The Moon of Gomrath Read online

  “You?” said Susan. “What’s the matter with everybody? You mustn’t let the Morrigan win!”

  “Can I stop her?” said Uthecar. “Listen to me. We have Colin, and there is nothing more to do, since magic holds the Brollachan in its circle. We have killed many bodachs, and routed the palugs. When I was fighting out there I saw but a dozen in all, and when they are spent the Morrigan must needs come herself, and that is no stopping time for me. I fear her, without shame. But also, wounded as I am, the bodach is not dear to me, and for death and its fearful afflictions, and the pang of the blue blades, I will not be clamorous, either.”

  “I’ll stay by myself, then,” said Susan.

  “You will not,” said Uthecar, and began to pick his way over the lawn to where Pelis had fallen. He came back with his sword.

  The lios-alfar were backing from the circle to make a column, the wounded in the middle, lashed to their saddles.

  “How did they know they were going?” said Colin. “I’ve never heard any of them speak, except Atlendor.”

  “It is a part of their strangeness,” said Uthecar. “They speak to each other through their minds, and from the looks I have seen, they hear what does not pass my lips!”

  Susan reluctantly mounted. Colin rode Melynlas, who appeared to have adopted him, and with Uthecar they joined the column of the elves.

  The fires were dying for want of attention; the ground was broken with bodies and splintered weapons; the house stood waiting. Susan looked round her at the scene of her failure: and that is how she saw it now. To begin with, Colin had been her only motive; she had faced impossible things for his sake; but now she felt that he had been the first step to her duty, which she was now being made to leave unfinished.

  The lios-alfar galloped away along the drive, and, but for their swords and Uthecar’s dwarf-sight, they could not have kept their pace, and the spears that came at them would have taken more. As it was, three of the horses lacked riders when they reached the open ground.

  CHAPTER 20

  THE LAST RIDE

  T he speed of the lios-alfar to Shining Tor was like a March gale, since the moon shone freely, and they were accustomed to the light. But when they were only a little way up the slope, the feeling of wrong became too much for Susan.

  “Wait!” she called.

  The elves halted, and their eyes were turned on her.

  “We must go back. We’ll not be safe this way. The Morrigan has got to be kept out of the house.”

  “We are not bound,” said Atlendor. “Come.”

  “Uthecar, will you go with me?”

  “My only craft is the sword,” said Uthecar, “and that is denied me now, and I fear the Morrigan more than dishonour. Come away.”

  “Colin?”

  “What’s the matter, Sue? You know we can’t do any more.”

  “All right,” said Susan, and she drove in her heels, and charged down towards Errwood.

  “Susan!” cried Uthecar.

  “She’ll turn back when she sees we’re not following,” said Colin.

  But Susan did not even look. She came to the round hill at the top of the valley, and instead of riding along the drive, on the right-hand side of the hill, she approached the house by a narrow footpath on the left.

  “She’s going in!” shouted Colin, and he spurred Melynlas after her. But Melynlas would not move. The harder Colin tried, the more he ignored him. It was not the usual stubbornness of a horse: he was quiet and docile: but he would not go.

  Colin dropped from Melynlas into the heather, and started to run. Cursing, Uthecar tried to follow him, but Melynlas kicked out at the horse, and bared his teeth, so that it dared not stir, and Uthecar knew that he was too weak to trust his own legs. The lios-alfar sat still.

  The path was overgrown and slippery, and the stream ran over rocks far below. Branches whipped Susan’s face, but that was little to the cold that seared her wrist.

  The path ended. She was at the front of the house, and there on the drive, shapeless in her robes, and surrounded by bodachs and palugs, was the Morrigan.

  Susan hauled on the reins and at the sight of her the bodachs and palugs screamed, for to them she was transformed; their hearts shook, and they fled. But the glamour of the bracelet was not on the Morrigan. She raised her hand.

  Now Susan felt the true weight of her danger, when she looked into the eyes that were as luminous as an owl’s, and blackness swirling in their depths. The moon charged the Morrigan with such power that when she lifted her hand even the noise of the stream died, and the air was sweet with fear.

  “Vermias! Eslevor! Frangam! Beldor!”

  Something like black lightning came from the Morrigan’s hand, and darted towards Susan, who threw up her arm to protect herself: and in doing so, she saw the word of power stand out above the Mark, and though it was not the word she had seen on Shining Tor, she spoke it with all her will.

  “HURANDOS!”

  And from the Mark sprang a lance of flame, which met the black of the Morrigan half-way to its target, and the two forces grappled each other, crackling, and writhing like snakes.

  “Salibat! Reterrem!” cried the Morrigan.

  The black rippled, grew in thickness, and slowly pushed the white back to the wrist.

  Susan rose in the stirrups, and, without her looking at the bracelet, the words poured from her lips, words that she had never known or heard.

