 
The Cutlers of The Howling Hills

Michael Summers

A Tale of Cutlery, Toads and Epic Poetry

Published by Michael Summers at Smashwords

Copyright 2014 Michael Summers

1st Ebook Edition

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Chapter 1 - A Page

A wilderness is a page. On this page there are hilltops, green and hunched over cold rock, arching up into the morning light. Rolling under the dawn sky, the hilltops hold a town, and in this town there are a thousand half-souls. Life is as hard as it is short, as short as the hobbled forms that tilt against the wind and brace out onto the rubble-cobbled streets. There is the steam of morning kettles, the mourning for another day, the first cigarette. And here, in the breakfast hours, life really starts to bite. People look out their windows and wonder what the weather may bring.

On the last page you will find out.
Chapter 2 - St. Collywobble's

Far away from the town, high upon the Howling Hills, the wind hit the walls of St. Collywobble's and rose to cry hag-like over the slates and chimneys of its rooftops. The monastery was built on the principle that bricks were like people: filigree was weakness and to be avoided at all costs. So each block was sturdy and precise, laid out in a simple rectangle and buttressed against the foul winds by sturdy limbs of sandstone.

In a cell, on a plain bed of bare wood, lay Bulkington. His was a slight, almost shrivelled form, hewn by early mornings and a spare diet into something reminiscent of a scarecrow. His clothes were large and empty-seeming, barely held together save for darning thread - a meagre defence against the elements. With cheeks that were hollow and a brow wrinkled in a pious way, he looked as though a natural intelligence had some time ago petered out in him; under his eyes there were bags full of weariness and his neck seemed to be losing a fight with gravity.

Bulkington's spiritual constitution, like that of the monastery, was built on simple and strong principles; he was, to the roots of his soul, a good man. Yet at this moment, as the sky rushed with the first whisper of dawn, Bulkington was feeling angry. Through the half-dark of the small, austere cell he looked across to the shelf above his reading desk, to the small, bulbous form that perched there with an air of grimness and solemnity. The first rays of the rising sun cut through the single window, which was aligned to catch the light of dawn. The sunlight hit the brickwork of the far wall and crept up, up over the skirting board, over the furrowed, damp-pitted stone, over the flocs of algae and moss, over the woodwork of the desk that stood short and stock against the wall, and over the illuminated, immaculate manuscript that was open on Bulkington's favourite chapter. And further up the wall the sunbeams crept, until they illuminated something less immaculate, something cobbled from nodules of slime and unctuous rolls of green flesh. As the sunlight hit this terrible creature, its eyes grew wide, swivelled around the room, and its mouth opened and closed.

Each cell had a toad. Bulkington stood up, walked over to the basin in the corner and washed. He looked out of the window for a moment, out across the valleys, to the distant sunrise. Then he pulled on his cassock and sat down at his desk. He stared at the text before him, eyes only half focused. It was always like this when he first went to read the texts. His mind was not sharp. And then, like clockwork, the Collywobbler Toad landed with a gelatinous flop onto the desk. Its neck pulsated and it crawled across to sit in front of Bulkington, eying the text. Then, deep down in its throat, it started to hum. The sound grew louder and louder, until it seemed that the walls pulsed with it. The familiar sickness grew in Bulkington's stomach, for the Collywobbler's chant was well known to induce the most unpleasant feeling of nausea in all who heard it. So it was that Bulkinton's eyes fell queasily upon the writing before him and thus began this and every day's reading. Bulkington loved to read.

At midday Bulkington filed along the shadow-pooled corridor to the refectory and sat silently at his place. To say that the refectory was crowded would be misleading; there were many monks in the refectory, all lined up in neat rows at long, wooden tables, but each sat alone in a pool of silence. At each place lay a bowl of gruel, filling the room with a smell like damp cardboard, and at each place there was a single, dull-metal spoon. At least that was how things should be. How they had been for the past thirty years. Only now, there was no spoon at Bulkington's place. He looked around helplessly, but the bell rang and those around him wordlessly conveyed the gruel to their mouths. Bulkington sat miserably, and when the bell rang again he was just as hungry as ever. He stood up and turned to leave, but found himself face to face with the Abbot, who smiled beatifically.

"Not hungry?" said the Abbot. He was a man who seemed to have been chiselled out of marble, for his skin had a bloodless sheen to it and his features a certain kind of statuesque solidity. His expressions were controlled to the point at which they were completely autonomous from any true emotion that still lingered behind his deep, dark, grey eyes.

Bulkington lowered his head.

"Don't worry," said the Abbot. He produced an apple from the folds of his habit and offered it to Bulkington. "Take it," said the Abbot.

Bulkington boggled and put the apple in his pocket. Before it disappeared amongst the coarse folds of cloth he noticed that it was dappled red and green in a way that was beyond appetizing. He had vaguely heard of food other than gruel, but had always treated such tales with fear and loathing.

The Abbot maintained his smile and put his hand on Bulkington's shoulder. "Would you care to join me for a walk of the cloisters?" he asked. It was not really a question.

The cloisters would have won some kind of award had anyone inclined to give awards ever seen them. They were full of ornate wooden carvings and exquisite stained-glass windows that caught the morning sun and set colours dancing on the tapestries that lined the far wall. The light seemed to sanctify the very air and with it the cloisters were somehow more than wood and glass. They showed that creativity was possible.

"You are aware that once you have donned the cassock you are bound to remain within these walls until your last day?"

Bulkington nodded.

"Unless," said the Abbot, "there is some dire and pressing need for you to leave. Temporarily."

Bulkington walked along, unsure of whether to nod or shake his head. He had never heard of such a concept before.

"The point is," said the Abbot, seeing Bulkington's bewilderment. "That over the centuries time erodes everything but faith."

Bulkington nodded. This was good, solid, familiar ground.

"Everything," said the Abbot. "Look at this floor, Bulkington. It's a good foot lower in the middle than at the edges. Footsteps are as powerful as a sledgehammer over the centuries."

Bulkington studied the floor with dedication. It was true. The stone curved in a smooth arc from wall to wall in smooth contrast to the straight rays of sunlight that poured in through the stained-glass.

They turned a corner and the abbot stopped. He faced Bulkington. "You had no spoon today at breakfast."

Bulkington looked up. "No spoon," he said.

The Abbot smiled kindly. "Cutlery, like everything in life, is fleeting," he said. "God deigned man's days to be numbered; in his humble and imperfect imitation man has designed the spoon also to be temporary."

Understanding dawned on Bulkington's face. "A parable for life," he said.

"No," said the Abbot. "A shortage of cutlery. Bulkington, we need more spoons."

"Oh," said Bulkington.

"You are to go forth in search for spoons, taking only a sturdy staff to fend off those that would not use spoons."

"Oh?" said Bulkington interrogatively.

"Mainly wolves," said the Abbot. "And the occasional bear. You may also come across the terrible Snarlgruber as well."

"Oh," said Bulkington miserably.

"But look on the bright side," said the Abbot, grinning. "At the end of it you will have a whole range of spoons to choose from. Every cloud and all that. Now be a good chap and eat your apple; you set off this afternoon. The nearest town is thought to be a mere two hundred miles away."

And so it was that the door of the monastery closed with a shudder and Bulkington stepped out onto the windswept turf that mottled the Howling Hills. All around was dull green, stretching down into the mists of the valleys. There was the ever-present moan of the wind and a cold that was driven by it into Bulkington's heart. He pulled up his hood, leaned on his staff and set forth across the wilderness.

Wolves. Bears. The terrible Snarlgruber. What were things coming to? Bulkington longed to be back at his books, for he was never happier than when he was reading. Oh, there was the nausea from the toad's rumblings, certainly, but that was par for the course. The Collywobbler Toads were a necessary part of the monastic life, serving as they did to teach the monks humility, forbearance, mental fortitude and a whole list of other good qualities. So what if there was a little queasiness?

Bulkington strode over the uneven ground, nervously on the lookout for things with empty stomachs and the means and inclination to fill them. The sun was growing dim and crimson when he saw a solitary figure, ragged against the skyline. Bulkington reasoned that two people could fend off a pack of wolves better than one, so he set out for the distant figure.

"Hello there!" cried Bulkington when he was a few paces away.

"Is it?" replied the figure. "Over there you say? I always thought it would be under some volcano or something, or possibly just an allegorical device, a means of conveying a moral message through the medium of hyperbole."

"What?" said Bulkington.

"What?" said the traveller.

There was silence for thirty seconds.

"I come in search of spoons," said Bulkington.

The grizzled man smiled. It was not a pleasant sight. There was something about that smile that indicated that gingivitis for this man was not a medical condition but a way of life. "You have come to the right place. I am a travelling cutler, roaming the Howling Hills and selling my wares to all in need of utensils, with the occasional witticism thrown in for good measure."

Bulkington sighed in relief. "Good, that'll save me a walk. How much for a bag of spoons?"

"How much have you got?" enquired the cutler.

"Two and a half groats," said Bulkington.

"Two and a half groats it is then."

Bulkington swapped the money for the bag of spoons. His eyes narrowed. "It's a bit convenient that I go on a quest for spoons and suddenly bump into an itinerant spoon merchant isn't it?"

"Somewhat, somewhat," said the spoon seller. "But you're going to forget all about that and return victorious with your spoons." The spoon merchant waved his hand in a meaningful way.

Bulkington shrugged. "I suppose so," he said.

"Good."

Bulkington stood in the Abbot's office. The Abbot looked at the spoons on his desk and grinned. "Good job, my son. You shall have the brightest and best of the spoons."

"What, that one?" said Bulkington.

"No, that one's mine," said the Abbot. "Here have this one."

Bulkington looked unhappily at the tarnished piece of cutlery before him. "Have you ever been outside the monastery?" he asked the Abbot.

The Abbot raised an eyebrow. "My spirit has never strayed from these walls," he said.

"What about the rest of you?"

"There is nothing apart from the spirit," said the Abbot, firmly.

"Why is there a half-crazed spoon merchant wandering about fifty yards from the front gate?"

Again the Abbot raised an eyebrow. He now had a surprised look on his face and no eyebrows left to raise. "There is?"

Bulkington nodded.

The Abbot lowered his eyebrows. "Spoons abhor a vacuum," he said after a moment's thought. "It is in the nature of cutlery to seek equilibrium."

This seemed unsatisfactory to Bulkington, but the Abbot followed by saying, "Now return to your cell and contemplate the texts for the next six hours."

There was no arguing with that. Bulkington bowed his head. He returned to his cell.

Bulkington did not sleep that night. When the sky was just starting to pale he found himself staring at the coarse stonework of the ceiling, watching as a fly crawled along upside down, sucking up whatever it is flies suck up from the occasional patch of algae. As the sunlight arched through the window the fly took flight, buzzed in a few aimless spirals and meandered towards the far wall. There was a disgusting sound and the fly disappeared into a mass of grey-green. The Collywobbler Toad had had its breakfast.

Bulkington got out of bed and got dressed. He eyed the toad and thought of the interminable nausea that accompanied its humming. He looked out the window at the Howling Hills, out over the valleys to the distant horizon. And, in the distance, he saw a lone, lank, haggard figure trudging along with a bag over his shoulder.

Bulkington looked at the toad.

He looked at his sciatica-inducing wooden bed.

He looked at the cold, grey stones of the walls.

He looked at the lifeless, meaningless letters of his book.

He looked at the... he looked at the... he realised there was nothing else to look at.

He looked out the window again.

It was uncharacteristic of Bulkington. He had slipped out of the monastery whilst the other monks were still at their morning readings and had walked out over the moorland, shivering in the early chill and stumbling over the wet grass. As he approached the cutler, he waved.

"Good morning," said Bulkington.

"Distinctly average," said the cutler, "but thanks for the sentiment."

"You're up early," said Bulkington.

"Force of habit," said the cutler. He laughed at this, although Bulkington couldn't figure out why. "You're after some spoons?"

"No," said Bulkington.

"How about a tea towel?" the cutler held up an off-white tea towel with the inscription "I Visited the Howling Hills and Now I'm Back to Washing the Bloody Dishes."

"That's stupid," said Bulkington.

"Of course," said the cutler. "So am I."

There was silence for a few seconds. The wind howled over the crags and grass, and the sun seemed lost on the horizon. At last Bulkington spoke, more out of awkwardness than anything.

"How come you're wandering about out here? The nearest town isn't for over two hundred miles."

The cutler tapped his nose. "Trade secret," he said. "I've got a great set-up, don't you worry. I'll leave the spoon business a rich man."

Bulkington thought for a moment. "Have you wandered far?"

"Everywhere that is devoid of cutlery," said the cutler. "It is in the nature of cutlery to seek equilibrium."

This phrase struck Bulkington as being somehow familiar. He continued. "What's it like in the next town?"

"Bleak, depressing and with a profound lack of interest in cutlery."

"And the next town?"

"Bleak, depressing and with a profound lack of interest in cutlery."

"And the next?"

"Bleak, depressing and with a profound lack of interest in cutlery."

"What's the furthest place you've ever been to?"

The cutler's eyes narrowed with thought. "Oh probably somewhere like Borczowia."

"What's it like there?"

"Bleak, depressing and with a profound lack of interest in cutlery. There's also a single-celled alga there that gives you terrible food poisoning."

"So, by and large, the Howling Hills is as good as it gets?"

"Oh, there's always the Great Shining City of Knerb."

"What's that like?" asked Bulkington.

"Never been there," said the cutler, "although I suspect the name is ironic. Apparently it's even worse than Borczowia."

Bulkinton sagged. "I suppose I'll just go back then."

"Jolly good," said the cutler. He watched as Bulkington turned to go. "Only I should add," said the old man, after Bulkington had taken a few steps, "that if you really want to know what's in that book of yours, all you have to do is put that toad on your window ledge as the sun rises."

Bulkington turned round.

"What then?"

The old man laughed and started tramping along, shaking his head. "You'll see."

Bulkington didn't sleep a wink that night. He was knotted with worry over what the mysterious cutler had said. Who was he to question the wisdom of the writings? Bulkington, of all people, knew the texts very well. In them was contained the wisdom of the Scurrilous Sages of the Five Kingdoms. The Scurrilous Sages had been men of renown, great spiritual wisdom and a proclivity for playing polo with parts of their enemies that their enemies would really rather still be attached. They had brought the Toads to the Howling Hills from the far lands of the South, where Sometimes It Stopped Raining. It had ever since been a most important aspect of the monks lives to tend to the toads and ensure they rumbled along all day, for it was said that the texts were of such power that the reader's intellect must be humbled by the nausea that the Toads induced. Bulkington agreed with this. It all made sense. Only the nausea, day-in, day-out...

