"Elathan favours this: it may be something that scientist-tutor of yours had a hand in; our magic and your science was ever an ill mix. For Faerie is the heart of magic, and Earth is far from that centre; so the magic here is weak, and may be overshadowed."

Chris tilted her head back, draining the last drops from her can of c.o.ke. The sun made an aureole of her fair hair. She seemed to Holly suddenly very young and very con-fident.

"Speed up," she checked her watch, "me and Holly's got to get back to Mill Road, remember? So: what happens now?"

"Elathan wants you in Brancaer itself," Fletcher said. "For questions and also-since there may be no easy answer -for the Council. And that is seven days before the mid-summer solstice; in your time, next Sat.u.r.day."

Chris shook her head, doggedly puzzled. "I hear Brancaer this-that-and-the-other and Hollow Hills and-what the h.e.l.l are they?"

"Our dwelling-places we call hollow hills; Orione because it is in the heart of a hill, and Brancaer-" he paused, then went on "-Brancaer, because it is reached through one. And that city lies in a region I may not easily explain... some island or backwater of time, shut off completely from the later years. Come there. I will show you. That is the only way to understand.

Would you have believed Orione if you had not seen it?"

"That's a point," Chris conceded. "OK, you're on. I'll tell me mum and dad we're going out for the day. Holly?"

"Yeah, me too, they'll have cooled down by then." She thought: It's all going too fast for me. "These hills-are they safe?"

"Safe?" He smiled, but it wasn't rea.s.suring, "They are no safer than anywhere else. Do you not know that you live on the knife-edge of danger-all the time? I will meet you on Hallows Hill, four hours after dawn on Sat.u.r.day. And go there by inland ways. The morkani do not forget."

"But we haven't definitely-" he was getting up, and by the time Holly spoke he'd threaded his way through the tables and out into the free air "-agreed to come," she finished lamely.

Chris snorted, apparently unaffected by the rapid pace and strangeness of the meeting. "What gave you the idea we had a choice? Hey, I hope he don't keep us out too late. There's some good programmes on the Box, Sat.u.r.day evenings."

Hallows Hill, a green shoulder of the earth with the ruins of a church on it, marks the end of the town to the west. Holly and Chris, about a quarter of a mile from the ruins, were leaning on the parapet of the railway bridge.

The hills retreated inland from the inexorable tide of the marshes. A slope of large-headed daisies fell away in front ofthem to flat fields split by irrigation ditches, waving tall gra.s.ses and stunted thorn trees growing sideways away from the wind. There the dark reed-beds began, stretching to Gallows Hill and Combe Marish; great squashy tussocks that would not bear a man's weight, wide pools stagnant in the sun, and bottomless mud.

Holly turned inland, tracing the twin silver railway lines northward out of sight. In the distance, beyond the steep-faced bluff of Gallows Hill, morning light was reflected from the urban windows of Combe Marish. It was clear enough to see the ancient Downs green on the skyline, the shadows of clouds gliding over them, and to pick out indi-vidual buildings of Deepdean at their feet. The white line of Chalkspit glimmered in a wrinkled blue sea. Dark currents snaked up from the west.

They had come inland as Fletcher had suggested.

"What's the time?"

"Nine." Holly stretched her arms, feeling sun and wind. The gull's scratches were neat scabs now. She hadn't slept the last four nights or paid any attention to school in the day. Common sense told her to be glad she was safely out of Orione, and to stay away from the elukoi in the future. But Mirrormere and the cavern, Eilunieth and Elathan and the lithe beast-people, all these resounded in her mind like Mathu-rin's harp-song.

The strange certainty came to her that she had heard his music before. It was impossible, but she could not dispel the feeling.

Towering c.u.mulus clouds drifted eastward. Seaward the gulls mewed, the wind drummed in her ears, there was the heavy drone of bees in pollen. The red brick parapet was warm under her hands. And then all in a second it had begun: Fletcher appeared in the field below, she swung the duffle-bag with the packed lunch in it on to her shoulder and she was wading through calf-deep daisies to meet him.

"Where to?" Chris was aggressively nervous.

"Follow me."

They went along the embankment, north, then west, skirting the marsh. In single file, Holly last, they moved quickly, hearing the humming of the rails and feeling the sun burning on their backs. Then the boy turned away from dry land, leading them to the very edge of the marsh. Holly wrinkled her nose at the rank smell.

