Peter Dickinson - Angel Isle

Man and boy rose and stood for a moment, staring north, and saw a dark fleck in the pale blue sky above a massive snow-streaked ridge. Tension swept up the hillside. It was as if the placid turf had been the nape of a giant neck, every grass-blade prickling with sudden apprehension. Quietly they walked toward the cedar, laid a hand on its bark and disappeared.

By now the stone where the lizard had been was mottled with blue and yellow lichen, and the place was empty apart from the sheep and the dog, and the small creatures that clicked and chirruped in the sun-warmed turf. The tension remained, electric.

Rocky circled down toward the mountain meadow, apparently empty apart from a flock of sheep and a sheepdog.

“I think this may be where we’re going,” called Saranja over her shoulder. “To start with, anyway. I didn’t ask him to land, and he can’t be hungry yet. There’s got to be a shepherd somewhere around. Perhaps he’ll tell us what happens next.”

The dog below yapped a warning. The sheep started to scatter and the dog raced to round them up as Rocky swung in a full circle and glided in toward the slope, closer and closer, and with a sudden bell-like booming of wings landed some twenty paces below the cedar.

All three riders climbed stiffly down. Rocky folded his wings and started to nose discontentedly at the sheep-nibbled turf, too short to be much use to him. The dog streaked toward them, snarling, only to halt almost as suddenly, but with hackles still bristling.

Maja stared around. Something was wrong. Apart from the spectacular view she couldn’t see anything different from any of the half-dozen lonely and peaceful places where they’d stopped to rest, but the feel of this place was like the twanging stillness before the thunder breaks.

“If there’s a shepherd he’s probably hiding in the wood,” said Ribek, apparently untroubled. “That’s where I’d be, seeing something like us show up. Unless that dog’s magical.”

“No,” said Maja. “But the place…”

“What about the place?”

“It’s… worried .”

They looked at her. Saranja shrugged.

“Rocky chose it,” she said. “We may as well stay here for a bit, anyway. There must be some better herbs in this lot of woods. I didn’t like the look of that leg of yours at all this morning. How’s it feeling?”

“Not too good,” said Ribek. “It’s been throbbing a while. But it’ll do a bit longer. I’ll just see if that stream’s got anything to say.”

Maja helped him limp across the slope. He paused at an odd little pool, an exact circle of still clear water cut into the grass.

“Nothing there for me,” he said. “Somebody made that.”

“By magic,” she whispered, afraid of her own voice.

“I’ll take your word for it,” he said, and limped on.

For a while he stood by the stream with his head cocked, apparently listening to the ripple of the water over the boulders. Maja had a strange notion while she waited for him that she could actually feel whatever he was listening to. Not hear it, the way he seemed to, but feel it as a sort of soft rippling tickle somewhere at the back of her mind. Momentarily it soothed the throb of tension.

“Well?” muttered Saranja sarcastically, when Maja had helped him back. “What’s the news from nowhere?”

“That tree’s watching us,” said Maja.

Ribek turned and looked.

“Isn’t that a cedar, Saranja?” he asked gently.

Saranja too turned.

“Oh, gods!” she yelled as she strode toward the tree and thumped her clenched fists against the bark. “I never asked for any of this! I tell you I don’t want any of this!”

A breeze woke in the stillness of the afternoon and whispered among the needles of the tree. Just as with the stream, Maja imagined she could somehow feel its mutterings in her mind. Saranja listened to them, frowning and biting her lip, and strode back unappeased.

“All right,” she said. “So this is the place, and we’ve got to wait. Same from the stream, I suppose. And I’m starving, and there’s almost nothing in the saddlebags.”

“There’s mutton,” said Ribek with a jerk of his head toward the flock. “Only I don’t like the look of that dog.”

Maja jumped with sudden shock. A moment later, with a faint sound of air abruptly displaced, a basket landed on the turf beside them. The smell of fresh bread added itself to the mountain odors.

“And you don’t want any of that either?” said Ribek. “What do you think, Maja? You’re jumpy about something?”

“I think it’s all right,” muttered Maja. “It was just the way it came. And this place.”

“Still worried? Any idea what about?”

Maja concentrated. The worry-feeling was like an itchy patch of skin round an insect bite that causes it, sometimes almost too small to see, but…yes…there.

“Rocky,” she said.

“What are you two talking about?” said Saranja, still sounding inwardly furious.

“Maja seems to be extra sensitive to magic,” said Ribek. “That’s why things like putting Rocky’s wings on shake her so badly. That must be really big magic. I bet that cedar is watching us, too. You’re not going to trust her about the food?”

“I’m not that pig-headed,” said Saranja.

They settled either side of the basket and checked through the contents. Ribek took out a mutton chop, shrugged, bit and chewed.

“Tastes fine,” he said. “But I suppose it would. Help yourself, Maja.”

She took one too. No thrill of magic came from it, though it tasted still warm from the grill.

“Well, you haven’t grown donkey’s ears,” said Saranja sourly, and started to eat. She continued to brood as she munched.

“What now?” she said. “Just sit here and wait for the Ropemaker?—Is there any reason, by the way, why we can’t just call him Ramdatta?”

The whole landscape answered her. The three syllables throbbed through Maja as if she’d been a hard-struck bell. Rocky lifted his head and neighed, a sound that seemed to shake the hillside. Birds exploded from the wood and wheeled clamoring above it. Something thumped onto the turf behind them. They turned and saw two figures sprawled on the ground beneath the downsweeping branches of the cedar. These now rose groggily to their feet, shaking their heads as if to clear them.

All three travelers stood to face them. They saw a man in early middle age, stocky, muscular, with close-cut curly brown hair, a smooth, unreadable face, clean-shaven but with remarkably hairy legs revealed by the odd leather kilt he was wearing. His skin was golden brown tinged with olive. Next to him stood a gawky boy with a strong family likeness despite the difference in build.

“One moment,” said the man, and strode past them with the boy beside him, then stood staring out southward across the immense landscape. They could feel the tension too. Maja could see it in their poses, and feel it humming from them. They relaxed at last, and the man shrugged his shoulders and sighed as they turned to face the newcomers.

“That name,” he said. “Don’t say it again, please. Your horse is more than signal enough of your presence here. Can anything be done to mitigate that?”

Maja could hear the strain in the quiet, slow-spoken words.

“I can take his wings off,” said Saranja. “Maja says he doesn’t feel at all magical without them.”

The man glanced at Maja, frowning.

“Maja seems able to feel magic,” said Ribek. “She knew you were in the cedar.”

Saranja picked an apple out of the basket, cut it in quarters with the knife from her belt, walked down to Rocky and offered him a piece of it, which he took neatly from her open palm. She waited while he munched, gave him another piece, teased at his mane and moved to his shoulder, and gave him the rest of the apple. She reached for the wing-roots and stroked her hands gently up the massive bones.