He tossed and turned. Eventually, as dawn was near, he got out of his bed, got dressed and paced back and forth across the cold stone floor. He put his hands in his cassock pockets and found the apple still there from when the Abbot had given it to him. He pulled it out and, hardly thinking, took a bite. It tasted delicious, sharp, sweet, aromatic.

He took another bite.

It was better than gruel.

He took another bite.

Better than nausea.

He took another bite.

Better than sitting down to breakfast in complete silence.

He took another bite.

With a tarnished spoon.

He swallowed the last of the apple and walked over to the toad. Reverentially, he scooped it up with two hands. With a slow, careful gait he walked over to the window ledge and set the toad down on the sill.

The Toad lazily eyed the horizon. It watched as the sun climbed over the hilltops. In a silent blink the first rays of dawn shot across the scenery, casting long, lowering shadows. The shadows shrank and the rays advanced, scaling the hilltops, scaling the wall underneath the window, until they alighted on the window sill.

The Toad belched. It looked around. It turned almost hesitantly and regarded Bulkington over what passed for its shoulder. Then, quite unceremoniously, it hopped off the window ledge and disappeared into the coarse grass.

Bulkington stared in disbelief. He ran over to the window and stuck his head out, looking for the Toad, but there was no sign of it. He let out a long, agonised groan. The abbot would find out about this. He would be cast out, disenfranchised, excommunicated. His whole life of silent contemplation and arduous study had been for nothing. Numbly, Bulkington walked over to his reading desk and sat down. He stared at the text, almost expecting the nausea to well up inside him. But it didn't. He stared at the writing for a little longer. For some reason the characters on the page seemed dislocated and empty, devoid of all meaning. He tried to focus, but the text just seemed to sit there. Bulkington ran his hand over his tonsure. This was more than the usual morning grogginess. He could not read a word.

That evening, after eating his gruel, Bulkington crept out of the monastery, across the moor, and found the cutler.

"Ho there!" he cried when he was in earshot.

"Why, are you thinking of starting a vegetable garden?" replied the cutler.

Bulkington looked confused.

"How's things?" asked the cutler, changing tack.

"The Toad escaped."

"Of course," said the cutler.

"You mean you knew it would?"

Again, the cutler tapped his nose. "That's toads for you," he said.

"Now I can't read a word of the texts."

The cutler laughed. "You never could," he said.

Bulkington looked confused. "I have read the texts every day of my life for the past thirty years."

"No you haven't," said the cutler.

"Yes I have," said Bulkington.

"And now the Toad's gone and mysteriously you can't read a word?"

"That's right."

"Don't you think there might be some kind of connection there?" said the cutler.

Bulkington stared at him in silence.

The cutler sighed. "The texts are just a lot of symbols that look very convincingly like letters."

"No they're not. They were written by the Scurrilous Sages deep back in the mists of time..."

"Written?"

"Yes."

"The sages could never even read."

"That's not true," said Bulkington.

"Look," said the cutler, "you've never read a word. The Collywobbler Toads do all the reading. Very wise, the Collywobblers. Apparently they come from the Parchment Forests of the South, where the Paperbark trees grow full of fiendishly original narratives. The Collywobblers read faster than you could ever hope to, absorb reams of information, and then plonk themselves on your desk and hum out the result. They're not quite psychic, just very good at humming, so you sort of listen to the Toad, look at the Texts and think you're reading."

"How do you know this?" asked Bulkington with venom.

"I used to be a monk," said the cutler. "My Toad hopped off a long time ago."

Bulkington couldn't help but look angry. "And now my Toad's gone. You knew it would."

"Look on the bright side," said the cutler. "You'll never be short of spoons now. I've got an arrangement with the Abbot to nick the spoons, then sell them back to the monastery and split the profits. That way we each get to keep half the money from the cutlery fund."

"You bastard!" exclaimed Bulkington.

The cutler laughed. "Better grab some tea towels," he said. "You're an idiot now too."

Chapter 3 - A Quest

There are many quests. When it comes to quests, there's a lot. There are many brave quests, many dangerous quests, many suicidal quests, many magical quests, many cursed quests and many bloodthirsty quests. Of course, because there are so many quests that there are also many bloody stupid quests. Finding More Spoons, on the scale of things, is not such a stupid quest. Take, for instance The Great Quest To Determine The Meaning of Epistemology. Or The Intrepid Quest To Calculate The Angular Momentum Of Basingstoke (this was especially stupid as nobody on the Howling Hills had ever heard of Basingstoke before). People seem to like ridiculous quests and so reams and reams of sagas have been written on missions that are impossible, bizarre, useless or very mundane. This story is about a quest that is none of these things. This story is about The Quest To Find The World Beneath One's Feet. It is a difficult quest.

"What's wrong with my tea-towels?" enquired the cutler angrily.

"Nothing," said Bulkington. "It's just that I never really saw myself in the tea-towel distribution industry."

"It's not an industry, son, it's an art. The fact of the matter is that there is a massive surplus of tea-towels and nobody really wants to buy them. Selling tea-towels requires magic."

"Magic?" enquired Bulkington with an enthusiasm that was to reality what saccharin is to sugar. "That sounds more like it. More epic. What magic do you know?"

The cutler shook his head. "You don't even know my name and you're asking me what magic I know? Have a little civility."

"What's your name?"

"Indole," said the cutler. "Indole Flux."

"And you're a magician?"

"A mage."

"So you know magic?"

"What? Would you ask someone who plays the harp if they 'know music'? Magic's big. I know one little corner of it."

"And you sell cutlery?"

Indole stopped walking. He rummaged in his bag and pulled out a very shiny spoon. "First test," said the mage, "for someone who wants to know magic. What's the most magical thing about this spoon?"

He handed the spoon to Bulkington. Bulkington looked at the spoon. He shrugged.

"It doesn't look very magical to me."

"You're not looking properly. Hold it up to the light. Now answer the question."

Bulkington thought for a moment. Then his brow furrowed and he decided to be clever (and also not very original). "There is no spoon."

"Of course there is, you clot. Look at the spoon."

Bulkington sighed. "You don't know any magic, do you? In fact, just as I always thought, there's no such thing as magic."

Indole laughed. "No such thing as magic? You put that spoon in your pocket. Keep it until the end of our journey and then you tell me there's no such thing as magic."

"What journey?"

"Well, more of a Quest."

"Does it involve angular momentum?"

"No more than anything else."

"What's it a quest for?"

"It's a Quest To Find Magic."

"Those are three a penny."

"No," said Indole. "There are lots of Quests to find magic things. Like The Quest To Find The Magic Axe of Ulgarth. Or the Quest To Find The Magic Lantern of The Undead. Or The Quest To Find The Magic Card Under The Upturned Cup Which Inevitably Ends Up In You Losing Five Quid. Not many people are stupid enough to go on a Quest Just To Find Magic In The Abstract. I mean wise. Not wise enough to go on a Quest To Find Magic In The Abstract."

"Well, a quest's a quest."

"No it's not. It's a Quest. Always capitalised."

"I suppose I don't really have much else to do. Where will this Quest take us?"

Indole waved his hands meaningfully at the horizon. "Over there somewhere."

"How far will this Quest take us?"

"Almost exactly two hundred miles."

"That's remarkably similar to the distance to the nearest town."

"It might be," said Indole, trying to sound nonchalant.

"You're just going to walk to the next town, aren't you?" said Bulkington. "The one that's bleak, depressing and with a profound lack of interest in cutlery."

"Possibly," said Indole. "Tea towels don't sell themselves."

"Magic tea towels probably would," said Bulkington.

"Well, these ones aren't magic. They would be if I wanted them to be, though," said Indole.

"Of course," said Bulkington. "Because you're a mage."

"Oh ye of little faith," said Indole, looking hurt. "Magic is a bit more subtle than fireballs and dragons. You can't even solve the riddle of the spoon. I wouldn't expect you to understand."

"Well, lead the way then," said Bulkington. "At least towns don't have wolves."

"No," said Indole. "Probably due to the free-lance coat making industry. Now that really is an industry."

There was a starkness to the Howling Hills as the evening drew on, not at all like the gentle sunsets in other parts. As the sun got lower it cast shadows that crept, shadows that snaked and darted in arcane patterns from every wizened tree and wind-carved crag. Then night was over the land, and there was nothing but the howling of the wind and the moonlit path before the two travellers. After a few hours walking in darkness, Indole motioned towards a series of crags next to the path.

"There's a cave over there. We stop for the night."

Bulkington nodded. "About time, too."

They picked their way over the rocks and found the cave, an arching black mouth set into the moonlit rock. Indole motioned to Bulkington to go in, but Bulkington stopped. "I can smell smoke," he said.

Indole sniffed. "Of course," he said. He waved his arms for effect. "I have summoned forth fire from the rocks."

"Yes, there's definitely a fire there," said Bulkington peering into the cave. "Although I doubt you conjured it up. There's someone sitting there. It looks like he's cooking a tin of beans."

"Magic beans?" asked Indole.

"No, just normal beans."

"Good," said Indole. "My wind's bad enough as it is."

"And he's chewing something."

"Probably his false teeth. Hello there!"

Indole strode into the cave and the hunched figure looked up. When he saw Indole he cackled and spat into the fire, at which the flames rushed up and burnt green.

"Ah, good stuff," said Indole. "Careful though, you'll burn the beans."

Again the stranger cackled. "I see your future, Indole Flux. I see it unfurled like a scroll of old parchment. I see every letter of your life to the last full stop."

"I think we should leave," said Bulkington through gritted teeth as he tugged at Indole's sleeve. Indole brushed him off and sat down next to the stranger.

"You wanted to see magic, eh?" said Indole to Bulkington with a grin. "Come on, sit down."

Cautiously Bulkington sat opposite on an outcrop of rock. He didn't take his eyes off the stranger.

"I see your life, Bulkington Azimuth. I see your life in the movement of birds, in the patterns of entrails, in the fall of sticks and bones."

"Cheery, eh?" said Indole.

"Watch the fire! Watch the flames rise!"

"Watch the beans!" cried Indole.

The stranger spat once more into the fire and the cave filled with smoke, out of which danced a hundred shapes and shadows.

"Watch, Indole Flux!" shrieked the stranger. "Watch!"

There was blackness and out of that blackness came daylight in a whirl of green flame. The smell of a forest hung heavy in the air, a smell that was at once fresh and ancient. Trees towered to the sky, trunks wrapped together in spiralling braids, each bough climbing up over another to reach towards light and life. There was a hut, outside which was a wind-chime made of spoons. The door of the hut opened and Indole hobbled out, his face wrinkled with age and a long, matted beard blowing in the breeze. He looked happy.

"A fortune made and my life as a cutler behind me. Now I can sit back and relax with the small fortune I accrued from the spoon racket. Life is good." Indole yawned, stretched and then sat down on an old wooden chair and closed his eyes in satisfaction.

Hours passed. The woodland was alive with the sound of birdsong, the natter of insects, the soft rush of wind. Indole thought to himself about the benevolence of Nature. He pondered the music of the humble song-thrush, the industrious thrift of the busy squirrel, the frivolous roaming of the bumble bee on the summer breeze...

"Not so fast," came a voice from nearby.

"I'm sitting on a chair," said Indole without opening his eyes. "I could hardly get less fast."

"Stand and deliver!"

Indole opened one eye. "But I was just getting comfortable."

"Give me all your money now!"

"Oh. I see."

There stood in front of Indole a young, stocky man with lank, brown hair and eyes that glinted with ill-intent. Round his face he wore a tea-towel and in his hand there was a spoon that glinted menacingly in the sunlight.

Indole gasped, which was a little late but effected with panache nonetheless. "Not a spoon!"

"Sharpened to a fine point!" said the bandit.

"And a novelty tea towel to hide your identity!" cried Indole. "Infamy!"

"Now stay still while I nab all your cash."

Smoke curled and cleared, and once more the fire burnt yellow and red. Indole shuddered.

"The future is so full of horror," he said. "Surely there could never be such malice in a breakfast utensil."

The stranger cackled. "Now, watch your future, Bulkington Azimuth! Watch the flames!"

"Here we go again," said Indole.

The old soothsayer spat and the fire roared.

The swamp was illuminated with marsh-lights and the thin moon above, an even mist settling on its surface to hide a thousand deadly sinkholes, making the bog impassable to all but the most intrepid adventurers. Bulkington, his face worn with age, sat cross legged on a platform built from old logs in the middle of the swamp. On the edge of the marsh the paperbark trees towered, their parchment bark flaking away in the wind and drifting in sheets over the brackish water. There was only the buzz of flies, the belch of rotting vegetation, the slow riffle of the trees. And then the sun hit the horizon and rays of light shot over the ground like laser beams and hit the swamp.

There was a burp.

There was a ribbet.

There was an indescribable gelatinous sound.

And then the swamp erupted in the most hideous croaking chorus that could be imagined.

Bulkington's brow creased in concentration. He loved to read.

The smoke cleared and the sound of a cackle disappeared into the night. When Bulkington could see once more, the stranger was gone and there were only Indole and he sat beside the fire. Indole reached over and picked the tin of beans from off the fire with his sleeve.

"That's it?" said Bulkington. "Nothing but robbery and nausea?"

"Depressing, eh?" said Indole, pulling out a spoon. "But, look on the bright side. You've had an irrefutable demonstration of magic."

"Not really," said Bulkington.

"Oh? Then what about the smoke, the visions of the future?"

"Didn't you notice him chewing something?" said Bulkington.

Indole narrowed his eyes. "Probably just finishing a mouthful of beans."

"No," said Bulkington. "He wasn't carrying anything and the nearest town is nearly two hundred miles away. He can't just live of beans. There must be another source of food on the Howling Hills."

"Nothing that I know of," said Indole.

"Nothing?" pushed Bulkington.

"Well there's a type of mushroom that's nearly edible."

"There you go," said Bulkington. "He spat a mouthful of nearly edible mushroom onto the fire and that explains the smoke and the green flames and the visions. Not magic, just a clever trick."

Indole shook his head. "So cynical," he said, casually brushing the mushroom stalks that littered the ground with his foot until they were out of the ring of firelight. "You really don't believe in magic, do you?"

"I believed in reading until my toad hopped off. Now I'm a sceptic about everything."

