Free Jack of Ravens by Mark Chadbourn Page A

from his upper arm, even down to the bone … too much blood.’
    Etain brushed away a tear, the strain of the evening evident in her face. ‘Is this how Existence works?’ she asked. ‘It demands a balance. Your life was saved, Jack, Giantkiller, so Owein must lose his?’
    ‘I don’t believe that to be true,’ Church said.
    They stood silently, unable to give voice to their momentous experience. All around them, Carn Euny slept, oblivious. Eventually Etain said, ‘It makes no sense to me, for Owein to lose his life so soon after being chosen as a champion of Existence—’
    ‘We are not meant to understand the rules of Existence,’ Conoran said. ‘We see only one small part of the sweep of the plan, like a fish in a pool who thinks the world is made of water and that the faces that occasionally look down into the depths are the gods of the fish-world.’
    Tannis arrived from feeding and watering the horses. He could see thatthe news was not good. ‘What now for us? The Fabulous Beast said there need to be five for the Pendragon Spirit to achieve its full potential.’
    ‘Perhaps another champion will arise,’ Conoran mused.
    Branwen made her way down the street from wherever she had been hiding since their return. Her face was streaked with tears. During their journey home from Boskawen-Un, Church realized she had feelings for Owein that she buried beneath her fractious exterior. Tannis called her gently, but she ignored him and slipped into the hut where Owein was caught between delirium and coma.
    ‘Look at us,’ Etain said bitterly. ‘Already broken and torn asunder. What kind of champions are we? Is this the best Existence could do?’
    No one answered her question, and after a moment Tannis bid them good night and Conoran followed. Church knew he wouldn’t be able to sleep with so many questions still troubling him. Etain led him to a spot just outside the village where they lay on the grass looking up at the stars and the smoke drifting from the hearths of Carn Euny.
    ‘Now you cannot leave us, Jack, Giantkiller,’ she said after a while.
    ‘What do you mean?’
    ‘From the moment you appeared in our midst, I have waited for the time when you would walk out of my life.’ Etain’s voice was low and dreamy. Church looked at her, but she kept her eyes on the stars. Her face was as pale as the moon, and shadows pooled in her eyes and added lustre to her hair. Her breasts rose and fell slowly. ‘Now you and I – and all of us – are joined by the Blue Fire. We are one. It will pull us together, however far apart we might be.’
    Church knew this to be true, in the way that he now knew many things on an unconscious level. Though the feeling of unity raised his spirits, he also felt deeply sad. Did it mean he would never be allowed to return to his own time, to see Ruth again, to reclaim the life he had lost? Was he now fated to live out his days and be forgotten long before anyone he cared for ever existed?
    ‘I’ll do what’s expected of me while I’m here,’ he said, ‘but I’m never going to stop looking for a way back home. And to Ruth.’ He felt Etain flinch.
    ‘We judge a person by what they hold inside them,’ Etain said, ‘and you are a good man to keep such a powerful love pure in your heart. But Conoran says your home is not one day’s ride away, nor many, but exists across the unending sea of days. Can you not see that your love is hopeless? You are hurting yourself by holding on to it. And those around you who care for you.’ She moistened her lips. ‘Let it go. Accept your loss.’ A desperate yearning was wrapped in her final sentence. ‘I could make your heart sing too, Jack, Giantkiller.’ She gently touched his face with her cool fingers.
    ‘I know you could,’ Church responded quietly, ‘but I love Ruth. I’m never going to give up hope. However many miles, however many years I have to cross, I’m going to get back to her. Nothing’s going to stand in my