as of somebody wading through the snow. Thinking the others were returning, she stood on tiptoe to peer out of the valley. This brought her eyes just above ground-level; and at that moment a flurry of wind pulled aside the veil of snow. A second later the wind had gone by, and the veil fell back into place, but in that instant, Susan’s eyes had registered every detail of the thing that was passing within ten yards of where she stood.
It bore some resemblance to a woman, an ill-proportioned woman, twenty feet high, and green. The long, thick-set trunk rested on massive legs with curving, bloated thighs. The arms were too short, muscular at the shoulders, but tapering to puny, indeterminate hands. The head was very small, elliptical, and scarcely broader than the neck on which it sat. There was no hair; the mouth was a shadowed line; the nose cut sharply down from the brow, between eyes that were no more than dark smears. It wore a single garment, a loose tunic that reached to the ground, and clung to the body in folds like wet linen. The flesh gleamed dully, and the tunic, of the same colour and texture, might have been of the same substance. A statue of polished malachite; but a statue that moved.
Susan began to scream, but before the sound reached her lips, a rough hand was clapped over her mouth, and Durathror pushed her down into the snow.
“Lie still!”
For a time, above the beating of her heart, she felt the earth shake beneath a ponderous tread that died away.
“Did you see it?” she whispered.
“I saw it. We must find my cousin: next time our luck may not hold.”
“What is it? What’s wrong?” said Colin from the bottom of the slope. But as he spoke Fenodyree, with Gowther on his heels, staggered out of the gloom and caught Durathror by the arm.
“Mara!”
“It has this instant gone by,” said Durathror. “It did not see us: there is still too much light.”
“So did it miss our tracks. Come: we have found shelter.”
“Then why do we delay?”
They slipped down the valley as quickly as they dared.
“Is curiosity satisfied now, farmer Mossock?” said Fenodyree when Susan had given a breathless description of what she had seen.
“Ay, it is that! But what in creation are they?”
“Troll-women: from rock are they spawned, and to rock they return if the sun should find them above ground. But by night they are indestructible, all-powerful. Only our wits can save us now, and be thankful we have more than they, for the mara’s brain is as meagre as its strength is great.”
The words were barely out of his mouth when a thin cry, like the plaintive voice of a night bird, yet cold and pitiless as the fangs of mountains, came from behind them.
“Run! It has found our trail!”
They had crossed the path where Fenodyree had turned back, and were forcing a way between the bushes when the mara called a second time, and now it was near.
“Steady!” cried Gowther. “We munner get separated in here!”
The thicket was not impenetrable, but it was close enough to make it difficult for five people to move quickly through it together. The snow was no longer falling: it was almost night.
Again the voice.
“Stay!” cried Durathror.
They had all heard: it was not an echo. It was an answering call – from the front!
Immediately there came another from the right, and the sound of snapping branches and rustling undergrowth. Hemmed in on three sides, they were, for the moment, spared the anguish of decision. They swung left. The voices were continuous now.
Durathror ran ahead of the rest. Susan was nearest to him, trying to keep in his wake, and as they came to a thick screen of brush, Durathror put up his arms to shield his eyes, and forced his way through. Susan’s dive after him was halted by a stifled cry from Durathror, followed by a splash.
“What’s happened?”
“Where are we?”
“What is it?”
“Are you all right?”
Susan put her head through the gap – and looked out across an apparently limitless sheet of water. In the gathering darkness she could not see any land. Beneath her, to his waist in the water, Durathror struggled to climb back through the weeds and dead vegetation to the land. By this time the others had all reached the spot.
“Redesmere!” said Gowther savagely. “I should have thowt of that one!”
“Back!” spluttered Durathror.
“But we conner!”
“We have no choice,” said Fenodyree, “and very little time. We may pass through the net: we may.”
Without a word Colin turned, and the rest hurried after.
“Colin, wait! Let me lead you!” Fenodyree called softly.
“All right …oh!”
“Colin!!”
“Stop, everybody!” cried Colin. “There’s water here, too!”
“What? Theer conner be! Here, wait on a minute!”
Gowther turned off left, and plunged into the bushes: ten seconds later he was back, only to vanish in the opposite direction without speaking. When he reappeared he was walking very slowly.
“I dunner ask onybody to believe this,” he said, “but we’re on an island.”
“And it inner very big, either,” said Gowther.
“But … but … it can’t be an island!” said Susan.
“I know it conner: but it is.”
“It’s not possible!” said Colin.
“That’s reet.”
“But …”
Laughter broke in on their bewilderment, and they were aware of the dwarfs sitting in the snow, each with his back against a tree, at ease, and openly amused.
“It is in truth an island,” said Durathror. “And, by the blade of Osla! I did not look to such a fair ending to this day’s work.”
“Hush!” said Fenodyree. “And lie low awhile.”
On the nearer shore, fifty yards away, three mara were casting about to pick up the vanished scent. They wailed, and whooped, and peered at the ground, uprooting bushes and bending trees.
Gowther pressed himself further into the snow: he was exposed, and obvious: it would not be long before the mara would put two and two together, and wade out to the island, and then …
Having flattened everything for yards around, the three shapes stood on the lake side, facing out across the water.
This is it, thought Susan. How far can I swim in these clothes? But the mara did not move: their bodies merged into the racing shadows. All was quiet. And then they turned, and disappeared into the wood: the whooping broke out again, and continued until all sounds were lost in the distance.
Gowther stood up, and shook the snow out of his clothes.
“They must be pretty dim!” said Colin. “Why didn’t they find us? Anyone with half an eye could have guessed where we were: our footprints must have ended at the water.”