The Hollowing by Robert Holdstock
As Richard approached his home, the centaur suddenly appeared. It had been lurking inside the palisade. Its eyes were huge, its mouth slick with saliva, and it was dropping dung uncontrollably, as if terrified.
“They haven’t got you yet, then? Are you looking for sanctuary?”
“Hide me…” the pathetic creature whispered, repeating the request three times.
Richard tugged its mane, trying to avoid its breath. “Of course I will. Jason can’t harm you inside Old Stone Hollow. There are defences here…”
The centaur seemed to relax, even though it couldn’t have understood the words: its request to “hide me” was almost certainly part of its education from Sarin. It shuffled nervously, its tail waving, its human chest expanded so that ribs and cords of muscle showed through the black hide. It backed away from Richard, back into the compound, eyes oddly imploring.
“The defences,” Richard said again, and the herons clattered their bills, distracting him, and a shrike called, and rooks, nesting in a high elm, cawed, while the wind brought the scents of sweat and groin, powerful smells that made Richard nervous. Yet when he looked around he could see nothing but the black man-beast, backing away from him.
The defences …
He realised with a terrible shock that the humming of the generator was no longer part of the sounds of the wood. Glancing quickly to the right, he ascertained that the glint of red light, the infra-red, was not there.
The generator was down!
He stepped quickly into the Station. The centaur made a sound, half fear, half laughter, then galloped behind him. Richard turned to watch the creature, which now pawed nervously at the ground by the gates, watching him, saliva streaming from its lower lip, eyes blinking furiously and nostrils twitching.
“A trap,” Richard said calmly. He turned back to the compound. There was an odd sound, a swish of air, followed by a second, then a third. He saw nothing in the rippling grass or among the waving trees that hid the path to Old Stone Hollow itself, but when he glanced back at the centaur he saw an arrow protruding from the creature’s mouth. The man-face was wide-eyed with shock as it collapsed onto its forelegs. A second arrow jutted from its chest, a third dangling in the shallow skin of its shoulder.
And then Lacan’s bagpipes wailed, the sound like a mocking sigh, breaking into the rhythm of a mocking laugh.
The fourth arrow, loosed now, sliced the air as Richard turned back to the cave. He saw it coming, but it was too fast. It struck the superficial flesh of his left arm and passed all the way through. The pain was strangely remote, and he lifted his forearm as if nothing had happened, then held his hand against the flow of blood as the bright woodland near the cave darkened with movement, and nine men, cloaked and hooded, all but one masked, stepped into the open and walked slowly through the wind-whipped grass towards their prey.
It was a moment of silence, oddly peaceful, nothing but the murmur of wind, the susurration of the grass, and the flap and slap of skins as the nine figures moved in a wide arc, closing on Richard. Jason was foremost, carrying a spear and the bone pipes, his glittering eyes filled with amusement as he watched from below his hood. “Your magic is finished,” he said in stilted English, waving a hand at the generator tent.
“Don’t be so sure,” Richard said, the wound in his arm beginning to hurt.
Jason shrugged. Sarin would have given him the words to speak, but he couldn’t understand the reply. He simply repeated, “Your magic is finished. Richard. Hollow. Magic finished.” And laughed, coming right up to Richard and striking him a stunning blow to the face. Richard fell and was sick. Jason squeezed the leather bag of the pipes, making a series of punctuated howls, like a tuneless jig, that caused laughter among the argonauts. As Richard half rose he saw one of them working the arrows from the cadaver of the centaur. When the weapons were recovered, he kicked the body into the river.
Poor betrayed beast. It had perhaps been promised its freedom if it helped entice Richard into the compound, where Jason was waiting. Its usefulness gone, its worth on the market limited, perhaps, Jason had decided to lighten the Argo’s cargo load. He had a new object to sell, now.
But if Richard entertained the idea that he was now one of Jason’s objects of interest to the citadels of the Aegean, he was mistaken. Though led through the gully to the Argo, he was paid scant attention. His wound was treated and bound, and from Jason’s murmured words Richard got the sense that the arrow hadn’t been intended for him at all.
