The Bells of Paradise by Suzannah Rowntree

Author:Suzannah Rowntree
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bocfodder Press
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

4.

He stepped outside into a storm and the expectant glare of a hundred fay-eyes.

The wind nearly lifted his cap from his head. Clouds threatened to overwhelm the moon. The dark forest surrounding the mansion-city of Cleopolis creaked and groaned. On the close-cropped grass before the mansion, the grooms of the Lordly Folk waited by the dozen, as if for a great hunting-party, trying to calm skittish horses. John did not shorten his stride at the sight of them. The moment he passed the threshold of Cleopolis, he found himself back in his smith’s clothes; he whipped out his knife and pressed on holding it clenched in his fist before him, and the fay grooms stood back to let him pass.

With the moon swallowed in darkness, John could see the forest path for no more than a few steps in front of him. But he went on confidently following the white stone borders.

When he first came to Cleopolis they had run straight as an arrow across the valley to the Queen’s house. Why, now, when he looked back, did he see lights shining fitfully through the trees to his left? The curve must have been so gradual he never saw it in the gloom, but certainly there should be a long straight path behind him, and small and far-off the door of the house.

He didn’t stop moving, but his steps slowed. He was yet far from home, and he no longer had Sir Thomas Lene to guide him.

Presently the path forked. On the journey to Cleopolis, there had been no forks in this path. John knew he was lost, or being toyed with, but he took the right-hand turn and went on in the dark, hoping to get further away from the house. The path forked twice more and each time he took the right-hand arm, but at last, among the trees ahead, lights pricked out of the darkness. John stopped with a falling heart, and then went on in faint hope.

As he expected, he had come back to the house.

He forced himself not to think too far ahead. He turned and retraced his steps to the previous fork, and took the other path. That led him for so far without a fork that he began to hope; then, just as he thought he might at last be getting free of Cleopolis, it turned and ran up a short slope to let him out at the back of the mansion.

When the third path ended back at the house, John lost patience. This time he dispensed with the white stones. Instead he marked a pale blaze in a tree with his knife and set out on a direct line-of-sight away from the lights. It was a laborious way of proceeding, for he could not see far in the dark, and in the shin-barking undergrowth it was difficult to follow a straight line. Presently he heard a great rush of hooves and the winding of horns as a host of riders passed in the distance.

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