‘Angwen told me about someone called Uldaneth,’ Farnor went on. ‘An old woman. An outsider. A teacher.’ He paused. ‘But she said that that was a long time ago.’
Uldaneth laughed. ‘At your age, two weeks is a long time, Farnor. When you’re mine, things tend to speed up a little.’ Her laughter faded away and she shook her head pensively. ‘It seems only yesterday I was teaching at Derwyn’s lodge. Not that it was his lodge then, of course.’ She let out a not unhappy sigh and fell silent. Farnor felt like an intruder.
Then she straightened up and slapped her knees noisily. ‘But a lot’s happened in the world since then, young man,’ she said briskly. ‘Far more than any of the Valderen know.’
Farnor was uncertain of the relevance of this obser-vation. ‘But what are you doing wandering about on your own at night?’ he asked, some concern in his voice as a feeling of companionship began to grow within him for this fellow outsider.
‘I’m always on my own,’ she replied. ‘More to the point, what are you doing here?’ Immediately, she gave an irritated click with her tongue and raised her hand to cut off the question. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘None of my business that, is it?’
Once again, however, it was Farnor who felt apolo-getic. An earlier question returned to him. ‘How do you know my name?’ he asked.
‘Derwyn told me,’ Uldaneth replied.
Farnor wanted to ask how it was that she had come again to Derwyn’s lodge after such a long time, but instead he asked, ‘What else did he tell you?’
‘Everything,’ came the immediate answer. ‘And so did Marken, Bildar, Angwen, Edrien, even that loud-mouth EmRan.’ Her forehead wrinkled. ‘I should’ve taken my stick to that little beggar when I was here last. I might have known he’d turn out the way he has.’
Farnor ignored this digression. He was not sure that he enjoyed having his doings related to all and sundry, and it showed on his face.
Uldaneth smiled wryly. ‘Don’t be offended,’ she said. ‘I don’t think you realize what a stir you’ve caused. And the Valderen are considerable gossips.’ She became more serious. ‘Besides, Derwyn wanted me to tell the other lodges about you. He’d sent message squirrels, of course, but as I was going your way he thought I might be able to explain a little better and perhaps help if you ran into any problems on the way.’
Farnor was only partly mollified by this. ‘Derwyn told you why I was here?’ he asked.
Uldaneth nodded. ‘He told me what you’d told him about your parents,’ she said. ‘And that you’re a Hearer of some considerable ability.’ She smiled. ‘Marken’s still so up in the air with excitement, he scarcely needs a ladder to climb to his lodge.’ Despite the humour in her voice, Farnor felt her sharp eyes watching his every response. ‘But Derwyn’s more concerned about what really brought you here – the thing that pursued you and alarmed the trees so much.’
‘Is he…?’ Farnor hesitated. ‘Is he going to go south and look for anything?’ he asked finally.
Uldaneth nodded. ‘Only on a private hunt, though,’ she replied. ‘EmRan got to the Shrub Congressim first, and they wouldn’t support him with a full hunt.’
Farnor’s eyes widened in dismay and he drove his fist into the palm of his hand. ‘He mustn’t go on his own,’ he said, leaning forward and taking hold of Uldaneth’s arm as if shaking her might unsay the news she had just given him. ‘It’s too dangerous. He’s going to need a lot of good men. I did tell him.’
‘Not clearly enough, apparently,’ Uldaneth replied sternly.
Farnor dropped his head on to his hands, abruptly reliving again those moments when he had been at one with the creature. When he had seen – felt – the terror of its victims. And now Derwyn was seeking it out, perhaps on his own. ‘Has he gone yet?’ he asked, desperately shaking away the memory.
Uldaneth shrugged. ‘I think he was intending to go after a first climb for one of Edrien’s cousins. He’s probably gone by now.’
‘He won’t have gone alone, will he?’ Farnor asked.
Uldaneth shook her head. ‘No. He was going to take Marken, and young Melarn. And I imagine Edrien will go with him; perhaps even Angwen.’
Farnor’s anxiety turned to horror. ‘Can’t you stop them?’ he gasped. ‘It’ll kill them all if they find it. It’s attacked groups of armed men, for pity’s sake, it’ll…’ He gave a cry of anguish and frustration and made to stand up.
Uldaneth laid a hand on his shoulder. Though her touch was not heavy, he could not move under its pressure. ‘What’s done is done, Farnor,’ she said. ‘Neither of us can do anything from here. But they’re none of them foolish or reckless people. And at least they’ve got some measure of what it is they’re dealing with. We’ll…’
‘They haven’t the slightest measure!’ Farnor burst in furiously. Then, scarcely realizing what he was doing, he poured out the whole saga of his strange encounters with the creature, ending with his panic-stricken flight into the Forest.
The telling was garbled and frantic, but, oddly, Uldaneth asked no questions; she simply watched and listened intently. Good,’ she said softly, as the tale petered out and Farnor subsided into a morose silence.
‘Good?’ Farnor echoed savagely. ‘Good? How can you say that? They might all be slaughtered They should’ve stayed in their lodges and left me… every-thing… alone.’
‘When people who see an ill thing stay in their lodges, they can look to lose them in time,’ Uldaneth said with chilling calmness.
‘Save your homilies for your pupils, old woman,’ Farnor snapped angrily. He struck his chest. ‘My parents neglected no ill thing. All their lives they worked to make the good better. But they lost everything, for all that – everything. Cut down like troublesome weeds.’
Uldaneth’s eyes narrowed slightly. ‘I know about losing parents, Farnor,’ she said. ‘Strange as it may seem to you, I’ve not that long lost my own father under less than happy circumstances. And I’ve few words of comfort for you. Sometimes – perhaps always – an ill deed begets ill consequences that travel on and on, far beyond the original cause in both time and distance, until all sense of meaning has gone from them other than the hurt they do.’
‘And the good deeds?’ Farnor’s voice was bleak and cynical.
‘The same,’ Uldaneth replied, with crushing as-suredness. ‘The same.’
Farnor could not argue. Uldaneth looked at him as if she was waiting for something. But he remained motionless, his head buried in his hands.
For all his stillness however, Farnor’s thoughts were twisting and turning, like caged creatures scrabbling frantically for escape. Images of Derwyn and the others, perhaps now to be slaughtered through his neglect, joined those of his parents, massacred on some mindless whim. This stupid old woman might ramble on about causes and effects travelling on and on, but he knew the single cause of all these happenings; all these brutal pointless deaths. It was Rannick. And only Rannick. And when he had killed Rannick, then…
Then…
But that was of no concern. All that mattered now was to kill the man. Put an end to the horrors he had begun. The image of Rannick’s dead body rose to fill his entire being. It would sustain him, carry him forward. And nothing must be allowed to stand in the way of his achieving this; not surly, watching Valderen, rivers, mountains, trees, ancient or sapling…
As this reaffirmation gathered strength, he felt him-self reaching out, reaching back towards the south, to the valley where he belonged: his home; and Rannick. Vaguely he felt a nervous fluttering about him. A myriad tiny cries of, ‘No!’ clung around him, binding him, straining to hold him here.
He would not be opposed thus! His will turned an-grily towards the voices – began to move…
‘No!’ Uldaneth’s voice and her hand on his shoulder drew him back to himself with a force that left him breathless, as if he had suddenly jerked himself violently awake from that uneasy gloaming between waking and sleeping. ‘You nearly fell into the fire,’ she said gently, still holding his shoulder. ‘Perhaps you should go to your tent. You look very tired.’ She looked into his eyes intently. ‘And you’ve a long way to go yet.’