"Tread where I do." He was staring out across the marsh, taking his bearings from trees and other landmarks that he knew. "There is one path only, and it is narrow."

But where to? Holly could see only one possible place; a low gorse-covered ridge that the mud made into an island, about a hundred yards out.

Fletcher was already ankle-deep in mud. She shrugged and followed, shoes sinking inches into sour-smelling dead reeds, but finding solid footholds.

Must be a sunken path or stepping stones , she thought. No one would find it, ever. Not even by accident. She heard Chris swearing behind her and smiled. Oh well. I did warn her about those fancy shoes. Tough luck, girl.

Step by step they crossed the marshes and the path was neither straight nor short. At last Holly found turf underfoot again, a smooth slope scattered with dead gorse. Bushes blocked the view, a riot of chrome-yellow flowers.

Fletcher glanced round. "Now: blindfolds. And this is for your safety, not our secrecy."

Holly did not say: but there's nowhere to go.

"The gates of Brancaer should not be pa.s.sed with open eyes..."

Holly said suddenly, "How do you get here? The other ones, from the caverns?"

"They go far, those caves. East Hill and West Hill, Ridge-way and Hallows Hill, Gallows Hill and further... you know little of what goes on below. We can always come out close enough to Brancaer's gate, under cover of the dark."

The West Hill caves were tourist attractions, the East Hill caves had at least been historic smugglers' haunts. But that the hills were riddled with holes like cheese gave Holly a queer feeling, as if not everything down there might be so friendly as the elukoi.

"Now." He went behind Holly. Soft cloth blotted out her sight; she felt his fingers fumble in her hair, tying the knot, then she was alone. A breeze... the smell of mud.. . peppery-sweet gorse... seabirds calling. After a minute-in which he must have blindfolded Chris-she felt his hand on her shoulder, pushing her forward.

Mud squelched unpleasantly in her shoes... a p.r.i.c.kling of gorse... her head swam and she lost all balance, felt she was falling though the ground was still solid under her feet... she burned with fever... she froze, clammy with sweat... and now a hand was on her arm, halting her.

"Are you well?"

"I think so-I feel sick."

"So do I." Chris, her voice thick and unsteady. "Get this d.a.m.n thing off my eyes."

"Hold still."

Holly had time to wonder, with fear and excitement, what she would see; then the blindfold was jerked from her head.

It was a forest.

Vast grey-boled trees rose up about her, heavy and ancient, and on them the leaves of one summer shone. There was no seeing the sky for the thickness of the foliage, but shaft on shaft of light speared down into the twilight, turning the grey bark to silver, the leaves to lime shadows, and the forest floor to flame. A woodish odour of leaf-mould and decay came to Holly, and a feeling of coolness, and the clear hard sound of a woodp.e.c.k.e.r.

There was little undergrowth and the beech trees grew well apart from each other. The ground rose and fell gently, with deceptive dips and hollows full of fallen leaves. She noticed they stood on a faintly-marked track that wound out of sight ahead.

"Pardon a silly question, but how in h.e.l.l did we get here?" Chris turned full circle and saw nothing but beechwood.

"Come to that, where are we? I thought this Brancaer of yours was a city?"

"It is." He pointed up the path. "The road goes from the gates of the Hills here, to the gate of the city."

"Gates of the Hills?"

He pointed behind them, to where two thick-branched trees hid grown into each other, forming an arch.

"Oh. OK, if you say so, friend."

"This is real," Holly said. A beam of sunlight dazzled her, gilding her momentarily in the others' eyes. "But where is it?""A better question would be 'when'?" He looked over his shoulder, impatient and (Holly thought) nervous. "Time was, the forest guards kept this road safe. Little befalls by daylight, but we should not stay."

Holly slipped off her plimsolls, rubbing her pale but dirty feet in the thick leaves. Tying the laces together, she hung the shoes from her duffle-bag. They began walking up the path.

"You see it too?" Chris beside her, a muddy sandal in each hand. "If it was just me, I'd reckon I was crazy."

"I see it. It's too real. I suppose we can get back."

"Bit late to worry now."

The twilight was deeper here where the trees were thicker. Fletcher stopped them at the top of a slope, looking down into a jewel-bright clearing.

An elukoi girl half-crouched in sunlight, staring off into the woods as if listening. She wore a short green tunic and a belt with a knife thrust through it and carried a long thin-shafted ash spear. White hair fell unbound over her shoulders, swinging in a bright curtain to hide her face.

