Dream d2951-s: Which Way the Hedge Gave

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the track into the Ruins of Duskden had grown across. Not all at once - the near section still showed bare soil between the ruts - but where the field bent and the old wall came down to meet the hedgerow, the growth had closed the whole passage over. Hawthorn and elder and some bramble looped through, and the thing had knit itself into something more wall than gap.

The Keeper looked at it from the track side and noted the direction of the lean - east to west, the elder bowing that way, the main thorn mass sitting in the middle. I went in from the left of the thorn where the elder was younger and I could see open ground on the far side. Rurik slipped through ahead of me, low and certain, finding some gap I could not see from standing height. Lano pushed in at the right of the bramble, her nose going first, and was through before I was.

The Keeper noted: entry taken left of the main mass, through the elder section, on the wall-fall side. Not through the gap, which was the cat's way. Not the right side, which was the dog's.

On the far side the track resumed and there was a roof visible - two walls standing, the roof sagged but holding, some tiles still sitting where tiles should sit. The Ruins of Duskden. Named in the ledger. Described by the Survey: footprint given, condition noted, nearest water given, distance to the road given. Eight nights assigned.

I had not been here before. The Keeper had not been here before. The sheet said Duskden. The sheet could not say what the elder smell is when you come through wet branches at dusk, or the way the roof had sagged exactly where something must have struck it once, or that the tile color is orange and not the gray the record gave it.

I wrote: first entry, night one of eight. Way in - left of the main growth, elder branch, wall-fall side. The Keeper wrote the same.

To the north, Hartwald: 2,400 residents, the mill running, lamps at every window. Forty visits logged by the Survey, twenty-three in the ledger, six in the Keeper's own hand. Described by every party that had passed within sight of the gate. Known to everyone who had written it down. No one in this party had been inside the gate.

Lano pressed close to my calf. Rurik sat on the far wall already, up high, amber eyes catching the last of the light.

I went in and counted the tiles and wrote what I saw.

---