Dark Waters of Hagwood Read online

  “Grimditch?” the werling said. “What’s the matter?”

  The barn bogle gasped. In a thick, rasping voice he said, “Do not drink the dark waters.”

  To Gamaliel’s dismay, the bogle then lurched backward and reeled around, and the boy saw that a dagger was lodged in his back.

  With a final, gurgling cry, Grimditch pitched forward and fell from the cave.

  Gamaliel dashed to the waterfall and saw the bogle’s body floating facedown in the pool below. Then he heard foul and raucous laughter as Captain Grittle gloated over his skill with a knife.

  Despairing, the boy staggered back out of range and slumped against the rocky wall.

  Outside he could hear the Lady Rhiannon rebuking her soldiers for letting him escape; what use were they if they were defeated by a trickle of water? The wer-rat would now be lost in the endless honeycomb of caverns that stretched beneath the forest. They were incompetent and worthless. She should consign them to her dungeons where they could sample the exquisite embraces of the torture instruments they took such a pride in.

  The spriggans’ pleas for mercy came echoing into the cave, and Gamaliel’s hand closed about the wergle pouch that hung around his neck. There was no time to despair. He still had a task to perform.

  “And then, My Lady,” he said grimly, “your reign must end. By the lives of everyone who has ever suffered and died at your command—I, Gamaliel Tumpin, swear to do my very best to destroy you.”

  Outside, in the ravishing sunlight, the Lady Rhiannon was crossing the pool to where her stallion was already sloughing the shape of Nanna Zingara’s humble donkey.

  As she stepped over the stones, the barn bogle’s body drifted past toward the stream.

  She stared at it callously for a moment then saw a trail of bubbles popping to the surface through Grimditch’s tangled hair.

  “This bogle still lives!” she declared.

  Stooping, she pulled Grimditch from the water, then retraced her steps and handed him to the spriggans. Shrinking from his waterlogged form, they immediately dumped him on the ground and, with a shudder, slapped their hands dry.

  “Take it to the Hollow Hill,” the High Lady instructed. “Give it to the goblin nursemaid. Gabbity will tend the wound. If it survives, there are questions I wish to put to it. Do not attempt to interrogate it yourself, do you understand?”

  Captain Grittle bowed, and Wumpit and Bogrinkle hastily did the same.

  “And if it don’t survive?” the captain ventured.

  Returning over the stepping-stones, Rhiannon Rigantona mounted the great faerie horse and threw back her head. “Then feed it to the Redcaps,” she snorted.

  “Where are you bound, M’Lady?” Captain Grittle called as she spurred the midnight stallion on.

  “Firstly,” her voice rang out, “to a place I have not visited for far too long, and then I go to the broken watchtower!” With her raven tresses flying behind her, she spurred the horse away at a gallop.

  The spriggans watched her thunder into the surrounding forest, then gave their attention to the barn bogle at their feet.

  “Right,” Captain Grittle announced, “you ’eard what She said. Let’s lug this ’orrible, soggy bit of vermin to the ’ill.”

  “But it’s all drippy!” Wumpit whined.

  “Like as not it’ll croak on the way back,” Bogrinkle added. “Why don’t we finish the job ’ere and take some prime cuts back for the Redcaps as proof it snuffed it?”

  Their captain slapped his own face in disbelief then kicked each of them in the shin.

  “You think She wouldn’t find out?” he bawled. “You think She ain’t got eyes all over everywhere? Don’t you ever let me ’ear you grumble against one of ’er orders again. Now pick up that saturated bogle and give it the gentlest ride it’s ever ’ad. If that sodden fleabag’s dead by the time we get back, then She’ll kill us an’ worse!”

  And so Wumpit and Bogrinkle lifted Grimditch with as much care as if he were a baby and bore him to the Hollow Hill.

  INSIDE THE CRONE’S MAW, GAMALIEL Tumpin had heard it all and felt more helpless than ever. He could not follow them; he had to remain true to his sister and Finnen. If Grimditch survived, then he would be safe for the present. Their lives were still in peril—if they were alive at all.

