Afterword

He walked to the Edge from the farm, slowly and steadily, with a long stride and a certain goal.  By the gates to Fundindelve—or the place where they would be, were they not closed firmly against him—he stopped, and looked at the cliff face as if it would, should, open at his glance.  It did not.

“Happen we’d best have a word, thee and me,” he said to the rock.  “Theer’s been goings-on; and I’ll have my say.”  He turned and looked back the way he had come.  It was a chill day, as one might expect in February.  The trees were mostly bare; and there had been a frost that morning.  On his way up he had passed no picknickers, no hikers.  It was better that way.  This was not an errand for onlookers.

After a while, he shifted slightly downslope to a fallen tree, where he sat.

An hour or so later, he stirred and turned to say, “Eh, if thee wants me gone, thee con think again.  I’ll bide here as long as need be.”

Some time later he reached into his bag and took out a large sandwich wrapped in a napkin, and, after finishing that, ate an apple down to the core, blossom and all, throwing away only the stalk.  “I’ve more with me,” he said, seemingly to thin air, “and if I mun stay here for days, then Bess’ll bring up food.  We’re of one mind in this, she and I.  ’Tis a tidy step from the farm, but she’ll not see me go hungry for the likes of thee.”

The shadows grew long and the wind cold; but he simply buttoned up his jacket, and took out a knitted cap, which he pulled down low.

The light was dimming to a glow behind the hills when the gates finally opened and the wizard came out.

“You are a persistent man, Farmer Mossock,” said Cadellin, “and foolhardy to confront a wizard in his place of power.’  He pointed his staff, which glowed suddenly blue round the tip, and added ominously, “You should leave while you still may.”  There was a crack, as of thunder.

Yet if he expected the man to shy from his sorcery, he was disappointed.  Gowther knew himself in the right with the certainty of one whose ancestors had farmed their land for far longer than the wizard had guarded the Sleepers in Fundindelve.

“Thee conner frit me,” was all he said.

Cadellin sighed, and dimmed the glow of magic on his staff.  “Let us walk and let us talk, then, if it means so much to you.  But I warn you, there are many matters of which I cannot speak.”

They passed along the Edge taking the downward path that led towards the Goldenstone.  Above them, clouds gathered in wisps around the moon.  At their feet, the wind scattered leaves along the ground.

“It has been a hard season,” said Gowther as they went, “from summer’s end till now.  I’ve had the police round thrice now, sithee:  first the plane, then Susan, now Colin.  Bess is beside herself—and we still dunner know if theer’s a funeral to arrange for the lass.  So, before we get to any other matter, answer me this:  is she all reet or is she drowned in truth?”

“I do not know,” said Cadellin, and added hastily at Gowther’s lowering sideways glare, “No, I truly do not.  That was none of my magic, the High Magic:  it was the oldest of Old Magic; and I make no claim to understand it.”

“I did wonder,” said Gowther tentatively, “whether she went to yon floating island.  Summer land in winter, like a dream, leaving all the woes of the world behind her:  I con see the draw of such, reet now in her life.”

“I do not believe so,” said Cadellin.  “Where she has gone I cannot say.  I do not think we shall see her again.”  After a pause, he added, “I am sorry.  None of you should ever have become a part of any of this.”

“It started with Bess’s Bridestone,” said Gowther stolidly, “and yon were in her family as long as ony con tell.  We were in it, I suppose, she and I:  it’s the childer who dinner belong in this tale.  Nobbut a rum adventure to them, and no thought of risk.”

“Yes,” said Cadellin.  “I agree.  I said so from the start, if you recall.  It was they who persisted, against my advice and your better judgment.”

They came to Goldenstone, and stopped.  Above them, between the lacing of twiggery, the stars began to come out in the night sky.

“And thee conner tell wheer Susan is?” Gowther persisted.  “Above or below the earth?”

Cadellin looked up, thoughtfully.  The stars swung overhead in their timeless patterns.  “An interesting choice of phrase,” he said.

Gowther waited.

“She is nowhere I can reach in this life,” said Cadellin with finality.  His voice was low and saddened.  “If you see her again, it will not be here; and, if you were to meet, I can tell you this:  you would not return to your farm once more.  Nor will she.”

“Aye.  I feared as much.”

There was a question still unasked.  Gowther would not go home until it had been spoken.  This was known to both, and said by neither.

The wind rose:  there would be rain before morning.  Clouds drove across the moon; the stars were blotted.

“How is the boy?” Cadellin said finally, reluctantly.

“Alive.”

“I am glad.”

“A bolt of lightning from a cloudless sky?” said Gowther.  “And th’art glad?  I reckon I can read yon.”

“I wish no harm to you or yours,” said Cadellin quietly.  “But there are higher concerns here than the fate of men-children, however dear—matters that transcend the mundane responsibilities that concern you and your wife.  The final conflict is not yet nigh; and I must look to that time, whatever the grief of the present.”

“Aye, well,” said Gowther, with no sympathy whatsoever.  “I’ll give thee credit for honesty, onyroad.  And should thee care owt more than that, the doctors are for keeping the lad in yon hospital in town—which has set Bess into a reet paddy, for they wunner let us have him home wheer she can tend him as she did Susan.  Though whether theer be some magic plant to rouse him I do not know.”

His voice was harsh.

Cadellin turned to look at him, though Gowther’s face was dim in the gloom and his expression hard to discern.

“Is there … a riddle here?” he said tentatively.  “I fear I lack the key to its meaning.”

“He woke fair mazed,” said Gowther.  “He dunner know me or Bess, or his own name.  He speaks, mind.  In a voice weak as my granny on her deathbed.  But he conner recall his own sister.”

Cadellin said nothing.

“And is that down to thee?”

There was still no response.  “Happen thee’d summat to do wi’ it,” said Gowther sourly.  He stepped closer.  Far the shorter man, he had to tilt his head to stare Cadellin in the eye.  “Happen thee’d like him to remember nowt of thee and thy magic.”

Cadellin still said nothing.

“Conner say owt?” asked Gowther.  “Well, thee’s done thy worst, shy of killing the lad.”

“Or my best,” said Cadellin softly.

“Thee thinks all champion, dunner thee?” said Gowther, with contempt.  “We’ve said our all, then.  I doubt we shanner be seeing thee again.”  His voice was hard with meaning, but to make all clear, he added, “And if thee should come down from th’Edge to meddle in our lives with thy magic, I’ll fain see thee off with my gun.  I conner say it clearer than that.”

And he turned on his heel and went down to the path round the foot of the hill, heading home to Highmost Redmanhey.