Bell Mountain (The Bell Mountain Series) Page 12

  “Please, sir—we’re looking for the Seven Hags,” Ellayne said. “Have you seen them?”

  The huge man stared at her for a second, then threw back his head and laughed. He sounded like two houses being banged together.

  “Oh! You mean those Seven Hags!” he said. “Why, they’ve all gone off with Abombalbap. Gone off to visit the Chief Giant in his castle!”

  He was more frightening when he laughed, Jack thought. What sane man would laugh so loud? And if he wasn’t the chief giant of these parts, who was?

  “Burn me if I don’t know a princess when I see one, even when she travels in disguise,” he said, when at last he’d stopped guffawing. “Quick, now, princess—where do you come from, and what’s your business with the Seven Hags?”

  Before Ellayne could answer, his face suddenly went grim and he spun around as fast as lightning. His staff made a terrifying swoosh! as it clove the air.

  It missed Obst’s skull by a finger’s width.

  “Ha!” he cried. “That was pretty good sneaking, Obst, but not good enough. I had you pegged, old man—just waiting for you to come closer.”

  “Almost too close, Helki,” said the hermit.

  “No—I knew it was you all along,” the huge man said. “I’ve been watching you all morning. Never knew I was here, did you? Admit it!”

  “Not until you laughed. There’s no one who can touch you for woodcraft, and that’s the truth. But I hope you haven’t terrified these children.”

  “Me—frighten children? Don’t be daft. I was just having a little fun with ’em. They’ll tell you so themselves.”

  Obst came up and clapped the big man’s shoulder. “Children, this is Helki—Helki the Rod, we call him. He looks ferocious, but he wouldn’t hurt you. He’s not even an outlaw.”

  “He knows about the Seven Hags,” Ellayne said. “I thought they were only in my storybook.”

  “I don’t know about books,” said Helki, “but Lintum Forest is full of stories, and I reckon I know burnt-near all of ’em. They’re part of the place, like the trees. I can show you the spot where King Ozias was born and a great hole in the ground that used to be the castle where the Enchantress kept Abombalbap prisoner for a year and a day.

  “But even better, I can show you the carcass of a buck I killed just yesterday, and Obst won’t have to bother to set snares if you want to eat. That is, if you’d like to visit my camp. It’s not far.”

  Helki led them to his camp, moving silently through narrow places along the path where the children and their donkey made a noisy thrashing. He didn’t hurry, but his strides were so long that even Obst had to hustle to keep up. In half an hour they were at a clearing where a deer hung on a makeshift tripod to be cleaned and a lean-to stood over a bed of green ferns. A pile of firewood lay beside a circle of blackened stones.

  “Sit down. Start a fire if you’d like a cup of tea. I’ll cut some venison for you,” Helki said. “And then, Obst, you can tell me who these children are and what you’re doing with them.”

  There were logs to sit on. Obst got the fire going. He brewed some tea that Helki had in his pack. “Good stuff,” Helki said, “from beyond the mountains and away down south.” It had an aroma that made Jack think of apple blossoms, and a flavor that he couldn’t place. “Almonds,” Helki said; but Jack didn’t know what almonds were.

  Helki stood a log on end and sat on it. “Well,” he said, “tell me your tale.”

  “I’d rather not,” Obst said, “except to say that what I’m doing, I do in God’s service. You understand.”

  The giant nodded. “I reckon I do. All right, so be it. But I’ll tell you one thing. You’ll have to cut the girl’s hair a bit closer if you want anyone to take her for a boy.”

  “I cut it,” Jack said.

  “You’re no barber, then, my lad,” Helki said. Jack looked up at his wild thicket of hair, with the burrs caught in it, and wondered what he knew of barbers.

  The aroma of the tea lured Wytt out of hiding. He hopped up to Ellayne and sniffed the steam coming from her cup, then looked up at Helki and chittered at him.

  Helki chittered back, and whistled; and Wytt answered him; and they went back and forth while Jack and Ellayne stared at them, astonished.

  “Are you talking to him?” Ellayne cried.

