Gemini Thunder (18 page)

Ike Penbarrow’s eyes narrowed and he again looked at his son.

‘Gold, eh, Ifor? Don’t get much of that around here. We’ll have to be careful what we do with it.’

Samuel Southee chuckled.

‘Stash it away for a rainy day, Ike. It will never lose its value. Who knows, one day you’ll be able to afford a castle to keep Gretchen in.’

Mention of his wife’s name caused Ike to suddenly look around them furtively. He put his finger to his lips.

‘Gretchen mustn’t know—nobody must know. Only Ifor and me,’ he whispered fiercely.

There followed a detailed conversation on where they would meet that night in order to ferry ‘the party of eight’ to Swifty’s Island, a small, wooded area completely surrounded by impenetrable marshland that only Ike knew how to get to. It would get even more remote as the winter rains fell. The horses would have to be left behind, but Ike would winter them in an equally remote meadow he just happened to own, and they would be fresh, if a little wild, for when they were required again next spring.

‘You ought to stay behind with the kernel and the animals,’ said Twilight. ‘It could get a bit nasty on Steep Holm.’

‘But I want to be there when you destroy that evil twin, Go-ian. The animals are safe and the kernel could be left anywhere.’

Twilight had seen the twins’ parting by tracking their auras and also now guessed that Olaf Tryggvason and his men were out at sea having been rescued. He also guessed that the twins had been very clever in keeping him so busy that he had forgotten to check on the marooned raiders for a couple of days, giving them the opportunity to get crews and long boats to them. A mistake he put down to only having seven years with Merlin. Some things, especially in such a complicated situation where lots of things happened at the same time, were bound to slip by him. He would learn and be stronger for it; there was time to deal with the returning Viking later, but the immediate and pressing problem was Go-uan. The female had taken the bait and transformed back to Steep Holm without her twin in the belief that Twilight had hidden his family there. With Go-ian escorting the marooned fleet back, she was vulnerable with only one-half of the power.

‘I won’t get in the way, promise,’ said Desmond in his best cajoling voice. ‘You can put me up in the clouds and make me invisible.’

‘I don’t intend to waste much time on her death. Quick and simple, no time for an opportunity to get in a riposte.’

‘Sounds even better. This I definitely do not want to miss.’

‘Take my hand,’ said the Wessex shape-shifter with a defeated sigh. ‘But be very careful. Gode would never forgive me if anything happened to you now.’

‘Aaahh, my beautiful and brave Gode,’ exclaimed the besotted troubadour. ‘I wonder what she’s doing right now?’

‘Arguing with her father at Combe Castle,’ came the reply as they appeared in a dark autumn cloud high over Steep Holm. ‘But beginning to get the upper hand.’

‘Know-all,’ sniffed Desmond.

The windswept island, situated in the Severn Channel estuary, comprised three interlocking hills with a small wood on the lea side. In the centre of the wood there was a small clearing with a carefully camouflaged hovel. Twilight had put it there the previous night to make it look as if anyone living there didn’t want to be discovered.

As Go-uan watched from the trees with the powerfully built bear locked to her side, Twilight’s wife, Rawnie, bending to get through the hovel’s low door opening, emerged carefully into the clearing around the hovel. Having looked around, she called back into the opening, and Eleanor and Harlo appeared hesitantly. Holding hands, one each side of Rawnie, the three of them moved to the edge of the clearing and began to pick some late summer yellow-wort growing up to the tree line. As they got closer to Go-uan, the deadly twin’s smile grew wider until, unable to contain herself any longer, she sprang out in front of Rawnie and the two children with a high-pitched giggle. The huge bear lumbered to her side with a deep growl.

‘Picking flowers for your own sarcophagi, are we?’ Go-uan giggled. ‘Something to brighten up the pile of stones you’ll be under.’

Startled, the children jumped behind their mother’s long tunic, peeping out from behind its protecting folds.