It's that girl Silverleaf , Holly realised.

The girl's head came up, unerringly facing them.

"My greetings, brother," Silverleaf said aloud, standing up. "I had thought to see you sooner, but waiting sweetens welcome. And Holly; Christine; be welcome. I will be your escort to the Caer."

The four of them set off on the path, walking in silence through green light and gold. Silver moved a few yards ahead, the ash spear held light and ready, her bare feet treading the dead leaves without sound.

Holly, watching her, thought, Brother? That makes her Elathan's daughter. Yes, there's a resemblance. But Fletcher's sister? Surely not.

The trees thinned to younger growth, brambly underbrush and festoons of ivy. They came over wide stretches of olive-coloured moss to the margins of the forest.

Silver took her arm. "Look," she said proudly.

It was not the end of the forest, only a clearing a mile or so wide and about four miles long. The trees ended at a great meadow of long gra.s.s that dipped down to a curving stream. Through this ran the track, crossing the stream by stepping-stones, and arrowing up to a hill beyond. Past that, Holly glimpsed orchards and cornfields, before the dark line of the forest shut in the horizon. The first shock came. The Downs were gone; and the air was too hot and heavy for this to be anywhere near the coast.

But the shallow tree-crowned hill... she saw what Silver pointed at: the last city of the elukoi, the castle of the House of Raven, the home of Oberon, Lord of Faerie-Brancaer itself.8 Brancaer For a minute Holly saw nothing but trees on that hill. Then the sun flashed from a window and at once she made out walls, towers, roofs, turrets, all in a warm yellow sandstone. Green foliage intertwined with the stonework, shimmering in the heat. On the very crown of the hill, clear of the trees, a high grey tower bore a pennant, motionless in the hot sun.

"Come." Fletcher led them.

Out in the field, the heat struck down. Holly became very aware, feeling the dry gra.s.s p.r.i.c.king her feet, the weight of her plait between her shoulder-blades and the sweat gathering on her upper lip and in her eyes. The duffle-bag's cord cut into her shoulder, the swinging plimsolls knocked softly together. Crickets buzzed in the long gra.s.s; there were flicker-ing shards of colour, pale blue, copper, brown b.u.t.terflies, and in the distance music, odd and subtle and familiar.

The river was low, its hot sandy banks quick with bronze lizards, the stepping-stones dank with weed. Hazelnut bushes and reed-beds thrived further down. Holly had crossed the stones before she saw Mathurin lying back against the yellow earth on the far bank, cradling the small harp in his arms. He left off playing and watched her until she followed the others across the pebbles, and then she heard the tune pick up again behind her.

As she caught hold of thick tufts of gra.s.s to pull herself out of the river channel, the ground gave way and she slid back to the bottom of the slope, ankle-deep in crumbling moist soil. Amazed, she found it hot against her bare skin. She plunged her arms into it, then let it slide away, soft as flour. Heat, and the sound of bees, and bright wild flowers, and rich earth that had the smell of pure growth.

Silver reached back to give Holly a hand. They went on, over the short-cropped turf on the hill.

Holly heard wingbeats overhead. She shrank away as a dark bird skimmed down, so close the feathers brushed her shoulder. She flung up a protecting arm, as if attacked again -and felt it gripped, felt a sudden weight; and there was the raven on her outstretched arm, glittering black as a starling in the heat.

For a second she was elukoi, beast-friend, belonging in that company; then the bird flexed strong wings and launched itself up in widening spirals and headed for Brancaer.

"Elathan will know we are come," the boy said.

They entered under the trees into welcome shade; into Brancaer. Holly had little time to look at the dwellings; how the city grew into the forest and the forest into the city; Fletcher hurried them on as if he wanted to keep them unseen.

He failed in that. Holly became aware of eyes in the green and shadow; of shapes that resolved themselves into fox and badger and crow, pheasant and hound and fallow deer, and-with a heart-stopping shock-the grey-furred and heavy-ruffed form of a wolf. She walked closer to Fletcher.

After a time, as if the beasts had spread the news, the elukoi began to collect silently round them. Their fiery hair gleamed in shafts of light. They wore robes of blue and white and green, with golden chains and silver armlets, pectorals, diadems, and rings. But what dried Holly's mouth and made her heart thump was this: all their animal golden eyes were fixed on her.

