Always Forever (9 page)

Before the dark figure could continue, Cormorel stepped between it and
Ruth, brushing the arm aside. With one hand in the small of Ruth's back, Cormorel steered her away.

"What was it?" Ruth looked back, but the presence had already melted
away amongst the busy crew. She felt as if a shadow lay across her, although the
effect diminished within seconds of leaving the figure behind.

"The Walpurgis," Cormorel replied coldly.

"Yes, but what was it?"

"A memory of the world's darkest night. A disease of life. An unfortunate
by-product of the Master's policy of admitting all comers is that occasionally we
must play host to ... unpleasant travellers." He eyed Ruth suspiciously. "You
would do well to avoid the Walpurgis at all costs," he warned.

"Did you hear me calling?" Church asked when they stood in the shadow of the mast.

"We hear all who speak of us." Cormorel had sloughed off the mood that
had gripped him after the encounter with the Walpurgis and his eyes were
sparkling once again. "A muttered word, an unguarded aside-they shout out
to us across the void." He surveyed them both as if he were weighing his
thoughts, and then decided to speak. "You did not call the ship, the ship called
you-as it did everyone who travels on board, myself included. Wave Sweeper
offers up to us our destiny, revealed here in signs and whispers, symbols that
crackle across the void. It is a great honour. For many who travel on Wave
Sweeper, the journey is the destination."

The concept wasn't something Church wished to consider; he yearned for
the old days of cause and effect, linear time, space that could be measured; when
everything made sense.

Irritated by the salty sea breeze, Ruth took an elastic band from her pocket
and fastened her hair back. It made her fine features even more fragile, and beautiful. "You don't mind us coming?"

"We accept all travellers on Wave Sweeper. They are a source of constant
amusement to us."

"That's nice," Ruth said sourly. She looked out to the hazy horizon, aware of
the shortening time. "How long will it take?"

Cormorel laughed at the ridiculousness of the question. "We will pass
through the Far Lands, Sister of Dragons."

"We have to be back before Samhain. A long time before." She fixed him
with a stare that would brook no dissent.

"You will be in place to face your destiny." There was something in Cormorel's smile that unnerved them both.

Before they could ask any further questions, they were hailed from the other
end of the deck. Cormorel's companion Baccharus hurried to meet them, his
ponytail flapping. Where Cormorel was overconfident, proud and arrogant, Baccharus was humble and almost shy, traits they had never seen in any of the gods
before. If they could trust any of them, he was the one.

Ruth greeted him with a smile, Church with a bow, but if anything he was
more pleased to see them. "We are honoured to have a Brother and Sister of
Dragons on board the ship that sails the Night Seas," he said quietly; he even
sounded as if he meant it.

Cormorel laid a hand on his friend's shoulder. "Baccharus will show you to
your quarters. They have already been prepared for you-"

"You were expecting us?" Church asked.

Cormorel smiled in his irritatingly enigmatic way. "Food and drink will be
sent to your rooms-" He caught the look in Church's eye and added, "It is given
freely and without obligation. Wave Sweeper is a place that defies the rules that
govern our existence. It is the Master's wish." He gave an exaggerated bow.

Baccharus led them to the door through which Callow had been herded.
Behind it, creaking, irregular steps went down into the bowels of the ship. The
torches that lit their path were set a little too far apart, so uncomfortable
shadows were always clustering. Despite the flickering flames, there was little
smoke and no charring on the wooden walls. Ruth steadied herself on the boards
at one point, but the surface felt so much like skin she never tried again.

They came on to a corridor that twisted and turned so much it was impossible to see more than fifteen feet ahead or behind. It was oppressively claustrophobic, barely wide enough for one person, with the ceiling mere inches above
Church's head; doors were on either side, each with a strange symbol burned
into the wood that was not wood. Baccharus stopped outside two doors marked
with the sign of a serpent eating its tail.

Or a dragon, Church thought. He let his fingers trace the symbol. It felt as
if it had been branded into the wood years before. Not wanting to consider what
that meant, he stepped into the room sharply once Baccharus opened the door.

