“the Earldelving has not used us ill: I had feared it would be more cruel. From here we shall be in little danger, provided that we respect the smaller risks.”
They now pressed on with all speed, for there could be scarcely an hour of daylight left, and the prospect of having to spend the night in wet clothes, with mud for a bed, was in no way appealing.
After a time, Susan thought she saw a faint grey blur ahead of them past Fenodyree’s shoulder. She switched off the lamp.
“Here, Sue! What are you playing at?”
“Look! Daylight!”
It was: and soon they had reached it. They were at the end of the tunnel, and at the bottom of a shaft. The converging lines of its gleaming, wet sides mounted to a tiny square of blue, a whole world away.
“We’ve not got to climb up this shaft, have we?” said Colin.
“Nay,” laughed Fenodyree, “we shall be in dire straits ere I ask that of you! Our way is easier by far.”
He raked about with his feet behind the pile of rubbish at the bottom of the shaft.
“It is somewhere … ah, I have it!”
He dragged to one side a mass of decaying branches to reveal a hole in the floor.
“Here is the exit from the Earldelving: once through here, we cannot return.”
It was a sloping continuation of the shaft, though only half its breadth, and it was cut through stiff clay that glistened without ledge or fissure.
“It is a pleasant ride,” said Fenodyree, seating himself on the edge, and grinning at Susan. He peered down between his feet, nodded, and let go. A faint splash marked the end of his glissade, and his voice sounded cheerily a long way below.
Susan lowered herself into the hole with extreme caution, but the edge crumbled beneath her hand, and yet again she disappeared from view like a bullet from a gun. She careered over the greasy surface, faster and faster, and landed waist-deep in a mixture of water and mud that broke her fall, but had little else to recommend it.
“Oh!”
“If you put your hand out to your left,” said Fenodyree close behind her, “you will find a corner of rock: pull yourself out with that. Good. Now feel your way round to the tunnel. We shall soon be out of here.”
The tunnel was flooded to a depth of three feet, and was sticky with clay, but it was high, and not long. At its end rose a shaft that offered few difficulties, for it was composed of a series of inclined pitches, connected by wide shelves, so that it was more like scrambling up a giant stairway than climbing a shaft. Only the last dozen feet were at all dangerous: here the rock was vertical, but the holds were many, and the top was gained without trouble. From there a short passage led into a circular cave – and daylight; real, accessible daylight. A tree trunk resting against the wall took Fenodyree, with the others packed behind him, up into a gully that overlooked the cave: the gully became a ravine and above was open sky; cold, crisp, dry air filled their lungs.
The side of the ravine was scored with holes and ledges, and children and dwarfs almost fell over each other as they swarmed up the last monotony of stone, out of the eternal, stagnant silences, into light, and life, and wide horizons. Then there was grass beneath them, and a wind upon their cheeks.
Beyond the ravine wound the elf-road, and the dwarfs lost no time in hustling Colin and Susan on to it, but once there they permitted themselves to relax, for as long as they remained on the road, said Durathror, they would be hidden from searching eyes.
They made a bizarre picture in their all-over coats of red mud, encrusted with yellow sand that spared only their more pliable features, and these were daubed with red, as if they were in warpaint. But none of that mattered now as they stepped out for Fundindelve, and their aching limbs only sweetened the prospect of rest. After all they had undergone in the barren caves, this scene of beauty, the waning light among the scented pines, was almost unreal.
“It’s like a dream,” said Susan: “just like a dream. I can even imagine there’s music all around us!”
“So can I!” said Colin. “It’s like a harp. What can it be?”
“A harp,” said Fenodyree, smiling. “See, on Goldenstone, a stromkarl plays.”
They had come to a junction in the path, and to their right stood a boulder, with nothing golden about it that the children could see: it was like any outcrop of weathered, grey sandstone, except that it had been crudely worked to an oblong shape by men long dead, and few now can tell its purpose.
On top of the stone sat a young man, plucking the strings of a harp. He was less than three feet high; his skin lustrous as a pearl; his hair rippling to his waist in green sea-waves. And the sad melody ran beneath his fingers like water over pebbles.
When summer in winter shall comeThen shall be danger of war.A crow shall sit at the top of a headless cross,And drink of the noble’s gentle blood so free.Between nine and thirteen all sorrow shall be done.A wolf from the east shall right eagerly comeTo a hill within the forest height.Beside a headless cross of stone,There shall the eagle die.
“Why do you sing the old prophecies?” said Durathror. “Are they now to be fulfilled?”
“Who knows? I do but sing of the summer that has come in winter. Does your road lead to Fundindelve?”
All the while the stromkarl was speaking, his hands plucked the silver strings, and the tone of his bell-like voice against the background of music was a song. He looked at neither the children nor the dwarfs once the whole time, but concentrated on his harp, or gazed out towards the hills.
“It does indeed,” said Fenodyree, “and we take with us the weirdstone of Brisingamen!”
“I am glad,” said the stromkarl. “But you will not go to Fundindelve.”
“What do you say? How shall we not?”
“The hooded one sits by Holywell, and the Shape-shifter watches the gates: and to them are gathering the morthbrood. The svart-alfar will be there at sunset, and with the night are coming others. No birds will fly, save the eyes of the Morrigan. It will be dark within the hour; see to it that you are not under the sky at that time.”
“Our swords will be ever at your command for this!” said Durathror. “You have done more than guard our lives.”
The stromkarl lowered his head.
“My people will aid you where they may: fare you well!”
And he jumped down on the other side of Goldenstone, and they did not see him again.
“It never crossed my mind that this would be their course,” said Fenodyree, “obvious though it was. Oh, I am not wise in judgement as a dwarf should be!”
“Nay,” said Durathror, “your wits have served us nobly this day. But what is there for us now?”
“I do not know.”
“Can we get to the farm before dark?” said Colin.
“This is a good plan!” Fenodyree smote his hands together. “With luck, the morthbrood will not hear of your part in this until the svart-alfar come, and they may be late if they are still searching for us in West Mine. We should reach the farm, but whether it will be shelter for the night I cannot be certain.”
“What of the stone?” said Durathror.
“We must find Cadellin,” said Fenodyree. “In his hands it will be secure, and he can wield