The Ropemaker Read online

  “So it’s the same as with us? The waters talk to Alnor and he sings to the snows and that brings the ice dragon? And the cedars talk to Ma, and she sings to them, and that’s what keeps the unicorns there?”

  “That’s right, far as I can make out. No one’s ever told us what’s really happening, mind you. All we know is what we found out, doing it, mother and daughter, all these years. But my ma told me she thought the real magic was in the cedars. That’s why we have to go to the lake to sing to them. The unicorns only do what they do, just by being there and being so scared of men. And if the cedars weren’t there, or if they lost their magic somehow, then there wouldn’t be any unicorns anymore.”

  “Alnor says the magic is running out, Tahl told me. Is it the same with us?”

  “Why do you think I’m here, girl, this time of year, at my age, with my hip and all? But could I tell them? D’you think they’d have listened to a word I’d got to say?”

  Meena stood for a moment, glaring out at the downpour, then sighed with exasperation and turned back to Tilja.

  “No reason to load it all on you,” she said. “You’ve troubles enough of your own. But you see what I’m talking about? When your grandfather wanted to marry me I told him about the cedars, listening to them, and sowing the barley field, and singing by the lake—all that. He didn’t like it much, but he took it for my sake, I’m glad to say. And the same with your own father. There’s no way either of them would have tried to stop us from doing what we know we’ve got to do. But supposing they’d come to us knowing our heads were full of crazy nonsense about unicorns . . . Your grandfather was specially fond of Grayne. She was always his pet. For all I know your father thinks it’s more than hard on you, being cut out by Anja, but they’ve known the reason. Supposing it was for something they’d grown up not believing in, couldn’t bring themselves to believe in . . . Do you see now why it’s better like it is, in spite of what it’s doing to you? And did to Grayne? I tell you, girl, it’s a knife in my heart every time I see her, thinking of it.”

  “Yes,” muttered Tilja. “Yes, I think I see. Thank you, Meena. Look, I think the rain’s stopping.”

  Once back at Woodbourne, Tilja told the others what had happened at the meeting, but not about her conversations with Tahl, or with Meena in the barn. She was, in a sense, no less miserable about knowing that she must one day leave Woodbourne, but at least she knew why, and could accept it as a fact, something that she had been born with—yes, like a kind of birthmark such as her cousin Rinter had on the side of his neck, a great ugly blotch that he wore high collars to cover up, because he didn’t like anyone to know it was there.

  When she’d finished, Ma sighed angrily and looked at Da, who shook his head and shrugged, obviously uncomfortable. It crossed Tilja’s mind to wonder whether, next time she was alone with him, she could ask him how much he knew, but she was afraid to. Neither of her parents talked about anything like that, private stuff. They just got on with what had to be done, and expected you to do the same. She couldn’t imagine Ma saying the sort of thing Aunt Grayne had said to her about having to leave Woodbourne, nor talking to her as Meena had, with tears streaming down her cheeks at the thought of the way she had been forced to treat her elder daughter.

  Next time Tilja went down to Meena’s, the door opened as she reached it. Tahl came out, pulled the door almost shut behind him, then faced her, amused, waiting for her to show astonishment. He was too late. She’d got over that while his back was turned.

  “Hello,” she said. “Run away from home, then?”

  “Come to seek my fortune,” he said.

  “Here? You’ll be lucky. I suppose Alnor wanted to see Meena again. Where’s your horse?”

  “We walked. He’s a tough old thing, but my feet are all blister. I saw you at the gate and came to warn you. Just go in quietly. Meena’s reading her spoons.”

  Tilja nodded, took off her cloak and boots in the porch and slipped through into the kitchen. Alnor was sitting by the stove, his beaky profile dark against the glow from the open fire door. Meena was opposite him, crouching forward over a low table spread with a dark blue cloth. She was always stingy with her oil, and kept the shutters open on the bitterest day until it was almost too dark to see across the room, but this afternoon she had her lamp lit, with her three spoons lying side by side in its circle of light.