"But you are to find plenty of toads again in the end; you saw it. Just like you'll find magic. Now let's get some sleep. A mage must replenish his awesome powers sometime."
Chapter 4 - The Valley of Bones

Not many days start at dawn. Even fewer days start at dawn when the night before was spent huddled in a cave with the unsettling smell of burnt mushrooms hanging in the air and only a tin of beans for supper. So when the sluggish grey light, the thick gloop of mist and the sound of a few half-dead birds coughing up a dawn chorus somehow made it past the mouth of the cave, these highlights of the Howling Hills took some time to wake Indole and Bulkington. When at last they awoke, Indole looked wistfully at the empty tin of beans and then pulled out a rock-solid hunk of bread from his pocket. He broke an unfairly small piece off and passed it to Bulkington, who eyed it ruefully before chewing a corner.

"You know what?" said Bulkington through a mouthful of bread that tasted like sawdust and mould.

"Yes," said Indole between mouthfuls.

Bulkington looked annoyed. "You didn't let me finish what I was going to say."

"You were going to say that you have never felt so miserable in your life."

Bulkington looked even more annoyed. "You could at least have let me say it," he said.

"What use will whining do?"

"It'd make me feel better," said Bulkington.

"No it wouldn't," said Indole. "It'd make you feel worse. So you'd whine more. Then you'd feel even worse. Much better to swallow down your misery and look forward to the future."

"You mean the future of sitting in a swamp surrounded by toads?"

"Maybe not that one."

"Or the future of being robbed at spoon-point?"

"Not that one either. The one where you're happy and everyone else's happy and nobody's being complete bastards to each other. That future."

"Oh," said Bulkington. "That future."

They walked on in silence for a while.

"What bright and happy landmark is next?" said Bulkington when they had walked a few hundred yards.

"The Valley of Bones."

"Oh, great," said Bulkington. "Happy days."

"Ah, a grim prospect, indeed, but proof that magic exists."

"How so?"

"You'll see."

They trudged on until the sun was high in the sky and then there it was: the valley of bones. In the diffuse light there was visible a deep dell and in that deep dell there was the macabre spectacle of thousands of bones from a hundred different species, bleached white by the scouring winds.

Bulkington started to mutter. "Bleak, depressing and with a profound..."

"Yes, alright," said Indole. "Whine all you like. But look at the bones."

"They're just bones."

"Look carefully."

Bulkington looked. He shrugged.

"You see?" said Indole. "You see how they're running?"

Bulkington looked again. He was about to mutter something unprintable about Indole but then something caught his eye. He squinted. "I sort of see what you mean."

There was definitely something in what Indole was saying. Each series of skeletons seemed to be laid out in a sequence, from a small, eel-type creature to a tetrapod frozen in mid stride.

"Bet you've never seen bones run before," said Indole. "Now do you believe in magic?"

"I believe in nature," said Bulkington.

"Then you definitely believe in magic," said Indole.

Bulkington shook his head.

"Well, think about it," said Indole. "You trace those bones back, right back past those eel type things. One day one of them was just a rock on the bottom of an ocean. One day a rock got up and swam."

"I don't think it happened like that," said Bulkington.

"More or less," said Indole. "Maybe not a rock, but something."

Bulkington smirked. "You know what, Indole? You would look at a mountain and say it's magic."

Indole shrugged and smiled. "I would if one day it stood up and looked back at me."
Chapter 5 - The Veins of The Earth

"Don't worry," said Indole, the next day. They had been walking since sun-up several hours ago and now they were greeted by driving rain that stung their cheeks and ran dripping down their necks. "There's a shortcut that keeps us out of the rain."

"A shortcut?"

"The Howling Hills are hollow," said Indole.

"Dwarfish mines?" enquired Bulkington.

"No. Elven Fracking."

"Oh, right," said Bulkington. "That'd explain it."

They walked on for half a mile, until they came to a deep hole in the ground. Indole pulled a rope out of his bag and tied one end round a moribund tree. "Perfectly safe," he said and gave the rope a yank. With a pathetic creak the tree fell over.

"Perhaps I'll try a rock," said Indole. He looped the rope round a sturdy looking outcrop and tested it.

"Wouldn't it be easier just to keep walking on top of the ground?" asked Bulkington.

"And get eaten by wolves?"

"Maybe not, then. I suppose there's nothing dangerous down there?"

"Of course there is," said Indole. "You just can't see 'em."

"You can't see them?"

"Apart from the ones that breathe fire," said Indole. He started to abseil down the rope, which involved him scrabbling frantically at the rocky walls of the hole with his feet and lowering himself erratically downwards hand over hand with the rope. "You coming or what?"

Indole disappeared into the darkness with a sound like an avalanche. Reluctantly Bulkington followed him. A few feet down the meagre sunlight turned to dull black, but Bulkington could hear Indole half falling over the rocks below and so they kept going. At last Bulkington felt solid ground beneath his feet.

"Can't see anything, eh?" said Indole.

"No," said Bulkington.

"Let your eyes adjust for a moment. Then tell me what you see."

Bulkington squinted in the darkness for a while. Slowly, a faint light could be seen running in veins along the wall of the tunnel.

"I'm not liking this," said Bulkington.

Indole laughed. "The veins of the Earth."

"I'm going back," said Bulkington.

"Why?"

"I tend to draw the line at the walls having a pulse."

"Just a bit of magic," said Indole. "Don't sweat it."

"Well done," said Bulkington, "you've won the argument. I'm off."

He started climbing the rope, but didn't get very far.

"Okay, hold up," said Indole. "If you must know, it's just plant roots. They link with fungi underground. The fungi glow in the dark. Therefore the root-type-things glow as well. Completely natural and boring."

Bulkington slithered down onto solid ground once more. "And the things that breathe fire?"

"Oh they're magical alright. But don't worry - I'll fend them off with a spell of protection." Indole advanced, waving his hands meaningfully. "Back, fire breathing things, back!"

Bulkington closed his eyes for a second, hoping that somehow he would be somewhere else when he opened them. He was disappointed. "At least we're out the rain," he muttered.

They trudged along through the tunnel, which twisted and branched until it was quite impossible to judge which direction was which.

"I take it you know the route," said Bulkington pointedly.

"Route?" said Indole. "Oh, yes. Of course."

"This is meant to be a shortcut after all," said Bulkington.

"Trust me," said Indole. "Now I'm sure we've already been past that mineral deposit that looks remarkably like a skull but isn't before. So that means that we just need to take the opposite fork than we did last time and we'll get somewhere different. And possibly in the right direction."

Bulkington felt an emotion that was a peculiar mixture of panic and depression. "We could always leave a trail of spoons," he said.

"I'm not wasting my spoons like that," said Indole.

"That's probably what that mineral deposit that looks remarkably like a skull said," remarked Bulkington.

"Look, just shut up and keep walking," said Indole. "Mineral deposits don't say anything. And that one definitely is a mineral deposit. And not a skull. Oh dear. Did you bring a compass?"

"No," said Bulkington.

They walked on in silent panic for another hour, before up ahead there was visible a dim glow.

"Move towards the light!" exclaimed Indole.

"You're a bit premature there," said Bulkington. "I think that bit comes after the hideous fire breathing dragon has frazzled you. I think that what we should be doing right now is moving very quickly away from the light."

"Nonsense," said Indole. "It doesn't look like a dragon at all. It looks remarkably like a knight carrying a lantern."

"Oh yes. In shining armour? One of the ones that believes in chivalry and saving people from becoming mineral deposits?"

"Sort of."

"What do you mean sort of?"

"Well, the armour would be shining if it wasn't..."

"Black? As in one of those knights that goes round chopping peoples heads off just for the hell of it?"

"No," said Indole, "that would be an unfair generalisation based merely on armour colour."

"Oh," said Bulkington.

"Actually," said Indole, "The knight's armour is pink. The only thing more terrifying than getting your head lopped off by a black knight is getting your head lopped off by a knight wearing a light shade of salmon. Although, don't worry; by tradition the Pink Knight must ask you some kind of incredibly unfair riddle beforehand."

"Halt!" said the knight, holding up the torch. "Who goes there?"

"Two itinerant cutlers," replied Indole.

"One itinerant cutler and someone who just happens to be here," said Bulkington, "but probably not for much longer."

"You shall not pass unless you answer me riddles three!"

Bulkington groaned. Indole looked oddly enthralled. "Good stuff," he said. "We will answer y' riddles three."

"Riddle the first!" shouted the knight unnervingly loudly.

"A man whose command can conjure up 'el,

This man draws black water from out of his well

Of six and twenty soldiers he takes his command,

With twenty six soldiers he conquers the land!"

"Who is he?" asked the knight.

Indole thought for a second. "He's a printer," he said calmly.

"Correct!" said the knight.

"Well, that was easy," said Indole. "Looks like mineralisation might not be on the cards after all."

"Riddle the second!" roared the knight.

"No sportsman here, but rows and rows;

runners and races and shooting it knows

On this earth the riddle is nought but a sieve

It lies in the sunlight so others may live!"

"What is it?" asked the knight.

"No problem," said Indole, yawning. "It's a garden."

"Correct!" said the knight. A malicious look was just visible under his visor. "Riddle the third!"

"What is the angular momentum of Basingstoke?"

"What?" said Indole.

"You heard," said the knight.

"That's not fair," said Indole. "It doesn't even rhyme!"

The knight drew his sword. "All right," he said.

"Tell me the angular momentum of Basingstoke,

Or I'll cut yer head off in one single stroke!"

"Erm," said Indole quickly, "thirty six point nine."

"Ah, but what units?" asked the knight, advancing.

Indole looked flustered. "Arc seconds?"

"Wrong!" shouted the knight gleefully. "This is when I chop you into pieces I think."

Indole shrugged. "Okay," he said, "but first I've got a riddle for you."

The knight hesitated. "Oh good. I've been using the last three for the past decade now. Nobody ever gets the Basingstoke one. To be honest it's a little unfair. What's your riddle?"

"Riddle the last!" shouted Indole.

"It makes one double, though you won't want two,

The tip for this riddle is the tip of the shoe

If you sing baritone it will raise your key,

not one octave higher, no sir, but three!"

"What is it?" asked Indole.

"That's easy!" bellowed the knight. "A kick in the groin."

"Right you are," said Indole and put his foot in. "This way!" he shouted to Bulkington, before adding, "Possibly!"

Bulkington needed no second telling. He fled after Indole into the darkness, leaving the salmon-coloured knight writhing on the floor.
Chapter 6 - Someone's Rockery

It was still raining when Indole and Bulkington surfaced again and they appeared to be only a few hundred yards from where they had started.

"Good shortcut," said Bulkington.

"Well, it was certainly very short," said Indole. "In terms of the distance covered, that is. Not the actual time it took us."

"Do you even know which direction we were heading before?"

"Of course," said Indole. "Forwards."

He started pacing on through the scrub. Bulkington traipsed after him and slowly morning turned into afternoon. When the sun was low and Bulkington was starting to think that sitting down to a nice steaming bowl of gruel was actually not such a bad thing, Indole pointed to a shape on the horizon.

"The Wizard's Tor," he said. "We can get a good sight of the nearest town from there."

"Good," said Bulkington.

"If we don't get vaporised by the wizard, that is," added Indole.

"Does a lot of vaporising does he?" asked Bulkington in a strained voice.

"Moderate amounts, yes," said Indole.

"Could we not just sort of wander about a bit more?"

Indole fixed Bulkington with a withering look. "It's either vaporisation or wolves, son, and vaporisation's a lot quicker."

As if on cue there was a sound in the distance. Suddenly it occurred to Bulkington that maybe the Howling Hills didn't get their name just from the wind. The two of them hurried on.

The tower was built of a dull, crumbling rock, which was covered in lichen and whatever moss had the tenacity to survive in the icy wind and scarce sunlight. There were no windows; only where the bricks had disintegrated was there any hint of the interior, and this was a faint outline of a spiral staircase half lost in shadow. The whole building looked completely deserted.

Bulkington rolled his eyes. "Doesn't look very wizardly to me. Or very weatherproof."

"The wizard's obviously out somewhere, probably vaporising something," said Indole. "We're lucky."

They entered through what used to be a doorway and Indole lit a match. He took a stub of a candle out of his pocket.

"You kept that one quiet when we were underground," said Bulkington as Indole lit the candle.

"Candles don't grow on trees, you know," said Indole.

"Nothing grows on trees on the Howling Hills," said Bulkington bitterly. "In fact trees don't grow full stop."

"You have a very pessimistic outlook," said Indole. "Let's get a birds-eye view and then see what you think."

They climbed the staircase in the pitch black, Indole occasionally cursing as he slipped on a long-since disintegrated step. At last they made the top floor, the roof and walls of which had caved in. All around were hilltops and in the distance the sun was setting.

"There it is," said Indole, pointing to a town in the distance. "Avaciggy. Named in an ancient tongue after a rest stop for wayfarers."

"What's that next town further on?"

"Splutter. And look, you can just about see the green lakes of Borczowia in the distance."

"What's beyond the horizon?" asked Bulkington.

"Oh, just the rest of the world; I wouldn't think too much about that. Generally it keeps to itself. Possibly because of the large expanses of algae-laden swamp between us and it. Apparently somebody tried to invade us once and found it so disappointing that they gave up half way. The Moaning Mounds are in the opposite direction, but the people there are too miserable to invade properly."

"Why do you think anyone lives in the Howling Hills?"

"You saw the Valley of Bones?" said Indole.

"Yes," said Bulkington.

"Well, the bones always run away from places that are comfortable. The trouble is, you see, that when they get comfortable, other things with larger mandibular bones - that's jaw bones to you and me - get comfortable too."

"What made you come to the Howling Hills?"

Indole smiled. "The horizon caught up with me."

"That's a good way of not answering the question," said Bulkington.

Indole raised an eyebrow. "You want to know?"

Bulkington nodded.

Indole shook his head, but he carried on talking. "It was a long time ago..."

Beyond the horizon the rain was lashing down as it always did. In fact, the only thing that differentiated the Howling Hills from Indole's home country, the Moaning Mounds, was a large palisade made from sharpened pieces of timber with what looked like mineral deposits on top.

Indole lived a few miles from the border. It was the customary pastime of people either side of the border to see who could hurl the largest boulders over the palisade and hopefully make someone else either very unhappy or very dead. This wasn't a custom born out of any particular animosity, it was just what they did. It started with pebbles. Then stones. Then bricks. Then people started building catapults and trebuchets. In the end boulders the size of small hills were regularly exchanged with the effect that the terrain for several miles of the border was reduced to rubble.

Indole spent a lot of time forlornly regarding the scene of devastation that lay just a few metres away from his town. He had heard that when people fought wars they usually had God on their side; evidently God had wanted a rockery. He watched the latest mass of stone land with a carrrump onto another mass of stone and shatter into little pieces. The young Indole walked along the main street of his town, past the trebuchet builders, the catapult manufacturers, the boulderers. He stopped when he saw two people arguing in the street.