  “—per sedem Baldery et per gratiam tuam habuisti—”

  The light grew again, but the Morrigan answered her, and Susan felt herself weaken: the blackness was groping for her like a tentacle. “It shouldn’t be me. Why me?” And then the Morrigan’s power reached her. Susan arched from the horse into nothingness.

  When Susan opened her eyes the Morrigan was standing with her back to her, facing the house. The Morrigan had been too sure of her art, too scornful of Susan’s bracelet, and what should have destroyed had only stunned. But Susan felt that she could do no more; she had tried, and failed. Her duty lay in warning Cadellin or Angharad Goldenhand. Let them deal with this.

  “Besticitium, consolatio veni ad me vertat Creon, Creon, Creon, cantor laudem omnipotentis et non commentur—” The Morrigan chanted tonelessly, her arms outstretched. “—principiem da montem et inimicos o prostantis vobis—” Susan crept towards the horse, which was standing as though mesmerised, and she reached it as the Morrigan’s voice rose to its climax. “— passium sincisbus. Fiat! Fiat! Fiat!”

  There was a noise of thunder in the house, and smoke began to pour from an upstairs window, then the whole front wall burst outwards, and a cloud spilled from the house, and in the cloud were two red pools.

  Susan did not wait. She scrambled on to the horse, and it came to life under her, and as they sped away she heard the Morrigan cry out, then she was round the corner and on the path above the stream.

  The Brollachan grew high above Errwood, strong in itself, and in the moon, and in the power of its keeper. It saw the rider in the valley, and the elves upon the hill, and it stooped to take toll of the long centuries of prison at their hands.

  Susan felt the sky go black above her: she glanced up, and all she saw was night. She lifted the Mark of Fohla, but its silver was dimmed, and the words would not come. The hill disappeared; she could see nothing; the air beat with the rhythm of her blood, and the night swam into her brain; the world drifted away.

  And then Susan heard a voice, urgent, the voice of Angharad Goldenhand, crying, “The horn with the wreath of gold about its rim! All else is lost!”

  Susan tore at her waist with fingers that resisted her will, and put the horn to her lips.

  Its note was music, like wind in caves of ice, and out of the wind and far away came hoofs, and voices calling, “We ride! We ride!” and the darkness melted. At her stirrup was a man with tall, proud antlers growing from his brow, and he ran with his hand upon the horse’s neck; and all about her were booming cloaks, red, blue, white, and black, and flying m
anes. She was swept up and along with them like chaff.

  And in the distance, as over a field, she saw nine women with hawk on wrist, and hounds at leash, coming to meet her, and gladness carried Susan past all thoughts but one, the memory of Celemon daughter of Cei, which the Mothan’s bitterness had driven from her.

  She spurred her horse faster to the welcome that sang through the night and lifted the riders from their bondage in the dark mounds, but the voice of Angharad spoke again.

  “Leave her! She is but green in power! It is not yet!”

  And the Hunter took his hand from Susan, and slowly drew away, no matter how she rode. It was as though she was waking from the dream of a long yearning fulfilled to the cold morning of a world too empty to bear. More than life, she wanted to share the triumph that was all around her.

  The Einheriar paled, their forms thinning to air and light, and they rose from her into the sky.

  “Celemon!”

  But Susan was left as dross upon the hill, and a voice came to her from the gathering outlines of the stars, “It is not yet! It will be! But not yet!” And the fire died in Susan, and she was alone on the moor, the night wind in her face, joy and anguish in her heart.

  Colin was nearly at the hill when he saw the Brollachan grow over the trees at the same moment that Susan appeared from the valley, and he watched, helpless.

  The Brollachan dwarfed the hill, overtaking Susan so quickly that she looked as if she was galloping backwards. The cloud lifted, and formed a lash like the root of a whirlwind, which swung low over Susan’s head, and then struck. The whole mass of the Brollachan flowed into that one point, and Colin’s ears were stunned by a blast that knocked him to the ground, and a section of the hill where Susan had been slipped into the water, and the Brollachan hovered over it.

  But as his head cleared, Colin heard another sound, so beautiful that he never found rest again; the sound of a horn, like the moon on snow, and another answered it from the limits of the sky; and through the Brollachan ran silver lightnings, and he heard hoofs, and voices calling, “We ride! We ride!” and the whole cloud was silver, so that he could not look.

  The hoof-beats drew near, and the earth throbbed. Colin opened his eyes. Now the cloud raced over the ground, breaking into separate glories that whispered and sharpened to skeins of starlight, and were horsemen, and at their head was majesty, crowned with antlers, like the sun.

  But as they crossed the valley, one of the riders dropped behind, and Colin saw that it was Susan. She lost ground, though her speed was no less, and the light that formed her died, and in its place was a smaller, solid figure that halted, forlorn, in the white wake of the riding.

