to the light: and then they saw.

The pillar was alive. It climbed from out the circle that Selina Place had so laboriously made, a column of oily smoke; and in the smoke strange shapes moved. Their forms were indistinct, but the children could see enough to wish themselves elsewhere.

Even as they watched the climax came. Faster and faster the pillar whirled, and thicker and thicker the dense fumes grew, and the floor began to tremble, and the children’s heads were of a sudden full of mournful voices that reached them out of a great and terrible distance. Flecks of shadow, buzzing like flies, danced out of the tapestries and were sucked into the reeking spiral. And then, without warning, the base of the column turned blue. The buzzing rose to a demented whine – and stopped. The whole swirling mass shuddered as though a brake had been savagely applied, lost momentum, died, and drooped like the ruin of a mighty tree. Silver lightnings ran upwards through the smoke: the column wavered, broke, and collapsed into the ball of fire that rose to engulf it. A voice whimpered close by the children and passed through the doorway behind them. The blue light waned, and in its place lay Firefrost, surrounded by the scattered remnants of Shape-shifter’s magic circle.

Colin and Susan stood transfixed. Then slowly, as if afraid that the stone would vanish if she breathed or took her eyes off it, Susan moved forward and picked it up.

In the silence she unclasped the bracelet and fastened it about her wrist. She could not believe what she was doing. This moment had haunted her dreams for so many months, and there had been so many bitter awakenings.

In a small room crammed under the eaves Selina Place and Grimnir waited. Both were keyed to an almost unendurable pitch. They knew well the price of failure. Not once in a thousand years had any of their kind disobeyed the charge of Nastrond, but all at some time had stood in the outer halls of Ragnarok and looked on the Abyss. Thus did Nastrond bind evil to his will.

“It cannot be long now,” said the Morrigan. “Within five minutes the stone must …”

A trail of smoke drifted under the door and floated across the room, and a bubbling sound of tears accompanied it. The Morrigan jumped from her chair: her eyes were wild, and there was sweat on her brow.

“Non licet abire!” She threw her arms wide to bar the way. “Coniuro et confirmo super …” But the smoke curled round her towards the hearth, and leapt into the chimney mouth. A wind sighed mournfully past the windows, and was still.

“No! No,” she mumbled groping for the door; but Grimnir had already flung it open and was rushing along the corridor to the stairs. He was halfway down the first flight when there was the sound of breaking glass, and the staircase was momentarily in shadow as a dark figure blocked the window at its head. The Morrigan’s harsh voice cried out in fear, and Grimnir turned with the speed and menace of a hungry spider.

The noise roused Colin and Susan from their trance. Again the Morrigan shrieked.

“Here, let’s get out of this!” said Colin, and he pulled his sister into the hall. “As soon as we’re outside run like mad: I’ll be right behind you!”

Quite a hullabaloo was breaking out upstairs, and most of the sounds were by no means pleasant; at least they made the other hazard seem less formidable – until Colin opened the door. There was a rasping growl, and out of the mist came a shape that sent the children stumbling backwards into the house, and before they could close the door the hound of the Morrigan crossed the threshold and was revealed in all its malignity.

It was like a bull terrier; except that it stood four feet high at the shoulder, and its ears, unlike the rest of the white body, were covered in coarse red hair. But what set it apart from all others was the fact that, from pointed ears to curling lip, its head and muzzle were blank. There were no eyes.

The beast paused, swinging its wedge-shaped head from side to side, and snuffling wetly with flared nostrils, and when it caught the children’s scent it moved towards them as surely as if it had eyes. Colin and Susan dived for the nearest door, and into what was obviously a kitchen, which had nothing to offer them but another door.

“We’ll have to risk it,” said Susan: “that thing’ll be through in a second.” She put no trust in the flimsy latch, which was rattling furiously beneath the scrabbling of claws. But as she spoke they heard another sound; footsteps rapidly drawing near to the other door! And then the latch did give way, and the hound was in the room.

Colin seized a kitchen chair. “Get behind me,” he whispered.

At the sound of his voice the brute froze, but only for an instant: it had found its bearings.