  “You can’t rightly call it talk—not like people talk,” Helki said. “But it’s more than any animal can do. In his way, he was telling me that he’s your friend, and I’d better be nice to you or I’ll have to answer to him; and I told him I’m your friend, too, just like he is.”

  “But how did you learn to talk to Omahs?” Jack said.

  “There’s a great heap of ruins south of the forest. I go there sometimes. There’s a tribe of these little hairy people living there. I made friends with ’em years ago. If you’re careful about listening, you learn to understand ’em by and by.”

  He shook his head. Jack noticed, for the first time, that Helki’s eyes weren’t quite the same color: two different shades of green.

  “You do see some funny things when you’re up in the ruins,” he said. “Makes you wonder what those places used to be and what happened there. But the little people can’t tell you. They don’t know.”

  Helki fed them with fresh venison, roasted over the fire, and gave them some rabbits to take with them.

  “I ought to go with you. I can protect you,” he said. “I’ve been seeing queer animals lately. There’s a striped beast with jaws that would snap a man in two with one bite.”

  “We saw it!” Jack said. “It was carrying half of a knuckle-bear in its mouth. What is it?”

  “Wish I knew,” Helki said. “I’ve seen some tracks, too, that don’t match up with anything I know. Maybe they’re coming over the mountains. Or maybe they’re just coming up out of the ground.

  “But beasts are only beasts. It’s men you ought to fear. There’s those hereabouts who’d be better off for a taste of this.” And he balanced his heavy staff on a fingertip.

  “I have a safe-conduct from Squint-eye,” Obst said.

  “I wouldn’t trust to that.”

  “If you want to help us, Helki, I’d be thankful if you stayed in this region of the forest and kept your eyes and ears open. Try to discover where the beasts are coming from. Keep track of unusual things. That’s what I’d be doing, if I could. I can’t ask anyone else to do it. They don’t understand the forest like you do. Their eyes don’t see; their ears don’t hear. You understand.”

  “Reckon I do.”

  Obst reached out and squeezed his arm. “And for the Lord’s sake, stay alive!” he said. “Stop looking for trouble.”

  Helki threw back his head and laughed like thunder.

  After they had hiked some distance, Ellayne asked the hermit, “Why didn’t you want him to come with us? He’s strong!”

  “He’s also as mad as a bat,” Obst said. “If he were with us, everyone else in the forest would know it, and he’d want to fight with every one of them.”

  “With that big stick?” Jack said.

  “It’s all he needs. But someday someone will put an arrow in his back, or poison him, or fifty men will overwhelm him—if Helki doesn’t kill Latt first.”

  They walked on. Another day, Obst said, and they’d turn aside, leave the forest, and make for the hills.

  CHAPTER 23

  Strange Beasts in the Land

  Coming out of the forest and onto the plains again and seeing the mountains from a new angle, it struck Jack for the first time that a mountain was a formidable thing, and it might not like to be climbed.

  Up rose Bell Mountain with its crown of clouds, Mount Nevereen huddled up against it, and various sharp, snowcapped crags standing like a bodyguard around it. How could they hope to climb up to the clouds? From this unfamiliar angle, the peaks looked like a hostile army pausing to take one last look at a doomed city before destroying it. Jack could almost believe the mountains were watching them as they toile
d along like insects, just waiting for them to get close enough to be crushed.

  “Had we gone all the way to Silvertown,” Obst was saying, “we would have found trails to take us along the skirts of the mountains, practically up to the shoulders of Bell Mountain itself. There are mines and lumber camps scattered throughout the hills, but all paths lead to Silvertown.

  “Instead, we’ll cross the plain and go slowly up and up to the forests that cover the foothills; and then for most of the way we’ll have to find our own paths, or even make them. When we come out of those woods, we’ll be on the slopes of Bell Mountain. God help us.”

  “My teacher back home said anyone would get killed who tried to climb the mountain,” Jack said. “He said you’d fall off, or freeze to death, or be crushed by falling rocks.”

  “And there are evil spirits on some mountains,” Ellayne put in. “They can bring fog and make you get lost, and they come at night and drink your blood while you sleep.”