"No, you've calculated the angular momentum all wrong," said Brickbat. "You'll never get your boulder off the ground. You want to take the square route of pi and..."

"Square route of pi? You don't know what you're talking about," laughed Slinger. "You take the fourth power of pi and divide it by nought point three, then..."

Indole coughed.

"What do you want?" asked Brickbat.

"Does it really matter what index of pi you use? I mean, when it comes down to it all you end up doing is hurling a bloody big rock a few hundred feet through the air."

Brickbat looked stunned. "What? A few hundred feet? A kilometer more like. You, sir, have insulted me."

"Good," said Indole.

Brickbat clenched his jaw and fixed Indole with a look that fizzed. "You woudn't be able to cube pi for all the readily extractible oil shale in the Moaning Mounds."

"You know, I don't think that sentence has been used before in the history of the universe. Congratulations."

"Don't rile him," put in Slinger quickly. "He's got a short fuse."

"Poor chap," said Indole.

"Right, that's it," said Brickbat. "I challenge you, sir, to a duel."

Indole sighed. "What with, catapults?"

"Pistols," said Brickbat.

"Right you are," said Indole. "Pistols at dawn it is."

And so it was. Early the next morning Indole and Brickbat stood on a particularly bleak hillside with Slinger as Brickbat's second. The pistols were loaded and Indole and Brickbat stood back to back.

"Twenty paces," said Slinger. "And may the best man win."

They took the paces. From where Indole was standing he could see a vulture circling ominously.

"Turn to face your opponent," said Slinger.

They turned.

"Take aim."

They took aim. There was an electric pause.

"Fire!"

Time seemed to turn to treacle and then a terrific bang rang out across the hillside. Indole blinked. When he opened his eyes he saw smoke rising from the breach of his gun. He looked across to the smiling Brickbat.

"You didn't fire," said Indole.

"Correct," said Brickbat, holstering his pistol with a flourish, "and you missed."

"Then why did you challenge me to a duel?"

"Because," said Brickbat, "I knew that you were a hopeless shot. I can now safely say that you demanded satisfaction over a matter of honour, but that I, as a gentleman, allowed you to fire upon me without so much as flinching, whilst you fired in a most dastardly manner. I, therefore, am the victor. I bid you good day."

"But you were the one who challenged me in the first place!" shouted Indole.

Slinger patted Brickbat on the back, completely ignoring Indole, and they wandered off in the direction of the pub. Indole looked mournfully at them as they walked away. "Smug bloody bastards," he said.

"That was it," said Indole to Bulkington. "I'd lost my honour. I was a laughing stock. So I snuck over to the Howling Hills and took up the cassock, the spoon and finally the tea towel."

"Don't you ever want to go back?"

"Not really," said Indole. "There's a good living to be made out of spoons. I'm not actually quite as miserable as I could be here upon the Howling Hills."

"You're actually happy like this?"

"That's not what I said. Anyway, enough about me. What's your story?"

Bulkington shrugged. "My life was being at one with the Scurrilous Sages."

"Play much polo then?" asked Indole.

"No," said Bulkington.

"Doesn't sound very scurrilous in that case," said Indole.

"Scurrilousness is a state of mind," said Bulkington.

"Book of Sages, verse nine, line fifteen."

"You really were a monk?"

"Not a very good one," said Indole. "I found out that the monks made a sideline in distilling creme de menthe. One night I polished it all off and ended up asleep in the vestibule with only a half eaten faal to keep me warm. I would have gone unnoticed all through the morning service if it weren't for my flatulence. At least the creme de menthe cured my gingivitis." Indole smiled a bacteriological smile.

"Let me guess: and your toad was gone."

"Bingo," said Indole. He sighed in a way that was almost happy - but not quite. "And then here I was: up on the Howling Hills. Look out over the land, for this is truly as good as it gets."

"The pinnacle of creation?" ventured Bulkington.

"You've got it," said Indole. "Just be glad you're not part of someone's rockery."
Chapter 7 - The Coliseum

There is little to the Howling Hills in winter save for the progression of night and day; the wind is a constant, the cold a leech and the rain a drumbeat. The rhythm of a hundred storm-swollen clouds pours down and down as the sun rises and sets and rises again; the birds swim more than fly and the ground is hardly ground at all, but a pockmarked morass of sponge-like heather and freshly spawned streams. And it is always winter.

After many days trekking across this barren waste, Bulkington and Indole came to a valley that was larger than the rest. At the bottom of the valley, there was a building, and it did things to scale that made scale look inadequate. Four tiers of stands, wrapped round in an oval, hewn of bricks that looked so weathered that they seemed almost organic. Up ahead there looked to be a doorway, looming out of the structure as though it were the entrance to a snail's shell.

"The Coliseum," said Indole.

Bulkington stared with eyes that were long used to squinting through the downpour. "How..."

"Nobody knows how it was built, or who built it. Impressive. Magical, in fact."

"What's it for?"

"Some say that an ancient emperor built it to host fantastic shows for his people. Apparently the crowd particularly enjoyed the bit where several hundred ostriches were decapitated with arrows. The gladiators didn't fare much better. When their heads were in the sand it was usually because their necks were elsewhere."

"People really liked that sort of thing?"

"Difficult to say," said Indole. "You see, if you build a bloody great big coliseum people are going to go and sit in it just because it's bloody and big. Gladiators or no, you're going to get a crowd."

Indole strolled through the entrance. Cautiously, Bulkington followed. They walked out onto a balcony overlooking the arena. It was as quiet as stone.

"So there must have been a lot of people on the Howling Hills at one point?" asked Bulkington.

"Why do you think they're so uninhabitable now?" said Indole.

Bulkington shrugged.

"The land was probably full of all the grape and grain you could feast on. Then people feasted on it, got strong enough to beat their ploughshares into swords and didn't stop burning and hacking until there was nothing but heather and rain."

Bulkington looked around the arena. "Why do you think they built it so big?" he asked.

Indole pointed to the far side of the arena. "Can you see what that says?" he said.

There was some ancient writing writ large in gold leaf across the marble top of the seating area. Bulkington couldn't make it out so he shook his head.

"It says," said Indole, "'Marble and gold: more effective than ostriches.'"

"I thought you said you couldn't read," said Bulkington.

"I can't, " said Indole.
Chapter 8 - The Fruit

At this point it is good to know a little about the teachings of the Scurrilous Sages. Take, for instance, the story of creation. It goes something like this:

God created the world and he saw that it was good, otherwise why would he create it? He created the heavens and the earth, the birds of the air, the fish of the sea and all the animals that walk the earth. He was pretty good at the whole creating thing, so he created capybaras, fjords and angular momentum as well. He created everything and it was all great, until he created man and woman. But then he ran into problems, because man and woman could be pretty horrible to each other and, in fact, were. They fought and died; they worked the dust day and night; and the serpents of the ground struck their heels. So God built a garden near some rivers, which was guarded by a sword that flashed back and forth day and night. He called the garden Nede.

There was a man called Mada and a woman called Eve and one day they dove past the swords and into the garden. It was better than the rest of the world, but they knew sin and they knew evil, and they were ashamed. One day they were walking in the garden when they came across a beautiful tree, more beautiful than any other in the garden. Suddenly Mada stopped, and he started choking.

"What's the matter?" asked Eve, terrified. "Please, Mada, what's wrong?"

But instead of answering, Mada coughed into his hands a chunk of fruit. He stared at it, puzzled. Then he coughed up another chunk, and another. Eventually his hands were full of pieces of fruit. Mada noticed that they were of the same fruit and he fitted them together. Then he looked puzzled.

"There is only half a fruit here," he said.

"Perhaps you only ate half a fruit," said Eve.

"I can't remember eating anything," said Mada.

Then Eve looked worried. "I have a taste in my mouth," she said. "It is like apple, only sweeter and more delicious. But I haven't eaten anything."

Mada looked at the fruit in his hand and then to Eve. "Here, take this half of the fruit," he said.

Eve took the fruit, and as she did she started to choke. Into her hand she coughed up the rest of the fruit and she fitted the pieces together. When the fruit was whole, she walked over to the tree and pushed the fruit up into the branches.

"Now the tree is whole again," she said. Suddenly she and Mada felt very happy.

"It is as though I have forgotten the troubles of mankind," said Mada.

"We shall stay in the garden forever," said Eve.

They lay in the grass and the sun warmed them. Then Eve turned to Mada.

"I've just had the strangest thought," she said.

"Oh?" said Mada.

"Wouldn't it be terrible if the whole thing had happened the other way round?"

The Scurrilous Sages were called scurrilous for a reason, but the excerpt serves to place in context Bulkington's own progress. He had eaten the apple. He had been forced out into a world that was full of misery and death. It had happened the other way round.
Chapter 9 - Weather

It was night. On the hillside in front of Bulkington and Indole was a shed that looked like it had been botched together from storm-blasted pieces of board and plastic bags, which indeed it had been; it was held together by nails, staples and pieces of string which made a flapping noise in the wind. The two travellers had been walking since sunrise and were bone tired, so the poor shelter offered by the shed was incentive enough to take a closer look. There was a door, which Indole cautiously opened.

"What? What? What?" came a voice from the gloom inside. There was a single candle which levitated high and nearly set fire to the roof as the occupant of the shed held it up half in threat, half in senility.

"What do you mean 'what'?" asked Indole.

"I mean what, that's what!" said the man inside the shed. He brought the candle down a little and it illuminated a mouse-like face with a pair of glasses from which it looked like the eyes were trying to escape. The shed-dweller had off-grey hair that fell in disarray over his shoulders and clothes that had a dignified, expensive, leisurely quality to them, or at least would have done three centuries ago. There was the distinct smell of pipe-smoke, which appeared to be issuing from a meerschaum that was still smouldering from the top pocket of a long-suffering smoking jacket.

"My name's Indole Flux. This is Bulkington. We're looking for somewhere to stay for the night," said Indole.

"What?" Two eyes boggled from behind the glasses.

"I said..." started Indole.

"You can't stay here," said the old man. "Highly important research that will one day transform our understanding of... what?"

"I didn't say anything," said Indole.

"...transform our understanding of why the weather's always so bloody awful," continued the shed-bound scientist, tapping a sign next to some complicated looking equipment.

Noctus Saltum

Meteorological savant, forecaster of storms, diligent sayer of "what?"

"That actually sounds surprisingly useful," said Bulkington.

Noctus nodded. "Very useful indeed," he said, "if I could only get the equipment working."

Bulkington peered into the dim interior of the shed. Spiders had long ago given up tending the webs that lay like candyfloss on everything, and the half-dark seemed to make everything somehow more distinct in an unpleasant way. All around were brass tubes and complicated looking screens. As Bulkington watched, one of the screens became a mass of jagged lines.

"There you go!" shouted Noctus. "Another bloody artefact! I don't know where they come from."

"What do you mean an artefact?" said Bulkington. "I thought that was something you dug up."

"It means," said Noctus, tapping the screen as if to dislodge the lines, "that this here screen is showing a spike when there is absolutely nothing happening. No lightning, no thunder, nothing."

"Oh," said Bulkington. "What exactly is it meant to do?"

Noctus furrowed his brow. "This is a machine for detecting storms. Every time there is a lightning flash in the distance, the fabric of the air is torn asunder and little wave-type-things travel through the atmosphere and down one of the tubes. Then that screen registers the wave-type-things as a series of spikes."

The screen flashed again.

"And again!" shouted Noctus. "I don't understand it. I've calibrated this thing a hundred times, taken it apart, hit it with a hammer, everything. Ten years I've been trying it, but still the same old spurious results. And always from the same direction."

"Have you tried turning it off and on again?" asked Indole.

The look that Noctus gave Indole could melt lead.

"Look," said Bulkington, "it's freezing cold, completely dark and lashing down with rain. Lightning would virtually be an afterthought. Can't we just kip on the floor and then we'll leave the next morning?"

"No," said Noctus, "certainly not."

"Indole will give you a tea towel," said Bulkington.

"No I bloody won't," said Indole.

"You must leave," said Noctus. "I must return to my work."

Indole shook his head and turned to Bulkington. "Come on," he said. "It's only getting darker outside. Let's go."

They left and trudged on through the night. Thick clouds fled across the surface of the moon, though the wind abated a little and the rain stopped in the early hours of morning. At last the two weary vagrants reached the brow of the next hill and then Bulkington looked up and stopped.

"I don't believe it," he said. "We've gone round in circles. It's the same shed."

Indole looked to the hilltop. "No," he said. "This one's different. Look, it's got a corrugated iron roof."

Bulkington looked miserably ahead. "Why am I not feeling optimistic?" he said.

"Enough whining," said Indole. "Hospitality favours the bold." They walked towards the shed and Indole opened the door. It took a moment for their eyes to accustom to the dark, so they heard noises before they could see inside.

"Ha ha ha!" came a sound from the gloomy interior. There was a tremendous flash and a smell of ozone. Indole tried to smooth down his hair, which had suddenly started to stand on end.

"What on earth are you doing?" asked Indole.

"Brilliant!" shouted a short, fat gnome-like man. He had auburn hair knotted in dreadlocks and a wild look in his eyes as he danced round the shed in with a lamp in one hand. The lamp lit a giant dome on top of a pole. There was a steam-powered wheel rotating a belt that whirred round and round. "Good stuff!"

"What?" said Indole.

"Not 'what?'," said the man. "'Why not?' is more like."

"Who are you?" said Bulkington.

"Volt Macabre," said the man. He tapped a sign.

Volt Macabre

Meteorological lunatic, creator of storms, diligent sayer of "why not?"

"What is that thing?" asked Bulkington, pointing to the equipment.

"Van de Graf generator," said Volt. "The belt whirs up and down, creates static and then every ten minutes or so there's a bloody great..."

The air lit up, there was a loud bang and Indole's hair fled upwards.

"...flash," said Volt. "Brilliant eh?"

"Any reason?" said Bulkington.

"Not really," said Volt.

"And how long have you been doing this?" asked Bulkington, thinking of Noctus.

"Oh, about ten years now. Why do you ask?"

"No reason," said Bulkington. "Any chance of some floorspace?"

"Of course," said Volt, "so long as you don't mind the occasional..."

There was another flash.

"Occupational hazard, I suppose," said Indole. He found a piece of floor as far away from the generator as possible and lay down uncomfortably.

"Every ten minutes?" asked Bulkington.

Volt nodded. "The ozone's good for the sinuses."

