Varlarsaga Volume 2 - Recovery

Chapter - 36 Rî-Mer-Ri

‘And...and that is all I have to tell, until you came to me last night,’ sighed Corin, taking a draught of water from a hide bottle.

Beside him, by the pale coals of a spent fire, lay the huge, snoring hummock of Brôga the ogre and upon his massive chest, heaving on the swell, sat Bimmelbrother the elvish cat, unblinking eyes starlit. Nearby stood Menkeepir, eldest Lord of Village Hill, far away in the Vale of Indlebloom. At a little distance, dotting the limits of the watery south and the stony north, loomed the pickets, like so many shadowy phantoms. Furthest of them, outlined by the timid dawn, was Mysingir, kneeling upon the crest of a dune. Below him milled the stout-hearted roans of Mendoth, waiting patiently for the morn.

Menkeepir took a pace closer to Corin's side saying, ‘May I see this armlet, the crown of which you spoke?’

Almost disbelieving himself, Corin threw back the witch-cloak and held his right arm aloft. There, bound about, now dull grey in the first light, ringed the band.

Menkeepir could but take his hand and gaze in silence. ‘I must believe,’ he choked at last. ‘You left us wearing only a smock. Yet we discovered you dressed thus; black and hooded, your feet a'bled and your face wind-blown and swollen, armed with this strange fillet of silver that you tell me was once your crown. In the time that we followed, nought was seen. Those I set to rear, came in through the night. One or two thought they heard the cry of a wolf, nothing more. Still and all, we found you wandering by this empty, reedy sea.’ He gestured absently, then went on, ‘Forgive me. It seems you have not even slept this long while. Here are the things you entrusted to my keeping. Take them and rest.’ Menkeepir bent and unwrapped a bundle containing Corin's elvish garments and the sword of Bel-Thalion.

But Corin said, ‘Do not offer me sleep, for I need it not, and now I think that I know why.’ He rose to stand beside the Lord of Mendoth. ‘Day is with us, and we must go on together. We both have yet to fulfil that which stretches beyond our sight, and though we may eventually go our separate ways, for this time I deem it right that we be not parted. After all, we have come so far, in and out of peril and danger. But you are still the chooser of your path as I am mine, and I say unto you that I will tread the eastward way, even if no other accompany me. For in that direction, I am sure, lies the next step, the next part of the puzzle that we are caught up in. Really, it is as if we were ants crawling across a huge painting; a picture that is slowly unfolding. So far we have seen only scant parts of it, though surely there will come a time when we shall know all there is to know that concerns us. It has been laid upon me to follow that quest; to seek the road of knowledge, searching out the ones of wisdom, to aid those in need and in the end, to defend them and this world, against that which is coming: The Old Danger, soon to be risen anew. And with It, the overthrow of Man and all other Dominions of Varlar. It is your task, as said the Witches of Ap-peloth, to prepare for that time; to play out your part as the Shepherd of Men.’

Menkeepir bent his head as if in deep thought. Then, after a little while, he raised his far-grey eyes to Corin's and looked him long and square. ‘There is something about you, something that eludes description and definition. Yet it is there. Be it your Fane heritage, I wonder?’

He ran his mailed hand over the growing stubble on his face, and the fair beard rasped softly. ‘If I am a Lord of Men, then you are far more; more so far, that I know you not, or at least, but little. You are like a deep sea, or a wilderness encountered and nigh untouched. If, as you say, we are merely ants moving upon a mighty pageant, then not only without you is the unknown. It is, as well, within you.’

He took Corin's hands into both of his. ‘We will go on together,’ he laughed. ‘Do not worry. For a while, perhaps I grew envious of you; that your stature amongst men had grown, and mine diminished. Of course that is not so, for though I am bound by men's affairs, you are a part of something greater. We will ride side by side into the east, and we will see what we shall see.’

They stood together in silence awhile, both gazing toward their road, deep within their own thoughts, until Bim gave a cry that startled them.

‘What is it, my dear Bim?’ enquired Corin, bending toward the furry form of the cat.

Bim lifted a forepaw. ‘It is you, Meowster. Long have I ponnderred, and neow I guess an answerrr.’

Both Corin and Menkeepir knelt beside the cat, who still sat astride the snoring ogre.

‘Well,’ said Corin, ‘what is it you have to say?’

