Кэролайн Черри - Fortress in the Eye of Time

But as he reached that point of exhaustion, and thought of sitting down and waiting for the dawn to come, whatever the hazards and in spite of Maurylʼs warnings, he rounded the shoulder of a hill and heard Owl calling. And in scanning the dark for Owl, he saw a triple-spanned stonework with an arch at either end.

It looked to be a Bridge like that at Ynefel. His spirits were too low by now for extravagant hope, but it was a faint hope, all the same, that he had come to some Place in the dark. A lightless, cheerless Place it might be, but it was surely stone, and the arched structure offered shelter of a kind Mauryl had told him made the dark safe.

So he walked, wavering and shaking as he was, as far as let his eyes tell him the arch let through not into a building but into utter dark — and reaching the second arch, and seeing planks between, he could see that the dark to the other side of the rail was no longer the woods but the glistening darkness of water.

A Bridge for certain, he thought. An arch and a Bridge had begun his journey; and now, with a lifting of his heart, he remembered Mauryl saying that Lenúalim was at the start of his journey and that Lenúalim should meet him on the far side of Marna Wood. Amefel was beyond, and Amefel was a Word of green, and safety.

He pressed forward to reach that span, and when he stood on it, beneath the arch, he saw faint starlight shining on the water beyond the stone rail, and saw to his astonishment a living creature leap and fall with a pale splash in the darkness.

“Who?” said Owl, somewhere above him.

This bridge was not so ruined as the one at Ynefel. The second arch, looking stronger than the first, stood above the edge of the shore where the reflective surface of the water gave way to the utter dark of forest on the far side. He stood beneath the first arch with his knees shaking, and with all that water near at hand — and was acutely thirsty. He could see the stars — truly see the stars for the first time in his life, for there were neither clouds nor treetops between him and the sky. He saw the Moon riding among them — a knife-sharp sliver. He had seen it only by day, in its changes. Its glory at night was unexpected and wonderful, a light that watched over him.

He did not leave the Road to go down beside the river. He sat down where he stood, his legs folding under him. He leaned against the stone. He knew it was not wise to leave the Road where he was, even to venture down to the river he could see. In the limited way the starlight showed it to him, it looked broad, and uncertain at the edges. Fool, Mauryl would say to him, if he fell in, after all this, and had not the strength to get out again.

Owl came and perched on the stone rail of the bridge. Owl came and went from there, and once brought back something which he swallowed with some effort. Tristen had no idea what it was nor wanted to know. Owl was a fierce creature, but Owl was all he had, so he tried not to think ill of him.

The water was brownish green and fast-running beneath him, as Tristen crossed the Bridge in the earliest glimmer of dawn, not trusting the middle of the boards — the loft had taught him that wisdom. Stone felt far safer, and he kept to the rim with the railing to hold to, where the planks lay on the stonework.

Owl had left him at some time last night and he had no guide in this crossing. But no stones fell. That heartened him. And oh, the other side of the river beckoned him, greener than Marna and lit in dawn sun. He was shaky with hunger, but he wanted to run, to rush whole-heartedly toward that green, bright place. Instead, he proceeded as carefully as he was certain Mauryl would advise him, all the way to the endmost span.

But only the width of the arch from a sunnier, younger forest, he asked himself, looking back, what if there were no way back, or what if he were, after leaving the bridge, at the end of all Maurylʼs instructions?

He went. He saw no choice. The Road led him onto solid ground and up to a forest that smelled of life. The wan sunlight itself seemed greened by the leaves through which it came. The Road vanished momentarily beneath a thick blanket of gold-colored leaves, but beckoned reassuringly further on.

Marna Wood had indeed stopped with the bridge, every sense told him so as he walked onto that solid ground, and smelled a fresher, warmer wind. He heard a bird singing to the rising sun, and another Word flickered into memory, Wagtail, although it flitted just far enough he could not see it.

And desperately thirsty as he had been since last night, his first venture in this new feeling of safety was down to the water, among green reeds, where, having reached that edge, he stood and looked back a second time at the far side of the river.

Marna stood as gray and as black as it had felt when he had traveled it last night.

Then he saw a lump in a tree branch on that other side, down where the woods met the water.

“Owl!” he called, loudly, so Owl could hear across the river. He waved his arm. “Owl? Do you hear me? Iʼm here!”

There was no answer, and he was disturbed at the thought of leaving Owl. He hoped Owl knew he had crossed the bridge. He hoped Owl could find him tonight where he was going, wherever the Road would lead him.

He sank down then on the waterʼs edge to drink, dry-shod on a spot of grass between two clumps of water-weed. In the shallows he saw brown and yellow stones. And before he could drink, a living creature swam up and looked at him from under the water surface.

Fish, the Word came to him. That had been the leaper in the river last night. It was brown and speckled and he sat very still as he would with the mice, until with a flip of a tail it sped away across the stones, free and very much in its own element.

One ate fish. That came to him, too, and he was repelled by the thought. He had no wish to be like Owl, who gulped down his neighbors.

The river as he drank made one sound, a hoarse voice of strength. The trees sighed with another. But those were not the only sounds. The air hummed with bees and a thicket by him twittered quite happily. He washed his head and hands and looked up to find the source of the commotion.

Birds had gathered about a bush, just up the bank, birds scolding and chasing one another, as he thought at first — but he saw when he came closer that berries were thick on the bush, and ripe berries had fallen on the ground, where birds lay, too, hale and well, but quite silly and flopping about, or sitting with feathers puffed, like pigeons on a chill morning. The birds, though unacquainted with him, did not all flee him, being much too eager for the berries, and those birds lying and sitting about the bush scarcely evaded his feet, so he was careful where he trod. He took a handful of berries for himself — they were sweet, overripe, and stained his fingers, and he ate a double handful of them before the birds that had fled ventured back to take the ones he dropped.

He was sorry to take their breakfast. He sat on the bank and shared with them, tossing berries out where they dared snatch them. Some squabbled and fought over the ones he threw, while others, full-fed, scarcely reached after the ones he set in front of them. One let him pick it up, and he smoothed its feathers and set it on a branch, but it swung upside down, hung from one foot, and fell into his hands again. So he set it on the ground. It was quite puffed and quite silly, and very full, seeming completely healthy, except the sleepiness. He left some berries on the bush for the birds, and walked with something in his belly for the first time in days, feeling quite giddy, but very much better, thanks to the water he had drunk and the berries he had eaten.