“Can we reach a window?” Colin dared not take his eyes off the hound as it advanced upon them.

“No.”

“Is there another way out?”

“No.”

He was parrying the lunges and snappings with the chair, but it was heavy, and his arms ached.

“There’s a broom cupboard, or something, behind us, and the door’s ajar.”

“What good will that do?”

“I don’t know: but Grimnir may not notice us, or the dog may attack him, or … oh, anything’s better than this!”

“Is it big enough?”

“It goes up to the ceiling.”

“Right: get in.”

Susan stepped inside and held the door open for Colin as he backed towards it. The hound was biting at the chair legs and trying to paw them down. Wood crunched and splinters flew, and the chair drooped in Colin’s hands, but he was there. He hurled the chair at the snarling head, and fell backwards into the cupboard. Susan had a vision of a red tongue lolling out of a gaping mouth, and of fangs flashing white, inches from her face, before she slammed the door; and, at the same moment, she heard the kitchen door being flung open. Then she fainted.

Or, at least, she thought she had fainted. Her stomach turned over, her head reeled, and she seemed to be falling into the bottomless dark. But had she fainted? Colin bumped against her in struggling to right himself: she could feel that. And the back of the cupboard was pressing into her. She pinched herself. No, she had not fainted.

Colin and Susan stood rigidly side by side, nerving themselves for the moment when the door would be opened. But the room seemed unnaturally still: not a sound could they hear.

“What’s up?” whispered Colin. “It’s too quiet out there.”

“Shh!”

“I can’t see a keyhole anywhere, can you? There should be one somewhere.” He bent forward to feel.

“Ouch!!”

Colin let out a yell of surprise and pain, and this time Susan nearly did faint.

“Sue! There’s no door!”

“Wh-what?”

“No door! It’s something that feels like smooth rock going past very quickly, and I’ve skinned my hand on it. That’s why my ears have been popping! We’re in a lift!”

Even as he spoke, the floor seemed to press against their feet, and a chill, damp air blew upon their faces, and they were aware of a silence so profound that they could hear their hearts beating.

“Where on earth are we?” said Colin.

“It’s probably more like where in earth are we!”

Susan knelt on the floor of the cupboard and stretched out her hand to where the door had been. Nothing. She reached down, and touched wet rock.

“Well, there’s a floor. Let’s have our bike lamps out and see what sort of place this is.”

They took off their knapsacks and rummaged around among the lemonade and sandwiches.

By the light of the lamps they saw that they were at the mouth of a tunnel that stretched away into the darkness.

“Now what do we do?”

“We can’t go back, can we, even if we wanted to?”

“No,” said Susan, “but I don’t like the look of this.”

“Neither do I, but we haven’t really much choice; come on.”

They shouldered their packs and started off along the tunnel, but seconds later a slight noise brought them whirling round, their hearts in their mouths.

“That’s torn it!” said Colin, gazing up at the shaft, into which the cupboard was disappearing. “They’ll be on to us in no time now.”

CHAPTER 10
PLANKSHAFT

The children went as fast as they could, stumbling over the uneven floor, and bruising themselves against the walls. The air was musty, and within a minute they were gasping as though they had run a mile, but on they sped, with two thoughts in their heads – to escape from whatever was following them, and to find Cadellin or Fenodyree. If only this were Fundindelve!

The passage twisted bewilderingly, and when Susan pulled up without notice or warning, Colin could not avoid running into her, and down they sprawled, though they managed to keep hold of their lamps. There was no need to ask questions. The tunnel ended in a shaft that dropped beyond the range of their light. And hanging from a spike driven into the rock was a rope-ladder. It was wet, and covered with patches of white mould that glistened pallidly, but it looked as thought it would bear the children’s weight. The urgency of their plight killed all fear: they dared not hesitate. Both hands were needed for the climb, so they tucked the lamps inside their windcheaters, and went down in darkness.

