Roger Taylor: The waking of Orthlund

Isloman shook his head. ‘No,’ he said. ‘He can’t be. Try again.’

Sylvriss laid her hand on Hawklan’s throat and closed her eyes to shut out all distractions. Very faintly, like the distant stirring within herself, she felt the flutter of Hawklan’s heart.

‘Yes,’ she whispered, as if the sound of her too-loud voice might extinguish the tiny flame. ‘You’re right. But what can I do? I’m no healer. I’ve no idea what’s wrong with him.’

‘I don’t know,’ Isloman replied. ‘But give him the sword. It’s… important… it’s saved me in the past, and it’s saved us all today. Give it to him.’

Reluctantly, Sylvriss held out her hands to receive the weapon. Isloman placed it gently on to the out-stretched palms. As the hilt of the sword touched her, Sylvriss felt the wind-blown Fyorlund countryside disappear in a great soaring song. A myriad voices singing a myriad tales of triumph and despair. There she was, riding by her father’s side across the open Riddin countryside, flirting and teasing the besotted Rgoric in summer orchards, withdrawing into herself over the long bitter years as Dan-Tor poisoned her husband, prowling the Westerclave, slaying the Mathidrin Sirshiant in the streets of Vakloss, at once exhilarated and degraded by the deed. And other tales were there. Everything was there. Everything. Even the life song of her unborn child.

With a cry she let the sword fall. ‘What is this?’ she asked hoarsely. ‘Who are you? And who is this to own such a thing?’ She looked down at the motionless Hawklan.

‘Help him, please,’ said Isloman again, taking her arms in his powerful hands. ‘I’m sure the sword will help him.’

‘No,’ she said. ‘He’s… too near the end to hear… that.’ She clasped her hands together to stop them trembling as she looked at the sword.

Then she leaned forward and took hold of Hawk-lan’s hand. It was cold and lifeless; a terrible contrast to the great celebration that had just possessed her. Almost without realizing what she was doing, she pressed it gently against her stomach. ‘He needs a softer song to draw him back from wherever he is,’ she heard herself saying.

The wind buffeted the motionless group, ruffling Gavor’s feathers, and blowing Sylvriss’s hair across her face, but it could not disturb the deep stillness that descended on them all as they watched and waited.

Then Sylvriss laid down Hawklan’s hand and placed her fingers on his throat. ‘His heartbeat’s a little stronger,’ she said after a moment, almost disbeliev-ingly. ‘Still faint, but definitely stronger.’

Isloman checked for himself. ‘It is, it is,’ he whis-pered. ‘And his face is less pale.’ However, despite his obvious relief at this improvement in his friend’s frail condition, the momentum of his journey seemed to return to him and without further comment he lifted Hawklan up quickly and began carrying him to his horse.

‘What are you doing?’ cried Sylvriss in alarm. ‘He’s very weak. I don’t think he should ride any more.’

‘He’s ridden this far and lived,’ Isloman said, almost callously, although his tone contrasted markedly with the gentleness with which he laid Hawklan across Serian’s neck. ‘We have to get away quickly.’

Sylvriss seized his arm and dragged him round to face her.

‘He might die yet, Isloman,’ she said angrily. ‘What are you running from that’s worth such a risk?’

Isloman looked down at her, his eyes full of concern and gratitude, but still impatient and fearful. He cast around for an explanation. It was there, in the west.

‘We’re running from that, Muster lady,’ he said, gently taking her hand from his arm, and turning her round to look at the place they had just so desperately ridden from. ‘We’re running from that. And the man… the creature that caused it.’

There, dominating the distance, was Vakloss, chief city of Fyorlund, standing high on its isolated hill, and crowned by the towers of the King’s palace. Its familiar skyline was unchanged, but Sylvriss was aware of some ominous difference, though for a moment she could not make out what it was. Two scars, seemingly rooted at the palace diverged across the city, as though a powerful flood had struck a massive rock and split irrecoverably into two lesser streams. At isolated points, smoke was being swept up and dissipated by the wind.

‘What… ’

‘Mount up.’ Isloman’s command cut across Sylvriss’s question, and forestalling any further discussion, he swung up on to Serian. Immediately, the horse began walking along the road.

Scowling, at first with annoyance and then with pain, Sylvriss mounted her own horse and rode after the retreating stallion, which had now broken into a trot. Catching a gust in the wind, Gavor opened his wings and rose straight into the air to follow them both.

‘What’s happened in the City?’ Sylvriss finished her question as she reached Isloman.

Isloman shook his great head, trying to order his thoughts. ‘I can scarcely remember,’ he replied. ‘I remember getting involved with a crowd and arriving at the palace somehow, then Hawklan was talking to this Dan-Tor, and… ’ He screwed up his face in concentra-tion, then laid his hand uncertainly on the bow hanging from Serian’s saddle. ‘Then Hawklan shot him… for some reason… ’

Sylvriss’s eyes widened. ‘Shot him,’ she gasped. ‘Shot Dan-Tor!’

Isloman nodded uncertainly.

Hopes began to form in Sylvriss’s mind. Was she fleeing now from something that no longer existed? Were these two men simply fleeing an anticipated retribution?

‘Is he dead?’ she asked anxiously.

Isloman turned to her, his face fearful again. ‘How can a thing like that die?’ he asked. Then, almost to himself, ‘It’s so confused. Hawklan’s never used a bow in his life. And he’d never strike anyone… ’ Memories returned to give him the lie. Memories of Hawklan wielding the sword like a great warrior to hack down Mandrocs as the two of them had fled from Aelang’s patrol in Orthlund, Hawklan defeating Mathidrin in the smoke-strangled streets of Vakloss. ‘Well, not without provocation,’ he added hesitantly.

Sylvriss leaned across to him and laid her hand on his arm. ‘What did you mean amp;mdasha thing like that?’ she said.

Isloman started slightly. ‘Hawklan’s arrow struck him, I’m sure,’ he said. ‘He twisted away, but it hit him. Sent him staggering. I’m certain it did, and yet… ’ His voice faded away as he struggled again with the confused images that were vying for his attention.

Sylvriss waited.

‘I remember Dan-Tor standing there, changed somehow, standing there radiating a terrible power, malevolent, like… ’

He shuddered. The words did not exist. ‘He… it … lifted its hand and pointed at us, then everything around us was heaving and rumbling… even the ground.’

Imperceptibly, Serian’s trot became a loping gallop.

Unthinkingly, Isloman’s hands clutched nervously at Hawklan’s limp body draped in front of him, like a child trying to wake a parent for reassurance that his recent vivid torment had been just an evil dream. But there was no response.

Sylvriss took his arm again. ‘What happened?’ she said softly.

Isloman shook his head. ‘It’s gone, it’s gone,’ he said. ‘I remember Hawklan holding out the sword, keeping back some awful… I remember cowering behind him as he sank to his knees. Then everything’s confusion, screaming and pain. Everyone’s screaming. Every thing’s screaming. Even the stones. Pity help me, even the stones.’

Isloman’s head went back in a spasm of despair. Sylvriss flinched away from his pain.

‘Then I was on Serian. Galloping through panicking crowds. Galloping through heaving streets… ’ Isloman’s eyes widened, and Serian’s gallop increased. ‘They were cracking open in front of us. Like great yawning mouths. And buildings were falling. Debris clattering around us everywhere, and great clouds of dust blowing.’ He drew a hand across his mouth. ‘And all the time, it was behind us, pursuing us. A great howl like a monstrous, demented animal… So much hatred… So much evil.’