“Do you know the purpose of the killings then? Why kill so many folks who have connections to serpent, worm and dragonet? That’s the only pattern we’ve been able to discern. And really,” said Caewen, “it seems such a strange thing. What was he hoping to achieve? I can’t unravel the motive at all.”
“Who can fathom? Maybe the Winter King saw a vision that a dragon-magi would bring him to ruin? Maybe the Winter King is mad and has no reasons?” He looked at the sky, and seemed to grow more thoughtful. His tone drew deeper in upon itself, more tentative, more hinting. “I do not know the whole of the why–who can guess–but I will tell you something. A new rumour has reached my ears. One that is almost too awful to believe.” He lowered his voice. “The Winter King plans to destroy the whole of the moot and kill every last magician in attendance. Everyone. The whole of everyone.” He arched an eyebrow at her. “Haven’t you wondered why the eerie and awvish folk have all been slipping away? They know. They have caught wind of the threat.” His tone rose a notch. “King of Winter? Bah. King of Death, more like. King of Corpses and miseries. Ah… but why? I see you about to ask. He means to do away with a vast number of wizards, witches and priests who are in the service of the Host of Brightness. That he will also murder all the night-folk who are here… all other sundry magicians, as well.” A shrug. “What does that matter to him? He means to strike a terrible blow against the Sunbright Lady in one stroke. It would be such a blow against all who oppose him, that the loss of his own people is, I fear, rather incidental.” He shifted his stance, breathed out a small wisp of a sigh. “Things that wear the shape of a men, but are not of mortalkind, they have no love in their unbeating hearts. Only rock. Only darkness. Only ice. Only fury.”
Caewen blinked. She was a more than a little thrown by this supposed revelation.” She exchanged a doubtful glance with Dapplegrim. His look said, maybe… who knows… but I doubt it. Caewen cleared her throat and said, “How could any power hope to destroy thousands of magicians, altogether, and whilst they are in the lap of their protecting goddess? How would anyone or anything hope to do such a thing?” She shook her head. “The rumour must be idle fear-mongering. It is too far-fetched, surely.”
He smiled at her, his pleasant, gnomish grin seemingly at odds with his warnings. “How? How indeed? Well, I admit, his method is still beyond me, but I wonder if you should be so incredulous. This is a world of miracles and wonders. Stranger things have happened. Perhaps you should think to your own safety? Of course, I don’t want to start a panic. I don’t want to go about levelling accusations that might be unfounded… my little flutterers and whisperers might be wrong, after all. Just as you say. It does seem improbable.” A bob of his head, side to side as he weighed up something in his head. “Still, I have a terrible dread worry that there is truth in the rumour. I plan to face it, as best I can. To stand against that which may come.” His voice grew softer, kinder. “But you? You’ve your life ahead of you, young Caewen. I wonder if you ought not consider your own safety? It would be easy enough to slip away. And then, if the worst does happen… if the moot is somehow reduced to ruin… then you could carry word of it abroad. You could tell all what happened here.”
“Away from here,” repeated Caewen, turning over the words. Then, softly, she said, “Fafmuir. Where are your children? Your tent is silent.”
“Ah, well, of course, I’ve already sent them away. Haven’t I? As I said, I don’t want to cause a panic, but I can’t stomach undue risk upon my children. Obviously I had to–“
Caewen took a step back. She looked around. It was awfully calm. Awfully quiet. “There are no songbirds. No birds are singing anywhere. I can’t even see a sparrow scavenging bread from the breakfast tables. Where are all the birds?”
Dappelgrim’s ears swivelled and he looked left and right. His nostrils flared. “They’re all gone. I can’t smell a bird anywhere near. Hurm. When did that happen? There were skylarks on the hill, but they were acting strange.” He strained. “I cannot hear them calling any more. They are gone too.”