She found Chris at her side. Two of the heavy-shouldered hounds loped up to circle and sniff. She stopped. Chris, fair hair spiking up in a halo round her sweating face, said nothing; only her eyes darted restlessly over the elukoi crowd. Holly flinched from the touch of their cool skins against hers. Hemmed in, she looked up into a foxy-sharp face framed with rowan-berry hair. Slit-pupilled eyes widened.

"Caren aman'th erieu d'chai ara'kayn?"

Fletcher shouldered ahead. "Yes, they be human. It is the Master Sorcerer's command."

"Edu'n, ata?"

"Yes, at this time, of all times. Stand aside." He added something sharp in the elukoi tongue.

Holly followed him through the crowd, head down, hearing raised voices behind her and not looking up until there was stone underfoot and they had mounted a flight of steps to a high tower.

"Be welcome." The boy had that odd formality of the Hills about him again. "This is the house of the Master Sor-cerer."

Towards evening, Holly came to sit in the western window embrasure of that tower. Behind her, Chris and Elathan were still talking. She had let Chris do most of the explaining. Now they sat shaking their heads in bewilderment over a succession of books and strange charts.

Holly gazed round the high-ceilinged room, with its books and tapestries, the evening sun striking fire from gla.s.s retorts and shelves of stone pots labelled with odd heiroglyphics. Dust danced in the sun. Then she swivelled round and opened the thick gla.s.s windows, looking out at Brancaer.

Down in the green city the elukoi moved in ones and twos towards the grey tower. Holly watched them and their houses.

In every case the ground floor was a stables or mews or kennels or byre and the friends of the beasts lived in the upper rooms; ivy and red creepers clung to the walls and spired in at the windows.

She thought, I wonder how far we really are from home? But the idea didn't worry her. She could not have said what she felt: did not know until a long time after that it was complete happiness; that long summer evening casting a yellow haze over the tree-tops, the towers and the fields and forest beyond; and herself up in the window of the tower, eagle-high, catching the last of the cool wind.

"Holly."

"Yes?" She saw Fletcher had come back. The boy was not in denim, for once, but in white tunic and silver belt, with a raven-headed knife in a sheath. She could almost believe him elukoi at that moment.Elathan stood. "The Council convenes shortly; you must be there. I have bid the boy take you to the Hall of the Three Ships. I will come later, and present you to my Lord Oberon."

They left the tower and headed uphill. The grey tower proved on close inspection to be a main hall and several smaller ones, enclosed by a ma.s.sive wall. They pa.s.sed from the city into the shadow of a tunnel-like arch, suddenly cool; and so under that wall and out into the citadel. Framed by the glossy stone, Holly saw emerald lawns, with a gnarled and spreading apple tree in their centre and beyond that the entrance to the Great Hall. Her eyes caressed the lines of rock that time and the sun had worn silky silver-grey, tracing the tall spires lancing dizzily into the deep sky, the towers, the balconies and courtyards, the fountains and statues seen framed through half-moon arches.

"They will not come into the Hall until the King bids them. We will wait inside, that will attract less attention."

Holly nodded. Walking on, she found the lawn soft to her feet. They paused under the fountaining branches of the apple tree and the boy reached up to pull down a ripe apple. Holly watched the dip and sway of the branch, the leaves rustling round her face, finding herself caught in a tent of green light and shadow. He bit into the apple, pulling down another branch so that she and Chris could reach.

Holly said, "What I don't understand is, why they want to leave. I mean I know about the sea-people, but they can't get into Brancaer, can they? Or can they?"

"No, never; yet. But listen, Earth is not Faerie. In Faerie they are the undying, the immortal shining ones-here they are the elukoi, and age tells. It is not the sole reason, but there it is: no elukoi wants to die."

The crisp ruddy apple, rivering with juice, broke white and cool under her teeth. She stared at him for a second, then hastily wiped stray drops of juice off her chin. She thought: Undying? And Elathan said: Oberon. And in Mathurin's song about Ys, Oberon. Is that the same-?

"What happens at this Council?" Chris asked. "It isn't just us, is it?"

"There is the King's decision to be heard, on the matter of the solstices of midwinter and midsummer; the which has more importance now than anything-" he threw down the apple core. "For that, you must ask Mathurin. Come into the Hall. He will be there, I think."

It was not until then, following him, that she thought, Apples from a tree, in June, ripe? and looked back. It was an immense tree, old, gnarled, branches spraying up to wide umbrellas of leaves, and in among those leaves were apples ripe as September, apples small, hard and green as June and blossom as white and delicate as April.