The room unnervingly echoed their bedrooms in the pub, as if they were
still on land, dreaming their encounters on Wave Sweeper. A fishing net hung
on one side, while lanterns, billhooks and other implements of a seafaring life
covered the walls. The bed was barely more than a bench covered with rough
blankets beneath a window with bottle-glass panes that diffused the light in a
dazzling display across the chamber; even so, shadows still clung to the corners.
A connecting door gave access to Ruth's room, an exact replica of Church's.

Ruth summoned up the courage to touch the wooden walls once more.
Something pulsed just beneath the surface, while her feet picked up faint vibrations, as if somewhere in the core of the vessel a mighty heart was beating. The
notion left her feeling queasy and disorientated.

Baccharus watched her curiously, as if he could read her thoughts, and then
warned, "The ship is large, with many wonders, but many dangers too. You are
free to roam as you see fit, but take care in your investigations."

Once he had left, Church threw open the window and looked out across the
waves. "This isn't going to be easy."

"Did you expect it any other way? From the moment we started on this road
we've had trouble at every turn." Ruth examined the cupboards. They were generally empty and smelled of damp and dust.

"You can't trust any of the Tuatha De Danann, any of the other creatures.
They've all got their own agendas, their own secret little rules and regulations-"

"Then we don't trust them. We trust each other." Ruth joined him at the
window; the sea air was refreshingly tangy, but her face was troubled. "Last
night I had a dream ..." She chewed on a nail apprehensively. "No, it wasn't a
dream at all. I felt Balor in my head." The gulls over the sea suddenly erupted
in a crazed bout of squawking. "It knows what we're doing, Church."

A chill brushed slowly across his skin.

"It was so powerful." Her eyes were fixed on the horizon. "And it's growing
stronger by the minute. I'm afraid of what the world's going to be like when we
get back. And I'm afraid that Bator will be waiting for us."

The food was delivered about an hour later by one of the blank-faced gods:
bread, dried meat, dried fruits, and a liquid that tasted like mead. They ate hungrily and then returned to the deck. Manannan was at the wheel, surveying the
horizon, while the crew prepared the ship for departure.

"If we're going to back out, now's the time," Ruth said. "Once it sets sail,
we'll be trapped with this collection of freaks until the bitter end." She thought
for a moment, then revised her words. "Until we reach our destination."

They moved over to the rail to take one last look at Mousehole. People moved quietly along the front, oblivious to Wave Sweeper's presence. The sky
was still blue, the sun bright on the rooftops, the wind fresh. Church scanned
the length of the coastline, then closed his eyes and breathed deeply.

"I love it," he said.

"What?"

"Britain. The world. There's so much-" He broke off. "I never thought
about it before. It was just there."

Ruth said nothing, caught in a moment of admiration for the untroubled
innocence that still lay at the heart of him, despite all that was happening.

Twenty minutes later everything appeared to be in place. Manannan looked at
various crew members scattered around the ship waiting for a nod of approval
before raising his hand and slowly letting it drop. A wind appeared from
nowhere, filling the sail with a creaking of canvas and a straining of rope.
Almost imperceptibly at first, the ship began to move, turning slowly until it
was facing the open sea in a tight manoeuvre that would have been impossible
for any normal vessel.

Church allowed himself one last, yearning look back at the Cornish coast
and then they were moving towards the horizon, picking up speed as they went.

Wave Sweeper skimmed the sea at an impressive rate. The activity continued on
deck, but Church couldn't work out exactly what it was the crew were doing; at
times their actions looked nonsensical, yet they were obviously affecting the
ship's speed and direction. Overhead, the gulls screeched as they swooped
around the sails. Manannan faced the horizon, eyes narrowed against the wind
that whisked his mane of hair out behind him.

"Can you feel it?" Ruth asked.