"Right," said Bulkington gloomily. He curled up on the floor and fell into a deep sleep for nine minutes and fifty nine seconds.
Chapter 10 - The Path To Avaciggy

Paths are a form of life. The path on which Bulkington and Indole walked was growing wider and so they knew they must be nearing Avaciggy. They passed a wheezing old crone leading a mule slowly along. She squinted at them from under a mass of haystack hair and smiled.

"Nice day for it," she said.

"For what?" asked Indole.

"Being a wheezing old crone."

"I suppose you're right," said Indole. "That'd explain why it's a bloody awful day for being anyone else."

"Of course, the path was shorter when I was a lass."

"Oh?"

"Enough to make you wheeze, paths getting longer."

"Are you sure it's not just your legs getting shorter?"

The crone thought for a while. "Could be, could be," she said.

"Are we heading in the right direction for Avaciggy?"

"Aye, I'm heading for Splutter. You're on the right road. Better hurry up otherwise the path'll be getting longer faster'n you're walking."

"Sound advice," said Indole, ushering Bulkington past. "Have a nice day?"

"What do I look like," said the old woman, taken aback, "a crone?"
Chapter 11 - The Town and Its Centre

South amongst the paperbark trees, where the narratives grow, through the ribbeting, still gloom, a hoarse breath blew. The first rasps of storm, flickers of long-pent lightning, a below of thunder; then the gale found its feet, the swamp water rippled and waves grew. Toad after toad hopped from logs, from hummocks and tussocks and rocks, down into the safe, treacle-black waters where the storm could only be heard as an echoing chunter and the wind felt only as the swirl of pondweed.

All around the wind whipped, in great slow circles. Then it gritted its teeth and spiralled in, around the marsh where the toads lived. Round and round it tore, until the howling of the hills rang through the bog. The water sprayed and frothed, and droplets flew up into the night air. A vortex of tearing force touched down, hit the brackish mire and suddenly all was a column of turbulent water, beaten white by the tornado. With a great, ribbetting whirl, hundreds upon hundreds of Collywobbler Toads disappearing high into the night.

"Looks like foul weather over there," said Indole, pointing to the distance. "Sky like pitch. Still, shouldn't be on us until tomorrow. And look, there's the town. Avaciggy."

And there it was. It smelt like an ashtray, a smell to make the eyes water. Filter-tip chimneys and pack-of-twenty houses, the sharp smell of a thousand lives. Those lives revolved around tramping out onto the hills, cutting down whatever half-dead tree or bush could be found and lugging it back to shove in the fireplace in order to fend off the cold for a few hours longer. For food the inhabitants ate a mixture of wolves, roots, pigeons, rats and nearly edible mushrooms. These were usually condensed into the form of some kind of pasty which, with a little creative thought, could be considered appetising. The people of Avaciggy were marginally less miserable than they should have been, owing mainly to the latter component of their diet, but also to their ability to maintain a sense of humour even when they were outnumbered by the former.

Avaciggy was not yet a city due to lethargy, malnutrition and mild narcosis, but it was a town and as such the heart of the Howling Hills. Long ago, it had spawned the culture that had produced the Scurrilous Sages, who had rode out of the gates seeking philosophical stimulation, fresh polo grounds and a temporary abatement of emphysema. They had found the first, despoiled the second and got within spitting distance of the third, when the revelation that the country life was one of hunger and monotony caused them to return to town with dreams of grandeur and a sack full of toads.

"And then, filled with the boundless energy that comes with faith and the threat of polo, the townspeople built them St. Collywobble's. It was said that, as a demonstration of their dedication, they built it two hundred miles away, carrying the stones all the distance with only primitive wooden rollers. The people of Avaciggy were happy after that, because mallets did not feature so heavily in their life."

Indole paused as they passed through the gates. "There is no luxury in this town," he said, "only necessity. There are no pubs, no coffee houses, no gambling dens, no restaurants, no theatres. There are rooftops and floors and a little in between and that's about it. People considered building things more than one story high and then thought of St. Collywobble's and decided that architecture was best kept at a distance. Everything here is built without a slide rule and so the rules slide - no right angles, no consideration of load-bearing walls or roofs that don't leak. It isn't planned obsolescence because it isn't planned. Life would be mundane, but people are apt to make things very complicated in even the most threadbare of environments. There is no such thing as boredom, only tiredness."

"This is the end of the quest?"

"The beginning of the Quest," said Indole.

"Oi," said a voice as they walked through the gates. A dumpy woman with a face like porridge approached Indole sporting a look of vehemence tempered only by obesity. "You bastard!" she said.

"Very concise," said Indole. "A good firm 'oi' and then an insult. Very efficient."

"I remember you," continued the woman. "Last time you were here, you sold me a love potion for half a year's wages. To win over the man of my dreams. A tincture of magical ingredients, you said."

"Ah yes," said Indole. "Did it work?"

"Of course it bloody worked," said the woman. "It turned out just to be two pints of brandy with some heather floating in it."

"There you go then," said Indole. "A very effective brew."

"Unfortunately it worked so well," said the woman angrily, "that of an evening the man of my dreams didn't stop singing 'you've got a lovely bunch of coconuts' for two hours, then fell asleep on them. For some reason the next morning I couldn't even get another verse out of him."

"Perhaps he was shy," said Indole. "Get it? Coconuts, shy..."

The woman looked unimpressed. So unimpressed that she made to knee Indole in the coconuts, which he only avoided by a quick hop backwards. This hop conveyed him into the clutches of a large man with a mean look on his face. It was a testament to the resilience of the human body that this man could sustain muscles like sacks of potatoes despite having a diet like that of a yogi.

"You bastard!" he said.

"I see you skipped the 'oi'," said Indole.

"You sold me a hangover cure. I'd just woken up with a splitting headache and the vague taste of heather in my mouth when I thought I'd go for a walk to clear my head. I got halfway down the street and you gave me a very convincing lecture on the health giving properties of natural mineral water when indisposed due to drink. From a pure mountain spring you said."

"I remember. Did it work?"

"Oh, it got rid of my hangover straight away."

"Good."

"The cholera lasted a week though. When you said a pure mountain spring, I take it you meant the nearest horse trough?"

"Well, it must have come from a pure mountain spring at some point," said Indole.

"The problem was it had gone through the horse afterwards," said the man. "I want my money back and something for my trouble."

"Something for your trouble? Have you tried coltsfoot in spirits of wine?"

"No I bloody haven't!"

"I'll just go and rustle some up then," said Indole, turning round again. There, stood in this new direction, was a tall woman with a thunderous countenance and a walking stick which she applied to Indole's shin.

"Quack!" shouted the woman.

"Meow?" ventured Indole.

"You sold me a sleeping draught! I'd been up two nights in a row, what with some lout singing 'til all hours one night and then vomiting the next. You said it would make me sleep, no doubt."

"Did it work?"

"I don't know. I spilt it before I had chance to drink any."

"A great shame," said Indole.

"For the petunias it was. Certainly sent them to sleep. Set them on fire first, though."

"I cannot be blamed for the potency of my wares," said Indole. He looked desperately for an escape route, but at the final point of the compass stood the crazed looking hermit from the cave.

"You stole my beans!" he shouted.

This proved decisive. From all directions, strong, gnarled hands grasped Indole's clothing.

A little later, Indole turned to Bulkington. Only very slightly though.

"Well, at least we now have the components of a pasta source," said Indole.

"Unfortunately not," said Bulkington, who sat glumly next to the stocks. "After they threw the tomatoes at you they went and picked them up again. Tomatoes are extremely scarce on the Howling Hills. They must have really liked you."

"Everyone likes me," said Indole.

"How are you going to get out?"

"I've already thought of that," said Indole.

"Oh?"

"Using the incredible powers of magic that reside within my coat pocket, I'm going to unlock the stocks. With the slightest bit of assistance..."

Bulkington took the hint and rummaged in Indole's pocket for him. He pulled out a paperclip.

"Put it in my hand," said Indole.

Bulkington gave the paperclip to Indole.

"Now let's see..." said Indole, a look of concentration on his face. There was a click and a lock dropped to the ground.

"You've done that before, haven't you?" said Bulkington.

"Once or twice," said Indole. "Now, let's find somewhere where I can sleep off my neck ache."

They wandered along the street, watching the people plod home as evening crept in. It was a simple life, the life of Avaciggy, which in other words meant that it was bloody awful. It was difficult to tell whether people hated each other, because they were very pleasant for ninety nine percent of the time but in the other one percent seemed to make up for this. Because Indole tended to exist in this percentage pretty much permanently he put his hood up and seemed to shrink into his cloak to such an extent that he was barely recognizable. They found a stable with some emaciated cobs and made themselves comfortable in some well-nibbled hay. The horses looked worried, which was not surprising seeing as the menu at the nearest inn was an omnipresent reminder for them to keep champing at the bit. Indole looked longingly at the inn and thought of gravy. With such thoughts he fell asleep.

Bulkington, however, could not sleep. He had been used to sleeping on a bare wooden bunk for his whole life and he was tempted to say to himself that straw was too soft for him, but this was not true. He had a sense of vertigo, a sort of feeling that there was nothing for his thoughts to grip. Everything that his train of consciousness alighted on seemed to shimmer and evaporate, no more substantial than the howling of the hills. Bulkington stood up, brushed the straw from his clothing and walked out of the stable. The street was dark, the windows of the houses a mass of rag curtains, the sparse cobbles iridescent in the moonlight. He did not really know where he was heading, but footstep after footstep he found himself wandering towards the centre of town. When he got there he sat on a bench and looked at the centre. It was large, perfectly circular and about twenty feet deep. He nearly jumped when he noticed in the gloom that there was already an old woman sat next to him on the bench. She was knitting.

"Is this some kind of new take on gardening that I'm not aware of?" he said, motioning to the crater.

"It's the centre of town," she said.

To Bulkington this was not really much of an explanation. "What exactly is it?"

"Part of the sky fell down a few thousand years ago," she said.

"Part of the sky?"

"Nothing but rockery for miles around afterwards. Still warm in the middle." The old woman grinned a toothless smile. "Don't go too near it though otherwise your gums'll bleed."

Bulkington thought of Indole's gingivitis and suddenly he felt very tired indeed. He walked back to the stable and fell asleep in the hay.
Chapter 12 - The Pig

It was to be a long day. The air was crisp - in other words achingly cold - and it drove Indole and Bulkington to stamp in the street with the first light of dawn, watching as the horses restlessly tugged at the remnants of hay that constituted their breakfast.

"New day, new chances," said Indole, striding forward. "I sense greatness is just around the corner."

Bulkington scowled and quite rightly too. Greatness was not round the next corner. Round the next corner was a market. This consisted of someone selling sprouts, two people selling cabbages and one person selling a pig. There were no customers.

"Geerrrt yer sprouts!" Shouted the sprout seller. He did not shout it directly at Indole, although there really was nobody else he could be trying to sell them to. "Two for a penny, buy three and I'll throw in a dead rat! There's good eating on one of them! Sprout and rat soup, make yer mouth water! Geerrt yer sprouts!"

Indole swapped a spoon for two sprouts.

"Getcha cabbages, luvverly cabbages! Good for the circulation! Full of 'ealthy minerals and vitamins! Penny a cabbage!"

Indole bought a cabbage.

Bulkington looked at the person selling the pig. She was an old lady with eyes that looked like they could see for a thousand miles - as well they might because a thousand miles away looked pretty much like right here on the Howling Hills. He nudged Indole. "Aren't you going to buy the pig?"

"No, strictly vegetarian me," said Indole. "Hence the flatulence. Besides, that pig's not for me."

"What do you mean?" asked Bulkington.

"There's a story behind that woman with the pig," said Indole.

"Oh no," said Bulkington.

"It's quite a good one," said Indole.

"I'm not going to stop you telling it me, am I?" said Bulkington wearily.

"No," said Indole. "Are you standing comfortably?"

"No," said Bulkington. "I'm cold and I can't feel my feet."

"Then I'll begin..."

There once was a young lad who, on his twenty-first birthday, decided that he was tired of the drudgery and grind of everyday life. He thought to himself "I'll never make my fortune here." So he gathered together all that he owned, which wasn't much, and counted out his money, which also wasn't much, and decided to walk with his dog to the nearest town, some twenty miles away, to buy a pig.

Now the road led out onto the moor. A very windswept and barren moor it was, jagged with gorse and heather, studded with rocks and pockmarked with bogs. It was a gruelling journey, but the lad was strong and kept going through the day until, just as night was drawing in, he came across a wall stretching as far as the eye could see, of large white bricks, amazingly even and smooth. The only way over this wall was a stile, which the lad and his dog climbed over. Once over, they kept going on through the night, though the rain lashed and the tormented air howled over the wasteland. It was as though the elements had spirits, as though the inanimate world could speak, and when it spoke, it roared. The lad was aware for the first time that he was very small, that the world was very big, and that most of it was powerful and angry. These tempestuous thoughts remained with the lad until the spiteful night grew still, the wind dropped, the moon grew wan and the birds started to chorus.

As the sun rose and reflected dull orange from the puddle strewn path, the lad finally caught sight of the town. The buildings stood in stark rows, magnificent in a way, yet frightening. The lad walked through the town and eventually came to the market, where he bought the pig from a gnarled old woman with eyes that saw right through him.

"It's a good pig," said the old woman. "But lazy as the proverbial."

So the lad paid the woman nearly all he had and left the town with the pig and his dog. It was slow going, for the lad had to nudge the pig on every hundred yards or so. After a long and arduous trek, the lad came to the wall and the stile, which he made to climb. Yet when he was half over he looked down and saw the pig sat in the mud, looking at him.

"Come on, over the stile, pig, so I can get off home," said the lad.

The pig sat obstinately and closed its eyes.

The lad sighed. Suddenly he realised how tired he was, but he was still a long way from home. He climbed down the stile and tried to nudge the pig with his foot, but it was snoring lightly and only grunted in response. Then the lad turned to his dog.

"Dog, bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

The dog lay down on its front paws and regarded him with baleful eyes. It did not look like it was going to bite the pig.

The lad was annoyed. He looked about, whereupon he saw a stick.

"Stick, poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

The stick just lay there. If it could have shook its head it would have.

Now the boy was furious, and the night was drawing in again, so he built a fire. When it was crackling away and throwing sparks into the blue-black sky, he addressed it in as authoritative voice as possible:

"Fire, burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb the stile, so I can go home."

The fire, however, remained happy to blaze away merrily as it was.

Now the lad was really mad, so he screamed at the sky:

"Sky, make it rain, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb the stile, so I can go home."

As if on cue, it started to rain again. The fire burnt just as it had done before, only now the lad was soaked through. He gnashed his teeth in fury. Out of his bag he pulled a tent and set it on the floor.

