Roger Taylor - Caddoran

‘It’s difficult,’ he said weakly.

‘These past weeks have been difficult,’ Hyrald retorted caustically. ‘Yesterday in particular.’

Abruptly, Nordath’s protective manner slipped away and uncertainty pervaded him. He turned unhappily to Thyrn and seemed to have to drag words from some great depth when he spoke. ‘You’ll have to tell them… us,’ he said. The last word was almost inaudible, but the three Wardens heard it.

‘Us?’ exclaimed Rhavvan. ‘You mean you don’t know?’

A gesture from Hyrald silenced him. The sudden change in Nordath’s demeanour as Thyrn’s guardian was disconcerting in itself, but now he saw Thyrn’s eyes glazing over. For a moment he thought that the young man was going to collapse.

As did Nordath, who reached out to support him. Despite this change, Rhavvan pressed his question.

‘You mean, you don’t know what all this is about?’

Nordath, recovered now and looking intently into Thyrn’s face, tried a half-hearted negotiation. ‘No, I don’t,’ he admitted bluntly. ‘But the fact that Vashnar’s proclaimed the Death Cry against you is enough to tell you it’s something really bad he wants hidden, isn’t it?’

Adren intruded quickly between Rhavvan’s wide-eyed indignation and Hyrald’s scarcely veiled anger. ‘The seriousness isn’t in dispute, Nordath,’ she said quietly. ‘Hyrald’s right. We’re here through a mixture of good luck and sheer panic, but we can’t carry on like this, we need to know why we’re running if we’re ever going to be able to stop. You must tell us what Thyrn’s done, Caddoran matter or not. You’re not bound by any oath just because he might’ve broken his and told you something. If you want to help him, you’ll have to tell us.’

As she was speaking, she was helping Nordath to lower Thyrn into a seated position against the wall of Endryk’s shelter.

‘What’s the matter with him?’ Rhavvan asked.

‘I don’t know.’ Nordath straightened up. ‘He goes like this sometimes – when things are too much for him. He usually just comes out of it after a while, as if nothing had happened.’

‘Running away, eh?’

Nordath turned on Rhavvan furiously, obliging the big man to take a step backwards. ‘You judge this lad when you’ve walked a mile in his shoes, Warden. Caddoran aren’t like ordinary people. They’re strange, special. Almost impossible for the likes of us to understand. And Thyrn’s special even amongst them. How do you think he got to work for Vashnar at his age?’ He slapped his hand on his chest. ‘I don’t know why, but I’m the only person he’s ever been able to turn to like an ordinary human being – a friend. His parents – my blessed brother and that shrew of a wife of his – just see him as a milch-cow. The other Caddoran of his age are too intimidated by his talent to treat him as an equal, while the older ones are for the most part either jealous of him or wanting to shine by reflection from him. And Vashnar cares for nothing and no one except his position and the power it brings him.’

Rhavvan recovered. ‘We still need to know what’s going on!’ he shouted.

Nordath nodded briefly, but his anger was spent and he sagged. ‘I know, I know. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to… I know none of us wants to be here. I realize we’re a burden to you. I’m grateful… we’re grateful.’ He fell silent and sat down wearily beside Thyrn.

Prompted by Adren, Hyrald crouched down in front of him. ‘Is Rhavvan right? Do you really not know what Thyrn’s done?’

Nordath did not reply immediately, but fidgeted nervously, rubbing the palm of one hand with his thumb. ‘No, I don’t,’ he replied eventually. ‘When he came to me he was frantic – hysterical. I couldn’t get two coherent words out of him. I’ve seen him in lots of moods, learned a lot about him over the years, even got some inkling about how he thinks, but I’ve never seen him like that before.’ He recalled the thunderous pounding on his door, and yanking it open to have the terrified lad tumble, white and shaking, into his arms.

‘It took me a long time just to get him quiet,’ he went on soberly, ‘and I soon learned that asking what had happened just set him back to where he’d started. I’ve never felt so helpless. Then, you three were there looking for him, and…’ A shrug encompassed the gasping Warden who had brought the news of the Death Cry, and the subsequent confusion and flight. ‘I haven’t asked him since – not that we’ve had a chance.’ He turned to the still distant Thyrn. ‘But in any case, I haven’t dared. Rightly too, by the look of him now.’ He levered himself up, reluctant to continue talking about Thyrn as though he were not there. He lowered his voice. ‘I don’t even know if he can hear what we’re saying when he’s like this. And you’re right, Rhavvan, he is running away, but what from, and where to…’ He shrugged again.

‘All of which leaves us where?’ Rhavvan asked, though his manner was softer.

‘No worse off, I suppose,’ Hyrald replied resignedly. ‘But, Nordath, we must try to find out what he’s done – you can see that. Can you speculate – guess at what might have happened?’

Nordath shook his head. ‘No. I told you, Caddoran think in different ways to the rest of us – especially Thyrn. You’ve seen how he is – nice to be with, more often than not, with an innocence about him and always wanting to know – like a child. Then other times he’s so serious and intense it gives you a headache just looking at him. All I got from him were odd words like “darkness” or “blood”. And he kept covering his eyes and curling up, as if he’d seen something he didn’t want to.’

‘Touched him. Deep.’

It was Thyrn, his voice distant and strained. As the others looked down at him, he let out a long, hissing breath and folded his hands tightly over his head. Hyrald knelt down in front of him, bending low in an attempt to look into his face.

‘What did you say, Thyrn? We didn’t hear you.’

A slight whimper keened out of the young man’s tightly closed lips. Hyrald could feel the fear that prompted it rippling through him.

‘Don’t be afraid, you’re safe with us, here. You…’ He stopped with a startled cry as Thyrn’s hand shot out and seized his arm. It drew him forward until there was scarcely a hand’s width between their faces.

‘Everyone be afraid,’ Thyrn said, his voice soft and still strained. ‘No one’s safe. No one, anywhere. Darkness.’

Then the grip was gone and Thyrn’s hands were covering his face. Hyrald looked up at Nordath for advice.

‘I’ll make him talk,’ Rhavvan said grimly, before Nordath could speak.

‘I doubt it,’ Hyrald said. ‘I agree with Nordath. From the look of him I’d say he’s scared out of his wits.’

Rhavvan bent forward, clenching his fist menacingly. ‘Just another uncooperative witness. Make him more afraid of us than whoever else is frightening him.’

Hyrald noticed a slight twitch in Thyrn’s face at this remark.

Part of you is still here, then, he thought. Listening, learning, watching. What goes on in that Caddoran mind of yours?

Once again, almost as though Thyrn had reached out to him, he sensed the young man’s leaking terror.

He spoke directly into Thyrn’s face as he eased Rhavvan’s proffered fist aside. ‘Difficult to do that, I’d judge. A push too far from where he is and, like some of our witnesses, we’ll lose him completely.’ Besides, despite the lad’s irritating ways, as Nordath had claimed, he couldn’t help liking him, not to say feeling sorry for him. ‘I think right now he needs our help more than we need his.’ He put his hands on Thyrn’s shoulders.