  The horsemen climbed from the hillside to the air, growing vast in the sky, and to meet them came nine women, their hair like wind. And away they rode together across the night, over the waves, and beyond the isles, and the Old Magic was free for ever, and the moon was new.

  NOTES

  These remaining pages have little to do with the story, and apart from a wish to acknowledge many debts, nothing would please me more than that they should stay unread. But so many people have shown an interest in the background of the book that some kind of appendix may be justified.

  Firstly, every thing and place mentioned, with the exception of Fundindelve, does exist, although I have juggled with one or two local names.

  The ingredients of the story are true, or as true as I can make them. The spells are genuine (though incomplete: just in case), and the names are real, even where the characters are invented. A made-up name feels wrong, but in Celtic literature there are frequent catalogues of people who may have been the subject of lost stories, and here it is possible to find names that are authentic, yet free from other associations.

  Most of the elements and entities in the book are to be seen, in one shape or another, in traditional folklore. All I have done is to adapt them to my own view.

  For example: The Einheriar were the bodyguard of the gods in Scandinavian mythology; The Herlathing was the English form of the Wild Hunt, and Garanhir, “the Stalking Person,” one of the many names of its leader. (Herne, King Herla, Wild Edric, Gabriel, and even Sir Francis Drake, are others.) But the nature of the Wild Hunt seemed to be close to the Ulster Cycle of myth, so I have made the Herlathing Irish in manner and bloodiness.

  That is how most of the book has been written. The more I learn, the more I am convinced that there are no original stories. On several occasions I have “invented” an incident, and then come across it in an obscure fragment of Hebridean lore, orally collected, and privately printed, a hundred years ago.

  Originality now means the personal colouring of existing themes, and some of the richest ever expressed are in the folklore of Britain. But this very richness makes the finding of a way to any understanding of the imagery and incident impossible without the help of scholarship, and in this respect the following sources have been invaluable to my own grasshopper research:

  The Destruction of Da Derga’s Hostel: trans. Whitley Stokes. Paris. 1902.

  Popular Tales of the West Highlands: J. F. Campbell. Alexander Gardner. 1890.

  Carmina Gadelica: A. Carmichael. Oliver and Boyd. 1929.

  Silva Gadelica: S. H. O’Grady. Williams and Norgate. 1892.

  The Black Book of Caermarthen, The Red Book of Hergest, The Book of Aneurin, and The Book of Taliessin: trans.W. F. Skene. Edmonston and Douglas. 1868.

  The Mabinogion: trans. Gwyn Jones and Thomas Jones. Everyman’s Library, No. 97. 1949.

  The God of the Witches: M. Murray. Faber and Faber. 1952.

  The White Goddess: Robert Graves. Faber and Faber. 3rd. ed. 1952

  The Old Straight Track: A. Watkins. Methuen. 1925.

  This last book, which argues that pre-historic man used a system of long-distance, straight tracks, marked by stones, cairns, and beacons, is full of the most romantic elements of archaeology and folklore.

  The spells, and many others, are in magical manuscripts at:

  British Museum: Sloane 213, 3826, 3853, 2731, 3648, 3884, 3850.

  Bodleian: Bod. MS. Rawl. D.253; MS. Bod. e. Mus. 243; Ms. Bod. Rawl. D252; Bod. MS. Ashmole 1406.

  The old names have been used for the places inhabited in the story by the dwarfs and elves. Talebolion is Anglesey; Sinadon, Snowdonia; Dinsel, Cornwall; Prydein, Northern Scotland. Minith Bannawg I have taken to be the Grampians, although there is a possibility that it was a district that is now a suburb of Glasgow.

  Fohla is the name of the wife of macCecht, one of the mythical kings of Ireland. She is an aspect of the Triple Moon Goddess.

  Finally, long strings of names are poor gratitude to helpers, and meaningless to readers, so there will be none here, but I do want to thank the Stockport Advertiser for permission to quote the article, and Joshua Rowbotham Birtles, of Over Alderley, for being unruffled in spite of the way I have put him into the book as Gowther Mossock, straight and undiluted.

  PRAISE

  “In this saga of wild magic Alan Garner achieves really powerful effects of beauty and terror that hold a reader well beyond the close.”

  Listener

  “The Moon of Gomrath is not only powerful but full of wild and whirling adventure… the reader is drawn right into the midst of it all.”

  Guardian

  ALSO BY THE AUTHOR

  The Weirdstone of Brisingamen

  Elidor

  The Owl Service

  Red Shift

  A Bag of Moonshine

  The Lad of the Gad

  The Stone Book Quartet

  COPYRIGHT

  HarperCollins Children’s Books is a division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd,

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  London W6 8JB

  The HarperCollins Children’s Books website address is www.harpercollinschildrensbooks.co.uk

  First published in 1963 by William Collins Sons & Company Ltd

  This edition published in 2010

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