  Taking a deep, resolute breath, he strode to the rear of the cave where the floor sloped downward, but before he began that lonely journey into the subterranean dark, he whispered, “Good-bye, Grimditch, my friend.”

  CHAPTER 14 *

  THE TOWER LUBBER

  LIFFIDIA WAS COLD. THE HAWK was soaring high above the forest roof, and a chill wind cut through her woolen clothes. Dangling from the bird’s talons, she tried not to think of the gruesome fate that awaited her, but she knew she would be torn to pieces and fed to hungry chicks in some remote and lofty nest.

  The immense sprawl of Hagwood stretched beneath in all directions, and its beauty and magnitude took her breath away. In the distance ahead a great moor was hidden by shifting mists that glowed in the dawn as gilded clouds, and there, on the horizon, a line of verdant hills reached back to a range of pale-blue mountains.

  The spectacle was almost enough to make her forget her terror—almost.

  Before her, the hawk bearing Bufus Doolan gave a high screech, and her own captor gave an equally shrill answer.

  Liffidia wondered what they were saying to each other. She could see the Doolan boy kicking and fighting in the bird’s grasp. Not for a moment since they had been torn from the Pool of the Dead had he ceased his violent struggles, but the claws that were clamped about his shoulders were like steel and would not release him.

  The standing stones were now far behind them; they had flown over the seven pines of the Witch’s Leap, and the expanse of Hagwood rushed below. They were approaching the eastern border of Hagwood. The trees were growing more sparsely, and the moor was beginning. But jutting from the edge of the forest was a high ridge and, standing at the end of that grass-covered promontory, was a tower.

  For many long years it had loomed there, a great solid shape built by the hand of man in that desolate corner of the wild world. To watch for enemies had been its original purpose, but no human guards had ever endured there for long. The isolation was one thing, but the noises in the night were worse. Although they watched for foes across the moor and away to the south, it was the forest behind them that they grew to fear.

  No one would stay on that desolate spur in the wilderness, only a day’s ride from the Hollow Hill and its inhabitants. Men would venture into the forest and never return; others were driven mad listening for inhuman voices on the wind. Within twenty years the tower was deserted, and slowly it fell to ruin.

  The threatened invasion never took place. Over the grinding centuries the great blocks of stone were battered by relentless winds, and endless frosts had crept in to perform a slow destruction of their own.

  Now the watchtower was a broken stump of a building, still higher than any of the tallest trees, but unroofed and exposed, and the winding stair within climbed only to the open sky.

  Yet it was not the sight of that desolate and forsaken structure that had amazed Liffidia, but what she beheld massing around it.

  At first she had thought a fire was raging upon the tower, for a dense, dark fume was wrapped about it. But, as she was flown closer, she saw that it was not smoke at all—the air was filled and choked with birds.

  They had flocked from the remotest pockets of the forest and beyond. In vast numbers they circled the ragged summit, calling and singing in thousands of discordant voices, a cacophonous music to inspire and blare in the ear of heaven. Every species of bird that dwelled in and around Hagwood was there: from the smallest jenny wren to barnacle geese and whimbrels, redstarts, chaffinches, shrikes, doves, mistle thrushes, crows, godwits, jackdaws, magpies, woodpeckers, and buzzards.

  With the sunlight gleaming over their countless wings, it was a vision Liffidia would never
forget, and her fear of being devoured by hooked beaks was forgotten. There was something more happening here, something greater.

  Toward that hovering multitude the hawks went rushing, and when they drew near, the raucous cloud of birds parted and flew around them.

  A wood pigeon gave Liffidia a curious stare as it fluttered past, and then a pair of starlings went chirping by, almost as if they were gossiping about her.

  Through the squawk and the din and the flap of feathers, the werlings were carried. Bufus was so overwhelmed that he stopped resisting, and Liffidia could hear his brash, incredulous voice exclaiming above the clamor around them.

  They were taken to the summit of the broken tower where, to their complete astonishment, they saw a figure standing in the midst of that airborne host.

