The wind through the keyhole adt-8 Read online

  Yet forty wheels wide had been enough to lay waste to the Fagonard. The black swampwater had become yellowish-white cataracts of ice. The gray, knotted trees that had grown out of that water had all been knocked over. The tussocks were no longer green; now they looked like tangles of milky glass.

  Run aground on one of them and lying on its side was the tribe’s boat. Tim thought of Helmsman and Headman and all the others, and burst into bitter tears. If not for them, he would be lying frozen on one of those tussocks five hundred feet below. The people of the swamp had fed him, and they had gifted him with Daria, his good fairy. It was not fair, it was not fair, it was not fair. So cried his child’s heart, and then his child’s heart died a little. For that is also the way of the world.

  Before leaving the swamp behind, he saw something else that hurt his heart: a large blackened patch where the ice had been melted. Sooty chunks of ice floated around a vast, plated corse lying on its side like the beached boat. It was the dragon that had spared him. Tim could imagine-aye, all too well-how she must have fought the cold with blasts of her fiery breath, but in the end the starkblast had taken her, as it had everything else in the Fagonard. It was now a place of frozen death.

  Above the Ironwood Trail, the dibbin began to descend. Down and down it glided, and when it came to the Cosington-Marchly stub, it touched down. But before the wider sweep of the world was lost, Tim had observed the path of the starkblast, formerly dead south, bending to a course more westerly. And the damage seemed less, as if the storm had been starting to lift off. It gave him hope that the village had been spared.

  He studied the dibbin thoughtfully, and then waved his hands over it. “Fold!” he said (feeling a trifle foolish). The dibbin did not, but when he bent to do the job himself, it flipped over once, then twice, then thrice, becoming smaller each time-but no thicker. In a matter of seconds it once more appeared to be nothing but a cotton napkin lying on the path. Not one you’d want to spread on your lap at dinner, though, for it had a bootprint square in the middle of it.

  Tim put it in his pocket and began walking. And, when he reached the blossie groves (where most of the trees were still standing), he began to run.

  He skirted the town, for he didn’t want to waste even minutes answering questions. Few people would have had time for him, anyway. The starkblast had largely spared Tree, but he saw folk tending to livestock they’d managed to pull from flattened barns, and inspecting their fields for damage. The sawmill had been blown into Tree River. The pieces had floated away downstream, and nothing was left but the stone foundation.

  He followed Stape Brook, as he had on the day when he had found the Covenant Man’s magic wand. Their spring, which had been frozen, was already beginning to thaw, and although some of the blossie shingles had been ripped from the roof of the cottage, the building itself stood as firm as ever. It looked as though his mother had been left alone, for there were no wagons or mules out front. Tim understood that people would want to see to their own plots with such a storm as a starkblast coming, but it still made him angry. To leave a woman who was blind and beaten to the whims of a storm… that wasn’t right. And it wasn’t the way folk in Tree neighbored.

  Someone took her to safety, he told himself. To the Gathering Hall, most likely.

  Then he heard a bleat from the barn that didn’t sound like either of their mules. Tim poked his head in, and smiled. The Widow Smack’s little burro, Sunshine, was tethered to a post, munching hay.

  Tim reached into his pocket and felt a moment’s panic when he couldn’t find the precious bottle. Then he discovered it hiding under the dibbin, and his heart eased. He climbed to the porch (the familiar creak of the third step making him feel like a boy in a dream), and eased the door open. The cottage was warm, for the Widow had made a good fire in the hearth, which was only now burning down to a thick bed of gray ash and rosy embers. She sat sleeping in his da’s chair with her back to him and her face to the fire. Although he was wild to go to his mother, he paused long enough to slip off his boots. The Widow had come when there was no one else; she had built a fire to keep the cottage warm; even with the prospect of what looked like ruin for the whole village, she had not forgotten how to neighbor. Tim wouldn’t have wakened her for anything.

  He tiptoed to the bedroom door, which stood open. There in bed lay his mother, her hands clasped on the counterpane, her eyes staring sightlessly up at the ceiling.