He was more concerned by the fact that the ship was now afloat. The below-water repairs were complete, and carpenters were working on the upper hull from the inside, braced among the branches of the sacred oak.
The wind brought rain, a dark thundercloud that poured across the lake, and made the morning seem like night. The tent was rapidly re-erected on the beach, and two small fires lit. Richard huddled in this miserable place, ignored by Jason for a while, free to run if he wanted, strangely reluctant to do so.
When Jason eventually came into this billowing shelter again, he was leading Sarin by a leather leash, tied tightly around her neck. Through the drum of rain, the woman said grimly, “The gods must have helped him with the Argo. The ship was unseaworthy yesterday: now it’s sufficiently repaired that he’s proposing to sail back through the storm channel.”
“The storm channel?”
“The passage here, a raging storm between sea rocks, too narrow for large ships. It’s how he escaped the war galleys of the Titan Polymnus, which were about to ram us and destroy us. The gateway is out on the lake, he knows that. But he’s frightened. He thinks there must be a trick, and he believes you can help him understand the nature of what happened. If he sails into the lake, will he pass back to his own world? Will Polymnus be waiting for him? Or will he sail into another of the god’s cages, like this place? Hera hasn’t spoken to him for days. He thinks he’s being tested, but he doesn’t know for what.”
Jason watched Richard all the time, his face quite expressionless, waiting for the other man’s response.
It occurred to Richard in an instant that there might be a way to separate Jason from his crew. He tried not to look too apprehensive. It would be difficult to contrive.
“There are many worlds beyond the lake,” he said, and Jason frowned as Sarin informed him of this. Richard described the dark lakes of Tuonela, the wild, icy seas of the Irish coast, the endless rivers through dense forest, marshes filled with brackish water that were home to heron-people, and offered no comfort at all. To pass back to his own, warm seas Jason would have to worship at a shrine. The shrine was on the hill, above Old Stone Hollow. It was a sanctuary of stones, and the far-sighted might be privileged to glimpse their destination.
Jason thought long and hard, staring at Richard with an almost corrosive gaze, grumbling in his throat, winding and unwinding the leather of Sarin’s leash around his brawny fingers. Richard felt his knees begin to tremble as he crouched, damp and cold below the sagging, dripping hides of this crude shelter. Jason was not convinced.
“Tell him,” Richard said, “that I have lived in this place for many years. I have seen heroes pass through, some wary of me, some befriending me. He has destroyed the source of my magic, but not my vision.” Sarin translated as Richard spoke. “Tell him that Hercules camped for five days in the Sanctuary and told me in detail of the quest for the fleece and that he had seen Medea dismembered and hung in pieces, still alive, from a giant cedar tree, where silver-crested crows feed upon…”
Jason half rose, his eyes widening. “Where? Where did Hercules see this?”
“He saw it through the shrine. There is a place of vision on the hill. Medea did not live long after the murder of your sons and second wife. A simulacrum took her place.”
This clearly conflicted with Jason’s own knowledge, but he was intrigued. “A simulacrum? Medea dead?” There was spittle at the edges of his mouth, and his skin, below the stubbly beard, was flushed. Tiny creases in his forehead
“Medea dead!” he repeated, staring into the distance.
“Medea among the living dead, all magic gone, the object of ridicule from passing heroes.”
And Jason smiled! He stood, tugged Sarin roughly to her feet, then eased the pressure, rubbing a thick thumb over the bruising around her neck as he glared at Richard and said, “Then take me to see this place.”
He bellowed orders. The sons of the Dioscuri cloaked-up heavily and picked short spears from the weapons pile, walking through the downpour to join Jason. Aeneus came too, the rain running from the smooth, yellow-metalled helmet that covered his face to the gaping mouth, where broken teeth gleamed between thin greying lips.
These three guardians followed Jason through the gully, and Richard led them to the Sanctuary, to the ruined stones.