Bim blinked his large, sad eyes, ‘Burrr-mauww. It began when you came to lost-home Elfame. Crreaturres chose to speak with you, and at that time we knew not that you were more than mortal. Yet something made Motherr-Swan Penavar and I wonderr. Even the highest Elloræ wondered. Then laterr, after sailing to the land of Ravenmoorr, strange things happened. Rememberr when we climbed the spiral stairr and came out of danger to the round chamberr, wherein stood the door without latch or key or lock, and I discovered the peephole nearby and climbed through? I did not paw the door open. I touched it not. It swang out of its own accord, as I then thought. But is it not true that you let your hand fall upon it from the other side?’

Corin wrinkled his brow in an attempt to remember. ‘Perhaps I did, my friend, though what of it?’

Bim tilted his head and licked a paw thoughtfully. ‘Do you not rrecall the golden gates that stood shut against us atop the mountains? They too, fell back at yourr touch.’

‘Others laid hand to them, if I recall a'right,’ said Corin, pondering.

‘Merreoww,’ said the cat. ‘There have been times when you have touched creatures too. That rrascally ymp, Pitrrag, forr one. Afterrward, he became verry tame, as did his drragling Sgnarrli.’ Bim nodded his coal-black head sagely. ‘Even this oaf beneath me, snoring careless in the night, took quaff-wine from yourr hands Meowster. And he, in his own way, has been faithful since. Why was it, I wonderr, that your hands found the poison-bane in Silval's neck when otherrs, even Talba Brighteyes, failed?’

Corin shook his head uncertainly. ‘That I do not know, of certainty,’ he murmured.

‘Why was it that Fane Talba spoke to you with his dying breath?’ Bim continued. ‘Why indeed did he bequeath to you the light of his own eyes?’

‘Perhaps because I am the last of all left in Varlar whose veins run with Fane blood,’ offered Corin, ‘excepting Aneurin, and he was hard-put elsewhere.’

‘Purrhaps’ replied Bim, ‘though I am not sure that be the only reason. 'Twould seem to me that there is morre in this. There have been times, though may you have been unawarre, that light has shone about you. I am a cat; I see things otherrs do not. White light, I have seen at your head and shoulders, even as you slumbered: halo golden and patina green upon yourr brow, as you walked at sunset.’ Bim purred deep in his throat, and his eyes flashed and flickered in the fire-light which, as if by some enchantment, now suddenly flared.

‘What are you saying, good cat? Earlier you spoke of guessing an answer. Speak, tell us what it is,’ Menkeepir exclaimed.

Bim's mouth, though stoic in cat fashion, crept the nearest a cat can ever come to a smile. ‘Guessed is what I said, and guess is all,’ he answered. ‘It may well be, Meowster, that you are mostly mortal, with the failties and frailings of such. Or maybe you are mostly Fane, with a wisdom beyond me and my kind. Or,’ he lifted a paw in consideration, ‘or may it be that you are something else.’

‘Else,’ repeated Corin. ‘What do you mean, else?’

‘That,’ Bimmelbrother returned, ‘is the riddle.’

‘What riddle?’ exclaimed Menkeepir, in some consternation.

‘The rriddle that surrounds him,’ said the cat, unperturbed. ‘There is something more to my Meowster.’ Bim turned his eyes to Corin. ‘You are the one; the only one left of Varlar, who might be saviour of this world. You are, I guess, The One, Meowster.’

‘The One Master,’ echoed Menkeepir. ‘Yes. I know what sir cat feels. It has a ring to it.’ He laughed, until his laughter subsided, and the three fell as silent as the night about them. Then the Lord of Mendoth, and the cat, gazed with same affection, but with new-mingled awe, at the black-robed figure before them. It was, that they were struggling within their own minds to grasp the enormity of this sudden revelation. A Doom, somehow, was laid upon them; indeed upon all the world, and here, according to the words of The Witches, sat The One, who might be Varlar's salvation.

For his own part, Corin withdrew into the depths of his flowing hood. He had much to think upon, though confused and jumbled were those thoughts: ‘Are some really still living, down there inside? It so, are they living in torment and torture, without hope of the green world?’ Then, another question struck him. ‘Where is Croh-Yah, Earth-Mouth, that the Witches spoke of? Not to the east, that seems certain, for as the Sorceress told me, the Maadim rode eastward, but northward and southward also. And from the west, were driven back by the Drotnar Valandir and his followers. Then where lies this plain of Croh-Yah? No doubt within the centre of those points; but depending on where one stands, where you are, those points mean nothing.’