‘You won’t be needing flowers.’ Go-uan swept her arm at them and the small bunches of yellow-wort flew from their hands. ‘They don’t like the heat where you’re going.’ She threw back her short-haired blond head and giggled again. Then, slowly pulling back her arm to deliver a thunderbolt she became sombre.

‘Who wants it first?’

Rawnie stepped forward protectively. The bear growled again.

‘Okay, mama.’ Go-uan giggled. ‘Say your good-byes. I’ll have some fun torturing your evil little spawns afterwards. I’m looking forward to hearing them squeal.’

As her arm shot forward, Rawnie and the two children disappeared. The thunderbolt fizzed through the air where Rawnie’s head had been and exploded harmlessly in the woods.

At the same instant the bear also disappeared. One moment he’d been locked to her thigh growling threateningly, and the next, nothing.

Very suddenly Go-uan knew she’d been trapped by carefully placed conspicuous images of Twilight’s family and that her big, protective bear would never growl again.

And it was too late for her. There wouldn’t even be time to send a good-bye to her twin brother.

But he would know.

Twilight had seen the long magus defeat Elelendise, the northern venefica and wolf woman, and remembered the old alpha astounder’s words at the time.

‘The time will come when you will be faced with a similar situation. Don’t hesitate, strike immediately.’

He’d also seen the devastation of Elelendise’s terminus. Something else to be avoided when ridding this turning earth of a veneficus, even an underpowered one.

Go-uan knew nothing of her own death. The suddenness and complete disintegration of her small, half-powered venefical body as the three thunderbolts hit her head, upper and lower body from behind saw to that. She didn’t even have time to register his voice as it delivered his death homily directly to her mind:

The moment of your venefical eternity has arrived, evil gemini.

Good-bye.

All the bears of Wessex were instantly released from their obligations to a now dead liege-lord. They were free to be wild, unencumbered animals once again.

Twilight remembered the beautifully constructed rhyme Elder Pendragon had taught Merlin, who, in turn, had passed it to him. The death of a veneficus seemed an appropriate time to commune with nature in its simple message to those who would seek to destroy its elegant and unrepeatable structure. Standing over the smouldering remains that had been Go-uan, Twilight lifted his arms high over his head and gave himself to the elegiac augury.

Kiss the winds and sense the seasons, Smell the rain and know the reasons. Feel the sun, plunge the earth Whisper plant, whisper birth.

Run with hares, fly with birds Climb with trees heavenwards. Then you will know the reasons why The earth resides beneath the sky.

And if you think it’s yours to change, To redesign and rearrange, Consider your time within its place As no more than a flash in space,

And in that flash you would deface The beauty of its timeless place, For no more than a flash in space You would leave your own disgrace

So by kissing winds of zephyr light And smelling rain throughout the night And understanding backward sight All your mistakes are rendered right;

And this noble place we call our Earth

Will have survived your death from birth

And all will be as it was before,

Your flash in space required a cure.

Far out to sea Go-ian received three instantaneous and sharp shards of intense pain in the back of his head, shoulders, and waist. A scream ripped across his mind like a lightning flash, and his entire system shut down. He collapsed to the heaving floor of the long ship platform and passed out.

All he could think of as the blackness closed in on him was that he was now irreparably alone.

And would be for the rest of his days.

With King Alfred and his small party safely installed on Swifty’s Island with the added protection of Desmond’s bears and a ring of pica dotted around the area for added security, Twilight’s thoughts turned to other matters.

Like Rawnie and his children. A visit to the isle of Silura, named by Merlin as Avalon, was overdue, but he also had the problem of the thirty long ships that, accompanied by Go-ian, were probably well on their way back to the mainland coast. They must be stopped at all costs. So that was his next task.

He soon found them. With wind and tides favourable, they had made good headway, even though each long ship was overloaded by thirty warriors. Estimating the present rate of progress would see them make landfall by early evening that day, Twilight began to plan for the fleet’s eradication.

Until, from his customary position high in the clouds above, he noticed something that changed the entire situation.