  “Mama?” Tim whispered.

  For a moment she didn’t stir, and Tim felt a cold shaft of fear. He thought, I’m too late. She’s a-lying there dead.

  Then Nell rose on her elbows, her hair cascading in a flood to the down pillow behind her, and looked toward him. Her face was wild with hope. “Tim? Is it you, or am I dreaming?”

  “You’re awake,” he said.

  And rushed to her.

  Her arms enfolded him in a strong grip, and she covered his face with the heartfelt kisses that are only a mother’s to give. “I thought you were killed! Oh, Tim! And when the storm came, I made sure of it, and I wanted to die myself. Where have you been? How could you break my heart so, you bad boy?” And then the kissing began again.

  Tim gave himself over to it, smiling and rejoicing in the familiar clean smell of her, but then he remembered what Maerlyn had said: When thee gets home, what’s the first thing thee’ll do?

  “Where have you been? Tell me!”

  “I’ll tell you everything, Mama, but first lie back and open your eyes wide. As wide as you can.”

  “Why?” Her hands kept fluttering over his eyes and nose and mouth, as if to reassure herself that he was really here. The eyes Tim hoped to cure stared at him… and through him. They had begun to take on a milky look. “Why, Tim?”

  He didn’t want to say, in case the promised cure didn’t work. He didn’t believe Maerlyn would have lied-it was the Covenant Man who made lies his hobby-but he might have been mistaken.

  Oh please, don’t let him have been mistaken.

  “Never mind. I’ve brought medicine, but there’s only a little, so you must lie very still.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  In her darkness, Nell thought what he said next might have come from the dead father rather than the living son. “Just know I’ve been far and dared much for what I hold. Now lie still!”

  She did as he bade, looking up at him with her blind eyes. Her lips were trembling.

  Tim’s hands were, too. He commanded them to grow still, and for a wonder, they did. He took a deep breath, held it, and unscrewed the top of the precious bottle. He drew all there was into the dropper, which was little enough. The liquid didn’t even fill half of the short, thin tube. He leaned over Nell.

  “Still, Mama! Promise me, for it may burn.”

  “Still as can be,” she whispered.

  One drop in the left eye. “Does it?” he asked. “Does it burn?”

  “No,” said she. “Cool as a blessing. Put some in the other, will ya please.”

  Tim put a drop into the right eye, then sat back, biting his lip. Was the milkiness a little less, or was that only wishing?

  “Can you see anything, Mama?”

  “No, but…” Her breath caught. “There’s light! Tim, there’s light! ”

  She started to rise up on her elbows again, but Tim pressed her back. He put another drop in each eye. It would have to be enough, for the dropper was empty. A good thing, too, for when Nell shrieked, Tim dropped it on the floor.

  “Mama? Mama! What is it?”

  “I see thy face!” she cried, and put her hands on his cheeks. Now her eyes were filling with tears, but that did Tim very well, because now they were looking at him instead of through him. And they were as bright as they ever had been. “Oh, Tim, oh my dear, I see thy face, I see it very well!”

  Next came a bit of time which needs no telling-a good thing, too, for some moments of joy are beyond description.

  You must give thy father’s ax to her.

  T
im fumbled in his belt, brought the hand-ax from it, and placed it beside her on the bed. She looked at it-and saw it, a thing still marvelous to both of them-then touched the handle, which had been worn smooth by long years and much use. She raised her face to him questioningly.

  Tim could only shake his head, smiling. “The man who gave me the drops told me to give it to you. That’s all I know.”

  “Who, Tim? What man?”

  “That’s a long story, and one that would go better with some breakfast.”

  “Eggs!” she said, starting to rise. “At least a dozen! And the pork side from the cold pantry!”

  Still smiling, Tim gripped her shoulders and pushed her gently back to the pillow. “I can scramble eggs and fry meat. I’ll even bring it to you.” A thought occurred to him. “Sai Smack can eat with us. It’s a wonder all the shouting didn’t wake her.”