It was perplexing to him. The only clue, as the Witches had indicated, lay in the east. That was Corin's hope, and to it then, more than ever, he clung. Then, one last thought he thought, and it haunted him from that time on. He remembered the ferocious turmoil of the ocean, when he and the elves had sailed its breadth from Elfame to Ravenmoor. He recalled the dead things floating upon the water's surface, their eyes wide and staring with echoes of fear. What was the thing that the dolphin, Morfar, had warned them of? The Nardred, the Shadow-Dweller. Had that colossal thrashing of the sea been a sign of its coming? Was Varlar threatened even in the great streams of the oceans?

Corin had one brief vision, a flash of sight as it seemed, and in that instant he saw a darkened expanse of trembling water, and in its midst a sudden convulsion, like a giant spouting, though this was more unto a tidal wave that poured forth in every direction as, from its centre, there emerged a mountain of black. Yet in that mountain, there burned the eyes of a living behemoth; a creature so vast, so menacing, that it seemed to squeeze the very air from the sky, and as it rose towering, the waters of the world fell away, lowering. Such was the preponderance of that dark leviathan. Then the vision was torn from his mind as if a high wind had blown it away.

Corin sat, confused, stumbling in thought, clutching at the threads as they raced him by, whilst Varlar went its way and the day began.

‘The landscape changes,’ hailed Mysingir, who was foremost of the riders. He and several of the men had ridden to higher ground upon the horizon. Behind, the travellers had parted from the shores of the reedy-sea, crossing for a time over undulating rifts, dune-like though fertile, and always rising.

Now, as Corin and Menkeepir drew nigh the younger lord, it was seen that the sandy wastes and barren lands were well passed. Below them, down a gently rolling slope, lay a carpet of soft green and rich, red soil. Distantly on a further ridge, a stand of trees, like poplars, were framed by a cloud-blown sky. For a little time, they stared at it, such a welcome sight, since there were those amongst them who had despaired of ever seeing grass or tree again. Even Brôga contentedly grunted, extending his massive arm in that direction, so that Bim could run out along it and perch on the stone club buried within the ogre's ham of a fist.

Then, a curious thing occurred to the wayfarers. Corin was the first to notice, though he said nothing, waiting for the others to see for themselves. Mysingir was next, since he had looked longer than the rest. Yet it was another, Lynmarr, the man who had risen against Corin, and then pledged his allegiance as they struggled, thirsting over the Edinu Plain, who said, ‘My Lords, you know there seems to be a strangeness beyond. Master Corin you see it do you not? It is so, just right. As if the land were somehow ordered, tilled and ploughed even. The grass is so set, and the loamy soil ready to take seed and bear bounty of earth birth. Look ye how those patterns of green run almost pasture-like, as if hands tended them. Why it reminds me a little of the fields of Indlebloom, in our own valley home.’ He gave up speaking, marvelling, as the clouds rolled and the rays of sunlight swept over the rippling grasses.

‘Come,’ said Menkeepir, ‘let us ride down into this land and joy at our discovery.’

Corin smiled at this, his dark hood thrown back, and away they jogged, undreaming of what might lie ahead.

They cantered over the hock-deep lawn and the morning smell of it rose deliciously into their nostrils. Here and there, clumps of wild mushrooms dotted the undulate land, and coveys of grouse fussed amongst the clumps of turf where they passed.

When they reached the poplars, for that indeed was what the trees were, a chattering of starlings burst forth and flew, wheeling into the sky. Below the riders, lay a hollow dale, empty but for the sweep of fields and the long, orderly hedgerows, where sheltered elder-berry shrubs and within them, the tremblings of finches. Into this dale they came, a sense of ease stealing over them, almost as if, in truth, they were coming home.

‘Stinks-good-here!’ bellowed the ogre.

‘Prowww, shhush!’ hushed Bim, climbing off the ogre's shoulder and wrapping his furry body across Brôga's broad face.

The ogre shut his mouth, almost engulfing the cat. Then, picking him up in one huge paw, he grinned and whispered, as only an ogre can whisper, ‘Shush-you-nearly-went-in-Brôga's-tummy-tickle-on-way-down-har-har!’ He held his grimy fingers up to his mouth in a gesture of silence.

