David Gemmell. The Hawk Enternal

‘Why should it be impossible?’ asked Caswallon. ‘All things have a beginning and an ending.’

‘Indeed they do. But when you play with time, Caswallon, you create circles. Think of this: today you will see the last of the Middle Gates. Today. Now. You will gaze upon it, and your people – our people – will pass through it. But tomorrow, let us say, the Gate disappears. We are worried at first, but then we think: It was there yesterday. Therefore we step through a Lesser Gate into yesterday. What should we find?’

‘The other Gate should once again be there,’ said Caswallon.

‘Aye, it should – for we saw it yesterday… passed through it. But that is the mystery, my boy. For when the Great Gates disappeared, they vanished throughout time. Impossible, for it does not correspond with reality.’

‘You told me,’ said Caswallon, ‘that magic was impossibility made reality. If that is true, there should be no problem accepting the reverse. What happened to your Gates was simply reality made impossibility.’

‘But who made it happen?’

‘Perhaps someone is studying you, even as you study us,’ said Caswallon, smiling.

Taliesen’s eyes gleamed. ‘Astole believed just such a thing. I do not.’

At that moment Gaelen entered the clearing, calling Caswallon’s name. The War Lord leaped to his feet, opening his arms as the young man ran to him. They stood there for several moments, hugging one another. Then Caswallon took hold of Gaelen’s shoulders and gently pushed him away.

‘Now you’re a sight to ease my mind,’ said Caswallon.

‘And you. Deva and I thought find you cut to pieces by the Aenir. We saw you from the peaks yonder.”

‘Just for once we out-thought them. You look tired, and there is dried blood on your tunic.’

‘We’ve been chased over the mountains for three days.’

‘But you came through.’

‘You taught me well.’

Caswallon grinned. ‘Where is Deva?’

‘Upstream, washing the grime from herself.’

Then you do the same. Much as I am glad to see you, you smell like a dead fish. Away with you!’

Caswallon watched the young man walk to the stream and his eyes glowed with pride. Taliesen stood beside him. ‘He is a fine young man. A credit to you.’

‘A credit to himself. You know, Taliesen, as I carried him on my back from the destruction of Ateris I wondered if I was being foolish. His wounds were grievous – and he was all skin and bone anyway. My legs ached, and my back burned through every step. But I’m glad I didn’t leave him.’

‘He is tough,’ agreed the druid. ‘Oracle did well to heal him.’

‘Yes. I hope the old man survived the assault.’

‘He did not,’ said Taliesen.

‘How do you know?’

‘Let us leave it that I know. He was a strong man, but vain.’

That is not much of an epitaph,’ said Caswallon.

‘It is the best I can offer. Now get the clan ready. We must cross the bridge before dusk.’

Almost six thousand people thronged the shoreline as the sun cleared noon. Silence fell upon them as a druid appeared on the island’s shore, some forty yards across the foaming water. He tied a slender line to a sturdy pine, then looped the long coil over his shoulder and stepped out on the water. A gasp rose from the watchers, for the man was walking several feet above the torrent. After some twenty paces he stopped, reaching down, and stroked the air in a vertical line by his feet. Then he looped the twine around the invisible post and walked on. This he did every twenty paces, and amazingly the twine hung in the air behind him. Slowly the man made his way to the waiting clan, stopping to tie the end of the twine to a small tree. Then he approached Taliesen and bowed.

‘Welcome, Lord, it is good to see you again. How many of the clan survived?”

‘Just under six thousand. But there could be more hidden in the mountains.’

‘And the Pallides?’

‘No one knows. But the Haesten were crushed, and I don’t doubt many lesser clans were annihilated.’

‘Sad news, Lord.’