Roger Taylor - Into Narsindal

‘He is,’ Gulda said firmly. ‘Sleep on it, both of you.’ She stood up. ‘You must excuse me. I’ve things to attend to.’ And with a brief nod, she was gone.

Hawklan watched her black, stooped form depart-ing. For an instant he seemed to feel an overwhelming sense of her great pain and loneliness.

‘Who is she, Andawyr?’ he said after the door had closed softly.

Andawyr turned away from his gaze. ‘I don’t know,’ he said simply. ‘I feel many things when I’m with her-pain, fear, excitement… ’ He shook his head. ‘Many things. But she’s more hidden from me than even you are.’

Over the next few weeks, Hawklan felt the whole Castle resounding to the arrival of Andawyr and the others. And indeed, it seemed to him that every step he took through its countless corridors and hallways rang out like a small peal of welcome. He remarked on it to Loman. The smith smiled.

‘It’s been like that ever since you left and we started studying and training in earnest,’ he said. ‘New people coming and going all the time debating, thinking, planning. The Castle seems to thrive on it in some way. As if it were waking after a long sleep. You can feel it all around like the opening of thousands of flowers.’

Hawklan gave his castellan a look of great gravity at this poetic image, but Loman ignored the gentle taunt and ploughed on.

‘I find new things every day, in the carvings, the pictures, everywhere, even whole new rooms. Things that perhaps I’ve been looking at but not seeing for years.’ He paused. ‘In truth I don’t know whether it’s the Castle or me, but it’s wonderful.’

Hawklan agreed. ‘It’s probably both,’ he said, smil-ing.

Isloman too noted a difference, and not just in the Castle. ‘Have you seen some of the carvings that are being done?’ he asked, eyes wide in appreciation. ‘And with everyone having less time for it as well. I’ll have to look to my chisels if I’m not to be replaced as First Carver.’

‘You don’t seem too concerned,’ Hawklan said.

Isloman gave him a large wink. ‘It won’t happen,’ he said, banging his fist on his chest and laughing. ‘I’ve learned a trick or two from those wood carvers up north.’

Yes, Hawklan thought. And you faced and survived Oklar’s storm fully conscious. That will add qualities to your work beyond measure.

He himself, however, felt oddly unsettled. This was his home; and yet not so. These were his people; this his time; and yet not so. A restlessness niggled deep inside him like a burrowing worm.

He succeeded for the most part in disguising this unease, but Gulda saw through him and brought him down with brutal ease.

‘Sit!’ she said, entering his room unannounced and finding him peering out through the window, frowning.

Hawklan’s legs responded before his mind caught up with them.

Gulda swung a chair round and sat down facing him, hands folded over the top of her stick and her chin resting on them as usual.

‘Where’s your pain?’ she said.

Hawklan looked bewildered. ‘I don’t understand,’ he replied.

Gulda glanced towards the window. ‘What were you frowning for then?’

Hawklan shrugged uncertainly. ‘Nothing in particu-lar.’

Gulda’s eyes widened. ‘You’re unhurt, you’re in this most wonderful of places and surrounded by splendid friends, yet you frown at nothing in particular,’ she said. ‘Heal yourself, healer.’

It occurred to Hawklan for a moment to protest, but the thought wilted under Gulda’s penetrating gaze.

‘How?’ he asked simply.

‘Face again what you’ve faced in your journeyings,’ Gulda replied. ‘Face again what you must face in the future.’

Hawklan frowned again. ‘I’ve no problems with what happened on my journeyings, as you call them. Unpleasant though some of it was. But how can I face what I was before or what I’ll become? The one I’m striving to remember, the other I’m striving to see.’

Gulda fixed him with a steely gaze. ‘Leave them,’ she said with stark finality. ‘Your past will return to you when you need it, and none can see the future-not even Sumeral. Have you forgotten the butterfly’s wings so soon? Your future will happen regardless, and your frowns now will merely become unhappy memories where there should have been happy ones.’

There was a humour in her voice but Hawklan felt the cold inexorability of her words exposing the folly of his fruitless concerns. It happened with such sudden-ness that for a moment he felt almost winded.

‘You’re right,’ he said, with a brief grimace of self-reproach. ‘I’m sorry. They sneaked up on me.’

Gulda laughed. It was like sunshine melting the frost. ‘They do,’ she said. ‘And they will again. But be more careful in future. Neither the warrior nor the healer can risk being ambushed like that too often.’

Hawklan stood up and walked back to the window. Gulda joined him.

Below them was a cascade of windowed walls and a patchwork of rooftops, glistening silver-grey in the drizzling rain. Beyond was the curving sweep of the wall of the Castle, and beyond that was a vague, rain-shrouded impression of the rolling Orthlund country-side. A few hunched figures walked to and fro along the wall. Hawklan smiled; for all its damp bleakness, the scene had a peace of its own which had eluded him but minutes earlier. No, he corrected himself gently. The peace had not eluded him, he had simply allowed his darker nature to turn his heart away from it.

Gradually the days shortened, and Anderras Darion began to sparkle with its winter lights, shining out through the dark nights as brightly as it gleamed in bright summer days.

And within it was the constant shimmer of activity as its occupants worked and talked and planned for the day when Sumeral’s cold hand must inevitably draw them forth.

Yet for all the grim prospect that lay ahead, the Castle’s inner light forbade entry to its dark shadow; as also did Hawklan, now keenly alert for signs of the clinging ties of fear and doubt that might appear like silent cobwebs to mar that very future by shrouding the present.

Many other threads of endeavour were woven through the weeks. A messenger was sent to Fyorlund with the news of the safe arrival of Arinndier and the arrival and recovery of Hawklan. A messenger too was sent to Riddin, but he was obliged to return as the snows took possession of the higher peaks and valleys.

Andawyr and Gulda wandered the Castle together, pored over tomes in the library together, and talked and talked.

The Fyordyn joined with Loman and the other Mor-lider veterans in the training of the Orthlundyn army, Dacu and Tel-Mindor taking a considerable interest in the Helyadin. All however, sat at the feet of Agreth to learn about cavalry warfare.

Jaldaric and Tirke were offered the opportunity to train with Athyr in the Helyadin.

Rede Berryn eventually took his stiff leg to Hawklan.

Dacu and Tel-Mindor were impressed by the Helyadin. ‘I’d never have thought it possible to achieve so much in so short a time,’ Dacu said. ‘You’re to be commended, Loman. Your people are remarkable and you yourself must have learned a great deal during your service under Commander Dirfrin.’

Loman grimaced. ‘Not from choice,’ he said. ‘It was learn or die. One doesn’t forget such teaching. And Gulda knows a great deal, though how she came by such knowledge I’m not even going to think about asking.’

The two Goraidin agreed with that sentiment and concentrated on adding their own expertise to that which Loman and Gulda had already taught. They had already bruised themselves badly against Gulda by casually protesting about the physical dangers to the women in training alongside the men, especially in the severe training required of the Helyadin. Hearing their unexpected complaint and being in no position to advise against its utterance, Hawklan and Loman had both developed a sudden deep interest in nearby carvings as Gulda had stopped writing, paused, and then slowly looked up from her desk.