  Silently Tilja moved to watch. She had seen Meena reading the spoons only twice before in her life, once at the family gathering after Tilja’s grandfather, Verlad, was buried, and she was making up her mind whether the time had come to pass the farm on to Ma, and the second time after Anja was born and she had been asked, as was the custom, to choose a name for her. Both times Tilja had been too small to understand what was happening, but there was nothing specially secret about fortune spoons—reading them wasn’t much more than a game to most people—so she knew enough by now to see what Meena was trying to do.

  The spoons—two dark ones with a paler one between them— lay facedown, with their elaborately carved handles pointing away from Meena so that she could study the backs of the bowls. The pale one was a true named spoon. That is to say it had been cut from the timber of the very tree that had grown from the stone of the peach that Faheel had given to Dirna. Its name—or rather her name, for these spoons had personalities and genders—was Axtrig. The other two were not named, but they were also very old, and having been kept wrapped in the same cloth with Axtrig all those centuries, had absorbed something from her. A named spoon could not be sold or stolen. Not only would the buyer or thief be unable to read it, but it would bring the worst of luck into any house where it was kept. It could only be inherited, or else given as a gift, and then only if the gift was freely made, without being expected or asked for.

  To read a spoon, all that was needed was to unwrap it, wipe it lightly with fine oil to bring out the grain, lay it under a good light and study the smooth back of the bowl in silence, thinking steadily of your need, or the need of whoever was consulting you, and after a while some of the lines in the grain would seem to become more marked. You could then “read” these lines, much as a palmist reads the lines of a hand. It was as simple as that, and as difficult.

  So Meena stared at the spoons, snorting slightly with each slow breath. At last she pushed herself upright and sighed.

  “Well, all I can tell you is I’m going on a journey, and a long one. I can think of a lot better things to do with my time, at my age, but it’s there, and there’s no getting away from it. There’s a lot of other stuff there besides, but I can’t make it out. That you, Tilja? Just lift the lamp, so I can wrap the darn things up and put ’em safe. Snuff it out, girl! What are you thinking of? I haven’t got oil to burn. And then you can nip off home and fetch one of the horses, so Alnor and me can come and have a word with your parents. And take that boy with you before he goes and says something that’ll cause him to feel the weight of my hand.”

  “Want to know what it’s all about?” said Tahl, as he hobbled up the lane beside Tilja. “Alnor’s going to go and look for Faheel to get him to renew the magic in the mountains and the forest. I’m going with him.”

  “Faheel! But that was centuries ago! He can’t still be alive!”

  “The millstream says so. I told you at the Gathering, didn’t I? We can hear what it’s saying, just like your sister can hear what the cedars are saying.”

  “But . . . how are you going to get through the forest?”

  “On a raft, at snowmelt, when the river’s in spate. You remember the story, the Emperor’s soldier who got through on a very fast horse? He’d passed out, but he made it. Alnor thinks we may pass out too. That’s why we’re here. We’ve got to have a woman to steer the raft, or it’ll run aground on a bend, or something. He tried to persuade my aunts, but none of them . . .”

  “And Meena’s going on a long journey.”

  “I don’t know about long. Whoever it is has only got to get us through the forest, then
they can come back. Look, Alnor’s going to try it whatever happens, and I’m going with him because somebody’s got to, but it’ll be a lot less of a risk with a steers-woman. I suppose Meena would do, if we can’t find anyone else. What about your mother? Or your aunt who was at the Gathering? It’d be best if it’s someone who can hear what the trees are saying, so they can tell her the way back. . . .”

  He chattered on about Alnor’s plan, but Tilja listened only enough to mutter something in the right places. Meena was going on a journey. A long journey. Much further than through the forest and back. That didn’t count as long.

  And Tilja was going with her, going away, unimaginably far away. Away from Woodbourne. Not waiting through the dreary years until she could, with luck, find a man on some other farm who wanted to marry her, and go and live with him, and make that her home, and dream of Woodbourne like Aunt Grayne did. Going now.

  Yes. Oh yes!

  Only her parents would never let her.