Where was the hollowing? It had only been a few months, but the wood had changed, grown denser …
He swept a stick through the ground elder, slapped at the carved pillars, ducked and weaved through this overgrown place of ruins. His eyes were alert for anything familiar, and he knew, too, that a hollowing led away from here, and that it was essential not to step through it.
A glimpse of red caught his eye, and he moved aside the ivy at the base of a standing stone to find a small hollowstick, a much-rotted doll, but the red fabric of its body still tightly tied. Triumphantly he picked the effigy up and held it to Jason, who backed away, raising his spear.
Now Richard could orientate. The stone was part of the original arch, but the top had fallen. Was it still the gateway that he had taken with Helen, that time in the past? He began to move about the clearing, while the Dioscuri watched him suspiciously and Aeneus stared at him through the sinister eyeholes of his helmet. Sarin smiled, chewing on her finger, half-aware that Richard was trying to trap her master.
Richard moved round the arch, then faced Jason, his arms wide, his head thrown back. “It’s, here,” he said loudly, and Sarin whispered the words.
“I can’t see anything,” Jason said.
“Come here, then, and look between the pillars,” Richard urged, backing away and beckoning to Jason. For a moment he thought Jason would bring the woman with him, but the argonaut let go of Sarin’s leash. He glanced at the Dioscuri and whispered something to them. Then, with his spear held ready and his black cloak wrapped tightly against the drizzling rain, he walked toward Richard …
For a moment Jason seemed to hesitate. Richard thought he had begun to move in slow motion. The light around him changed and the Dioscuri shouted in alarm, backing away. Sarin gasped and crouched, like an animal about to flee. Jason stared at Richard then spoke quickly and with meaning before his face slowly melted into a scowl, becoming a rage, the flesh blackening, the eyes deepening, radiating a terrible if futile menace, a menace touched by a sudden death’s head smile.
He was still walking. He had been caught by the hollowing, and a second or so later he vanished completely from view. Richard had the sensation of being struck, but it may have been a leaf blown on the wet wind. The Dioscuri had fled. Aeneus stood, staring from behind his helmet mask, then he too turned and walked quickly down the hill.
“Where did he go?” Sarin asked in the sudden silence. “I heard the statue of the goddess, screaming.”
“A long way away. Where Hera cannot control him. And for Jason there’s no coming back, now. His newest adventure is one that no one will sing about.” He hesitated, watching the rain-drenched woman. “What did he say? What were his last words?”
“He shouted, ‘I didn’t see the trap. Well done! Though it won’t hold me. So now you should start watching your back!’”
She shuddered, arms around her body, dark eyes enthralled by the silent stones that had consumed her tormentor.
“You banished him. I thought your magic was dead. Jason killed the humming rock, the source of your power. I thought you were finished.”
“He should have believed his own insight: true magic is in here, in the jelly.” Richard tapped his head. Scents and sounds swirled around him. He was dizzy with triumph and the wood. The rain had different odours, different textures. It ran down his skin, through his hair, through his clothes, and seemed to converse with him. Sarin’s small hand tugged at his arm.
“Are you leaving me?”
He stared at her, frowning. “Leaving you?”
“A spirit has you. You have the look of faraway. Are you leaving me?”
“I’m trying not to…”
She led him quickly back to the river, then through the gully. They had heard shouting on the shore, the sounds of frightened men. The Argo had been launched and was out on the lake, drifting slowly towards the hollowing, its sail furled, its oars out and steady, ready to strike. It was running away. On the shore, a motley collection of creatures huddled in the rain. Aeneus, or whoever had taken command, had decided to empty the hold of living creatures, perhaps unnerved by the thought of the magic they possessed. The two forest hunters were already moving surreptitiously around the lake, scanning the woods, looking for a pathway in. The female centaur was drinking at the lake’s edge. The horned woman, wrapped now in a fleece, was cradling the open-mouthed head of Orpheus.
