Alys Clare - Out of the Dawn Light

The trees thinned out and as we emerged into the sunshine, for the first time in my life I saw the sea. I stopped dead — just then I couldn’t have moved to save my life — and stared. I heard myself go ‘ Oh! ’, but it was quite inadequate. There were no words to describe what I was feeling.

We were on a low sandy buff and I could see a large town in the distance below us. That in itself was quite awe-inspiring for someone who had lived her whole life in a small Fenland village. The greater wonder lay beyond.

The sea, restless under a light breeze that blew from the east, was like a huge sheet of beaten silver. It stretched from as far as I could see to my left to equally far to my right, and I had the sudden sense that we were nothing but a small outcrop in a vast watery world. Something in the sea called out to me, so that there and then, as I absorbed the effects of my first glimpse of it, I wanted to run towards it, give myself to it. It was just so big . Endlessly big, and the long line of the coast, stretching almost due north-south, seemed a feeble and inadequate defence against its might.

It will eat up the land, I thought. I didn’t know where the image came from — I still don’t — but I saw in my mind an image of low cliffs crumbling before the constant, effortless attack of the waves. Mighty buildings cracked and the lines that webbed out across them, tiny and insignificant at first, swiftly and inexorably grew into huge fissures, and then enormous chunks of masonry fell away and disappeared with vast splashes into the hungry sea. People cried out in panic, the church bells sounded their urgent alarm, and from out of the turmoil I thought I heard a sudden clear note ringing out, as if someone had struck a ring of metal with an iron hammer.

Then the image faded.

I was shaking, my knees suddenly weak. I would have liked to sit down but Romain, impatient now, was already striding on.

‘Come on!’ he urged, and Sibert and I hurried to join him. ‘We’ll look down on the town, then we’ll proceed on to — to our destination.’

Had we further to go? I did not know, for Romain had only said vaguely that we were going to the coast and now we had reached it. I looked at Sibert, raising my eyebrows in enquiry.

‘The port’s down there,’ he said quietly, jerking his head in the direction of the town. ‘Romain’s land’ — a sardonic smile briefly crossed his face — ‘is on the coast a few miles to the south.’ He added, half to himself, ‘Drakelow.’

Drakelow? Was that the name of Romain’s manor? If it was, I didn’t much like it. A drake is another name for a dragon, and it was surely inauspicious to call one’s dwelling place after such a fearsome and aggressive creature. To compound the folly by adding low — our word for the roar of a wild beast — seemed to be just asking for trouble. .

The bellowing of a dragon. . Why, I wondered, did that image seem familiar? But there was no time now to dwell on that.

I frowned as I walked, already deeply uneasy about the task before us. Before me , in fact, for I was the dowser and it was for me to pinpoint the location of whatever we had come to find. All at once I was very angry with Romain. He had been high-handed and arrogant, assuming my — our — ready compliance with his wishes and giving out so little information in return. I’ve been such a fool, I thought miserably; I’ve gone along with his wishes as meekly as a puppy eager for a pat on the head. I ought to have demanded to know what I was getting into before I even considered leaving the safety of my sister’s house.

My sister. My fat, pregnant, complaining, cruel but nevertheless suffering sister. And I had abandoned her. Oh, well, I reflected, while I was castigating myself I might as well do the job thoroughly, so I gave myself a good scolding for being selfish and heartless as well.

Romain had stopped. I was so preoccupied with my unhappy thoughts that I almost walked right into him. I went to stand on his right; Sibert was on his left.

He stretched out his arm, indicating the scene before us. ‘Dunwich,’ he said grandly. ‘It’s one of the largest and most important ports on the east coast. Three thousand people live there’ — three thousand! I could not believe it, nor begin to imagine how so many people could possibly be in one place — ‘and there are half a dozen churches and quite a few chapels, and several religious foundations as well. The port exports East Anglian wool and grain and those ships you see down there’ — he pointed to the harbour — ‘are probably from the Baltic. They’ll have brought furs and timber, mostly,’ he added knowledgeably. ‘We also receive ships from the Low Countries with fine cloth’ — he brushed nonchalantly at the sleeve of his tunic — ‘and from France, bringing good wine.’

He spoke with such confident authority and for a moment, scared and homesick, so far from my home and all that I knew and understood, I had an urgent need of his strength and self-possession. He’d said we. We receive ships. How possessive he sounded about this astonishing place. Well, if his manor were indeed close by, then it appeared he had every right to be. I was suddenly struck by the unpleasant thought that he can have had nothing but an abysmally low opinion of Aelf Fen. Oh, dear Lord, and I gave him some of the food my mother had prepared for Goda’s wedding. Whatever could he have thought of it, he who was used to the very best that money could buy?

I felt my face flush with shame.

But then I thought — actually it was almost as if someone else had put the thought into my head, and the voice sounded very much like Edild’s — that Romain might be wealthy and powerful but despite all that he had come looking for our help, mine and Sibert’s. This vital task that he had to do could not, it seemed, be achieved without us.

After that, I began to feel less abject.

Romain was very aware of the two young people standing either side of him. The boy was trembling. Although the awareness of this disturbed Romain he was not surprised at it, for he had been aware of Sibert’s growing fear for some time. He was fairly sure that he knew from where it stemmed: at the outset, the youth had said very promptly that he knew where the search must be carried out, no doubt about that . Now that the time had come, was he beginning to question himself? Perhaps he was thinking, Oh, but it’s all changed — as indeed he well might — and I’m no longer sure of my bearings.

In a way, Romain hoped that this was the cause of Sibert’s obvious distress. Romain could deal with it if it were; a few encouraging words, a few hearty phrases on the lines of ‘Of course you can do it, Sibert! Just relax, take your time, study the area carefully and the rest will follow, you’ll see!’

There was something else that could be causing Sibert’s alarming tension. Studying him covertly, Romain wondered if at long last the boy had realized what Romain had tried so very hard to gloss over. Sibert was far from being stupid but he was obsessed, and such a violent and all-encompassing emotion did not always permit rational thinking. Romain had rather depended on this. So far, he had got away with it. Please, he prayed to a power he could barely envisage, please don’t let him realize now, of all times, what I’ve been so very careful never to mention!

Sibert gave himself a shake, as if coming out of some bleak reverie. Sensing Romain’s eyes on him, he turned and gave the older man a small smile. Romain, taking that as a good sign, returned it with a broad grin. ‘Not long now!’ he said encouragingly.

Sibert did not answer.

Romain twisted round to look at the girl. Something had shifted within her, too, although the change was subtle and Romain could not interpret it. He had sensed her awestruck reaction to her first sight of Dunwich — it was hardly surprising, she was a rural peasant who had probably never strayed more than a few miles from her ghastly little village before now — and he had compounded the moment by sharing a few of the impressive facts about the great port. Let her be in no doubt, he had thought, who is master in our enterprise. She’s right out of her natural element here, as well as being absent from her sister’s home without permission, and she’s got to realize that I’m the only one who can protect her. I need her to be utterly dependent on me and on my good will, he reminded himself. That way she’ll be completely in my power and there won’t be any silliness when we find what we’ve come looking for.