  “She came when the wind began to blow, and was up all through the storm, feeding the fire,” Nell said. “We thought the house would blow over, but it stood. She must be so tired. Wake her, Tim, but be gentle about it.”

  Tim kissed his mother’s cheek again and left the room. The Widow slept on in the dead man’s chair by the fire, her chin upon her breast, too tired even to snore. Tim shook her gently by the shoulder. Her head jiggled and rolled, then fell back to its original position.

  Filled with a horrid certainty, Tim went around to the front of the chair. What he saw stole the strength from his legs and he collapsed to his knees. Her veil had been torn away. The ruin of a face once beautiful hung slack and dead. Her one remaining eye stared blankly at Tim. The bosom of her black dress was rusty with dried blood, for her throat had been cut from ear to ear.

  He drew in breath to scream, but was unable to let it out, for strong hands had closed around his throat.

  Bern Kells had stolen into the main room from the mudroom, where he had been sitting on his trunk and trying to remember why he had killed the old woman. He thought it was the fire. He had spent two nights shivering under a pile of hay in Deaf Rincon’s barn, and this old kitty, she who had put all sorts of useless learning into his stepson’s head, had been warm as toast the whole time. ’Twasn’t right.

  He had watched the boy go into his mother’s room. He had heard Nell’s cries of joy, and each one was like a nail in his vitals. She had no right to cry out with anything but pain. She was the author of all his misery; had bewitched him with her high breasts, slim waist, long hair, and laughing eyes. He had believed her hold on his mind would lessen over the years, but it never had. Finally he simply had to have her. Why else would he have murdered his best and oldest friend?

  Now came the boy who had turned him into a hunted man. The bitch was bad and the whelp was worse. And what was that jammed into his belt? Was it a gun, by gods? Where had he gotten such a thing?

  Kells choked Tim until the boy’s struggles began to weaken and he simply hung from the woodsman’s strong hands, rasping. Then he plucked the gun from Tim’s belt and tossed it aside.

  “A bullet’s too good for a meddler such as you,” Kells said. His mouth was against Tim’s ear. Distantly-as if all sensation were retreating deep into his body-Tim felt his steppa’s beard tickling his skin. “So’s the knife I used to cut the diseased old bitch’s throat. It’s the fire for you, whelp. There’s plenty of coals yet. Enough to fry your eyeballs and boil the skin from your-”

  There was a low, meaty sound, and suddenly the choking hands were gone. Tim turned, gasping in air that burned like fire.

  Kells stood beside Big Ross’s chair, looking unbelievingly over Tim’s head at the gray fieldstone chimney. Blood pattered down on the right sleeve of his flannel woodsman’s shirt, which was still speckled with hay from his fugitive nights in Deaf Rincon’s barn. Above his right ear, his head had grown an ax-handle. Nell Ross stood behind him, the front of her nightgown spattered with blood.

  Slowly, slowly, Big Kells shuffled around to face her. He touched the buried blade of the ax, and held his hand out to her, the palm full of blood.

  “I cut the rope so, chary man!” Nell screamed into his face, and as if the words rather than the ax had done it, Bern Kells collapsed dead on the floor.

  Tim put his hands to his face, as if to blot from sight and memory the thing he had just seen… although he knew even then it would be with him the rest of his life.

  Nell put her arms around him and led him out onto the porch. The morning was bright, the frost on the fields beginning to melt, a misty haze rising in the air.

  “Are you all right, Tim?” she asked.

  He drew in a deep breath. The air in his throat was still warm, but no longer burning. “Yes. Are you?”

  “I’ll be fine,” said she. “ We’ll be fine. It’s a beautiful morning, and we’re alive to see it.”

  “But the Widow…” Tim began to cry.

  They sat down on the porch steps and looked out on the yard where, not long ago, the Barony Covenanter had sat astride his tall black horse. Black horse, black heart, Tim thought.