The rope was slippery, and it took all their willpower to descend at an even pace. They did this by moving down rung by rung together, Colin setting the pace by counting. “One – two – three – four – five – six – seven.” He was ten rungs higher than his sister, and the urge to increase the rate was very strong; he tried not to think of what might happen if Grimnir reached the top of the ladder while they were still on it. “A hundred and forty – and one – two – three – four – five.”

“I’m at the bottom!” called Susan. “And it’s wet!”

The end of the ladder dangled a few inches above an island of sand that lay at the foot of the shaft, and from here four ways led off, none very inviting. Two were silted up, and two were flooded. Colin chose the shallower of the flooded tunnels, along which stray lumps of rock served as unreliable stepping-stones, and for a few yards the children made dry, if cumbersome, progress. Then Colin, in helping Susan over a particularly wide stretch of water, saw the end of the ladder begin to dance wildly about in the air. Someone obviously had started to descend.

The brown water splashed roof-high as Colin and Susan took to their heels, skidding over slimy, unseen rocks. But the tunnel sloped upwards, and to their relief, they left the water behind and were running on dry sand. This, however, was not long an asset: for soon it lay so thickly that the children were compelled to run bent double, and, finally, to scramble on hands and knees.

What if the roof and floor meet, thought Susan, and we have to go back … or wait?

Sweat was blinding her, her hair and clothes were full of sand, stones added to her bruises, and her lungs ached with the strain of drawing air out of the saturated atmosphere: but she had her Tear, and this time Susan was going to keep it, even if all the witches and warlocks that ever were came after her.

Suppose we can’t go on, though …

But almost at once her fears were allayed: the lamp’s beam outlined the end of the tunnel against a blackness beyond.

“Oh, glory be!” she spluttered, and they crawled out on to a soft mound of sand. At first, they could only droop on all fours, heads sagging like winded dogs, and gulp in the cold air, which was a little more wholesome than that of the tunnel; and, from the sudden lack of resonance, they guessed that they must be in a cavern. Every movement in the tunnel had produced a magnified, hollow echo, which made their breathing now appear dry, and remote. The children staggered to their feet, and looked about them.

In shape and size it was just such another cave as the Cave of the Sleepers in Fundindelve, but instead of the light, darkness pressed in from every side. The yellow walls were streaked with browns, blacks, reds, blues, and greens – veins of mineral that traced the turn of wind and wave upon a shore, twenty million years ago.

Colin bent down and listened at the tunnel mouth.

“I can’t hear anything,” he said, “but we’d better move on, if we can.”

Losing their pursuer was an easy task. It seemed that they were in an intricate system of caverns, connected by innumerable tunnels and shafts. These caverns were remarkable. The walls curved upwards to form roofs high as a cathedral, and the distance between the walls was often so great that, at the centre of a cave, the children could imagine themselves to be trudging along a sandy beach on a windless and starless night. The loose sand killed all noise of movement, and helped the silence to prey on their nerves: moreover, it made walking hot, laborious work, and the air was still not good; ten minutes under these conditions sapped their energy as much as an hour of normal tramping would have done.

Tunnels entered and left the caves at all angles and levels. They turned, twisted, branched, forked, climbed, dropped, and frequently led nowhere. They would run into a cave at any point between roof and floor, and wind out on to dizzy ledges, which in turn dwindled to random footholds, or nothing at all. And the square-mouthed shafts were a continual hazard. Through some, the distant floors of lower galleries could be glimpsed, while others disappeared into unknowable depths. It was no place for panic. Every corner, every bend, every opening, had to be approached with the greatest caution, for fear of an unwanted meeting; and the caves were the worst of all. After crossing through half a dozen or so, and peering round at the holes which stared sightless from all quarters, Colin and Susan took to scuttling over the floor and diving into the first tunnel they saw, trusting blindly that that particular one would not be tenanted. In the tunnels they were close to wall and ceiling, lamps held their own with shadows; but in the caves the children felt truly lost, for their puny light only accentuated their insignificance, and the feeling of being exposed to unseen eyes grew ever stronger. Somewhere within this labyrinth someone was hunting them down, and Colin and Susan were never more aware of this than when they broke cover beneath a soaring dome of rock and ran through the nightmare sand.

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