Its sickly stale-milk stench assailed Aoz Roon. He stood there, gazing down at it, uncertain. Not so far behind, the other phagors were running to the rescue. Grey galloped off. His plight remained as desperate as ever.
He called Curd, but the hound crouched trembling in the grass and would not come.
As the phagor rose, Aoz Roon started to run for the river, clutching the spear. He could swim to the island—it represented his one hope.
Before he reached the edge of the flood, he saw the danger of that swim. The flood water was black, carrying heavy muds in its progress, and worse than muds. There were also drowned animals and semi-submerged branches against which a swimmer would have to battle.
He hesitated. While he did so, the phagor was upon him.
To Aoz Roon came the memory of wrestling with one of the brutes long ago, before his shaming fever. That adversary had been wounded. But this one—this was no youngster, he felt that instinctively, as he grasped its arm and kicked out with his boot. He could heave this one in the river before the others were on him.
But it was not so easy. The brute had enormous strength still. One of them gave a little ground, then the other. Aoz Roon could not bring up the spear or get at his knife. They struggled, proceeding in hops or small runs, groaning, while the adversary tried to bring its horns into play.
He cried in pain as the phagor managed to wrench one arm. He dropped the spear. As he cried, he got an elbow free. He brought it up, sharp under the other’s chin. They staggered backwards a few paces, splashing in floodwater almost to the knees. Desperately he called to the hound, but Curd was rushing back and forth, barking savagely to keep off the three phagors approaching on foot.
A large tree bowled along in the flood, currents rolling it so that it turned as it came. A branch emerged like an arm, dripping, striking phagor and man as they stood interlocked in the shallows. They fell, caught by irresistible forces, and we drawn below the plunging water. Another branch rose from the flood, then it too sank, creating yellowish eddies as it was drawn into the undertow.
For four hours, Batalix worried at the flank of Freyr, as a hound worries a bone. Only then was the brighter light entirely engulfed. All the early afternoon, steely shadow lay on the land. Not an insect stirred.
For three hours, Freyr was gone from the world, stolen from the day sky.
By sunset, it had only partially reappeared. Nobody could guarantee that it would ever be whole again. Thick cloud filled the sky from horizon to horizon. So the day died, and an alarming day it was. Whether child or adult, every human being in Oldorando took to bed in a state of apprehension.
Then a wind rose, dispelling the rain, increasing anxiety.
There had been three deaths in the old town, one a suicide, and some buildings had been burnt, or were still burning. Only the heavy rain had saved worse violence.
Light from one of the fires, woken by the wind, lit a sheet of rainwater outside the big tower. Its reflection cast patterns on the ceiling of the room in which Oyre lay sleepless on her couch. The wind blew, a shutter banged, sparks flew up into the chimney of the night.
Oyre was waiting. Mosquitoes troubled her; they had recently returned to Oldorando. Every week brought something that nobody had experienced before.
The flickering light from outside coalesced with the stains on the ceiling, to give her a glimpse of an old man with long ragged hair, dressed in a gown. She imagined she could not see his face, for his head was hidden by a raised shoulder. He was doing something. His legs moved with the ripples the wind raised on the puddle outside. He was silently walking among the stars.
Tiring of the game, she looked gway, wondering about her father. When she looked again, she saw that she had been mistaken; the old man was peering over his shoulder at her. His face was blotched and seamed with age. He was walking faster now, and the shutter banged in time with his steps. He was marching across the world towards her. His body was covered with a poisonous rash.
Oyre roused herself and sat up. A mosquito buzzed by her ear. Scratching her head, she looked across at Dol, who was breathing heavily.
“How goes it with you, girl?”
“The pains are coming faster.”
Oyre climbed naked out of bed, put on a long cloak, and padded across to her friend, whose pale face she could dimly discern. “Shall I send for Ma Scantiom?”
“Not yet. Let’s talk.” Dol reached up a hand, and Oyre took it. “You’ve become a good friend to me, Oyre. I think of such funny things, lying here. You and Vry … I know what you think of me. You’re both kind, yet you’re so different—Vry so unsure of herself, you so sure always…”
“You’ve got that quite the wrong way round.”
“Well, I never knew much. People do fail each other most dreadfully, don’t they? I hope I don’t fail the child. I failed your father, I know. Now the scumb has failed me… Fancy not being with me, this night of all nights.”
The shutter banged again on the floor below. They crouched together. Oyre put a hand on her friend’s swollen belly.
“I’m sure he has not gone off with Shay Tal, if that’s what you fear.”
Dol eased herself up on her elbows and said, turning her face from Oyre, “I sometimes can’t bear my own feelings—this pain’s welcome by comparison. I know I’m not half the woman she is. Still I said Yes and she said No, and that counts. I always said Yes, yet he’s not here with me… I don’t think he ever ever loved me…” She suddenly started to weep so violently that tears sprang from her eyes. Oyre saw them glint in the flickering light as Dol turned and buried her face in Oyre’s broad breast.
The shutter slammed again as the wind gave a sullen howl.
“Let me send the slave for Ma Scantiom, love,” Oyre said. Ma Scantiom had taken over the duties of midwife since Dol’s mother had become too decrepit.
“Not yet, not yet.” Gradually, her tears subsided. She sighed deeply. “Time enough. Time enough for everything.” Oyre rose, wrapping the cloak round her, and went barefoot to secure the shutter. Damp wind gusted in on her face, blowing tremendously from the south; she breathed it with gratitude. The immemorial Embruddock sound of geese came to her, as the creatures took shelter under a hedge.
“But why do I keep myself alone?” she asked the darkness.
A bitter savour of smoke reached her while she secured the latch. The building was still smouldering nearby, a reminder of the day’s public madness.
When she returned to the worn room, Dol was sitting up, wiping her face.
“You’d better get Ma Scantiom, Oyre. The future Lord of Embruddock is waiting to be born.”
Oyre kissed her cheek. Both women were pale and wide-eyed. “He’ll be back soon. Men are so—unreliable.”
She ran from the room to call a slave.
The wind that rapped on Oyre’s shutter had travelled a long way, and was destined to blow itself out among the limestone teeth of the Quzints. Its birthplace had been above the fathomless stretches of the sea that future sailors would name Ardent. It moved along the equator westwards, picking up speed and moisture, until encountering the great barrier of the Eastern Shield of Campannlat, the Nktryhk, where it became two winds.
The northern airstream roared up the Gulf of Chalce and exhausted itself melting the spring frosts of Sibornal. The southern airstream curved about the headlands of Vallgos over first the Scimitar Sea and then the northeast region of the Sea of Eagles, to exhale over the lowlands between Keevasien and Ottassol, with fish on its breath. It roared across a wilderness that would one day be the great country of Borlien, sighed over Oldorando, setting Oyre’s shutter banging. It continued on its way, not waiting to hear the first cries of Aoz Roon’s son.