"Tent, scatter the rain, so it'll rain harder, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

The tent lay unmoved. Reluctantly, the lad set up the tent, crawled inside and fell fast asleep.

The next morning, the rain had stopped, though the wind was still high and howled against the tent. The lad sat up, rubbed his eyes and thought how far away from home he was. He shuffled out of the tent and into the pale sunlight, where he could still see the pig asleep by the stile. He threw a pebble at it but it didn't even flinch.

"Stupid pig," he said. "Now I'm starving. I'll have to walk back to the town and get some food, then I'll be back and I'll get you to climb the stile, so I can go home."

So the lad walked back to the town, bought some food with what little money he had left and returned to the stile. The pig opened one eye and watched him languidly as he returned, before drifting off to sleep once more.

"Pig, climb over the stile, so I can go home."

The pig didn't move.

"Dog, bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

Nothing.

"Stick, poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

There was absolutely no response from the stick.

"Fire, burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

The fire was remarkably unperturbed.

"Sky, make it rain, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb the stile, so I can go home."

Obligingly, the sky started to rain, and once more the lad was miserably wet. He took out the tent.

"Tent, scatter the rain, so it'll rain harder, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

He set up the tent. Still angry but very tired, he climbed inside and quickly went to sleep.

The lad got up the next morning and found the pig just as sessile as it had been the day before. Despairing, he walked to the town and earned a little money by helping the old woman from whom he had bought the pig to carry some of her produce to market.

"I told you it is a very lazy pig," said the woman, when he told her about it. She smiled. "A good buy, I think you'll agree though, when you get home."

The lad was puzzled at the woman with the smile and the vast eyes, but he said his thanks and walked on. He bought some food, lingering in the market where there were people and the bustle of life. Every moment he spent here made the desolation of the moorland seem all the more pronounced. At last, he felt he could linger no longer, for the night would soon be drawing in, so he walked back out into the wilderness.

"Pig, climb over the stile."

Of course, there was no response.

So the lad kept up the routine, day after day, night after night, cursing the stubborn pig and longing every minute to go home. After a week or so, the old woman at the market gave him a job, and though the pay wasn't good he had enough to keep him in food. He would return, irritable and with aching legs, to the tent which wouldn't scatter the rain, which wouldn't dampen the fire, which wouldn't burn the stick, which wouldn't poke the dog, which wouldn't bite the pig, which wouldn't jump over the stile, so he could go home; he would return and go through the same rigmarole again, without success.

The seasons passed, and summer chased winter, chased summer, until one day, when he was in the town he met a girl about his age and with long, oaken hair. She smiled and he smiled back, and before he knew it they were talking together about anything that came into their heads. As the night drew on, the lad tore himself away and returned to the moor, where the pig lounged and refused, again, to climb over the stile.

How fast is a year? How fast are ten? To the lad they seemed long in the making and so ephemerally short in the recalling. A decade had gone by, and the lad was a man. He had kept up his trudge to the town and back every morning and every evening for those long years, and still the pig was just as immobile. When he got to the town on the first day of the tenth year, the girl, who he had been seeing for all this time, who was now a woman, was angry with him.

"You always disappear every night. What is more important than being with me?"

So that night the man took the woman back to the stile and showed her the pig, the dog, the stick, the fire, the sky and the tent. By morning she was happy, and she told the man:

"I will walk with you back to the town to work every day, and then return with you every night."

And so it was.

The years made their slow dash by, falling and melting away like the winter snow, evaporating like the summer rain. Every night the man returned to the stile and tried every which way to get the pig to climb over, always finishing with the same old monologue. The dog whelped and soon one of its pups followed the man and the woman back and forth to the town. With every day the pair grew in wisdom and understanding, until eventually one morning the sun rose and they realised that they were old. The man let his beard grow long and the woman acquired eyes with depth.

Though he was happy, the man couldn't help but grow grumpy every time he came back and the pig, seemingly unaged, was still happy asleep in the mud. He would say to it:

"Pig, climb over the stile, so I can go home."

And then to the dog:

"Dog, bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

And to the stick:

"Stick, poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

And to the fire:

"Fire, burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

And to the sky:

"Sky, make it rain, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb the stile, so I can go home."

And to his tent:

"Tent, scatter the rain, so it'll rain harder, so it'll dampen the fire, so it'll burn the stick, so it'll poke the dog, so he'll bite the pig, so it'll climb over the stile, so I can go home."

Finally, he said to his wife:

"Let's sleep, for tomorrow, who knows? Maybe the pig will climb over the stile."

On his ninetieth birthday, the old man and his wife returned from the town, tired and feeling the chill of the wind and the weight of their years. They came to the stile and the man started to say:

"Pig, climb over the stile, so..."

But then he stopped, because the pig wasn't there. He looked around, panic suddenly gripping him, feeling lost and bewildered, casting about for any clue of the pig's whereabouts. The pig was not to be seen. However, there were trotter marks in the mud that led up to the wall, and, daubed in charcoal from the fire, in shaky but legible handwriting, there was written:

"You are home."

The old man, needless to say, was furious. His wife tried hard not to laugh too much. They lit the fire and pitched the tent, and went to sleep.

So it was that the old man passed away, leaving the old woman alone with the dog, the stick, the fire, the sky and the tent. She walked back to the town, bought a pig with all the money she had, and set up a market stall.

"Sentimental rubbish," said Bulkington. "And probably untrue. I very much doubt pigs can write."

"You would have said that about toads a couple of weeks ago. Anyway, the point is that first impressions can be deceiving. There's stories lurking everywhere - it's just that there's only so many pages that people can be bothered reading."

Bulkington shook his head and they carried on walking. Indole found a corner of the market where he sat down and made a pathetic fire out of some straw from the stable and a few pieces of rubbish that were lying around. He took the empty can of beans from his bag, filled it from a horse trough and set it on top of the fire.

"What about the cholera?" asked Bulkington.

"Trick is to boil the water first," said Indole. "You know how long it took people to figure that out?"

"How long?"

"Not very long. It's just that they invented beer first and ignorance of germ theory was a convenient excuse for inebriation. I should have a tasty bit of cabbage, sprout and very dilute rancid bean juice soup ready in a few minutes once the water's boiled. If that doesn't trigger my flatulence I don't know what will."
Chapter 13 - Round and About

Following breakfast, Indole and Bulkington's thoughts turned to their next meal.

"Can't we sell some spoons or something?" asked Bulkington.

"Not much demand for spoons when there's nothing to eat with them," said Indole.

"Then what are we going to do?"

"Walk this way, that's what we're going to do. Come on."

Without further explanation Indole led Bulkington through the streets, out of town and up onto the surrounding moors. After half an hour they came to a large cliff. It looked as though the land had been ripped in two, one part moving up and the other part staying where it was.

"There was an earthquake a few years back," said Indole. "When it was over this cliff was here."

"And how does that help us?"

"There's stuff in the cliff from long ages past. The rain washes it down. All you have to do is walk along and pick up the useful looking stuff and then haul it back to town to trade for a cabbage or two."

Bulkington looked at the floor. There, scattered in layers were the paraphernalia of a forgotten era, objects that seemed to have long ago sprung forth from the ground like so many species of wayside plant - for how else could such a diversity of trinkets be made? He nudged a stapler with his foot and wondered what the hell it was for; he kicked a long-dead television and succeeded only in knocking it onto its side; he sought meaning in an array of garden gnomes; he looked for the divine creative spirit in a toasted sandwich maker that would never again make a toasted sandwich. There was novelty here in everything and anonymity at the same time. He learnt a lot about the forgotten era and that was that there was a lot to forget.

All of a sudden, Indole stooped down and, with the spark of interest in his eyes, nudged a piece of half-rusted metal with spongy black stuff on the edges.

"What is it?" said Bulkington.

"Don't know. Funny shape."

"What do you think it was used for?"

Indole waved his arms meaningfully. "I see people travelling over the land at amazing speeds, seeking out new corners of the globe, hauling great loads..."

"I don't think so," said Bulkington.

Indole scowled, then waved his hand again. "Okay then, I see people building huge contraptions, artful fabrications to do the work of a thousand men, monsters of mechanics to harness wind and rain and..."

"Not very likely," said Bulkington.

This time Indole shrugged. "I see a rusted piece of metal with spongy black stuff on the edges then. What shall we call it?"

"Don't know," said Bulkington. "It's sort of round."

"That's it then: a round."

"Do you think many people would be interested it swapping a cabbage for a round?"

"Probably not."

"Shall we leave it on the floor?"

"Go on then."

So Bulkington and Indole walked away from the round, rusty piece of metal and scrabbled about a bit at the foot of the cliff. They found the cable for an old smart phone charger, brought it back to town and, with a few tea towels thrown in, swapped it for a cabbage. The cabbage vendor used it as a belt.
Chapter 14 - How The Hills Began To Howl

"Did you know that there's a huge crater in the middle of town?" Bulkington asked Indole as they ate their sautéed cabbage sitting on a piece of waste ground at the edge of Avaciggy. Once there had been a building here; then there had been a pile of rubble; now the rubble had been used to build other unambitious things. There was now only a patch of scrubland covered in more or less noxious weeds. The fire, made from thistles, smouldered woozily and the smell of burnt greenery filled the air.

"Oh yes," said Indole, chewing thoughtfully. "That's where part of the sky fell down. Everyone knows that."

"I didn't," replied Bulkington.

"Well you do now. Quite a legend around the whole thing."

"Another story?"

"Worse," said Indole. "An epic poem."

Bulkington groaned. "Surely not."

"Sorry," said Indole. He cleared his throat. Clearly there was no stopping him.

Never so terrible a tale there was;

How the hills began to howl

A grin was on the verdant slopes,

Yet on the sky a scowl

The scowling sky, it grimaced low,

And scoured the hills with rain,

Yet rambling rills did swiftly flow,

And made them dry again

Ever a frown was borne aloft,

On gunmetal clouds of grey,

A fleet diffuse and lightning quick,

Lit up the night like day

Bright day was ever turned to night;

Dread elements in array,

Dressed in clouds of thund'rous smoke,

Spun fast like potters clay

The whirlwinds ate into the earth,

And threw sharp thunder down,

But the hills were made of granite strong,

Deep roots in iron ground

Hail fell thick upon the hills;

the meadows ached with ice

'Til sunlight's fire came to their aid,

to ward off Winter's vice

The sky thought dark and low, its brow

Creased in vales of cloud;

It thought of a creature swift and sly,

As strong as it was proud

The sky made red the mottled moon,

The twilight turned to blood;

Out from dust was born mankind,

The evil and the good

The evil cursed up to the sky,

The good a prayer proclaimed,

With different words they told in verse,

One thing and the same

The thought from them was borne aloft,

So simple and so plain;

That high evil thinks it's good

And good takes evil's name

There began a bitter war of words,

A war of heart and mind;

And where a heart could only lose,

Crosshairs could surely find

To plant a cross takes fertile land,

Ploughed deep with blood and lime

To make a wreath takes craftsmanship,

A bomb the production line

Quick it was, for the hills to howl,

A firebrand cloud and flash;

Five thousand years of artifice

Laid low in a bed of ash

So drear it was, the howling trill,

The poison rains that choked the rill,

Roots, pigeons, rats and all that's ill,

Were all that lived, alone to grieve

Nothing remained,

Save Mada and Eve

Nothing could grow,

Nothing could breathe

So think of wind when you eat your sprouts,

And hail unto the wasteland's shouts

An empty slate, a piece of chalk

An ever longer road to walk

A crater fount, a town forlorn,

Built upon this frazzled gorse,

A cliff from fossil ages torn

Speaks one fossil word: Remorse

"That was the condensed version," said Indole. "Count yourself lucky."
Chapter 15 - The Library

After his attempt at poetry Indole decided to show Bulkington the town library, reasoning that he had spent most of his life staring at books so he should be at least a bit interested. Bulkington followed, harbouring a hope that the library would have central heating of some kind and a place to sit and doze. He pictured a grand building, a true seat of learning in a neo-classical design, shelf after shelf of aged volumes with the smell of old vellum wafting in the air...

In fact, Bulkington found that the library was a small tent, inside which sat a woman with dark clothes in the stereotyped style of a fortune teller, her face all dark eye-shadow and swarthy skin, a pair of bangle earrings hanging down to her shoulders.

"This is the library?" asked Bulkington.

"Welcome," said the woman, who, Bulkington guessed, must be the librarian. She held out her hand and Indole placed a shiny spoon in it.

"Where's all the books?" asked Bulkington, peering over Indole's shoulder.

Indole turned and scowled. "You're ruining the effect," he said.

The librarian motioned to a small rectangular shape on the table next to her.

"That's it?" said Bulkington.

"Quiet," said Indole. "She's about to start."

The librarian closed her eyes, a look of concentration on her face. "Bloody Thing, It Has Run Out Of Batteries," she said.

"What does that mean?" asked Bulkington.

"Nobody knows," said Indole. "Quiet now, here comes the next bit."

The librarian continued, "It's Not As Good As A Proper Book, It Doesn't Smell The Same."

Indole and Bulkington waited silently.

"Despite What They Say It's Not As Easy To Read In Bright Sunshine."

There was another pause.

"Saying That, It Is Very Convenient For Travelling."

Indole bowed respectfully to the librarian. "And that," he said to Bulkington, "is a library. Good eh?"
Chapter 16 - Donkey Oaty

They left the tent and Bulkington conveyed his disappointment to Indole by a silence, which Indole ignored. As the day wore into night the sky grew sullen; the dusk light seemed to filter through an ever-thickening layer of bubonic cloud that smouldered above. The birds had started their evening chorus halfway through the afternoon and then given up, thinking it better to find some cranny in the rocks where they could avoid getting struck by lightning. The first thunder made the ground shudder and the residents of Avaciggy followed suit, barring shutters, tying down pigs and pulling tarpaulin over their sprout patches.

Indole and Bulkington watched as doors slammed and chimneys started to smoke. There was little comfort, it was true, in Avaciggy, but a warm fire and a roof could make that little seem a lot. Nothing separated Indole and Bulkington from the rain that started to patter, then shower, then hammer: here was misery, unroofed. The streets became saturated with water and really did seem to take on some new life, gutters forming unbidden at the sides of the curbs and channelling water downhill, towards the centre of town. Indole and Bulkington followed the flow and by early morning, just before dawn, they stood staring unhappily as the central crater filled with water.

"Look, it's got a shopping trolley in it already," said Bulkington. "There wasn't even a pond there a minute ago."

"People make a bloody great crater and then nature somehow finds a way to turn it into a water feature," said Indole. "That says a lot."

