Alan Garner Classic Collection. Alan Garner

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СКАЧАТЬ like. Cousin Fenodyree, what make you of those clouds to the north? How is it they have not changed since I saw them under the moon? The wind should have carried them to us long ago.”

      “Hm,” said the dwarf. “Fimbulwinter?”

      “Ay. They do not mean to lose. First, they drive us out with the threat of the mara. We dare not bide. Next, they watch us through the day, and when we reach some lonely place, they pen us close under the fimbulwinter till night comes, and they can take us as they wish.”

      “Wait on,” said Gowther; “what’s all this ‘fimbulwinter’ business? And you’ve not told us yet …”

      “I know,” broke in Fenodyree. “But there are some things better left untold. It will be time enough to fear the mara when we see them; and I hope we shall not do that. Meanwhile you will rest happier for your ignorance.”

      “That makes me a lot easier, I must say!”

      Fenodyree smiled, and inclined his head politely.

      “You’re a supercilious little feller when you want to be, anner you?” said Gowther testily. He was a direct, open man, who liked everything to be clearly defined. He could not tolerate haziness or uncertainty; and he had not quite overcome the countryman’s natural distrust of strangers – such strangers, too!

      “I do not mean to give offence,” said the dwarf. “But I must ask you to lean on our judgement in this venture. You are in our world now, and without us you will not regain your own, even though it lies at your feet.”

      Gowther looked down at Highmost Redmanhey, then back at the dwarf. There was a long pause.

      “Ay. I spoke out of turn. You’re reet, and I’m wrong. I’m sorry.”

      “It is of no matter,” said Fenodyree.

      “Oh, look!” said Colin, anxious to change the subject. “We’re not the only people out early this morning. There are two hikers down by Mr Carter’s: can you see them?”

      In the lane below, a man and a woman, both rucksacked, and wearing anoraks, ski-trousers, and heavy boots, were leaning over a field gate, apparently absorbed in a map.

      “There are two more behind us on Clinton hill,” said Susan.

      Sure enough, a quarter of a mile away, not much higher than where they were standing, two hikers gazed at the wide plain and its rim of hills.

      “Happen it’s a rally,” said Gowther.

      “Ha! It is indeed!” laughed Durathror shortly. “Those are witches and warlocks, or I am not my father’s son!”

      “What?” said Colin. “Are they the morthbrood?”

      “There is the danger,” said Fenodyree. “They mingle with others unnoticed, and can be detected only by certain marks, and that not always. For this reason must we shun all contact with men: the lonely places are dangerous, but to be surrounded by a crowd would be a greater risk.”

      Gowther shook his head, and pointed his ash stick at the “hikers”.

      “You mean to tell me it’s the likes of them as we’ve to run from? I was thinking more of broomsticks and tall hats!”

      The whale-backed Pennines, in their southern reaches, crumble into separate hills which join up with the Staffordshire moors, and from the Cheshire plain two hills stand out above all the rest. One is Bosley Cloud, its north face sheer, and southwards a graceful sweep to the feet of the Old Man of Mow, but, for all that, a brooding, sinister mountain, for ever changing shape when seen from meandering Cheshire lanes.

      The other is Shuttlingslow. It is a cone in outline, but with the top of the cone sliced off, leaving a flat, narrow, exposed ridge for a summit. And three days hence, on that ridge, eight miles from where they now were, Firefrost would be given into safe hands – if the morthbrood could be kept at bay for so long.

      “Ay, and that’s another thing,” said Gowther. “What are we going to do between now and Friday? It’s nobbut half a day’s tramp to Shuttingslow from here.”

      “Hush!” said Fenodyree. “There are keen ears listening. The where and the when are all they do not know of our plans. If we can shake off these bloodhounds and lie hidden until nearer the time, we may reach the hill. Trees and running water will shield us best; and for a start we must try to lose the morthbrood spies in the wood that fringes Radnor mere. We shall keep to this lane until we come opposite the middle of the wood: there we shall enter and, with luck, come out at the far side alone.”

      “But we shall need more luck to remain alone,” said Durathror, “for I fear that little escapes those eyes.”

      Above their heads wheeled a cloud of ragged-winged birds. Out over the plain other flocks were sweeping in what, from the height of the Riddings, could be seen to form a very definite pattern, an interwoven net of such efficiency that any one section of the ground of, say, a mile square, was rarely left uncovered by any one flock for more than a minute at a time. And they flew in silence, the only living things in all the sky. The hikers continued to pore over the map, and to admire the view.

      Fenodyree led the way back to the crossroads, where the old Macclesfield road, Hocker Lane, ran left to Highmost Redmanhey, and right to Nether Alderley. To Alderley they turned, and walked beneath the round shoulder of Clinton hill. Below, across the fields, was Radnor Wood.

      “I’ll tell you what,” said Gowther. “Tom Henshaw seems to be as mithered with these birds as much as we are: he’s getten enough scarecrows anyroad.”

      “Ay,” said Durathror, “and can you tell me, farmer Mossock, what need he may have of them on pasture land?”

      It was as Durathror said. Every field within sight held a tattered figure with outstretched arms – even those under grass, and with cows in them.

      “Now I wonder what’s up with owd Tom! He did say as how he’d been having queer turns off and on since before Christmas, but this is …”

      “No time to linger,” said Fenodyree. “You will embarrass our companions.”

      They looked round, and saw that the two hikers who had been leaning over John Carter’s gate were now walking casually along some distance behind, to all appearances engaged in nothing more sinister than knocking off the tops of dead fool’s-parsley with their sticks. A flock of thirteen birds closed in and began to glide in circles overhead.

      “Are they scarecrows?” asked Colin as they continued down the lane.

      “Mostly,” said Fenodyree: “but eyes for the morthbrood, every one.”

      The road gradually converged on Radnor Wood until the two were running together, with only a low stone wall between them, and at a bend in the road Fenodyree said:

      “When the morthdoers round this corner, we must be hidden.

      “Now! Over the wall!”

      Brambles were waiting for them on the other side, but they tore themselves free, and ran as best they could through the scrub and undergrowth of the matted fringe of the wood after Fenodyree, who was dodging nimbly over the rough ground СКАЧАТЬ