  Obst threw a stern look at her. “If God has called you to the top of the mountain, He’ll see that you get there. But there’s danger enough in the world without a need for evil spirits. That’s just a lot of Heathen superstition.”

  “Well, it was in my storybook,” Ellayne said.

  Obst made no answer, but led them tirelessly across the plain, making for the green-clad hills in the far distance to the north and east.

  “Do we have to go so fast?” Jack said.

  “I’m always happier under cover of the trees,” Obst said. “It’s safer.”

  “What can happen to us out here?”

  “Enough. Slave-traders, robbers—and maybe beasts.”

  “Please, Obst—where do the beasts come from?” Ellayne said. “Like the knuckle-bears and that horrible striped thing we saw in the woods. Do the Old Books have anything to say about them?”

  They went on for another hundred yards before Obst began to answer.

  “When the Children of Geb first set foot upon the mainland and history began,” he said, “there were many kinds of beasts that had to be subdued before the people could live in the land. Some we still have with us—the wolf and the bear, the wildcat and the catamount, and the wild boar. Others are no longer seen in Obann, but still inhabit other countries—the lion and the leopard, the wild dog, and the rhinoceros. And some are not to be found anywhere, unless it be far to the south or far to the north where no man ever goes. But men remember them—the dragon and the basilisk, the satyr and the gryphon, and the cockatrice with poison hotter than an adder’s.

  “But there were still other beasts. Of some, nothing remains but an old name in an ancient language, a word that has no meaning anymore. We see these words in Scripture, but there are no descriptions to go with them. Mumheer, allabach, vehoma, kecharr—those are some of the names. And there were beasts whose names are not recorded.

  “I have come to believe that God is bringing back those beasts that were lost. You’ve seen some of them, and I’ve seen more. To what end, who can say? Maybe to devour a wicked and rebellious people from off the face of the earth.”

  Jack thought about that for some minutes, but Ellayne spoke first.

  “But you said the knuckle-bears were harmless,” she said. “And Jack shot with his slingshot a little hoppy animal with big ears and a long nose, and we ate it for supper. Beasts like those wouldn’t devour anybody.”

  “Do the Old Books say that God will bring back the beasts to kill off the people?” Jack asked.

  Obst stopped walking, and suddenly grinned at him.

  “My boy, you have the makings of a theologian!” he said. “No, the Scriptures say no such thing, neither in the Prophets nor the Songs. So I’d be wise to dismiss the thought! I don’t know why there are strange beasts in the land these days. I simply don’t know!”

  But it was Martis who had the most perilous encounter with a beast, and this is how it happened.

  Having been told by outlaws that Obst was going to Silvertown, but knowing that the children’s true goal was Bell Mountain, Martis wanted to catch up to them and follow closely. He doubted they’d go all the way to Silvertown: that was almost as far from the mountain as Ninneburky. It was the chief of all the mining towns; and if I were minding children, he thought, I certainly wouldn’t take them there. Every slaver and kidnapper in Obann passed through Silvertown. He was sure the hermit knew that, and had simply lied to Bort and Tumm.

  Martis reasoned that the hermit would lead the children out of the forest on a course for Bell Mountain. If he knew the lay of the land as Martis knew it from maps, he would want to cross the plain where the forests of the foothills reached farthest south and west. It was on the plains that they’d be most vulnerable to human predators; the hermit would want to cross as quickly as possible.

  Martis decided to travel along the fringe of the forest, where he could watch the plains. He could question anyone he met: an old man accompanied by two children would be conspicuous. He found a northerly trail and spurred his horse to a trot, expecting to break out of the forest by midday. What he didn’t expect was for his horse to fight him, shuddering under the saddle.

  “What ails you, cousin?” he said, fighting for control with reins and spurs.

  Right beside him, a wall of underbrush and saplings burst open with a roar, and Martis was unhorsed, hurled backward onto the trail. And the horse screamed.