Bulkington looked down into the rain-lashed water and saw the reflection of the stars and the moon, fragmented and turbulent under the downpour.

"What do you think the future holds?" asked Bulkington.

Indole shook his head sadly. "You know how people used to try and answer that question?" he said. "They looked up to the night sky. They charted the heavens and thought that that would give them the map of fate."

Bulkington shrugged. "So what?"

"So now people aren't looking up to the sky anymore, they're looking down. They're looking at the surface of that pond and seeing a reflection battered and torn by rain they can't even see. So what does the future hold? I don't know. Winter, rain, roots, rats, wolves probably."

Indole paused, and then continued suddenly, "You know what the first book was that I tried to get to grips with after I left the monastery?"

Bulkington squinted through the rain. "Surprise me."

"Donkey oaty," said Indole. "Stupid name, I know. Have you ever heard of it?"

"It's not by the Scurrilous Sages so no. I thought you said you couldn't read?"

"I can't," said Indole. He rummaged in his bag and pulled out a battered looking walkman. "Talking book, you see? An ingenious invention of a past age."

Bulkington looked unimpressed. "So you listened to this book."

"Yeah, Donkey oaty - you know how it ends?"

"No."

"Nor do I," said Indole. "The book player thing conked out after the first few chapters. But I think I would have smashed the thing anyway. It made me feel incredibly unhappy."

"Sounds like an uplifting book."

"It was a masterpiece. But do you know what the most interesting bit was?"

"What?" asked Bulkington.

"It was the introduction, about Cervantes, the guy who wrote it. His life was even worse than the character in the book. He was poor as hell. He killed some sheriff, apparently in self-defence, so he was condemned to have one of his hands lopped off. Understandably he legged it and joined the army, where he got shot in the chest and had his hand mutilated anyway. Then he got caught by the enemy and spent most of the rest his life locked up with barely enough money to afford the paper he wrote on. Yet he still wrote this amazing book. Sometimes, just sometimes, we don't make the crater. Sometimes the crater makes us."

Bulkington shook his head. He looked at the pond and the shopping trolley. Then he looked at Indole with a peculiar look of concentration. "You know this reminds me of the Text Of The Scurrilous, Verse 3:

And verily men shall go forth unto the wasteland

and they shall look around the wasteland and say:

"Here is desolation: I shall plant a vine and a grain,

so that in future days I shall be merry and rotund."

And yea the vine and the grain did bear fruit

and they were merry and rotund."

Indole raised an eyebrow. "That came out of the blue," he said. "Very profound though. It almost reminds me of The Rubaiyat of The Beer Monster, Verse 11:

Men shall speak with profundity on many things,

and then promptly forget what it was they were talking about;

yet the next morning, oh how they shall remember."

"Indeed," said Bulkington. "Very true. Which reminds me of the Scurillous Sage's sayings on truth in the Eclogues of The Unkempt, Verse 8:

Truth is beauty.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

No wonder people with ugly girlfriends have to lie to them so much."

"Quite," said Indole, a look of extreme concentration on his face. "You know, this rain reminds me of Deluge Verse 1:

The skies did pour forth a deluge upon the Earth

and then it became a river;

then it rained a bit more

and lo it did become a lake;

yea, it did rain until there was no water left in the sky

and the Earth did become a Sea.

Then The Scurrilous Sages turned everything upside down,

and lo, it did start raining again."

Indole paused. "Did you just hear a ribbet?"

"What?" said Bulkington.

"A ribbet. I'm sure I just heard a..."

"Ribbet."

"You did that very well," said Bulkington.

"That wasn't me," said Indole.

Then something made them look up. At that point Indole Flux was hit square on the forehead by something large and green, whereupon he sank to the ground senseless.
Chapter 17 - Chorus

When Indole woke up Bulkington was standing over him looking worried, although Indole didn't even notice him. His attention was entirely absorbed by a squat, bulbous form on the ground. There, on the rain-soaked grass, eying them both with a nonchalant look was a huge toad. Indole got to his feet and brushed himself off. He walked over to the amphibian.

"Two warts over its left eye. A dark streak down its back. A toe missing on its right foot. It can't be..."

Bulkington watched as Indole peered closely at the toad. The rain was still sheeting down and the wind whipped at Indole's clothing.

"I thought that you had hopped off a long time ago," said Indole. "Where did you come from?"

The toad opened it's mouth and let forth a gargling sound. Indole swallowed down his nausea and then looked oddly entranced.

Yea, long through the desert I have travelled

scorned by the very stones and the dust.

Yet if out of stones and dust life was once made

out of them a life can yet be made again.

"How did you get here?"

The heavens did seethe with tempest,

the winds howled with fury;

a great column descended from on high

and did do many wrathful things.

"Why did you come back?"

Why the hell not?

Indole grinned. "Oh well, as good a reason as any I suppose. I have the wisdom of the Scurrilous Sages with me once more. You know, maybe now things are looking up."

"Speaking of which," said Bulkington, "I think we should shelter under that tree."

"Why, it's only a bit of rain..."

There was a chorus of ribbeting. The moon disappeared. There was a rumble from on high. And then, in a chaos of green slime and webbed feet, thousands upon thousands of Collywobbler Toads began to rain down on Indole and Bulkington, knocking them off their feet. They crawled under the tree.

Disturbed by a ribbeting coming from their rooftops, the people of Avaciggy filtered out into the pale half-light and surveyed the scene with a mixture of curiosity and mistrust. There, littering the ground was a layer of toads, scrambling desperately over each other to hop down into the safety of the pond.

Bulkington stood up. "Oh dear," he said. "The sun's almost up. The toads will start their dawn chorus any second."

"So?" said Indole. "What's a bit of nausea?"

Bulkington motioned towards the people who stood blinking in the pre-dawn light. "Lets just say there are going to be some very well-read people by the end of this morning."

"A bit of reading never did anyone any harm," said Indole. He smiled, picked up a branch from off the floor and pointed to the shopping trolley. "The future starts today," he said. "It's not the Paperbark Forests but it'll do. Go on, row out into the middle. That way you won't miss a single ribbet."

Bulkington looked at Indole.

"Don't just stand there," Indole said.

Bulkington shrugged, took the piece of wood and walked over to the shopping trolley. Cautiously he clambered on and pushed himself out, punting along with the branch. As the first rays of dawn crept over the horizon, Bulkington Azimuth was sat in the middle of the pond with a look of zen-like calm on his face.

There was a burp.

There was a ribbet.

There was an indescribable gelatinous sound.

And then the pond erupted in the most hideous croaking chorus that could be imagined.

Bulkington loved to read.
Chapter 18 - The Last Page

As the chorus finished there was a moment's silence. Then the crowd around the pond started talking - and highbrow talk it was too.

Indole stepped forward to the edge of the water. "You figured out the riddle of the spoon yet?"

Bulkington reached into his pocket and took out the spoon. He looked at the concave surface of the metal. Then he smiled.

"I think I've got it," he said.

"Oh," said Indole. "Go on, do tell."

Bulkington looked at his reflection in the spoon. "All I had to do was look. The most magical thing about the spoon," he said, "is me."

"Excuse me while I vomit," said Indole. "You haven't learnt anything, have you? You're looking at the wrong surface."

Bulkington turned the spoon round. "I don't get it," he said, looking at a very small reflection of himself.

"You're still looking at the wrong surface," said Indole.

Again, Bulkington turned the spoon round and stared back at himself magnified in the silvery metal.

"You really don't get it, do you?" said Indole.

Bulkington looked annoyed. "I'm tired of this semi-mystical bunkum," he said. "You know what? I'm going to bag a toad, walk back to the monastery and then I won't have to worry about wolves or crazy cutlery salesmen for the rest of my life."

Indole watched as Bulkington punted back to the edge of the pond. Now it was his turn to shrug. "I suppose," he said quietly to himself, "that you would say that. But then you can't really see the other surface of the spoon, can you? It's pretty frightening, that other surface. Because in it are the sky, the ground and lots and lots of people. Not magic, perhaps, but very close."

Indole picked up his toad, slung his bag over his shoulder and trudged out towards the edge of town. Bulkington, wet, cold and miserable, picked up a toad. It looked him square in the eye and then let out a long, sustained burp. In Bulkington's mind, there materialised a series of words:

A man sees in the world

a hundred reflections of his own foolishness;

yet the world, in its wisdom,

sees only one fool.

He scowled and made to walk off towards the distant, cold, austere monastery. Only, when he had taken a few paces, something made him stop. He found a smile creeping onto his face and he turned to Indole.

"I may not know the answer to the riddle of the spoon," he said.

"Eh?" said Indole, cosseting his toad. "What's that?"

"I may not know the answer to the riddle of the spoon," repeated Bulkington, "but I don't think you know the answer to the riddle of the toad."

"I don't?" said Indole, not quite knowing what else to say. Bulkington's expression was unnerving.

"No," said Bulkington. "You see, reading shouldn't be about nausea. It shouldn't be about sitting there feeling sick and letting something else do all the work."

"That's the way it works," said Indole.

"Not any more," said Bulkington. "Not for me. My toad's gone."

"Your loss," said Indole.

"Not necessarily," said Bulkington. "You see, now I'm going to learn to read. Properly."

Indole laughed. "Impossible. Next you'll be saying you've come up with a use for the round."

"You watch me," said Bulkington.

"No thanks," said Indole sadly. "I've got my own future to keep my eye out for."

"It doesn't have to be like that," said Bulkington.

"But it probably will be like that anyway," said Indole, "just to be spiteful."

"Well, I'm going to at least make the effort," said Bulkington.

Indole laughed. "You've got spirit after all, more so than creme-de-menthe even. Good luck."

"I might need it"," said Bulkington, thinking of the abbot and excommunication.

"Go on," said Indole looking miserable. "It's been nice knowing you. We might meet again sometime."

Bulkington smiled again, a smile that struggled against the cold. "You never know," he said. "I'll think of you when I eat my gruel. And when I read."

Indole smiled back, "Go on," he said.

Bulkington put his hand on his shoulder. They stared at each other for a few seconds, then Bulkington turned and set off in silence.

"You'll be alright," said Indole to himself as Bulkington faded into the distance. "You can think for yourself."

He stared at the horizon for a few moments, lost in thought. The wind was biting, the sunlight scarce, and his eyes stung with the years. He didn't know how to describe the emptiness. Of course, when he turned round to pick up his toad, there was only a patch of withered, wind-blasted gorse. For a moment, he felt an odd kind of happiness.

Chapter 19 - The Lay of The Last Wastrel

An Epic Poem

Introduction

To drink the black and chase the damp

Low on the hills there burned a lamp;

A single dour tallow lantern,

Lit in shades the Hogshead Tavern.

A rookery or castle keep,

May hold a king or knave in sleep;

Yet draughted here with copper coin,

The beer could wake and sleep conjoin.

A shadow settles in a glass

And back and forth the shadows pass;

To beat the time with every mite

Of hourglass dust and faltering light

All balanced folk of goodly mould

Had long since heard their bar tab told

Yet left to eke the gritty drops,

One red-cheeked sot still praised the hops.

"As good a brew this Hogshead ale,

As one that e'er deserved a tale;

So trip up close ye gangled spider,

Ye mouse drunk on the dregs of cider

And listen sharp to what I tell-

'Tis the Lay of The Last Wastrel!"

Canto First

At first were two words: "Eh?" and "What?"

And out of dark there sprung a dot.

Out from the dot there scribed a line

And this was stretched across in time.

The line became a sheet of cloth,

The Fates wove tales of peace and wrath,

And of the sheet sprang forth a world,

Where many dots, lines, sheets unfurled.

When two cruel lines did chance to cross,

A hope was born from mighty loss;

The hope that earthly dots would see

How fluent this blank sheet could be.

Yet something on the page did draw

And men once more began to fall

All charmed towards a central dot

That bore the graven name: "Full Stop".

(There was a flash.)

Canto Second

Newly drawn from radiant gamma;

A line began with ad-hoc grammar;

They roistered 'cross the wasteland's pages,

And hence was scribed the Book of Sages.

They looked about and in one breath,

Roared "OMG" and "WTF?"

"How have these hillsides sunk so low?

Wherefore shall we play the polo?"

From this began the first brave quest

For polo grounds on which to test

Skill with mallet and with rein,

A goodly pitch on which to train.

To heavens drear stretched rugged ling,

The rain did sheet, the wind did sting,

Yet still the sages toiled away,

And oiled their mallets twice a day.

With spades they moved the rock and dirt,

The fossils and the hallowed chert,

Until the pitch was flush and true

And but one thing was left to do.

"Up with the nets and shoe the horses!

Muster all your polo forces!"

The sages cheered and grabbed their steeds,

And on the pitch did derring deeds.

The turf was churned with iron hooves,

The ball rolled over ragged grooves;

Points were scored, the audience roared:

"Glory to the polo horde!"

At full-time's blast the sages slept

Not much for was their one precept:

"While proud the moon shines in yon sky,

We'll drink moonshine till we're pye-eyed!"

This blessèd revel lasted long,

All red-wine cheeked and full of song,

Until one chilblained winter morn,

Their vigil was from polo torn.

On rime-dressed bank of frozen brook,

Stood fast with her shepherd's crook,

A shepherdess in sunlight's glow

Arrayed, her cheeks as pale as snow.

Her tresses were of golden hue,

Her eyes looked not upon but through

The polo horde assembled there

On their rutted polo square.

(The maid lifted her hand and pointed to a tall hill.)

"Four years and twenty I did roam

And call that craggy mound my home;

Yet, highest of the Howling Hills

That peak with all its ice-locked rills

Has no name of which to speak.

I tell you if this hand you seek

Call forth the name of yonder brow."

The merry knights of polo fame

Stopped at once their polo game;

With clash of spurs they made dismount

And to the hill gazed adamant.

A silence passed as tense and taut

As e'er a battlefield was fraught,

Until at last a noble lord

Stepped forth from 'mongst the polo horde.

"Why, fair maid, that high hill yonder

Has no name, for we did wander

For many a mile naming all we saw

But that good fell we left uncalled."

The shepherdess took up her crook,

And in the frost beside the brook,

Drew bold and deep a single line

And, stepping back, spoke her design:

"None shall cross this boundary

Until they apt a name decree,

For the hill on which my flock reside,

Must have name 'fore eventide."

Mute as one the sages sought

That wisdom-steeped elusive thought,

That wind-blown name to call the mount

From inspiration's crystal fount.

Then one bright armoured, hill-strong buck

From off his horse his claymore took,

And raising it to the mountain's heights,

Looked down the blade as an archer sights.

