K Parker - Pattern

'We can probably get along without you for a day or so,' Halder said suddenly. 'Why don't you go over to Colscegsford? You should go and see how they're getting on.'

Poldarn was so taken aback by this unexpected reprieve that he almost forgot to take the hot iron out of the fire. 'All right,' he said.

'Splendid. You might like to take the dun gelding, it could do with the exercise.'

Disconcerting; but so was everything at Haldersness, and the thought of getting out of the forge and not having to bash steel bars into ash rakes for a couple of days was almost intoxicating. 'I'll go first thing in the morning, then,' he said.

Halder shrugged. 'You could go now if you like. I'm sure Asburn can cope.'

'Sure,' Asburn confirmed, and there was just a faint hint of relief in his voice. That wasn't very flattering, but Poldarn could sympathise. They'd been cooped up together in the dark heat of the forge for five days while the rest of the household had been out in the fresh air raking ash, and what little they'd had to say to each other had been said a long time ago. He liked Asburn, of course-what was there not to like? Nevertheless.

He found the horse saddled, groomed and ready at the mounting block, with saddlebags packed with bread and cheese, a heavy riding coat rolled up and strapped to the back of the saddle, and a light hand-axe with a long, slender handle hanging from the pommel by its wrist-loop. Nobody offered to tell him what the axe was supposed to be for, and he didn't feel up to asking.

Another thing nobody told him was how to get to Colscegsford but that was all right, since Eyvind had pointed out the head of Colsceg's combe-you could just about see it from the Haldersness porch, on a clear day-and once he'd found that it'd be easy enough to find the house. 'I'm not sure when I'll be back,' he told Halder as he shortened his reins and crammed his broad-brimmed felt riding hat onto his head. 'Figure on a couple of days, at least.'

'You take your time and don't rush,' Halder replied with ambiguous enthusiasm. 'If they need you for anything over there, you stay as long as you like.'

Poldarn decided to assume that that was well meant and ineptly phrased. 'Thanks,' he said. Any message?'

Halder shook his head. 'Can't think of anything,' he replied. 'Well, you could mention to Colsceg that we could use another half-dozen cartloads of hazel loppings, but there's no rush for them, we've got enough to be going on with. And I expect he'll have more pressing things to do than go out cutting twigs for us right now.'

It was undeniably pleasant to go for a ride in the weak sunshine, even though the crunch of ash under the horse's hooves grated on Poldarn's nerves every step of the way; undeniably pleasant to be out in the fresh air, each moment taking him further away from Haldersness; undeniably, supremely pleasant to be alone. He had no great opinion of his own company, having had a great deal of it during his time in the Bohec valley, but he'd been working and eating and sleeping surrounded by other people ever since he'd arrived at Haldersness, and he had the feeling that he wasn't as naturally gregarious as all that. There were times when he felt as if he was getting swallowed up in the household, almost as if he was being diluted, to the point where he no longer existed as an individual; and yet not a single day passed when he didn't feel the enormous gulf separating him from the others. Probably it'd be no bad thing if he could lose himself in the common mind of the farm. In a way, it was the best thing that could happen to him-since he had so very little of himself-to fill up the empty spaces in his mind with other people's lives and thoughts and memories. Unfortunately, for all the others' assurances that it'd all come flooding back any day now, there didn't seem to be any reason to believe that it really would. In consequence, he was stuck halfway, a perpetual guest in his own house, never quite certain what he should be saying or doing, or where he was meant to be, or where anything was.

From the top of the valley Poldarn had a fine, clear view of the farm. There was the main house, with the red and white sail incongruously draping the roof; beside it, the barns and sheds and stores, a grouping as large as a small village; behind them the animal pens and the kitchen garden, a splash of browns and greens in the ocean of black ash. Beyond that, flashes of green testified to the tireless efforts of the household and the efficacy of Asburn's excellent cinder-rakes, while the river sparkled cheerfully in the sunlight, long and silvery as a childhood scar. Under other circumstances, he thought, you'd be hard put to it to find a better spot, and you'd have to be a prince or an earl or a wealthy man to have such a fine spread back in the Empire (-And it's all mine, or it will be some day, but it doesn't feel like it's mine. More the other way around, like it owns me.)

Half an hour further on down the other side of the slope, the Haldersness valley was invisible-you'd never even know it was there unless you happened to know the country. That was a strange thought, that the whole of his new life could be so easily overlooked, when the farm and its people had become his whole, all-enveloping world. Remarkable; a stranger could ride on by, and never know any of it was there (except that there weren't any strangers in this country, of course, apart from himself).

The further he went, the less Poldarn enjoyed his day off. On every side there was nothing to be seen but black ash, masking the features of the landscape so that he found it hard to keep his bearings. It was as if someone had covered up the whole island with a dust sheet, like servants in a house to which the master isn't expected to return for a long time. True, he was heading towards the mountain rather than away from it, but seeing it like this brought home to him the full scope of the disaster. If the stuff dissolved in rain, the mudslides were likely to be terrifyingly destructive; and if it didn't, there'd be nothing for it but to pack up and go somewhere else, because it'd take a hundred years just to clean up the Haldersness grazing, assuming there wasn't more where that had come from. The sight of it made him feel uncomfortable. A fine inheritance this was turning out to be.

Three hours on, as Poldarn passed the hog's-back ridge that he'd been told to look out for-it marked the nominal boundary of the Haldersness pastures and the start of Colscegsford land, though from what he'd gathered, nobody really gave a damn-he decided he'd had enough. He dismounted, found the stone jug of strong beer he'd noticed in the saddlebag, and sat down under a scorched-looking thorn tree with the aim of drinking enough beer to restore his sense of perspective. That turned out to be harder to accomplish than he'd hoped; the beer was strong, but not that strong, and as soon as he sat down, a mob of crows formed in the air and circled over him, passing remarks he was delighted not to be able to understand.

It was undoubtedly the beer that put him to sleep. He was dreaming about something (but, as always, the dream left him, like someone else's wife at sunrise, before he was fully awake), and then he opened his eyes and realised he was looking straight at a large, unfriendly-looking black bear.

Not so good, Poldarn thought, though it did explain what the hand-axe was for. But the axe was hanging off the saddle of his horse, which was tugging on its reins hard enough to uproot the tree he was leaning against. Whether it was his horse or himself that the bear was taking such an unhealthy interest in he didn't know, but he guessed that this wasn't a guessing game in which it would do to win second prize.

Bears, he thought; according to Eyvind, they were so rare as not to pose a threat worth worrying about; they only came down out of the mountainside forests in atrociously bad winters, when there was nothing left for them to eat, and even then they confined their attention to sick sheep and elderly cows, being too cautious and timid to attack a man unless starvation had made them truly reckless. Of course, if you did happen to run into one in that condition, Polden help you; because when they were that desperate, you could rip their guts open and they'd still keep coming.