“This gives us time,” Gereint said, when Ivor snatched a minute to talk with him. The work continued at night, by the strange moonlight. “He will not move quickly now, I think.”
“Nor will we,” Ivor said. “It is going to take us time to get there. I want us out by dawn.”
“I’ll be ready,” the old shaman said. “Just put me on a horse and point it the right way.”
Ivor felt a surge of affection for Gereint. The shaman had been white-haired and wrinkled for so long he seemed to be timeless. He wasn’t, though, and the rapid journey of the coming days would be a hardship for him.
As so often, Gereint seemed to read his mind. “I never thought,” he said, very low, “I would live so long. Those who died before this day may be the fortunate ones.”
“Maybe so,” Ivor said soberly. “There will be war.”
“And have we any Revors or Colans, any Ra-Termaines or Seithrs among us? Have we Amairgen or Lisen?” Gereint asked painfully.
“We shall have to find them,” Ivor said simply. He laid a hand on the shaman’s shoulder. “I must go. Tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow. But see to Tabor.”
Ivor had planned to supervise the last stages of the wagon loading, but instead he detailed Cechtar to that and went to sit quietly by his son.
Two hours later Tabor woke, though not truly. He rose up from his bed, but Ivor checked his cry of joy, for he saw that his son was wrapped in a waking trance, and it was known to be dangerous to disturb such a thing.
Tabor dressed, quickly and in silence, and left the house. Outside the camp was finally still, asleep in troubled anticipation of grey dawn. The moon was very high, almost overhead.
It was, in fact, now high enough. West of them a dance of light was beginning in the clearing of the sacred grove, while the gathered powers of Pendaran watched.
Walking very quickly, Tabor went around to the stockade, found his horse, and mounted. Lifting the gate, he rode out and began to gallop west.
Ivor, running to his own horse, leaped astride, bareback, and followed. Alone on the Plain, father and son rode towards the Great Wood, and Ivor, watching the straight back and easy riding of his youngest child, felt his heart grow sore.
Tabor had gone far indeed. It seemed he had farther yet to go. The Weaver shelter him, Ivor prayed, looking north to the now quiescent glory of Rangat.
More than an hour they rode, ghosts on the night plain, before the massive presence of Pendaran loomed ahead of them, and then Ivor prayed again: Let him not go into it. Let it not be there, for I love him.
Does that count for anything, he wondered; striving to master the deep fear the Wood always aroused in him.
It seemed that it might, for Tabor stopped his horse fifty yards from the trees and sat quietly, watching the dark forest. Ivor halted some distance behind. He felt a longing to call his son’s name, to call him back from wherever he had gone, was going.
He did not. Instead, when Tabor, murmuring something his father could not hear, slipped from his mount and walked into the forest, Ivor did the bravest deed of all his days, and followed. No call of any god could make Ivor dan Banor let his son walk tranced into Pendaran Wood alone.
And thus did it come to pass that father and both sons entered into the Great Wood that night.
Tabor did not go far. The trees were thin yet at the edge of the forest, and the red moon lit their path with a strangely befitting light. None of this, Ivor thought, belonged to the daylight world. It was very quiet. Too quiet, he realized, for there was a breeze, he could feel it on his skin, and yet it made no sound among the leaves. The hair rose up on the back of Ivor’s neck. Fighting for calm in the enchanted silence, he saw Tabor suddenly stop ten paces ahead, holding himself very still. And a moment later Ivor saw a glory step from the trees to stand before his son.