"It seems to me fair yonder fell

Has many a glorious name to tell;

It speaks of battles fought and won,

On ling-bound slopes of purpled dun;

It tells of castles and of rooks,

Of gibbet trees and cheated crooks;

Of might and mien; of all between

The sky and earth, and arts unseen;

It tells of honour and of strength

In sagas of an epic length;

But a name can be but one thing cried,

And that one thing forsooth is 'Pride.'"

The maiden smiled but shook her locks,

Gazed past the sword unto her flocks

That grazed on distant climb,

And with a soft yet hardy voice

Rebuked the knight upon his choice:

"Your hearty guess, beats out of time."

There was a pause and the kestrel's greet

Was a single dot on an empty sheet

Of air that howled, as though to prove

A leveret's warning, as the kestrel dove.

Then from amongst the gathered men,

Stood another knight to ken;

His whipcord face well showed his steel,

Swiftly moved, and slow to heel;

A man of bullet quick resolve

A swifter hawk there never dove.

He squinted 'gainst the sunlit glare

And threw his words to wintry air:

"The hare runs swift beside the burns,

The lordly stag his horned head turns,

Both fell-run by the hunter chased,

For sure the good hill's name is 'Haste.'"

At this the shepherdess paused a breath,

Then with the crook she scored the heath.

"No wisdom in the name you speak,

For slow as stone is that weathered peak

The true name is buried 'neath the moss,

Find that truth for this line to cross."

The sun, now high and bright ahead

Set aflame the hare's last tread;

With coal-black eyes the kestrel met,

The glassy eyes of the leveret.

Then spoke a knight with bullish breath,

And beat his ale-horn to his chest;

Strong he was, as a barrel of oak,

Brave as wasps who in th'ullage soak.

His hair burned with the fiery shades

Of dreadlocked auburn, held in braids;

His cheeks were of a ruddy glow

Much known to strength and drowned sorrow.

When he spoke it seemed the peat

Tolled the words from under feet;

For his voice had battle braved;

Its clarion tune could not be stayed.

"The clouds merge with the stony top

Of Olympian ridge and staunch outcrop;

There is a name would reach that height,

Surely that hill's name is 'Might.'"

The pastor girl stood furrow-browed

For such furrows e'er reflect the proud,

Hasty and even men of might,

And the furrows stay when those things take flight.

Striking her staff on iron ground

The shepherdess did thus expound:

"Yon hill stands fast, its high-held hackle

Has suffered many a lightning crackle

Many a wind-lashed day and night,

And dry, scorched summer with the sun full bright

There is but one name to reach its tip

That storm-proved name must be 'Hardship.'"

Each sage cast eyes one to another,

And glassy-eyed they saw no further,

Then turned back to the wise-woman

But though her breath hung still, her form was gone.

Canto Third

On his throne of well-smoked oak,

Soliloquised the minstrel soak,

He raised his eye from the gnarlèd table,

"My God!" he slurred, "it's turned into a fable!"

"No fables in here mate," said the barman.

"Sorry," said the wastrel bard,

And fell asleep on his tankard.

Yet though his eyes closed 'gainst the dregs

On the table danced eight drunk legs;

A spider reeled and jittered near

And whispered a canto in the wastrel's ear.

Canto Fourth

In sage days cold the air hangs still;

Sagacity, that heartfelt chill

Is there amongst the fens;

It stalks with hart and hare alike;

It shakes with every lightning strike;

Each fearful step from nature's psych;

It measures by the foot.

The skies hiss cold and hard with rain,

The rattled moon keeps ghostly train;

A half-shade foil to the paling sun,

It marks its course, and Winter's run.

Yet through all the cloudbanks' churning,

There is no sign of season turning,

No warming sunlight on the heath,

No leaves for harts to test their teeth.

In Winter's grasp the hills are fast,

Cold, grey, still as the printer's cast;

In capitals strong, this stark grammarye

Spells sage and bitter one grim reverie:

"Why does the sky the sun forgo?

There's scarcely light to play the polo!"

The sages keened unto the skies,

And the heavens hailed upon their cries;

For far away from cheerless weather,

The distant sun shone on the heather;

Far south in water, mire and moss,

Out over many a slough and fosse

There lit in dulcet springtime's glint

A polo pitch of lustrous tint.

As one the sages took to horse,

And out they rode across the gorse;

They ploughed the sleet-mired ground of snow

Each hoof cleft coarse the ling below.

All through the boiling clouds of night,

Right to the half-froze daytime light

The sages drove their horses forth

Over the ice-wrought iron earth.

They pounded over streams and fens,

Beat hard the roofs of foxes' dens,

O'er tumbled stones of country kirk,

Through lych-gates half lost in the murk.

Never was there so fleet a sprite,

Nor wraith-like wisp of fire-damp light,

No shooting spark upon dark heavens

Nor flitting bat that turns and leavens;

Ne'er did man reck one so swift

As a polo-crazed sage atop the drift.

Eight days their horses champed, foamed, sped,

Their haunches steamed, their eyes ringed red,

'Til on the ninth appeared o'er brow

A troubled mire in morning's glow;

No pitch was this, but black as tar

No meadows green seen from afar.

The pool cast back a spectral light,

Mirror'd hills to seem lush and bright;

Yet here was a hollow of ungodly vapour

Where witchery trees turned sunlight to paper.

Many a thriller was cast to the wind;

A religious polemic announced "We Have Sinned."

Yesterday's news was blown on the breeze

A hundred best-sellers took flight from the trees.

The sages stared out at this vegetable lexis,

This ponderous, eloquent xylogenesis;

They looked at the letters arrayed on the breeze

And scratched their heads, for not one could read.

Downhearted, the lode of their old polo field,

Seemed a magnet to draw to their own homely weald;

Yet just as they hurried their horses to leave,

Out hopped a bull-toad with a ribbeting heave.

As sunlight unravelled over the mire,

The toad opened its mouth and recited a quire

Of elegant verse so stately and true

That the oil-black waters seemed to take on the hue

Of amber and gold in exquisite brocade

Woven with agate and with chrysoprase.

Ream after ream of deciduous rhyme

Blew past the toads where they sculled through the slime;

They belched and they gulped out a thousand refrains

Like the rumble of thunder that ushers the rains.

Yet though the bardic toads did chunter

And rhymes full tore the gloom asunder;

Despite the wisdom hewn of lyric

A curse came with this panegyric:

With each new verse there rose an ague,

Churning foul each sage's stomach,

Making seem each lowly hummock

A fleapit full of plague.

A knight of highest polo fame-

Galbanum was this noble's name-

This lord of stealth and argent steel,

As loyal to his master's seal

As list-proved champions brave,

Crept up unto the nearest toad

Which not the slightest interest showed

And sought its song to stave.

Yet as Galbanum drew his knife,

The toad at last perceived the strife;

It quickly scanned a canny line,

A cobbled block of foot and sign,

And with a belching, metric flow

Spake a shield to stop the blow:

"It was before the lime-slaked fossils,

When flagellates were the lone apostles

Of a churchyard sea awash with life,

Newly forged and not yet rife,

But sparsely spread upon the deep

In pseudopods that snake and creep;

It was in times of ancient power

That there were forms most grim and dour

Who sought advantage in the gain

Of causing protoplasmic pain;

When first the movement of the tide

Was a tolling bell to chide

Those chronic marks on the sublime.

So it was that the sea kept score

And equity was first ashore.

So let this simple chime rang true:

Suffer the meek, lest the tide turn on you!"

Canto Fifth

Amongst the beams the shadows roosted;

The minstrel was the wear'r for worsted;

His coarse cut clothes a sop for beer,

One eye cast far, the other near.

The barman mopped around his feet,

The wasted bard did low repeat:

"Suffer the tide, lest you turn meek!"

And with that he lost the will to speak.

He slept there downed upon the table,

And dreamed of lands of myth and fable,

Until he woke in pale dawn's light,

And scanned the room with double sight.

"It's all too much! Alack! Alas!

Was there not wisdom in that glass?

Did not that spider talk in rhyme?

Where went all the wasted time?"

With bloodshot eyes his focus stopped

Upon the distant countertop;

He saw a bottle yet half low

And no barman to keep it so.

In one swift move he was at feet,

And twice as swift fell on his knees;

He crawled across the mottled floor

And at the bottle made to claw.

Three swipes it took to gain his prize;

Now on the floor the wastrel lies,

The bottle dry as island sands:

Once more he dreams of ancient lands.

Canto Sixth

Galbanum sheathed his dagger blade,

For with a swamp the toad had made

A new-cleft Hyperborea

Hewn from wretchèd nausea.

The next bold sage of steel and might,

Aloud did laugh and mock the knight:

"How sharp-tongued is your steel good squire?

As sharp as the ribbet arose from the mire?

There must be a fever aloft from this bog,

For sure it is ill to be beat by a frog!"

Galbanum bowed with mock aplomb,

And when he rose he bit his thumb.

"Sneer you may at amphibious verse,

But ask I must, which pray is the worse:

To hear and be humbled by so lowly a toad,

Or to be over-hasty with your own goad?

If you think ye immune from malarial lyric

Forgive my disdain, for I am a cynic!"

"A challenge!" cried his rival, Nystagmus by name,

A sage of good living and plentiful frame;

He drew out a broadsword and with haughty mien,

Approached the toad on its island of green.

To sky he held the glinting edge;

Extolled the time a hearty pledge

Of hatred to the slow, cold blood

That through green veins did ebb and flood.

Nystagmus was about to dart,

When with a toadish, silent art

The creature sat upon the slough

Seemed to spy him well enough.

It seemed that with each twitch and tic

That heart, though green, was full and quick,

For underneath the paper leaves

This toad-destroying Damocles

Was smitten with a verse:

"When first the trees did start to spread

Their roots through dust and ochre red;

When forest's sultry canopy

Made green the thunder-croaking sky:

When there were shapes upon the boughs

That fell and walked and took up ploughs:

When all this happ'd and man was cast

Of ochre and the acorn mast;

It was that he first learned to gib

And call this fresh-walked Earth his crib

To draw his words from tiers of rye,

To cast a newly tearless eye

On all that he surveyed:

That surely he believed was made

Some paradise amongst the sheaves

Some newfound font to pen his leaves

Of history sublime:

Yet forth from this new measured time

There marched a second measure grave

With at its head the will to stave

Those of others, to cleft and beat

And leave the birds of prey to greet

Them to the leaden clouds;

As though they found in fields of rye

And ochre some new crimson dye

To stain their hempen shrouds.

So when you seek this skull to stave

Think whether you be knight, or knave;

Though dulcet sounds the harmonium

T'is the ribbet brings encomium."

Aghast and rapt all of the same

Moment, the sage was struck as lame;

The blade fell useless from his hand

And lodged deep in the oil-black sand;

The hilt sent shadings long and low

To cast a stark sun-crossed shadow.

"What happ'd here?" enquired Galbanum,

"Forsooth in that toad's arcanum

Didst thou not shun all measly gleaning

Of subtle stress and lofty meaning?"

Mute and fast Nystagmus stood,

As a carving on the rood;

He made no sound, nor tried respond

But cast eyes down into the pond

As though fixed far away.

Although his cheeks yet bore the blood

And through his lungs still breath did flood

His soul, it seemed to stray

There was the while a lull unbroken,

And not a whispered word was spoken,

Until a weathered seneschal

Broke the hush that held them thrall

"It seems to me," he dared to quip,

"That this is meet to be hardship:

To swipe at thoughts discorporate

And suffer good Nystagmus' fate.

Yet perhaps there is a way less loth:

To use not swords but instead the cloth.

A mighty fastness we shall build,

A monast'ry with good things filled;

With learnèd texts of wisdom fine,

From subtle Nature's mind.

If there be corners of this world,

If there be parchments left unfurled,

Age-tanned maps and star-charts curled

In velum we shall bind."

Canto Seventh

The tale must here a moment halt,

Not for Inspiration's fault,

But to let the wastrel collect

His senseless form and resurrect

Once more to cold daylight.

For the wastrel, still full prone

Has been from out the tavern thrown

With all the barman's might.

With the last dregs of spirit warm,

Still moving his bedraggled form,

The wastrel marches to the drum

Of rain, and starts a song to hum;

His lips move with untimely slurs

And eulogise the final verse.

So watch the slur of thoughts unbound

And listen for the garbled sound;

Velum may hold the pages fast

But wastrels will long books outlast.

Canto Eighth

To say the sages sacked the marsh,

For sure would stand a little harsh,

But when they left the ghostly slough

They had a bag of toads in tow.

They hurdled furze in thorny pales,

O'er crested hills and pummelled dales,

With banded hooves of iron red

That caught the daylight as it fled.

A last sly dart of amber shone

All gleaming where the troop had gone

And chased them as they topped a hill,

To fire the crest with clement skill;

Whereon the final tones of dusk

Set heaving an inclement busk

Of banded croaks in synchrony

That eulogised this harmony:

"The sun had set and ris untold

For many years before the skald

Did learn to tilt his head to write

While mulling in the steeped sunlight;

To take his eye from off his quill

And set the words that echo still

In ancient lays of ogam stone

That spoke of light, yet light outshone.

It seems too wondrous far to tell

That from a stone in ocean's swell

A beach was made and on it stood

A being with breath to call it good;

Yet not alone could he now breathe

But to others could his thoughts bequeath;

He was to be the ocean's liege,

For on that beach, stood the first sage."

The sunlight died and moonlight fierce

Cast silver as the hooves did pierce

The hoary ground, set hard with frost

And rivers where the ice was crossed.

Swift they ran, the road ahead

Was like a line cast in the lead;

For they thought not to glance aside;

To glance would be to break their stride.

Had not the moonlight been so spare

They may have chanced a fleeting glare

Over heathland of a silvered-brown;

For there decked in pastoral gown

The shepherd girl stood stock.

She watched as the sages rode on clear,

Far from the unnamed hillside drear,

Where rested her good flock.

In laic mode she whispered low

Words spoke to chase, though uttered slow:

"I pray the hills remember well

As nodding monkshood bells do knell

That bitterness, the sagest taste

Has stalked diffuse across this waste

For time immemorial;

That long before the songs of man

The first primordial lines did scan

The furrowed brows of each sage clan

With fear corporeal;

So look upon the monast'ry,

Built tall from blocks of sandstone scree

And windows glazed with the true tree,

The cruciferous seal;

Look upon the subtle craft

When it stands real yet true to draft;

And think how those sage gambollers

Became a race of thoughtful scholars."

With the last line the moon dipped low

And sunrise shone across the snow;

The shepherdess walked in the rays

And gloried was the day, and sage.