  “We’ll pray for Ardelia Smack,” Nell said, “and all of Tree will come to her burying. I’ll not say Kells did her a favor-murder’s never a favor-but she suffered terribly for the last three years, and her life would not have been long, in any case. I think we should go to town, and see if the constable’s back from Taveres. On the way, you can tell me everything. Can thee help me hitch Misty and Bitsy to the wagon?”

  “Yes, Mama. But I have to get something, first. Something she gave me.”

  “All right. Try not to look at what’s left in there, Tim.”

  Nor did he. But he picked up the gun, and put it in his belt… * Which sounds like S, in the Low Speech.

  THE SKIN — MAN

  (Part 2)

  “She told him not to look at what was left inside-the body of his steppa, you ken-and he said he wouldn’t. Nor did he, but he picked up the gun, and put it in his belt-”

  “The four-shot the widow-woman gave him,” Young Bill Streeter said. He was sitting against the cell wall below the chalked map of Debaria with his chin on his chest, he had said little, and in truth, I thought the lad had fallen asleep and I was telling the tale only to myself. But he had been listening all along, it seemed. Outside, the rising wind of the simoom rose to a brief shriek, then settled back to a low and steady moan.

  “Aye, Young Bill. He picked up the gun, put it in his belt on the left side, and carried it there for the next ten years of his life. After that he carried bigger ones-six-shooters.” That was the story, and I ended it just as my mother had ended all the stories she read me when I was but a sma’ one in my tower room. It made me sad to hear those words from my own mouth. “And so it happened, once upon a bye, long before your grandfather’s grandfather was born.”

  Outside, the light was beginning to fail. I thought it would be tomorrow after all before the deputation that had gone up to the foothills would return with the salties who could sit a horse. And really, did it matter so much? For an uncomfortable thought had come to me while I was telling Young Bill the story of Young Tim. If I were the skin-man, and if the sheriff and a bunch of deputies (not to mention a young gunslinger all the way from Gilead) came asking if I could saddle, mount, and ride, would I admit it? Not likely. Jamie and I should have seen this right away, but of course we were still new to the lawman’s way of thinking.

  “Sai?”

  “Yes, Bill.”

  “Did Tim ever become a real gunslinger? He did, didn’t he?”

  “When he was twenty-one, three men carrying hard calibers came through Tree. They were bound for Tavares and hoping to raise a posse, but Tim was the only one who would go with them. They called him ‘the lefthanded gun,’ for that was the way he drew.

  “He rode with them, and acquitted himself well, for he was both fearless and a dead shot. They called him tet-fa, or friend of the tet. But there came a day when he became ka-tet, one of the very, very few gunslingers not from the proven line of Eld. Alth
ough who knows? Don’t they say that Arthur had many sons from three wives, and moity-more born on the dark side of the blanket?”

  “I dunno what that means.”

  With that I could sympathize; until two days before, I hadn’t known what was meant by “the longstick.”

  “Never mind. He was known first as Lefty Ross, then-after a great battle on the shores of Lake Cawn-as Tim Stoutheart. His mother finished her days in Gilead as a great lady, or so my mother said. But all those things are-”

  “-a tale for another day,” Bill finished. “That’s what my da’ always says when I ask for more.” His face drew in on itself and his mouth trembled at the corners as he remembered the bloody bunkhouse and the cook who had died with his apron over his face. “What he said. ”

  I put my arm around his shoulders again, a thing that felt a little more natural this time. I’d made my mind up to take him back to Gilead with us if Everlynne of Serenity refused to take him in… but I thought she would not refuse. He was a good boy.

  Outside the wind whined and howled. I kept an ear out for the jing-jang, but it stayed silent. The lines were surely down somewhere.

  “Sai, how long was Maerlyn caged as a tyger?”

  “I don’t know, but a very long time, surely.”

  “What did he eat?”

  Cuthbert would have made something up on the spot, but I was stumped.

  “If he was shitting in the hole, he must have eaten,” Bill said, and reasonably enough. “If you don’t eat, you can’t shit.”