100TWC - Day 8: Gateway

Like a floodtide of human flotsam, sunlight winking off their bright costumes and beribboned staffs and instruments like the sparkling shimmer of a white-water gully, the inhabitants of Berikatanya moved slowly across the valley floor.

Dotted over the hillside, a few shepherds, children, and those too old to partake in the ceremony watched the colourful parade as it approached Stanring - the sacred circle - and formed itself slowly into a larger circle around the standing stones of the ancient ceremonial site.

To the East of the circle a small group of hooded figures, obviously more plainly dressed than the rest of the throng, took up position atop an outcrop of black rock. As the bowl of the Stanring filled, they began chanting quietly. At first their voices seemed to vie with each other, but as they settled into their rhythm it became clear that there were three distinct chants, each different and yet each designed to complement and augment the others so that the whole acquired a cadence that echoed across the valley, reaching even the furthest shepherd on the most distant hilltop.

To the West, where the late afternoon sun was about to fall below the craggy top of the nearest bluff, stood four individuals whose costume outdid even the most garish of the company. Red, blue, ochre and white, each of the four wore robes of a single colour, yet which flashed and glimmered in the last rays of sunlight as if arcane patterns of many complementary hues were woven into the cloth. Each carried a staff fully twice as long as they were tall, and the staffs were topped by enormous gemstones mirroring the colours of their garb.

These four took positions in front of four great stones on the West side and as they moved into place an expectant hush fell over the rest of the congregation. The music of the hooded chanters appeared to swell as the hubbub of conversation died away, and the four mages raised their staffs. Each began to intone song of his or her own, threading their incantations amid the three continuing melodies of the chantsmen while the reddening orb of the sun fell ever closer to the bare rock surrounding the valley.

As the lower edge of the sun crossed the boundary and the light around the circle began to fade, the mages' singing took on a more urgent note, increasing in pace and acquiring a more complex rhythm. In the centre of the circle, a faint mist began to gather, slowly resolving itself into a spinning disc of greyness through which those standing on the hillside could clearly see stars.