Carahue began to lag. His mare tripped. He jerked her head up and roweled her. Holger thought he could hear the feet of the nightmare dogs. A lunatic yelling broke about him.
He looked behind, but Alianora’s tossing hair hid those who followed. He thought he saw metal ablaze. And was that the clatter of dead men’s bones?
“Hasten, hasten, best of horses! Oh, run, my comrade, run as no horses ever did erenow, for surely all men are pursued with us. Haste thee, my darling, for we ride against striding Time, we ride against marching Chaos. Ah, God be with thee, God strengthen thee to run!”
The horn blasts filled his skull. The hoofs and hounds and empty bones were at his back. Holger felt Papillon stumble. Alianora was almost thrown. He clung to her wrist and dragged her against him. Once more they rode.
Up ahead there, what was that, stark athwart the sky? The church of St. Grimmin—but the Wild Hunt howled and swept downward. He heard the clamor of huge winds, and saw murk before his eyes. Jesu Kriste, I am not worthy, but help thou me.
A wall stood in his way. Papillon gathered himself and sprang. As the huntsmen closed in on him, Holger felt such a cold as he had not dreamed could be, strike through his heart. He thought he heard the wind whistle between his ribs.
The black stallion hit earth with a crash that nearly slammed him from the saddle. Carahue followed. The white mare did not clear the wall. She fell back, but her rider leaped free. He caught the top of the wall and pulled himself over to land in the churchyard. Holger heard the mare cry out once, briefly and horribly, as the roaring overwhelmed her.
And then it was gone. The wind was gone too. Silence shot up like a scream.
Holger bent over. His hand shook, but he caught Carahue’s as he already held Alianora’s. They looked about them.
The yard was overgrown with grass and whins, through which crumbling headstones could be seen to ring the ruinous outline of the church. Fog drifted in tendrils, glowing white where the hunchback moon touched, with a dank smell of corruption. Holger felt how Alianora shivered in the chill.
He heard the sound as it came from the shadows behind the church. It was the sound of a horse moving among the graves, a horse old and lame and weary unto death, stumbling among the graves as it sought him, and he whimpered in his throat. For he knew that this was the Hell Horse, and whoso looks upon it shall die.
Papillon could not make haste, here where the headstones reached out of weeds like fingers to pull him down. Carahue took the reins and led the stallion. They walked between the slabs, which leaned about in a drunkenness of neglect, the names long worn from their faces. The sound of the old lame horse grew louder, slipping and staggering through shadow to meet them.
Mists glimmered about the church of St. Grimmin’s, thicker and thicker, as if they would hide it. Holger could just see that the steeple was fallen, the roof gone, the windows blindly agape. Slowly, feeling his way through the vapors and the tombstones, Carahue neared it.
The hoofs of the Hell Horse scrunched in ancient gravel. But this was the door of the church. Holger sprang down. Alianora huddled on Papillon’s back. He lifted his arms and she fell into them. He carried her up the time-gnawed steps.
“You too,” said Carahue gently, and led the stallion inside.
They halted in what had been the nave and looked toward the altar. The last moonlight poured over it. The crucifix was still there, high above the fallen chancel, and Holger could see Christ’s face against the stars. He fell to his knees and took off his helmet. After a moment Carahue and Alianora joined him.
They heard the Hell Horse depart. As its clopping, limping hoofbeats dragged into silence, the faintest of breezes awoke and scattered the fog. Holger thought that the church was not dead, not defiled. It stood roofed with sky and walled with the living world; it stood as the sign of peace.