The Last Enchantment - Mary Stewart [186]
"Aye."
"Kept sheep in this valley?"
"Aye. Used to come with my brother. Then he got sold to a trader and went on a ship. I keep the sheep now. They're not mine. Master's a big man over to the hill."
"Do you remember -- " I asked it without hope; some of the saplings were surely ten years grown. "Do you remember when this landslide came? When they were rebuilding the fort, perhaps?"
A shake of the tousled head. "It's always been like this."
"No. It wasn't always like this. When I was here before, many years ago, there was a good track along the hillside here, and deep in the side of the hill, just over yonder, was an underground building. It had once been a temple. In old times the soldiers used to worship Mithras there. Have you never heard tell of it?"
Another shake.
"From your father, perhaps?"
He grinned. "Tell me who that is, I'll tell you what he said."
"Your master, then?"
"No. But if it's under there" -- a jerk of the head toward the scree -- "I know where. There's water under. Where the water is, that'll be the place, surely?"
"There was no water when I -- " I stopped. A prickling ran over my flesh, like a cold draught. "Water under where?"
"Under the stones. There. Way under. Twice a man's height, by the feel of it."
I took in the small dirty figure, the bright grey eyes, the hazel stick at his feet. "You can find water under the ground? With the hazel?"
"It's easiest wi' that. But I get the feeling sometimes, just the same, on my own."
"And metal? Is that the way you found gold here before?"
"Once. It was a nice bit of a statue or something. A dog, sort of. The master took it off me. If I found some more now I wouldn't tell him. But mostly it's copper, copper coins. Up there in the old buildings."
"I see." I was thinking that when I found the shrine it had already been a deserted ruin for a century or more. But when it was built, no doubt it would have been beside a spring. "If you will show me where the water lies below the stones, there will be silver in it for you."
He did not move. I thought he looked wary. "That's where it is, this treasure you're looking for?"
"I hope so." I smiled at him. "But it's nothing that you could find for yourself, child. It would take men with crowbars to shift those stones, and even if you led them to the place, you would get nothing of what they found. If you show me now, I promise that you will be paid."
He sat still for a moment or two, scuffling his bare feet in the dirt. Then, groping inside the skin kilt that was his only garment, he produced, flat on a dirty palm, a silver coin. "I was paid, master. There's others knew about the treasure. How was I to know it was yours? I showed them where to dig, and they lifted the stones and took the box away."
Silence. Here in the lee of the hill the wind had no way. The bright world seemed to spin far away, then steady, and come back. I sat down on a boulder.
"Master?" The boy slipped from his perch and padded downhill. He stopped near me, peering, but still poised warily, as if for flight. "Master? If I did wrong -- "
"You did no wrong. How could you know? No, stay, please, and tell me about it. I shan't hurt you. How could I? Who were they, and how long ago did they take the box away?"
He gave me another doubtful look, then appeared to take me at my word. He spoke eagerly. "Only two days since. It was two men, I don't know them, slaves they were, and they came with the lady."
"The lady?"
At something in my face he stepped back half a pace, then stood his ground. "Aye. Came two days ago, she did. She must have had magic, I think. Went straight to it, like a bitch to the porridge-pot. Pointed almost to