World's End (Age of Misrule, Book 1) (48 page)

Laura didn't look at her. "I know what you mean."

Shavi rose and went through a series of yoga movements to stretch the ache of the night chill from his muscles. It felt like they had been sitting in the tower for hours, although it had only been about forty-five minutes.

"So what do we do now? Do you think Mister Dog Collar could have been any more vague?" Laura asked gloomily.

"It is all about ritual," Shavi explained, "and part of the ritual is finding the path ourselves. He gave us some guidance-the time of the ritual-and I think the rest of it is pretty obvious."

"To you, maybe, but then you're some big shaman-type." Laura stood up and leaned in the arch, looking down at the town.

Shavi moved in beside her and pointed to the faint terraces cut into the hill centuries ago, visible by their moon-shadows even in the dark. "You see those? What use are they? They are patently not fields, nor could they be the kind of defences thrown up on some earthworks from neolithic times. Yet it would take a tremendous amount of effort to level out those terraces, so they must be of some significance to whatever culture invested all that manpower and time hundreds or thousands of years ago."

Ruth joined them in the archway, tracing the path of the terraces with her fingertip. "They're like steps."

"Exactly," Shavi nodded. "A path to the top, but not in the manner you suggest. A labyrinth, a three-dimensional one. You can walk a route back and forth around the tor to the summit."

"Why do that when it's easier to go in a straight line?" Laura said.

"The labyrinth is a classical design found in rock carvings, coins, turf mazes around the world. It has more than one meaning, like everything else we have encountered, but at its heart it represents a journey to and from the land of the dead. Birth, death and rebirth."

"I really don't like all this talk of death," Ruth murmured.

"And what happens when we get to the end?" Laura stamped her feet to boost the blood circulation.

Shavi shrugged.

"And the water?"

"An oblation to be offered at the point where we find ourselves."

"You call it ritual, but it sounds like magic to me," Ruth noted.

"Perhaps." Shavi put an arm around both their shoulders, an act that would have seemed too familiar from any other man they had just met, yet from him it simply suggested friendship and security. "We think of magic as something from children's stories, but it may simply be a word for describing that activa tion of the earth force you have seen. New knowledge which we have no frame of reference to understand. Magic is as good a word as any."

"Sometimes you sound just like that old hippie," Laura said with an acidity that was transparent to both Shavi and Ruth.

They continued to discuss the tor and the mysteries they had uncovered for the next half hour, yet none of them touched on the matter that was most important in all their hearts; the sense that they were on the verge of something profound, a turning point which would finally reveal the truth about the events that were shaping the world, about the forgotten past and the hidden future, and, above all, about themselves.

The closer the sunrise drew, the more they seemed to feel an electric quality in the air which resonated deep within them. Barely able to contain their anticipation, they sat against a wall and watched the eastern sky for its lightening. It was a magical moment that stilled conversation, of stars, and wind and the sound of the trees at the foot of the tor, and for a while they seemed to feel the axis of the heavens turning, as they knew their ancestors would have done millennia ago.

It was during one such lull in the conversation that they were startled by the noise of something heavy hitting the ground and a strange liquid, flopping sound. It was incongruous enough to set their hearts racing, and they hurried around the tower to search for its origin.

But as they rounded the western flank of the tower, they were brought up sharp by a bizarre sight that sent their heads spinning: three figures floundered like fish on the slopes of the tor, soaked to the skin and retching up sea water.

"Oh great," Laura said sourly. "The old git's back."

uth reached Church first. "We're on the highest spot in the area and they're drowning," she said incredulously. Without giving it a second thought, she jumped astride him and began massaging his chest to free the water trapped in his lungs.

The others reacted slightly slower-Laura gave the kiss of life to Veitch while Shavi administered to Tom-but within five minutes the three new arrivals were sitting up, gasping and wringing out their sodden clothes.

Bafflement at the bizarre situation was washed aside in a rush of emotion. Ruth threw her arms round Church and hugged him tightly. "God, I'm so glad you're alive!"

Although still dazed by the situation, his relief at seeing her was palpable. He kissed her affectionately on the cheek, then glanced up at Laura who was standing uncomfortably a few feet away.

"I knew you were too stupid to get yourself killed," she said.

He smiled; the message between the lines was obvious. "I missed you too."

Their brief introductions dissolved into a mess of garbled comments as they struggled to understand what had happened. Church described the confrontation at Tintagel and their plunge into the ocean, while glancing at Glastonbury's lights. Then he caught Tom's eye. "What do you know about it?"

Tom's grey, drawn face suggested the experience had affected him more than the others. "I moved us along the lines of power." He sucked in a deep, juddering breath.

"You transported us here?" Church said incredulously.

"It was always theoretically possible. A matter of shaping the energy to do your bidding, forcing a connection between two nodes. I'd been taught the ritual movements, the correct vibrational sounds to make-"

"Magic!" Shavi said, his face alight with excitement.

"-but I'd never achieved anything like this before. Desperation must have focused my mind."

"Who taught you?" Church asked. "You owe us a lot of explanations-"

"There is no time now," Shavi interrupted. He explained the impending sunrise ritual and the events that had led them to it.

