Robert Carter - Whitemantle

Will lapsed into silence again. He had more than enough on his mind without troubling himself about Gwydion’s problems. Chlu lay heaviest upon his thoughts. It was strange to think that he had always had a brother, stranger still to know that brother was his twin, but strangest of all to find that it was Chlu who all along had been trying to kill him.

‘I must find out why, and make my peace with him if I can,’ he told Willow.

‘Some chance of that when all he wants to do is murder you. And mind what Master Gwydion said about speaking his true name. He said that if you did that you’d be destroyed.’

He shook his head. ‘He said that would happen only if I spoke Chlu’s true name as part of a spell. Don’t worry, the pronunciation is difficult, for it’s a Cambray name and the men of Cambray have their own tradition in both magic and words that is hard to approach and even harder to master. And anyway, Master Gwydion says that knowing a person’s true name always gives a measure of power over them.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t take the risk if I were you. Promise me you’ll keep away from Chlu if you can.’

‘I can’t promise that. I need to know what Maskull has done to him. Perhaps I can heal him. And perhaps in return he’ll be able to tell me what I most want to know.’

As they rode south, shadowing the last league of the Great North Road, they crested a heath dotted with elm trees and Trinovant began to rise up out of the afternoon haze. Will saw the dark needle of the Spire, which rose up like a crack in the sky, and the blue-grey sprawl that lay below it, sunk in summer haze.

‘The Spire contains the shrine of Ercowald,’ Gwydion said, ‘to which many pilgrims make journeys on the days when its precincts are thrown open to the ill and the dying, the lovelorn and despairing. They are given to wash in the troughs that surround the building, and perhaps make bargains of the heart with the hidden agents who speak to them persuasively from behind the iron grilles. Pilgrims come here even in freezing weather, when the ice on the troughs must be broken. On two great days in November and February there is a special ‘Day of Whipping’ in which the most committed of the Fellows go in procession through the City, beating themselves with scourges, for these are the ones that are mad beyond repair and have come to revere, and even to love, the suffering of their own flesh.’

Will felt a shiver of revulsion go through him. He looked to his wife and daughter, anxious now about the ordeal that was soon to come. It was said that at each of the City’s seven great gates there was kept a pair of dragonets, silvery wyrms whose task it was to guard the capital. Gwydion said that in olden times they had been bred to smell out treachery, and would pick clean the ribs of anyone whom they thought unworthy to enter.

Gwydion had spoken many times of the great city of Trinovant. Often he had likened its size and power to that of Tibor, the Slaver capital of old.

‘Over the centuries this place has grown into a vast, walled capital, a city of spires and towers and palaces, of the Guild Hall and the White Tower and Corfe Gate. A sprawling, rollicking morass of people live here, huddling inside for warmth in the cold midwinter, sweltering in the sweats of high summer. It is a city of high and low, from the bright, castellated battlements of royal palaces to the crowded hovels of the poor. It is quite unlike anywhere else.’

Now, as the shadows of the elms stretched more and more, the wizard turned, pointing ahead. ‘And do you see the white heart weather vanes of the Sightless Ones? Look how they rise above the walls. Those walls that will soon pass on our right are not the walls of the City, but those of the House of Silence. Beyond it lies the College of Benedix and the glass-makers’ yards, which is another rich establishment of the Fellows…’

Will listened as Gwydion pointed out the various marvels that were to be seen as they approached the City wall proper. So much of Trinovant seemed to have burst out and overspilled into the land beyond. But these unprotected buildings were not all mean houses and trade stalls as he had thought. His eye passed along many a row of tall merchants’ houses, some of three and even four floors built right on top of each other. In the street there were all manner of people – such a flow of traffic coming in and out of the City that Will could hardly believe there was not some special reason for it.

As they came past the great chapter house to their right, Will got his first sight of Eldersgate. It was like the gate of a great castle, all decorated with the rough likenesses of several great wyrms – the five great dragons of Umberland, Gwydion said. Their heads snarled down at them stonily.

‘What you will never see of this city are the cellars down below,’ Gwydion told them. ‘The whole place is greatly undermined. There are the secret passageways of the Guilds and many a sunless dungeon that lies beneath every lordly mansion flanking the river. There are tunnels too, linking together the many places of secret power – places like Bayard’s Castle and the Fitchet’s Den. The lords dwell there and the streets around them are wide and throng with sellers of costly wares. You will see, but first we shall pass by more humble ways, for we must go by Fish Street, Salters Ride and the Cloth Market, and so by unstraight ways to our destination, for today I must speak with Magog and Gogmagog.’

‘Magog and Gogmagog…’ Willow mused. ‘Weren’t those two the last of the giants? The ones that were put to flight by King Brea in the olden days?’

‘Put to flight? Not at all. Do you not know your own history? They were taken captive by Brea. Chained by him, then brought to his oaken palace, which was from that time onward called the White Hall.’

Will said, remembering his lordly schooling, ‘I was told by Tutor Aspall that Magog and Gogmagog were sent to the White Hall to do service as porters. Perhaps they serve King Hal still, for I don’t know how long giants live.’

Gwydion grunted. ‘Long, but not that long. Today’s Magog and Gogmagog are not the same as those giants of yore, yet they serve the present king after their own fashion, for today they are two great statues which stand in niches on each side of the throne. They look down upon the king’s proceedings and call out to give warning whenever his throne is in danger.’

‘They must be crying themselves hoarse at present,’ Will muttered.

‘And so it may be for the next few months, unless I am allowed to set to work to prevent the catastrophe.’

‘What will you do?’ Willow asked.

‘Do? I must do many things. But first there is a far greater work of un-doing. As I have already told you, I must pull down the grey skeins of sorcery that festoon the White Hall. Maskull has dwelt here for many a month, and in that time he has crept over every wall and tower like a longlegged spider, spinning webs of deceit about the royal house. Those spells must be swept away before the king and his captor come to town. I must find the workshop of Maskull’s wickedness.’ He sighed and glanced to his left. ‘What say we slake our thirsts at The Bell Without?’

‘Bell without what?’ Willow asked.

‘Without its clapper, I guess,’ Will said. ‘The Fellows of the Charterhouse yonder are of the White Order, and they keep a ritual of silence.’

‘A creditable surmise, but you guess wrongly. The inn is called The Bell Without, because it is without the walls. There is another alehouse inside the City called The Bell Within.’

Will smiled at that. ‘They seem to like their drink here. That’s a good sign, at least, for those who can drink and be merry are good men indeed!’