Dark Ages. John Pritchard
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explain that troubling description. She’d found the passage, but could only remember fragments of it now. Fourteenth-century copy of an earlier work, now lost. The word had struck her, even as she kept on reading. With all these books around her, how could anything be lost? Surely it was hidden somewhere; forgotten, in an attic or a cellar. It bothered her to think that it had ceased to exist. If there hadn’t been a copy, all that work would just have vanished. As if it had never been.
The writing (she discovered) was Medieval Latin, with the constellations labelled in Old English. Hebrew characters as well. No wonder that she couldn’t understand it.
… Ursa Major is marked as ‘æelgar’ (a personal name), while ‘fluar’ (meaning unclear) denotes the constellation Draco …
There was more on the way the star-chart was set out; but though she strained her mind now, only those two names had stuck. She’d taken them phonetically back then: Edelgar, of course, not …
Athelgar.
She knew it was coincidence, the testament she’d found. So that was enigmatic, too. So what?
Fluthar was a nonsense-name. She couldn’t work it out. Scribal error, probably. The earlier work already being corrupted.
She lay there on the sofa, feeling listless. It must be the link with Martin that had got her down like this. Her jealous little rascal of a brother. She sniffed, and was surprised to find how close she was to tears.
She’d got what she deserved, that day; the thought was almost satisfying now. Growing bored with the so-called Magic book, she’d put it away, and returned to the big volume on the Middle Ages. One of the chapters was called King Death. Something had made her hesitate; and then she’d turned the page – and kept on turning.
Horrors swarmed towards her, almost boiling from the book. A painting from a manuscript showed knights being hacked to pieces, limb from limb. Statues carved on tombs were split and rotting, full of worms. A skeleton was riding down his victims, his eyeless horse as ghostly as an X-ray. And there he was, King Death himself: a gutted, grinning figure with a gold crown on his skull.
She’d wanted to stop looking, but she couldn’t. As if she had to know the very worst. She’d come to another fold-out page – and opened up the gateway into Hell.
A panoramic painting, full of horrid, screaming detail. A tide of naked people, flowing down into the Pit. Hideous monsters clutched at them, and beat them with spiked clubs. Real, despairing faces cried for help – but the devils overwhelmed them. They seemed to spring up everywhere, alive on the page: shaggy, scaly, homed and fanged. She’d sat there with wide eyes and soaked it up.
It had taken quite an effort to close the book again. The images stayed crowding in her head. Subdued, she’d put the book away, and crept out of the room. And Daddy had been right, of course. That night she’d had bad dreams.
1
They’d walked for a while in Christ Church Meadow, then meandered into Oxford through the backstreets and the lanes. Sitting on the steps of the Martyrs’ Memorial, Fran reckoned she must still look like a student. Same gypsy clothes, same sturdy boots. Same undernourished look.
Craig’s arm was resting gently round her shoulders. He’d held on a little tighter as they’d walked past Christ Church College, as if afraid she’d break away and run towards the walls. But all she could do was turn her head, and watch it passing by. The citadel from which she’d been excluded.
The pavements here in front of her were thronged with real students. She wished she could slip through time again, and fall into step beside them. Being twenty-three had never felt so old. She rested her head against Craig’s shoulder, and smelled the musty leather of his coat.
‘You sure about this evening?’ he asked quietly.
She raised her head again. ‘Would I have asked you if I wasn’t?’
He conceded the point with an amiable shrug. ‘I wanted to be sure I wasn’t … rushing you too much.’
‘Don’t worry. If you do, I’ll let you know.’
She remembered the doubts she’d had, before the first time. They came from every side. She’d lost her virginity while still at school, but still felt inexperienced. Her religious instincts were none too keen on sex outside of marriage. And besides – above all else, in fact – the man was one of them.
Did that make her a hypocrite? A quisling? She’d agonized for hours, without an answer. She looked for deeper motives: was she trying to win him over? And was he trying to do the same to her?
Maybe all he wanted was her body. She wasn’t twenty yet, of course. Still a rather wide-eyed student, once the shades were taken off.
He hadn’t rushed her, though. He’d let her pick the pace. He fancied her a lot, that much was clear – but took each step as cautiously as she did. Two lovers, separated by a fence. Fumbling along till they came to the end of the wire.
‘Where will you be going next?’ Craig asked. He couldn’t cope with silences like she could.
‘Back to the Plain,’ she said, after a pause. ‘To see the place we crashed. Then I can get on with the rest of my life.’
Silence again; but she could tell what he was thinking. Was he included in that brave new future? She took his hand and squeezed it, just to tell him that he would be. But whether as a lover or a friend, she wasn’t sure.
‘You want to put some flowers where it happened?’ Craig asked gently.
She shrugged against him. ‘Maybe.’ And it seemed a good idea. But what she needed most of all was to go back there in daylight, and know what had been real, and what had not.
She thought about her dream last night. The faceless man on Imber – and the voice. The recollection filled her with a conflict of emotions, unsettling her, but haunting her as well. She knew it was a throwback to that night on Larkhill range. But his pleading tone still echoed in her head.
Perhaps she’d dream of him again – unless she went to Imber range as well. And walked along that empty road, to exorcize his ghost.
Anyway, with Imber, there were other factors counting. Another memory to draw her back.
2
MOD RANGES
This is a live firing area
and is closed to the public
KEEP OUT
Sod off, she’d thought, and kept on walking. Past the weathered crimson sign that marked the limit of the range, and down the grassy slope into the valley.
It took nerve to do a walk-on in broad daylight. An element of recklessness as well. She could feel the tension fizzing in her stomach – threatening to erupt into a fit of nervous giggles. She was committed now, no turning back; exhilaration lengthening her strides. Her long coat flapped and fluttered in the breeze. The heady sense of trespass made her giddy.
They’d catch her in the end, of course – and that was the whole point. The worry was, they’d cut her off before she reached the village. She needed to meet those airmen, face to face. Her one chance to appeal to them directly.
She knew she’d get arrested, and would probably be charged – which might cause complications back at College. She’d thought long and hard about crossing the line. It wasn’t really something she could talk about with Lyn; her friend regarded protest with suspicion. Two things had tipped the balance in the end. The urge to bridge the gulf between the missile crews and her; and a compulsion to confront