The sunlight slanting through his narrow window fell directly on the brooch, and its contorted shapes slowly assumed the form of a star, then a snowflake. A group of petals changed into a creature with glittering eyes and then became a twisted piece of metal again. Something or somebody wanted him to use the brooch!
Gwyn picked it up and thrust it into his pocket. Grabbing his coat from a chair he rushed downstairs and out the back door. As he raced across the yard, he heard a voice calling him to a chore. "But the wind was too loud, wasn't it?" he shouted joyfully to the sky. "I never heard nothing!"
He banged the yard gate to emphasize his words and began to run through the field. After a hundred yards the land began to rise. He kept to the sheeptrack for a while, then climbed a wall and jumped down into another field, this one steep and bare. He was among the sheep now, scattering them as he bounded over mounds and boulders. Stopping at the next wall, he took a deep breath. The mountain had begun in earnest. Now it had to be walking or climbing; running was impossible.
A sense of urgency gripped him, an overwhelming feeling that today, perhaps within that very hour, something momentous would occur.
He stumbled on, now upon a sheeptrack, now heaving himself over boulders. He had climbed the mountain often, sometimes with Alun, sometimes alone, but the first time had been with Bethan, one summer long ago. It had seemed an impossible task then, when he was not even five years old, but she had willed him to the top, comforting and cajoling him with her gentle voice. "It's so beautiful when you get there, Gwyn. You can see the whole world. . well, the whole of Wales anyway. And the sea and clouds below you. You won't fall; I won't let you!" She had been wearing the yellow scarf that day. Gwyn remembered how it had streamed out across his head, like a banner, when they reached the top.
It was not a high mountain nor a dangerous one. Some might even call it a hill. It was wide and grassy, a series of gentle slopes that rose, one after another, patterned with stone walls and windblown bushes. The plateau at the top was a lonely place, however. From here only the empty fields and surrounding mountains could be seen, and, far out to the west, the distant gray line of the sea. Gwyn took shelter beside the tallest rock, for the wind sweeping across the plateau threatened to roll him back down.
He surely must have found the place to offer his brooch. "Give it to the wind," Nain had said. Bracing himself against the rock, Gwyn extended his upturned hand into the wind and uncurled his fingers.
The brooch was snatched away so fast that he never saw what became of it. He withdrew his hand and waited for the wind to answer, not knowing what the answer would be, but wanting it to bring him something that would change the way things were, to fill the emptiness in the house below.
But the wind did not reply. It howled about Gwyn's head and tore at his clothes. Then slowly it died away, taking the precious brooch somewhere within its swirling streams and currents and leaving nothing in return.
Then, from the west, came a silver white cloud of snow, obscuring the sea, the surrounding mountains, and the fields below. And, as the snow began to encircle and embrace him, Gwyn found himself chanting, "Math, Lord of Gwynedd, Gwydion, and Gilfaethwy!" This he repeated over and over again, not knowing whether he was calling to the living or the dead. And all the while huge snowflakes drifted silently about him, melting as they touched him, so that he did not turn into the snowman that he might otherwise have become.
Gwyn stood motionless for what seemed like hours, enveloped in a soft, serene whiteness, waiting for an answer. Yet had Nain promised him an answer? In the stillness he thought he heard a sound, very high and light, like icicles on glass.
His legs began to ache. His face grew numb with cold, and when night clouds darkened the sky, he began his descent, resentful and forlorn.
The lower slopes of the mountain were still green. The snow had not touched them, and it was difficult for Gwyn to believe he had been standing deep in snow just minutes earlier. Only from the last field could the summit be seen, but by the time Gwyn reached the field, the mountain was hidden by mist. He could not tell if snow still lay above.
It was dark when he got home. Before opening the back door he stamped his boots. His absence from the farm all day would not be appreciated, he knew. He did not wish to aggravate the situation with muddy boots. He raised his hand to brush his shoulders free of the dust he usually managed to collect, and his fingers encountered something icy cold.
Believing it to be a snowflake or even an icicle, Gwyn plucked it off his shoulder and moved closer to the kitchen window to examine what he had found. His mother had not yet drawn the curtains, and light streamed into the yard.
It was a snowflake, the most beautiful he had ever seen, for it was magnified into an exquisite and intricate pattern: a star glistening like crystal in the soft light. And then the most extraordinary thing happened. The star began to move, and Gwyn stared amazed as it gradually assumed the shape of a tiny silver spider. Had the wind heard him after all? Was he a magician then?
"Gwyn, is that you out there? You'll have no tea if you hang about any longer." His mother had spied him from the window.
Gwyn closed his fingers over the spider and tried to open the back door with his left hand. The door was jerked back violently and his father pulled him into the kitchen.
"What the hell are you doing out there? You're late! Can't you open a door now?" Mr. Griffiths had flecks of mud on his spectacles. Gwyn tried not to look at them.
"My hands are cold," he said.
"Tea'll be cold too," grumbled Mr. Griffiths. "Get your boots off and sit down. Where were you this afternoon? You were needed. That mad rooster's out again. We won't have a Christmas dinner if he doesn't stay put."
With some difficulty Gwyn managed to remove his boots with his left hand. "I'm just going upstairs," he said airily.
"Gwyn, whatever are you up to?" asked his mother. "Wash your hands and sit down."
"I've got to go upstairs," Gwyn insisted.
"But Gwyn. ."
"Please, Mam!"
Mrs. Griffiths shrugged and turned back to the stove. Her husband had begun to chew bacon and was not interested in Gwyn's hasty flight through the kitchen.
Rushing into his bedroom Gwyn scanned the place for something in which to hide his spider. He could think of nothing but the drawer. Placing the spider gently on the yellow scarf, he pushed the drawer back, leaving it open a few centimeters for air, then fled downstairs.
He got an interrogation in the kitchen.
Mrs. Griffiths began it. "Whatever made you run off like that this afternoon?" she complained. "Didn't you hear me call?"
"No, it was windy," Gwyn replied cheerfully.
"Well, what was it you were doing all that time? I rang Mrs. Lloyd. You weren't there."
"No," said Gwyn, "I wasn't!"
"Not giving much away, are you?" Mr. Griffiths muttered from behind a mug of tea. "It's no use trying to get that rooster now that it's dark," he went on irritably. "We'll have to be up early in the morning."
"Won't have any trouble waking if he's out," Gwyn sniggered.
"It would take more than a rooster to wake you some mornings," laughed his mother. At least she had recovered her good humor.
After tea Mr. Griffiths vanished into his workshop. His workload of farm repairs seemed to increase rather than diminish, and Gwyn often wondered if it was his father's way of avoiding conversation.
While his mother chattered about Christmas and the rooster, he thought impatiently of the drawer in his room. Excusing himself with a quick hug, Gwyn left his mother to talk to the cat and, trying not to show an unnatural enthusiasm for bed, crossed the hallway and climbed the stairs two at a time.