  But not for long. With a loud crack, a massive beak crushed the horse’s neck and cut off its scream. The beak belonged to a creature spawned in a madman’s fevered nightmare—a gigantic bird that had to bend down to seize a horse’s neck. Legs like scaly pillars, useless tiny wings that flapped excitedly, matted grey feathers shot with white and blue, a long powerful neck, staring yellow eyes as big as teacups, and a hooked beak as mighty as a pair of clashing millstones: that was what Martis saw. Before he could catch his breath, it killed his horse.

  It shook once, then dropped the limp and lifeless body to the forest floor.

  Then it spotted Martis.

  At first he couldn’t move a muscle. The yellow eyes glared at him. He’d never seen or heard of such a thing in all his life. What could a man do against such a monster? A bird that might weigh as much as a big bear!

  It glared at him, then opened that vast beak and cawed.

  Martis scrambled backward into the foliage, somehow found his feet, and fled in a blind panic. He didn’t stop until he ran right into a fallen log and fell over it, landing face-first in a mire of wet, sticky, rotting leaves.

  Only then did he realize that the bird had not pursued him. Why should it, when it had his horse to eat?

  He rose to his knees, turned and looked back, clinging to the creeper-covered trunk of the fallen tree. It had been a very long time since Martis had experienced pure, overpowering fear. Now it drained out of him, leaving him exhausted but rational.

  I’ll need my pack! he thought. My tinderbox, my map, my money, my credentials—I’ve got to get them back. He would have to wait until the bird had eaten its fill and moved on.

  When he felt strong enough, he got up and crept back the way he’d come. Broken bushes and gouges in the leaf-litter marked his trail like signposts. It was not as long a trail as he thought. He stopped when he heard the bird ripping flesh from bone and noisily gulping it down: stopped and hid behind a stout oak tree until the noise stopped.

  After what he deemed a long enough wait, he crept a little closer, silently. He peered through a screen of brush. The great bird was gone.

  It had eaten half his horse, tossing the head aside, gobbling up the neck—bones and all—and tearing the meat and hide off the rest of the carcass. It must have devoured several hundred pounds of flesh in a few minutes.

  Martis found his pack a few yards from the horse. Now he had everything he needed—except a weapon with which he could hope to defend himself, should he meet the bird again. It wouldn’t leave much of a man’s body uneaten. But then what weapon would avail against a creature t
hat attacked from ambush?

  He shouldered his pack, wrapped the leather thong of his mace around his wrist, and marched. The mire he’d fallen into stained his clothes, his hands, and his face, and it stank. Maybe it would protect him from beasts that hunted by scent.

  By noontime he was out of the thick of the forest, in sight of the plains, and hot and winded from the hard pace he’d set himself. He rested against a tree, embracing the trunk, and then began to tremble all over from head to toe, and couldn’t stop.

  A bit later Helki came upon what was left of Martis’ horse, and marveled. He’d never seen the giant bird, but he’d seen its tracks before, and he saw them again, here.

  “Look at that!” he said to himself. “Well, where there’s a horse, there’s a man. Let’s see what’s left of the rider.”

  He read the marks: man thrown clear of horse, bolts into underbrush, and then returns, has a look-round, and resumes his journey. That didn’t sound like any man Helki knew. An outlaw would’ve fled back the way he’d come, and wouldn’t have come back.

  Helki decided to follow him: he wanted to meet that man. If nothing else, the rider could describe the creature that had killed his horse.

  CHAPTER 24

  What Jack Saw by Starlight

  Latt Squint-eye insisted on dues being paid to him by every man in his part of Lintum Forest, but there was one thing he valued even more: news. For that reason, Bort interrupted his dues-collecting to hurry back to Squint-eye’s camp with his news.

  The self-styled King of the Forest might have been a beautiful baby once, but now he was a hideous man. His left eye squinted. His right eye goggled, and around it was tattooed a blue serpent that writhed when he spoke. A ghastly white scar ran diagonally across his forehead; but the man who’d given him that was dead. He missed a few teeth, and the one eyetooth that remained on the right side of his jaw, he’d filed to a sharp point. He braided his grey hair and beard into many braids, and sometimes stuck slow-burning fuses into his beard to accentuate an already daunting appearance. But of course the most daunting thing about him was that he’d murdered a great many men to gain his position, and was willing to murder many more to keep it.