Bim rolled his eyes, after the booming reply. ‘I should not have sspoken,’ the cat ventured, climbing back to his perch upon the ogre's brawny back.

Not long after, the company came upon a high hedge. It towered before them, unbroken, left and right, into the distance.

‘What is this then?’ wondered Mysingir. ‘Should we try to cut our way through?’

‘That would take some little time, so close grown is it,’ replied Menkeepir. He drew nearer to examine the hedge. ‘Thick, but fine,’ he said, running his hand over the tight foliage. ‘Too fine to climb I guess.’

‘Even for a cat?’ mewed Bim, who was about to leap from Brôga's shoulder when a distant noise made him pull up sharp.

It was a barking and a baying and a general bow-wow-wowing, growing louder every moment, and it came from the furthest side of the fir-green barrier.

‘Yut-yut-yut!’ called a strange voice.

‘Hush now,’ said Menkeepir, drawing the reins of his roan. Holding a hand aloft, he signified that they should follow, whilst the racket and commotion neared and passed north-bound, along the further side.

‘Holla-holla,’ cried the voice from beyond. ‘Ræbit-ræbit. Hoy-hoy!’ And the caller charged off, it appeared, at a scurry.

‘Whatever have we come upon?’ Mysingir asked, good humouredly, as they trotted in pursuit.

Corin shook his head. ‘Someone in a hurry after his dogs, I suppose. Maybe they will lead us to an entrance through this living wall.’

He was right, for not much further on, the yapping and yowling came to a clamorous halt, whilst the calling and cursing puffed its way up from behind.

‘Yip-yip, wow-wow, yip,’ whined the animals, all at a fever.

‘Hie-hie, phew, eloo-eloo! Od drat, rat, drabbit!’ shouted the voice.

There came a scraping and a scratching, a clank, a rough slide and noisy push-push slither, as of old, unused metal against rusted housing. The animals howled frantically. The roans jittered and baulked. Protesting hinges squealed a laboured discomfort as their burden of hidden door slewed back an arm's length, and a knot of scrapping, frantic dogs struggled through the gap and burst, like a whirlwind, upon the travellers. Instantly there was uproar, horses reared and plunged whilst men fought them for saddle-hold. Dogs, everywhere, snapped and snarled and sniffed, puzzling. The ogre picked one up by the scruff of the neck as it barked and twisted. Brôga laughed, thinking it a great joke, but Bim spat and hissed, his hackles rising.

‘Hold your horses!’ commanded Menkeepir, steadying his own mount and swinging to the gateway, from whence there issued a shrill whistle. The din abated, the dogs fell back toward the covered arch, their raucous baying at end.

The last to have say was Bim, ‘Prrr, meoww, wwretched crreatures. Some are not brigands and thieves that dogs bark at!’

Then, the sudden panic over, all steadied. Within the alcove, where now lurked a handful of the dogs: some rough and black-white furry, some middle-sized yellow, and one red, there ventured a small figure. Ginger-bearded was he, and he clutched a walking-stick of curly black-wood. His garments were of autumn: rust, green and deep tan. Pointed cap, blouse, and leggings he wore about his baggy breeches, though his feet were bare and brown. Ringlets of hair fell about his ears and apple-flushed-cheeks, and set in his round, red nosed face, were deep, blue eyes. He held up, wary and undecided, his dogs clustering about his legs.

Then, he spoke. ‘Ye pardin M'sters. Gretan. Ar ye knawan mæ speecan? Hwither do ye hail from? Ar ye cumen tæ hidder geat en pæce?’

To this, Menkeepir answered, ‘Aye, we come in peace, and we know your words, though a little strange to our ears. Yet it is nigh to the language known as Ren by our peoples, where they dwell far, faraway westward.’ He waved an arm in that direction.

The tiny man, if indeed he was a man, replied uncertainly. ‘Ef tha’ bæ sooth, et bæ a wundrian. Tha’ hway hlies owny stæny pathas o'er emptæ lond, an bæyon tha'grund, mickle desert, hylls an Rine Sæ.’

Mysingir smiled. ‘A wonder, but nonetheless true, for beyond the hills and seas and deserts are other lands that, it seems, you know not of. One such is the realm of Menkeepir, my Brother here. He is Lord of Indlebloom Vale. But pray tell, good fellow, where we are now come to? What is this place named, and what lies on the furthest side of this high hedge?’