  Her thoughts were broken by Brando’s warning bay at the footstep of a stranger.

  Ma didn’t seem surprised to see them. She looked at Tahl as if there were something unusually interesting about him, though normally she was shy of strangers and barely met their glances. Tahl gave her stare for stare.

  “Your father’s up splitting logs in the spare ground,” she said. “Anja, you run up and fetch him. You can take Tiddykin down for Meena, Tilja. If Alnor wants a horse too, you’ll have to take Calico.”

  “Alnor’s all right,” said Tahl. “It’s me who isn’t. Mind if I take my boots off?”

  By the time Tilja had Tiddykin saddled and bridled and came in to look for Tahl he was sitting in Ma’s chair with his feet in a steaming basin of steeped herbs, and chatting away to her and actually getting answers more than two or three words long. He turned and grinned at Tilja.

  “You’ll be all right on your own,” he said. “Alnor will hang on to a stirrup. That’s what he usually does. He doesn’t like riding. Horses aren’t much use round us. Too steep.”

  When Tilja led Tiddykin into the yard, with Meena in the saddle and Alnor walking steadily beside her, they met Da, Anja and Dusty coming down from the spare ground with a loaded log sled.

  Tilja helped Meena onto the mounting block and down, then took Alnor’s arm and guided him through the farm door, helped him and Meena off with their cloaks and led him to a chair. Then she went and took Tiddykin’s tack off, rubbed her down and gave her a feed. She turned to find Anja waiting for her at the stable door.

  “What’s up?” she asked.

  “You’ve got to come, Til.”

  “I’m coming.”

  “No, not there. Up to the forest. They want you. Please!”

  “Want me? Who?”

  “The cedars. They’ve got something to tell you. Please, Til! I’ll tell Ma.”

  She scampered off. Watching from the kitchen door, Tilja saw her tug at Ma’s apron and start to whisper. Ma bent to listen, straightened and looked for a while almost blankly at Tilja, with her mouth slightly open—that gone-into-a-dream look she’d worn sometimes since the night of the first snows. She shook herself, sighed and looked away.

  “All right,” she said. “Don’t be long.”

  By now it was getting on toward dusk on a mild, sunless day, with the clouds moving all in one mass, blown by a steady wind. Anja led the way in under the trees to a place where three cedars growing together made a patch of dark green gloom. She stopped.

  “Listen,” she said.

  Tilja did her best. She strained to hear, to listen with her whole soul, but all she could make out was the hiss of the wind through the cedar needles and a faint, pulsing hoot where moving air swirled into a hollow trunk. Almost weeping with disappointed yearning, she shook her head.

  “But they’re talking to you!” said Anja, astonished.

  It was too much to bear. Tilja grabbed at her wrist.

  “If they’re so clever, why don’t they know I can’t hear them?” she snarled. “All right, what are they saying? Or aren’t you allowed to tell me?”

  “Let go! I can’t hear them either when you’re doing that. Please let go.”

  Reluctantly Tilja loosened her grip.

  “What are they saying?”

  Anja drew a breath, waited, and spent it all on the first slow syllable. Another breath for the next, and the next, and the next.

  “Go. Tilja, go. You go too. Find Faheel. Make us strong again.”

  Faheel

  4

  The River

  Tiddykin went dead lame the day before they left. “There’s nothing for it,” said Da. “No chance of find-ing a decent horse at any price, this time of year. Meena will have to make do with Calico. I’ll fix the horse seat to fit her better, and take a look at her harness. Tilja can give me a hand.”

  Together they went over the worn old gear, buckle by buckle, strap by strap, stitch by stitch, cleaning, oiling, replacing, making good. They worked for a while in silence, but then, without looking up from what he was doing, Da said in a low voice, as if speaking to himself, “I’d give my right arm for this not to be happening. All my married life I’ve had to accept this stuff. I don’t understand it, I don’t feel it in my bones, it means nothing to me, but I’m forced to believe in it. It isn’t just your mother and Meena saying it’s so—Anja too, now. It’s because it works. Time and again. You found that when you lost the hand ax. Even when it seems pure nonsense—how can Faheel still be alive, for pity’s sake? But the cedars say you’ve got to go and look for him, so you have to go, and I have to accept it. Accept it, though it means I may never see you again.”