Expecting to encounter the half power of the male twin, Go-ian, he was surprised to find a full and powerful aura emanating from the leading long ship. In an instant response to his position high in the clouds over the fleet, a figure walked out from under the platform and looked up.

She was bent and wrinkled, with white hair down to her shoulders, and Twilight knew immediately who it was.

The fight against the Viking had just got harder.

Freyja, the ninety-year-old mother of the twins and training queen of the Northern venefici had arrived to avenge the death of her daughter and protect the fleet.

I can’t see your aura, shape-shifter, but I know you’re up there somewhere. You will know who I am and what I’m doing here. These old bones will not rest until I have extracted every drop of blood from your body and those of your wife and children, and drank it. The thirst of my revenge for what you did to my beloved Go-uan can only be slaked by such a draught. Why don’t you reveal yourself to me instead of skulking in the clouds with your aura hidden, killer-from behind-boy? What’s the matter, afraid of an old woman? I also hear that you like the Latin tongue, foul crepusulum. Try this one then: Freyja is here esto perpetua, rune-slayer, meaning I am everlasting.

Freyja’s words seared across Twilight’s mind, but he did not reply directly. She was just trying to draw him out. He moved position; her gaze did not move with him. She was guessing that he was there, probably doing it every few minutes knowing that he would have to come to the fleet sooner or later.

Ad exiguum tempus, odiosa, ad exiguum tempus,
the Wessex astounder replied to himself. Only for a short time, odious woman, only for a short time.

He continued to say nothing but watched as the old, bent lady, who was the most difficult opponent he’d ever faced since Elelendise, hobbled back under the long ship platform. A few moments later she emerged and went through the same procedure again.

Uncertainty of Twilight’s whereabouts was obviously a major problem to her, despite all that experience. When, in his fight against the wolf woman, the long magus had come up with the ability to lose the venefical aura, it had been a breakthrough of monumental and lasting proportions.

Could Freyja also find the way to do it?

As a small tester Twilight arranged a swift offshore current beam-on to the ships that would quickly drive them back out to sea.

It was countered instantly by Freyja, who again came out from under the platform and looked upward.

You’ll have to do better than that, boy. I am mistress of the ocean and all her ways. These vessels will make landfall, and Guthrum will have his warriors. Then they will be joined by my wild boar, a particularly fierce and brave animal.

I wouldn’t be so sure of that, thought the Wessex astounder. I’ll deal with you on land. As for your wild boar, they won’t find the marshland of the Levels to their liking, and my pica would say it’s a fierce land animal with no wings and no brains, just like your vaunted warriors.

Arranging a series of forceful current changes and strong wind shifts over the next three hours to keep her fully occupied, he transformed to Avalon to see his beloved wife, children, and Guinevere.

The old Norse hag could wait awhile. Besides, the rules of engagement had changed, and he needed to think carefully about his strategy; mistakes with this powerful and astute old rune-queen would be costly.

Even final.

Ike Penbarrow poled quietly and expertly through the weed-clogged, willow-hung channels of the Levels in a roundabout way to Swifty’s Island. In the front, parting the overhanging branches, sat Ifor. They carried sacks of barley flour Ike had obtained from Bobber the miller in exchange for a new metal billhook and four sun-dried fawn skins and a good-sized cooking cauldron from Ernie Wicks the blacksmith, against next week’s supply of charcoal. Every day they brought something useful to make life for the men, and now a woman, a little easier. The woman, Gode, had, much to Desmond’s delight, joined them on the previous day, having finally succeeded in moving her father, Edwin of Combe, west toward Tintagel Castle in Kernow. Coughing and spluttering with indignation and consumption, wrapped in thick blankets in the back of an old hay cart and still protesting, he’d left with an escort of his last twenty men and three younger daughters on the journey. With the Viking no more than three hours away, the brave Edwin had at last given up any thoughts of dying a glorious death protecting Combe Castle, an old Roman-built garrison fort, and the lands he’d inherited from his father. His mind was also made up to leave when Gode explained what would happen to his girls and her sisters when captured by the brutal invaders.