The Moon of Gomrath. Alan Garner

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СКАЧАТЬ thing this night.”

      They came to a wide expanse of stone and sand which spilled down the face of the Edge. This was Stormy Point, a place of fine views in daylight, but now it was friendless. From here they crossed over the rocks to Saddlebole, which was a spur of the hill jutting into the plain, and half-way along this stood a tall boulder.

      “Will you open the gates, Susan?” said Albanac.

      “But I can’t,” said Susan. “I’ve tried often enough.”

      “Colin,” said Albanac, “will you put your right hand to the rock, and say the word ‘Emalagra’?”

      “What, like this?”

      “Yes.”

      “Emalagra?”

      “Again.”

      “Emalagra! Emalagra!”

      Nothing happened. Colin stood back, looking foolish.

      “Now Susan,” said Albanac.

      Susan stepped up to the boulder, and put her right hand against it.

      “Emalagra. See? It’s no good. I’ve tried every—”

      A crack appeared in the rock; it grew wider, revealing a pair of iron gates, and beyond these a tunnel lit by a blue light.

CHAPTER 4

       THE BROLLACHAN

      “Will you open the gates?” said Albanac.

      Susan stretched out her hand, and touched the iron gates. They swung open.

      “Quickly now,” said Uthecar. “It is a healthier night within than without.”

      He hurried the children through the gates, and the rock closed after them the moment they were all inside.

      “Why did they open? They wouldn’t before,” said Susan.

      “Because you spoke the word, and for another reason that we shall talk about,” said Albanac.

      They went with Albanac down the paths of Fundindelve. Tunnel entered cave, and cave gave way to tunnel: caves, and tunnels, each different and the same: there seemed to be no end.

      As they went deeper the blue light grew pale and strong, and by this the children knew that they were nearing the Cave of the Sleepers, for whose sake the old dwarf-mine of Fundindelve had been charged with the greatest magic of an age, and its guardian was Cadellin Silverbrow. Here in this cave, waiting through the centuries for the day when Cadellin should rouse him from his enchanted sleep to fight the last battle of the world, lay a king, surrounded by his knights, each with his milk-white mare.

      The children looked about them, at the cold flames, now white in the core of the magic, flickering over the silver armour, at the horses, and the men, and listened to the muted, echoing murmur of their breathing, the beating of the heart of Fundindelve.

      From the Cave of the Sleepers the way led uphill, by more tunnels, by stark, high-arching bridges over unknown depths, along narrow paths in the roofs of caves, across vaulted plains of sand, to the furthest caverns of the mine. And finally they came to a small cave close behind the Holywell that the wizard used for his quarters. In it were a few chairs, a long table, and a bed of skins.

      “Where’s Cadellin?” said Susan.

      “He will be with the lios-alfar, the elves,” said Albanac. “Many of them are ill of the smoke-sickness: but until he comes, rest you here. There is doubtless much you would know.”

      “There certainly is!” said Colin. “Who was that shooting arrows at us?”

      “The elf-lord, Atlendor son of Naf: he needs your help.”

      “Needs our help?” said Colin. “He went a funny way about getting it!”

      “But I never thought elves would be like that!” said Susan.

      “No,” said Albanac. “You are both too hasty. Remember, he is under fear at this time. Danger besets him; he is tired, alone – and he is a king. Remember, too, that no elf has a natural love of men; for it is the dirt and ugliness and unclean air that men have worshipped these two hundred years that have driven the lios-alfar to the trackless places and the broken lands. You should see the smoke-sickness in the elves of Talebolion and Sinadon. You should hear it in their lungs. That is what men have done.”

      “But how can we help?” said Susan.

      “I will show you,” said Albanac. “Cadellin has spoken against this for many days, and he has good reason, but now you are here, and I think we must tell you what is wrong.

      “In brief, it is this. There is something hiding in the dead wastes of the Northland, in far Prydein where the last kingdom of the elves has been made. For a long while now the numbers of the lios-alfar have been growing less – not through the smoke-sickness, as is happening in the west, but for some cause that we have not found. Elves vanish. They go without a sign. At first it was by ones and twos, but not long since a whole cantref, the cantref of Grannos, was lost, horses and weapons: not an arrow was seen. Some great wrong is at work, and to find it, and destroy it, Atlendor is bringing his people to him from the south and the west, gathering what magic he can. Susan, will you let him take the Mark of Fohla?”

      “What’s that?” said Susan.

      “It is the bracelet that Angharad Goldenhand gave to you.”

      “This?” said Susan. “I didn’t know it had a name. What good is it to Atlendor?”

      “I do not know,” said Albanac. “But any magic may help him – and you have magic there. Did you not open the gates?”

      Susan looked at the band of ancient silver that she wore on her wrist. It was all she had brought with her out of the wreckage of their last encounter with this world, and it had been given to her, on a night of danger and enchantment, by Angharad Goldenhand, the Lady of the Lake. Susan did not know the meaning of the heavy letters that were traced in black, in a forgotten script, upon the silver, yet she knew that it was no ordinary bracelet, and she did not wear it lightly.

      “Why is it called that?” said Susan.

      “There are tales,” said Albanac, “that I have only dimly heard about these things, yet I know that the Marks of Fohla are from the early magic of the world, and this is the first that I have ever seen, and I cannot tell its use. But will you give it to Atlendor?”

      “I can’t,” said Susan.

      “But the elves may be destroyed for lack of the Mark!” said Albanac. “Will you fail them when they most need help?”

      “Of course I’ll help,” said Susan. “It’s just that Angharad told me I must always look after my bracelet, though she didn’t say why: but if Atlendor needs it, СКАЧАТЬ