Even from the gully, Richard could tell that Orpheus was dead, that his singing days were finished.
The centaur bolted suddenly, disappearing among the rocks and calling out as it entered the forest. The Argo was rocked and the waters thrashed. Sarin cried out and hid her eyes as the serpentine tail of the lake creature wrapped suddenly and sinuously around the broken hull of the vessel, knocking men and women from the deck, snapping the oars like matchwood. The creature’s head emerged and the argonauts shrieked. The Argo buckled, cracked, the sail spar shattered. As men and women dived for the unlikely safety of the lake the creature rolled, taking the Argo with it, vanishing suddenly amidst a storm and explosion of blue water.
Then one by one the swimmers heading for the shore screamed and were gone, the last being the shade of Aeneus himself who made it to the shore and was standing when the open-mawed beast flung itself suddenly through the shallows and dragged him back. Others had swum for the hollowing. Richard watched them reach the grey water and slowly vanish, emerging no doubt into the middle of a wild sea, to face a terrible drowning.
The hunters had gone, merging stealthily with the wood. The horned woman came up to the gully and gave the head of Orpheus to Sarin. Then she kissed the other woman, touched a rough-skinned hand to Richard’s beard, before wading into the water and walking steadily into obscurity.
“Will I be safe?”
Sarin’s words pulsed on the wind. Richard had a scent, though; it was coming on the rain. He crouched and brushed the water against his nose, smelling, lapping at it. The woman touched him, the ridges of her fingers sliding over his bristling skin. Her odour was strong, and the head of Orpheus was a faint sound as its final songs sang in the jelly of its skull, though no sound came from its mouth. The wind turned, the breeze stroked and curled, the rain shifted, the scents and touches of nature embraced Richard, and the stink-trail suddenly touched him in his heart.
He straightened and cried out. It was her! He sniffed hard, then breathed slowly and deeply, waving his hands through the drizzling rain, touching the play of aromas. She was signalling to him. She had touched his heart once before, now she called to him. The scent-trail rose from his groin to his throat and he cried her name. Helen!
Frightened, the dark-skinned woman scampered away from him, into the Hollow, through the rain-lashed grass and into the longhouse. Richard followed, a part of him wanting to see that she was safe. Then he closed the gates, howled his pleasure, and moved with the scent into the overhang below the cliff, huddling there until the night came, the rain eased, the wind dropped, and the stink-trail hardened, gusting from the hole in the ground, below the running creatures …
Bosky
He rose to his feet, turning as the huge shapes drummed and billowed past him, and he ran with them, following the broken ground, his face wet with the rank foam that sprayed from their stretched mouths, their lolling tongues. He drew a new strength from the power of the great beasts and grasped at the thick and heavy hair that streamed from their dark hides. He followed the movement of the sun as it glinted on the curved horns and was carried by the power of the herd. Smaller creatures ran too, white-backed, grey-flanked, high-horned, slender-legged. He pranced with them on the rumbling earth, then loped with grey wolves that raced across the grassland, all moving towards the great cavern. The world was vibrant, the earth a deep and resonant drumbeat, the air thick with mud and spray, the sky darkened by huge backs. He ran with them, the scent-trail strong in his nostrils despite the dung and sweat and animal breath of the running herds.
When the earth of the hollow closed around him it was cold. The sounds of the herds became faint. He plunged through darkness into the coiling passages of the world underground, squirming and crawling through the narrow spaces, every finger alive to the smooth, damp rock, the slick stone, his body like that of a snake as he pulled himself deeper through the dark. The earth around him still thundered and shook as the herds of bison and gazelle found their own paths down into the odd world, not of dreams, or the real, but a place between the two. Water fell, hard and cold, from a high ledge in a great dark cavern, into a second system of passages, and he slipped down, following the flow, hands briefly brushing marbled human figures, his eyes glimpsing the stony faces, his nostrils flaring as he again responded to the scents of the wood that lay at the far end of the cave system, and the sweet and beckoning woman who waited for him there.