  Tilja sat blindly picking at a stretch of frayed stitching on the girth. Her thoughts, if you could call them thoughts, were a muddle of astonishment and grief. Why had he never once said anything like this before, never let her glimpse, even, what his feelings for her might be? No, they were secret, those feelings, like the unicorns, yes, private unicorns, deep in the pathless forest inside himself. But to Tilja they mattered more than anything else.

  Since that evening when Tilja and Anja had come back from the forest and told the others what the cedars had said, he hadn’t spoken a word about her going, apart from the practicalities of it. His only response, on hearing the news, had been to look across the room at Ma, who had silently put on her cloak and boots and gone out into the dusk. When she had come back they had turned to look at her where she stood in the doorway, but she had simply nodded once to him, telling him that what Anja had said was true, and gone back to the stove. From that point on they all had taken it for granted that Tilja was going with Meena, not just to see Alnor and Tahl safe through the forest, but to join them in their search for Faheel.

  “I’m coming back,” she said now. “Whatever happens, I’m coming back.”

  “If you can.”

  “But I was going to have to go one day, wasn’t I? Anja will have the farm, because she can hear the cedars. Like Ma did, instead of Aunt Grayne.”

  “One day. But not yet. You’re not ready. And nor am I.”

  “Anyway, I’m coming back. And that’s that.”

  He grunted, and Tilja realized that though she might have used exactly the same words half an hour ago, on their way out to the tack shed, she wouldn’t have meant them in the way she did now.

  There was another long pause while they got on with their work in silence. Then, without having to screw herself up to it, but asking the question easily, naturally, she said, “Do you know about the unicorns?”

  “Know?” he said musingly. “Well, I’ve guessed. . . . You know?”

  “I guessed too. But then I made Meena tell me.”

  “Made Meena tell you? That’s as miraculous as any unicorn. In that case . . . maybe you should ask your mother to tell you her dream. All right, got all those stitches out? Then see what you can do with this while I sew ’em back.”

  Ma told her about the dream reluctantly, with long pauses during
which she seemed to be forcing herself to go on. She didn’t know when she had had it. It could have been while she was still lying by the lake, or in her six-day coma at the farm, or even later, in an ordinary night’s sleep. She’d only remembered it after the next full moon, when she’d gone out with another load of barley to spread beneath the trees.

  “I didn’t want to go,” she said. “I was filled with fear, a numb, black, griping horror in my chest and stomach. . . . But I went. I made myself . . . and I got there and tipped the barley out and went down to the lake to sing, and . . . and I remembered the dream. I was standing like that in it, just getting ready to sing, when I heard something moving toward me, crashing its way through under the trees. Then it crossed a bit of rock and I heard its hooves. It sounded like a horse, and I thought somehow Calico must have got out and followed us, though she’s never . . . and then it came out into the open and I saw it wasn’t Calico, or Dusty either—it was as big as Dusty but even through the snow it seemed to be a funny sort of reddy chestnut . . . and then it lifted up its head and I saw the horn. . . .”

  There was a longer pause. Eventually Tilja said quietly, “You mean it wasn’t one of ours. It’s all right, I know about ours. Meena told me.”

  Ma shuddered and dragged herself out of the pit of remembered dread.

  “No,” she said. “Ours are white, smaller than Tiddykin. I gather Meena saw them that day. I never have, but I’ve seen their hoofprints in the snow . . . anyway this—this thing . . . it came toward me . . . I was stuck . . . you know, in nightmares . . . and then it stopped and lowered its horn and . . . touched me. . . .”

  She raised her hand and felt the place on her forehead where the strange mark had been.

  “That’s all,” she said, forcing a kind of briskness into her voice.

  “Are you sure it was a dream?” said Tilja. “You don’t think it was what really happened, before you went to sleep, that time we found you by the lake?”