  Upon the highest point of the crumbling, circular wall was a creature with his arms held out wide and the birds whirling around him.

  Liffidia tried to see what manner of being he was, but a flock of sparrows obscured the view. Some alighted upon the sleeves of his shabby leather coat while others hopped from one finger of his large hands to another. Not one of them tried to perch upon his pointed felt hat, for a sparrow hawk was already in place there and, even though this was the Time of Truce, they were still shy of her.

  And then a voice rose above the chattering and the yikkering—a gentle, warm, throaty voice.

  “Thank you, my friends,” it called. “And where did they go then? I see—ah, our other guests have arrived.”

  The hawk carrying Bufus had given a cry, and at once the sparrows began chirping in alarm.

  “Now don’t you frighten yourselves,” he reassured them. “There is no danger here, as you well know. I thank you for the tidings you brought.”

  The timid birds sang a twittering farewell, then, as one, they flew off. Truce or no truce, three hawks were three too many, and the sooner they fled their vicinity, the better. The sparrows hurried away, and, finally, the figure on the tower was in plain view.

  For once Bufus Doolan was lost for words, then the hawk carrying him turned about, and he felt the talons unhook from the shoulders of his jacket. With a wail of surprise, the boy dropped through the air.

  He did not tumble far, and the landing was unbelievably soft and cushioned. Bufus snorted with pleasure and immediately wanted to do it again.

  An instant later Liffidia was bouncing next to him. The Doolan boy sat up and looked around them. They were in a nest, a great comfortable nest, lined with moss and downy feathers.

  “There ain’t much breakfast left,” said a familiar voice nearby.

  Bufus laughed and there, leaning on the twigs opposite, with his sore foot resting on a heap of moss and feathers, was Tollychook. A hard-boiled pigeon’s egg was in either hand, and he was cheerfully taking bites out of each of them in turn.

  “How many have you had, you great dollop?” Bufus snorted.

  “Only four!” the boy replied. “I saved you both one.”

  Liffidia rushed over, but he thrust an egg into her hands before she could hug him.

  “I’m so glad to see you!” she told the boy.

  Whatever Tollychook answered, his mouth was too full of his own breakfast for anyone to understand.

  Liffidia held the egg to her chest. It was deliciously warm, and the sensation comforted her.

  The air was still thronged with birds. Their numbers painted the tower in ever-moving shadow, and, as Bufus tucked into his own breakfast, Liffidia turned her attention to the strange figure who was now praising the hawks for bringing the werlings to him.

  “How clever you are,” he said as they landed upon his sleeve and he stroked the plumage on their breasts. “You have done so well, my swift ones. I congratulate you, all three. This dawn heralds more than the beginning of a new day, and this spring shall see more than the unfurling of new leaves. The long winter of our waiting is at an end, and the new light will banish many darknesses.”

  Liffidia looked long and hard at him: he was slightly taller than Nanna Zingara but broader and far more ugly.

  His legs were crooked, his back was twisted, and a great hump distorted the shape of his shoulders. The arms that hung from them were not in proportion to the rest of him, being far too long, so that he could trail his fingers over the ground even while standing. Yet it was his face that held Liffidia’s attention.

  The creature’s head was large, and countless years of standing upon the tower, weathered by the wind, had turned his skin brown and leathery. His small chin was almost completely hidden by an enormous lower lip shaped like a trowel blade, and his beaky nose was long and bristled. His forehead was low and sloped back under his hat, and he had the largest, lumpiest ears that Liffidia had ever seen. But all these observations were fleeting, for the girl was staring fixedly at his eyes, or rather where they ought to have been.

  Beneath those low brows there was no glittering gaze, no penetrating look, no curious gleam. The stranger’s eyes were gone, and in their place were two crudely carved pegs of wood.

  His appearance was horrific and should have been terrifying, but Liffidia felt only sympathy and compassion. The eyelids that held the rough timber chunks in place were red and raw and watering. They could never close or blink and she could feel her own eyes stinging as she tried to imagine what it must be like for him. There was something so immeasurably tragic about that blind and deformed figure.

