Kill the Dead(10)

He sat on a slope where a colonnade of trees stalked, like furled plumes, back toward the upland valley and the village. The trees gave colour, shade and a pleasant noise of air swimming through leaves. He could see the village, quite small but very clear, below him. Also the switch of the road, leading around the old house and up the mountain, which was a smooth marble cone by day.

As the morning matured, Dro saw the village come fully alive. Miniature figures filled the street, little toy animals were herded out to pasture. When the warm breeze blew the right way, he could hear cows lowing, sheep which sounded more like cats, dogs barking, a hammer striking on metal, the wheels of a cart.

A short while before noon, a party of men and women went along the street, onto the road, and walked to the house with the tower. They stood about there for some minutes. When the wind blew on this occasion, Parl Dro caught a far off curdle of yells and what sounded like stones landing hard on wood.

He was not particularly in favour of this, nor did it worry him unduly. Just as Ciddey’s beauty, insidious and not instantly apparent, had interested, but not spontaneously moved him.

On the return journey of the witch-hunting party to the village, Dro identified for the first time the thief-musician’s varied regalia in their midst. As soon as they reached the juncture where the village thorough-fare branched off from the road, the musician swung aside. Some of the villagers appeared to be arguing with him, but it looked good-natured enough. After a moment or so, the minstrel moved on into the fields that lined the opposite side of the road. Dro lost sight of the man cutting south through a strand of young wheat.

Afternoon streamed over the landscape, tinting everything with its unmistakable changes of light.

Relaxed, yet unsleeping, Dro sat with his back to a tree, watching the village with a long-lidded gaze. His mantle was laid aside, revealing that trousers, boots, shirt were also black, black as his eyes, though his hair had mellowed a shade under the sun. He looked exotic, foreign and dangerous. Only a fool would have stolen up on him from behind. It appeared the man prowling up the south side of the slope was not quite such a fool as that.

The drab green lost itself in the grass, the poppy red did not. If he had been attempting surprise, the musician had obviously accepted his inadequacy at the game. He emerged quite flamboyantly to Dro’s left, and stood studying him with frank accusation.

“I suppose you were expecting me,” he said.

Dro looked at him. The look was neither baleful nor encouraging.

“You could pretend to be astounded,” said the musician. “It wouldn’t kill you.”

“It might have killed you,” said Dro.

The musician shrugged and trudged the rest of the way up the slope. When he stood directly over Dro, he produced the bag of pebbles he had thieved the previous night. He threw it dramatically at Dro’s feet.

“That was a nasty trick,” said the musician.

“Stealing isn’t particularly wholesome, either.”

“You could survive it. You’re famous. I’d never thieve from someone who couldn’t afford to lose a few coins. How was I supposed to pay for my supper? You think I had credit there? They wanted me to play songs and pay money too.”

Parl Dro sat looking down the slope.

The musician slung the musical instrument off his back on its frayed embroidered sling, and set it in the grass. He sat down about a foot from Dro.

“In the end,” he said, “I had to make up to some girl to get a bed for the night. And I was worn out, so that wasn’t a good idea. But I’d better stop. I can see I’ll have you in tears in a minute.”

Dro went on gazing at the village.

The musician lay back in the grass and gazed at the leaves overhead, spotted sheer green against sheer blue. His face, with its long nose and cap of darkly gilded hair, was basically a rather sad and very worried face, from some angles quite ordinary, from others extremely good-looking, from others still, simply mournful.

“You probably want to know why I’m here,” he said at length.

“Not especially.”

“All right. You want to know why I’m not clever enough to clear off.” The silence lasted. “All right,” said the minstrel, “I’ll tell you. We’re actually going the same way.”

“Which way is that?”

“Oh, come on. The way any of your calling was bound to go, this year or next. Of course, it may only be a legend. In which case, it’s still my business. I can still make a song of it. I’m referring to Ghyste Mortua.”