Caewen pinned Fafmuir with a worried look. His face, at first impassive, sunk into an unpleasant, weary scowl. “So, I do not like my friends to die. What of it? I am friends to the birds. My children wards are dear to me. And so what, then? I told them to all to go away too. That is all. And you should listen too. You should leave and warn everyone about the threat of the Winter King.”
“You seem terribly certain that everyone here is going to die.” She spoke slowly. “What do you know, Fafmuir?” Then it occurred to her that something else wasn’t quite right. Fafmuir was still wearing his heavy gloves. He was dressed in thick garments from neck to fingertip, to boot. The only part of him that was visible was his head and face. But the air was warming. Was he concealing something under his many layers? She took another step back, laid a hand on the hilt of her sword.
He made a threatening noise in the back of his throat, more like an angry child than an old man.
Dapplegrim snarled back.
Caewen drew the sword slowly, and tried to look as little like a clumsy girl off a farm as she could. “Fafmuir,” she said. “What do you know? What have you done?”
But he just quietly sighed, and said, voice hushed, “Ah, but you owe me a favour. It would be an accursed betrayal to go against what I ask of you. So, this is what I ask of you. Do me this: leave here at once. Go away. Take yourself from here, and tell all that the Winter King is to blame.”
“Fafmuir–“
“Go!” His voice was insistent. “Flee! Tell everyone the truth!”
“And what truth is that, exactly?” Caewen asked. “Who’s truth?”
“The deeper truth. That when the moot was burned down to the blackened earth, when the ash and flames and embers rained from the sky, when every last soul here was rendered into bone and smoke, it was the doing of the Winter King. He brought this on us. He destroyed us all.”
“Fafmuir. What have you done?”
“I did what must be done. In a time of need, one must act in answer of that need. I have acted, as I had to.” He stepped towards them, out of the tent. “You really ought have taken my advice. I was quite happy for the two of you to be messengers on my behalf. A couple of borderland folk, such as you. You would have no reason to lie.” He sighed. “Everyone would have believed you, wouldn’t they?” A weary sigh. “I did my best. Other ways and means then.” He mumbled a little and stopped. “Hmmm. I have always found the magics of the mind to be hard work with dumbed fingers.” Muttering to himself, he pulled at the fingertips of his righthand glove. As it slipped it off, he winced. Underneath, his flesh was blackened and charred. Red, bloody patterns laced his fingers, hand and arm, oozing blood as his fingers moved. It looked as if someone had thrown raw meat into a fire that was too hot for cooking, so that only the skin had been scorched. He frowned at his hand. “It is taking all my will to hold back her curses and her rages. She knows, of course. She is trying to punish me for breaking the sacred peace of the moot. A death for so many deaths. She has done her best to avenge herself, but I am working my will against her. I bend, but I do not break.”
“The Goddess of the Tor?” Caewen stared at his hand. “That is her curse? She is killing you with curses.”
“Trying to. Though, I admit, she will eventually succeed. I may be a grand old magus, but I cannot hold my will and purpose against a goddess, can I? Not forever. Not even a minor, local goddess, such as she.” He twisted his fingers and jabbed them towards Caewen, sketching a giddy shape in the air. Just seeing the movement of the fingers made her feel queasy. She felt her thoughts dull, but then she found that she could bring her own will to bear and forced her mind back against him. Her head cleared.
Dapplegrim growled. Evidently, whatever spell of the mind he had tried to work did not overturn Dapple’s will either.
He huffed, annoyed. A red flush had crept up on his cheeks now. Sweaty streaks glistened on his forehead. The effort had taxed him. He stared coldly at them, then, finally, he puffed out a breath and said, “Ah, so I see. She protects you. Else, I’d have overrun your minds and made you go away. No matter.” He made the same gesture, but in a wider arc.”
A sudden noise of movement, shuffling, footsteps arose from everywhere at once. To the left and right, the wizards and witches, the servants, taggers-on and loiterers, the merchants and wandering small-traders: everyone in sight, they all stopped what they were doing, and turned towards Caewen and Dapplegrim. Famfuir seemed almost sad, as he said, “Rid me of these fools.”