  As the birds continued to fly about him, he spoke to each and every one, knowing them only by the sound of their voices, and they sang to him with joy and gladness.

  No one who is so beloved by so many living things could be evil, thought Liffidia.

  Bufus finished eating the last of his breakfast and came to stand at her side.

  “He’s a shocker,” he said. “What a fright of a face that is. Do you reckon his eyes were pecked out by some of these twitterers?”

  “No,” she answered firmly. “Listen to them—he’s their friend; they all trust and adore him. They wouldn’t do that.”

  The boy shrugged then glanced over the edge of the nest and pulled back sharply.

  “Fancy standing up here!” he exclaimed in admiration. “Bad enough being able to see how high up we are. How come he’s never fell off the edge and got splattered?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Maybe he’s been here so long he knows every inch of every stone without needing to see them.

  Bufus screwed his face up. “But who and what is he?” he hissed. “Winner of the most hideous goblin award? That’s a face only a mother could love—but only if she were blind as well! And what does he want with us?”

  Liffidia turned to Tollychook who was busily licking his fingers.

  “What has he said to you?” she asked.

  The boy gave a contented smile and patted his stomach. “Only to enjoy a good breakfast,” he replied. “Nothing else. Said he had to listen to what all these ’ere birds have to tell him. Calls them his children, he does.”

  Bufus snorted. “Doesn’t that mean we’ve just eaten some of his grandchildren then?” he cackled.

  Lifiddia ignored him, but Tollychook rubbed his tummy uneasily.

  “Didn’t he even tell you who he was?” she asked.

  “No, but he said to expect you two, so that’s why I saved you them … them eggs.”

  Any further talk was abruptly quenched by a sudden increase in the din. The stranger bid farewell to the birds and their response was almost deafening.

  And then they departed. In one vast flock they flew from the tower, flooding through the sky as a great shadowy river. Over Hagwood they rushed until finally they scattered, some raining down into the trees while others raced across the forest.

  The birds’ voices died on the chilly wind. The peace and calm left in their wake was a startling contrast, and Bufus rubbed his ears.

  Now the three werlings were finally alone with the strange blind figure. He turned toward them and, with assured steps, approached th
e large nest in which they stood. Then he crouched on his haunches to speak to them.

  “My children will return to their daily struggles,” he declared. “The harsh rule of beak and claw resumes. But while they are here, they know they are safe; the Tower Truce binds them all, and none will break it.”

  Liffidia gazed up at him. It was unnerving looking at those sightless wooden pegs, but his voice was kind and she was unafraid.

  “Who are you?” she asked.

  The stranger smiled. “I am the Tower Lubber,” he said. “A friend to all creatures who take flight. Many orphans of the egg have been raised by me; abandoned fledglings, broken wings, shattered bill, and injured claw—all find their way here and I nurse them.”

  “The Tower Lubber?” Liffidia repeated. “It’s a strange sort of name.”

  “Daft one if you ask me,” Bufus put in. “What’s ‘lubbing’ all about then?”

  The stranger laughed softly. “Lubbard, Lubberkin, Lob-Lie-by-the-Hearth,” he said. “It’s just a name for a clumsy, oafish fellow or a helpful hobgoblin.”

  “So which are you?” the boy asked.

  “A blending of both, perhaps—but then maybe neither.”

  “You bain’t a bit clumsy the way you balances up here,” Tollychook said admiringly. “Right nifty and light you is.”

  “Very goblinish though,” Bufus added.

  The Tower Lubber turned away to the east, and the morning sunlight streamed over his ugly face.

  “I was not always thus,” he answered. “I did have another name, once—but that seems an eternity ago to me now.”

  He fell silent, and the smile faded from his large lips.

  “So long ago,” he murmured eventually. “Can it really be time to end this? Could it really be possible?”

  It seemed to the werlings that he had forgotten they were present. Then he stirred himself and returned his blind gaze to them.

  “Yes,” he said. “The time is here and we must not waste what Fortune bestows upon us. The war has already begun.”