"Don't we get a bleedin' rest?" Veitch flopped back on the grass.

"We can rest later." Church retrieved the sword from where it lay and made a tear in his jacket, slipping it in between the lining; the handle protruded above his right shoulder where he could reach it easily. "Two down," he said, "and two to go."

Huddled in the tower away from the wind, they made hasty introductions and exchanged fuller details of their experiences, but any excitement they may have felt at their reunion was muted by the apprehension of what lay ahead. Twenty minutes later the first faint silvering in the sky brought with it an oppressive silence. Shavi rose and led the way to the Living Rock, a standing stone that marked the entrance to the labyrinth. While the others waited uncomfortably behind him, he bowed his head silently in meditation. Then, when the first rays of dawn crept across the grass to hit the stone, it seemed to ignite with blue fire. A gasp of amazement rippled through the others, but Shavi simply rested his hand upon it for a moment before setting off along the first terrace; the others followed in a solemn procession.

The going was not easy. They weaved back and forth in horseshoe patterns around the tor, slowly rising through the terraces as the sky exploded in gold, purple and powder blue. Though none of them spoke, the dawn chorus soaring from the trees at the base of the hill provided an epic soundtrack. Whatever power lay in the ground reinvigorated Church, Veitch and Tom, but there was still a hard lump of fear in all their hearts.

It took them nearly two hours to complete the serpentine route. At the final turn, the path seemed to disappear, leaving a precipitous, near-impassable way to the summit. Veitch opened his mouth to question, but Church silenced him with a wave of his finger. At that spot, the underlying rock broke through the short grass to reveal a large boulder.

The others waited patiently while Shavi produced the plastic bottle containing the Chalice Well water and, after another moment of meditation, he poured the oblation upon the boulder. A strange dual tone emerged from deep within the tor, like falsetto singing merging with a bass rumble. Tiny threads of blue fire spread out across the boulder and then into the other exposed rock. It fizzed and licked for a moment while the noise grew in intensity and then, with a sudden roaring, the rock drew aside to reveal a dark tunnel winding down into the black depths.

They could remember nothing about that journey through the dark. Sometime later, they found themselves in a place that took their breath away; not some dingy cavern lying inside the tor, but green fields and thick woods, rustled by a slight breeze in the heat of a summer's day. Nearby they could hear the faint babbling of a brook. The air smelled sweeter than anything they had experienced before; to breathe it in was so fulfilling it was almost as if they had eaten a hearty meal. Ruth caught a fleeting glimpse of her owl soaring high above and wondered how it had got there.

"Where are we?" Veitch said in bewilderment. "We should be underground. I can see sky."

Tom knelt down and gently kissed the green sward. "Tir na n'Og," he muttered.

Ruth looked round in confusion. "We're not in Somerset any more, Toto."

"The Land of Youth, or Always Summer." This Church did remember from his studies. "The Celtic heaven. The Otherworld where all the gods were supposed to have gone to after they left Earth in the hands of man."

"That's one aspect of it." Tom rose and stretched; he looked revitalised. "Like everything else, it has a dual aspect. It is also The Land of Ever Winter, or hell, by any other name, depending how you come to it."

"I don't understand." Veitch looked from one face to the other.

"This place is not fixed," Tom said, "like all the things that originate here. You are all seeing something slightly different, depending on your perception. What is within, is without."

"Listen to the voice of Buddha," Laura sighed.

But now he had mentioned it, they could all see it. The edges of each blade of grass, tree branches, even the horizon, seemed vaguely fluid, as if they could change at a moment's notice; they seemed to radiate a subtle, inner light, creating a distorted sense of unreality.

"But we should be underground," Veitch protested.

"Hey, new boy, when you find your brain, let us know." Laura kicked up a few sods of turf. "We've crossed over. We're in Never land now." Veitch returned a combative scowl.

"Look at it!" Shavi said. "It is amazing. Everything is so vital." He whirled round to take in the landscape. "Even the quality of the air, the sounds-"

"Don't be mistaken," Tom interjected. "There's danger here too."

"It looks deserted," Ruth said.

"The Danann are missing. Everything else is in our world," Church said.

The Wayfinder's flame pointed them down the gentle slope of the meadow to a wood that lay beyond the brook. As they walked, Church caught up with Tom. "So this is where you stayed for all those years. Is it good to be back?"

"You misunderstand." Tom didn't take his eyes off the path. "I miss this place like a murderer who has spent his entire life in solitary confinement misses his cell. Familiarity forces you to love the things you hate."

"You were a prisoner here?"

"A prisoner, a plaything, something to be tormented by the gods, torn inside out and reshaped for their enjoyment."

Church eyed him askance. "I hope that's a metaphor."

"I told you-they are alien, unknowable. We cannot begin to grasp the power at their disposal. Do not be fooled because we view them in vaguely human form. They are beyond most of our emotions-love, hate-"

"Cruelty?"

He paused. "No. Not beyond that."

Tom was interrupted by a cry from Veitch, who had moved into lead position along the path which was skirting a thick wood. They hurried through the meadow flowers until they saw what had alerted him: an odd circular structure of timber and stone with a tower at its centre. The Wayfinder flame flickered enticingly towards it.