Until then he hadn't, but her perceptions had become much sharper than
his. It manifested as a burnt metal taste at the back of his mouth, a heat to his
forehead that caused palpitations and faint nausea. A drifting sea haze appeared
from nowhere and was gone just as quickly, and suddenly the world was a much
better place: the sun brighter, the sky bluer, the sea so many shades of sapphire
and emerald it dazzled the eyes. Even the scent of the air was richer.

The gods relaxed perceptibly and an aura of calm fell across the ship.
Church went to the rail and watched the creamy wake spread out behind. "I
wish I could understand how all this worked."

"I shouldn't trouble yourself." Ruth held her head back to feel the sun on
her face. "For years all the rationalists and reductionists have been fooling themselves, building up this great edifice on best guesses and possibilities and maybes while ignoring anything that threatened the totality of the vision. It was
a belief system like any religion. Fundamentalist. And now the foundations have
been kicked away and it's all coming crashing down. Nobody knows anything.
Nobody will ever know anything-we're never going to find out the big picture. Our perceptions just aren't big enough to take it all in."

Church agreed thoughtfully. "That doesn't mean we shouldn't keep trying
to understand it, though."

"No, of course not. There are too many wonders in the universe, too much
information. The best we can hope to do is build up our own, individual view
of how it all fits together. Though most people can't be bothered to look beyond
their lives-"

"That's not fair. When they're not held in check by authority, people can
do-"

Ruth burst out laughing.

Church looked at her sharply. "What is it?"

"You sound like my dad! He was such a believer in the strength of the
people."

"Everybody has to believe in something."

Their eyes held each other for a long moment while curious thoughts came
to the surface, both surprising and a little unnerving. It was Ruth who broke
away to look wistfully across the waves. "I miss him."

Church slipped a comforting arm around her waist. It was such a slight
movement, but a big gesture; boundaries built up during the months they had
known each other crumbled instantly. Ruth shifted slightly until she was
leaning against him.

"Jack."

The voice made the hairs on the back of his neck stand alert. He snatched
his arm away from Ruth like a guilty schoolboy. Niamh was standing a few feet
away, her hands clasped behind her back. Her classical beauty still brought a
skip to his heart, her features so fine, her hair a lustrous brown, her skin glowing
with the inner golden light of the Tuatha De Danann. Church didn't know what
to expect. Only days ago she had been dangling him off a cliff for his refusal to
return her love in the manner she expected. The fury within her at that moment
had terrified him.

"Hello, Niamh." He tried to see some sign in her face, but anything of note
was locked far away.

Her eyes ranged across his features as if she were memorising them. He
steeled himself as he felt a sudden surge of attraction for her. Proximity to the
Tuatha De Danann set human emotions tumbling out of control. It wasn't manipulation, as he had at first thought, just a natural reaction to contact
between two different species.

Ruth glanced from one to the other, then said diplomatically, "I'm heading
back to my room for a rest. I'll see you later." She smiled at Niamh as she passed,
but the god gave no sign that she was even there; Church was the only thing in
her sphere that mattered. He couldn't begin to understand the depth of her
feeling. They had shared barely more than a few moments, exchanged a smattering of words, the sketchiest of emotions, though Niamh had been with him
all his life, watching him constantly from his birth, a whisper away during every
great happiness and every moment of despair; even that couldn't explain the
depth of her love, so pure and overwhelming it took his breath away.

"How are you, Jack?"

"As well as can be expected, given that my world is on the brink of being
torn apart." He tried not to sound bitter; it wouldn't do any good. But he
wanted to say: considering you tried to murder me with a lunatic god who could boil the
blood in my veins at a gesture. Even as he thought it, contrition lit her face. "How
is Maponus?" he asked.

"The Good Son is ... as well as can be expected."

"Will he recover?"

She looked down. "We do what we can."

"I'm sorry."

"May we talk?" As she gently touched his hand, a spark of some indescribable energy crackled into his arm. She led him across the deck to the highest
level beyond Manannan's vantage point. A table placed where one could admire
the view was laid out with crystal goblets and a jug of water.

"The Master will not mind us sitting awhile. He knows I love the sea as
much as he." Niamh filled two goblets, then watched the waves for several
moments, a faint smile on her face.