Later there was entertainment from musicians. They had lutes not unlike the ones we knew but also instruments which were strange to me: some in which a stick was rubbed over strings fastened to a long curved box with a handle, and others which were blown. Their sounds were unfamiliar but sweet; and the singers, I was bound to admit, were better than ours. The Wilsh loved music, as they loved color and paintings and talking nonsense.
Then, with no hurry, the hunt was prepared. The valley was wooded, but for a stretch beside the river the land was clear of all but grass—so clear that I suspected men had done this and kept it so. From one of the carts which had followed the procession, contraptions of wood were brought and set up. They formed barriers, a little less than a man’s height, covering front and sides. There were slits in them providing a field of vision and also a means of firing arrows from the crossbows which were placed two or three to a cover.
I was granted the honor of sharing the King’s cover. To my astonishment rugs were laid on the ground and a soft quilted affair placed over them, to lie on while we aimed our crossbows. It seemed we must not dirty our knees by contact with the earth!
With the preliminaries completed the hunt began, though it was beyond me how such a term could be used to describe what happened. Beaters were sent into the woods, some on the far left and others on the right. Eventually, beyond our range of vision, the lines joined to form one that moved back toward us through the trees. On the way they created a great din to drive the boars out into the open space before us.
There was a shout as the first beast broke cover, followed by several more. At my side there was the clonk of the King’s weapon being fired and the hiss of arrows through the air. I had my own aimed at a point close to a patch of thorn, and saw the thorn shake and a beast crash out from it. I had it in my sights with my thumb on the trigger ready to squeeze when I noticed something else: it was a sow heavy with young.
I took my hand away and the animal rushed on. King Cymru shouted something. His own crossbow fired again and I saw it score a hit. The sow was running across our front and it took her in the flank. She crumpled and fell, gushing blood. For a moment I thought I would be sick.
Within five minutes all was over, with half a dozen beasts lying dead and perhaps as many more having made their escape, some pierced with arrows, past the covers and along the river bank. The king stood to stretch his legs and I did the same. He asked:
“Did you see the one I got?”
I nodded. “Yes, sire.”
“I did not notice you fire at all, Luke.”
“I was—taken by surprise.”
He clapped me on the shoulder. “You look white. It requires a little time to get used to the sight of a charging boar.”
Especially, I thought, when the charging boar is a gravid sow, desperately running for safety. I said, trying to make conversation that would not be offensive:
“The beaters were lucky to find so many. I suppose they must often draw blank.”
“Not on my hunts!” He winked at me. “There is an earlier chase. The beasts are taken in nets and brought here. There are delicacies that keep them from roaming for a day or two. The Master of the Hunt sees to it, but the notion was Snake’s. It is well arranged, do you not think?”
“Yes,” I said. “Very well.”
The beaters were dragging in the carcasses, the King’s kill first. The sow was not only pregnant but polybeast, with an extra rudimentary pair of legs dangling uselessly from its sides.
“A fine specimen,” said King Cymru.
• • •
We moved on up the valley, heading for another thicket where we could ambush more beasts. I had a brief opportunity to speak alone to Edmund. He was as shocked as I, but warned me to be cautious.
“You show too much of your feelings, Luke. As always.”
“I cannot help it.”
“The King will notice.”
“He has done. And thinks it due to fear.”
“Do you not . . . ?”
“Let him think what he likes,” I said. “He is a butcher, not a huntsman.”
Blodwen rode up to us and I held my peace. The road had parted from the riverside and climbed over high ground. We reached a crest and saw a village in the dip a few hundred yards ahead.
It was very small, no more than a score of huts clustered round the road, and approaching we saw an oddness in it. Many of the huts had collapsed. An earthquake? But we would have felt it also. There was no sign of life. Then from close by a man rushed out of the cover of the trees. He was in panic fear and gabbling. What with that and his accent I did not take his meaning until others repeated the cry:
“Bayemot . . . Bayemot!”
I had heard tales of these things, which were said to live in the sea and swallow whole the boats of men foolish enough to venture out from the shore. It was also said that at times they emerged onto land, and then destroyed and devoured every living thing in their path, leaving a trail of stinking slime.
I was with the King. I said:
“It cannot be true. You have told me—there is no sea-coast within thirty miles. The man has imagined it.”
“I think not,” King Cymru said. “The sea is a long way off but less than a mile up the valley there is a lake. There were rumors that a Bayemot had its lair there. It seems they were true.” He spoke to the man, who trembled in front of him. “Where is the beast?”
“Gone, your Majesty.” His whole body shook. “It came . . . and killed . . . and went.”
The King nodded. He said to Snake, who was close by:
“It will be interesting to see what a Bayemot leaves behind it. Let us go and look.”
So we advanced again. A whiff of filth and corruption came from the ruined village and then the stench was all round us. The sun’s rays struck through the clouds, showing more clearly the shattered cabins ahead, and I saw that they were coated with a slime which, though transparent, gleamed in the sunlight. Something wet dropped with a squelch from a jutting plank. I was glad that Blodwen and the ladies had stayed on the crest of the hill.
At close quarters both smell and sight were more hideous. The slime was everywhere and in places frothed with a nauseous bubbling sound. Nothing moved. The villagers had presumably fled up into the woods: those that had escaped. We reined our horses, even the Wilsh nobles brought to silence.
Then someone cried: “Up there!”
I looked over the ruins to the next rise of ground, and saw the Bayemot.
Except in size it was something like the bubbles of jelly that make up frog spawn. But it was almost as high as three men, one above the other, and being flattened from a true sphere by the earth’s pull was even greater in breadth. It was motionless but quivered, although the wind had dropped, and though it was nearly transparent there were darker shapes within. Were they eyes, I wondered? Was it regarding us now? Or did it move blindly, swallowing everything in its path as legend told? And the reality was more terrible than the legend. It was hard to see how anything could withstand such a monster.
It moved. With a small lurch it began to roll down the hill in our direction; slowly at first but fast gathering speed. There were cries, and with the rest I spurred my horse back up the slope. We halted on the higher ground and saw that the Bayemot too had stopped in the midst of the slimed ruins.
Snake said: “We are safe here. They travel fast downhill, as a ball does, but uphill a man, let alone a horse, can easily outdistance them.”