‘Mæsters,’ said the little chap, ‘thes grund namad Rean. Ay bæ namad Peasen. Ef ye seecan knawan bæyon, ye abidan mæ ræturna. Mæ furst speecan wid Cwen of lond, speecan of ye cumen.’

With that, and before any could say more, he darted back into the alcove, shooing the dogs inside. At once the door creaked shut and the bolts shot home. Then, the riders heard his voice calling, ‘Dogga, dogga, yut, yut. Hund, hund, huic, huic!’ till it faded into the distance.

Menkeepir looked at Corin with surprise and amusement in his eyes. Some of the men in the company laughed aloud, for such had been that comic scene. Even Bim meowed in light-hearted fashion. The ogre rubbed thoughtfully at an itch on his nose with his stone club. ‘Want-l-should-bash-down-door-must-be-food-blood-wine-inside-hungry-now!’

‘When are you not hungrry,’ said Bim stretching.

‘No,’ answered Corin. ‘We do not want you to knock the door down, thank you all the same. That would be impolite, to say the least.’

Brôga nodded, then as an afterthought asked, ‘Wot's-himponite?’

‘You are,’ said the cat. ‘And unclean. When we get inside, maybe you can learrn about bathing.’

‘Brôga-bat-thing-himponite!’ bawled the ogre, baffled.

‘Neverr mind,’ replied the cat, with a sigh.

They waited through the morning, making a meal at noon from their dwindled supplies.

But it was not until after their nuncheon, whilst the horses cropped the succulent grasses and the men lay or sat about expectantly, that the sounds of approaching folk could be heard upon the far side.

Bim, who had been keeping watch atop the hedge, scrambled down. ‘They are coming,’ he mewed, ‘a grreat many. Some bear scythes and pitchforks and otherrs bows and pikes.’

‘Look to your weapons men,’ said Mysingir, stirring the company to mount and be at the ready.

When the door began to open, only Brôga, Menkeepir and Corin were afoot. The others were drawn up around them, astride the gallant roans. Brôga was stationed beside Mysingir's steed, towering above Menkeepir, though the lord of Mendoth was a tall man, and Corin waited at the forefront, with Bim peering out from beneath the hood that shaded his master's eyes from the east-bound sun.

With a last rattle, the door fell back and out, cautiously, crept a growing band of folk. Some were quite small, ruddy-faced and glowing with curiosity. Others were taller, man-sized, and they had the look of men and women: their skins were tanned, but not the rubicund colour of their smaller companions. All in all, they appeared a healthy people; their dress was simple and countrified, their faces bright, ample and alert. The womenfolk, some of whom clutched hatchets or sticks, wore brilliant scarves about their necks, or bound over their hair. In the background, Corin noticed several holding babes swaddled in woollen rugs, or tugging at toddlers close to their sides. Many of the men held dogs a'brace on leather thongs, these were growling low, although they barked not, but sat instead on command. The smaller people carried odd looking crossbows, fitted with bolts, or hefted hoes and axes.

Yet to Corin, they seemed not warlike, but rather merely wary, rustic farmers and hunters of game.

As a growing tide, they spread out, lining the hedge ten deep to left and right. They appeared almost like an expectant crowd awaiting a procession or parade, and soon began to engulf the company, whilst Bim watched the dogs with a suspicious stare.

Then, there rose a murmur from beyond, as through the doorway stepped a tall woman in dress of unadorned brown. Something about her face struck a faint chord of memory in Corin's mind, though he could not guess what that might mean. She was weathered, but still young, and her bearing held grace and quality. As she walked, her hands sought children's heads, ruffling their tousled hair and, smiling, bade one of the smaller folk to lower his bow with a touch of her fingers.

Coming before Corin, she allowed her gaze to rest upon him, and then at each of the others in turn. ‘I am thæ Mistress,’ she said in a slow, clear voice, tinged with a hint of accent. ‘Thæ small folk nama me Cwen, but my true nama be Qwilla, daughter of Ernole, Mæster here before me. Welcome strængers, to thæ land of Rî-Mer-Ri.’

At those given names, Corin drew a sharp breath. Qwilla and Ernole, names of long ago, of a prince and princess who sailed the oceans and were lost to the waves before landfall with their brother Weldun and the pilgrims to the Isle of his own beginnings, Ravenmoor.

Chapter 37 [next]