Caledonii: Birth of a Nation. (Part Two; The Druid's Plan.)

by Hall, Ian

  Anger?

  He thought about it for a moment.

  No. Jealousy.

  His son was only doing what he should have done twenty summers ago, before he took over as chief from his dying uncle, Forrebes. As he watched the final light retreat from the glen, he began to reluctantly realize that weakness and jealousy were the mainstay of his anger. He had never travelled as a young man; he had been hidebound by his own father. And now he was too old. He would never see the lands beyond Caledon borders. He was chief, and so belonged to the land.

  At the back of his mind he nursed a bitter hatred of Ma’damar and his violent feudal ways. As a boy, Ranald had been taught the ways of peace, not to raid from his neighbors. At the ‘gaither’ this had come to the surface and instead of being a rock for Ranald to stand on, his peaceful ways had been used by Ma’damar to ridicule him. He couldn’t seem to shake the feeling that nothing good would come of the association between Caledonii and Meatae. He cursed himself for not being a strong chief, and speculated that he was perhaps losing his grip on his eldest son. He hoped not. If he lost his grip on his son, he could envisage the whole clan being next.

  The scene before him; the sunset and the arrangement of the defenses at Lochery were far from the mind of the chief who stood alone leaning on the battlements. He had a sudden awareness of his own mortality, he had been chief for nearly twenty summers.

  Mawrin has already chosen Calach to succeed me.

  Ranald was sure that he would have did the same, but it was still a reminder that he was growing old.

  In a few years,Calach will make a fine leader.

  In a few years.

  “Few”. That was the word he fastened upon. Ranald thought of his wife and family. He only hoped that they would have peace that both could enjoy those years together.

  ~ ~ ~

  “Don’t do it Uwan!” hissed Fetasius. The Brigante boy addressed the small figure who sat cross-legged, his back upright, pressed hard against the inside wall of the broch. “You’re not meant to do things like that, Sewell said as much!” His speech was still heavily accented with Brigante, a lilt which stood the orphans apart from Caledon children.

  Uwan closed his eyes and dropped his hands into his lap. “Look Fetty, I told you a’ that I could do it, an’ you didn’t believe me!”

  “That doesn’t mean that you’ve got to prove that you can do it!” Fetasius spat back.

  “He can prove it if he likes,” Benelek the younger brother snapped. Both boys shared light blond hair, not often found in the Norlands. Benelek’s Caledon speech had the same hint of Brigante in it.

  “Easy for you to say, Benny.” The older boy hissed, his eyes never looking at his younger brother, his attention fully taken up by Uwan’s attempted ‘magic’ trick. “You’re just trying to get us a’ into trouble.”

  “If anyone finds out, we’ll be in trouble a’ right!”

  “Shhh,” Uwan’s older sister, Bretha scolded. “You’ll get Ma’ coming if you don’t both shut up.” Then to Uwan, “Go on, do it, I still don’t believe you!”

  Uwan scowled. “None o’ you believe me.”

  The chief’s four children shared the second floor with the two Brigante boys Fetasius and Benelek; the two orphaned sons of Chief Venutius. Although the room had curtained beds round the walls, the centre, complete with table and chairs, was a common area. The children’s sleeping room was directly under the parapet roof of the broch, and was lit by two small candles. Five bracken lined beds lay in a half circle against the stone walls. The beds of Calach and Lachlan were empty; Bretha lay on Uwan’s bed. Fetasius sat at the table, head cradled in his hands watching the younger boy’s antics. Benelek sat cross legged on his bed.

  “I’ve got to have ‘shush’ for this, so shut up an’ give me a chance.” Uwan said, irritably. He shuffled his behind on the rough wooden floor, readying himself.

  The other three watched as the ‘little dhruid’ of the family began to mumble a sequence of words, again and again.

  ‘The dhruid’ was eleven summers old; one finger showing, and had been Sewell’s apprentice now for over a year. In that time he had been taught to count, he could write, he could tell the tales of the stars, now he was going to show his brothers and his sister that he was on the way to becoming a real dhruid.

  “He’ll never do it.” Bretha across the room.

  “Nobody can do what he said he can!” Benelek dismissed.

  “Hush, Benny.” Fetasius’s replied, “Something’s happening already.”

  Uwan was still sitting in the room, but it appeared to the watching children that his shape was growing indistinct; his outline was shifting, rippling. It was almost as if they could see right through him to the stone wall. They could still hear him mumbling the words, again and again, and gradually, his body became fainter, until with a visible jump, he winked out of sight altogether.

  “Uwan!” Both brothers chorused together. Bretha was transfixed.

  Instantly Uwan was visibly back in the room, eyes wide, looking expectantly at his siblings.

  “Well, did I do it? Did it happen like I said?” He chirruped excitedly.

  He jumped up, ran across the floor and dived into a kneeling position, in front of his sister’s face.

  He spoke slowly and deliberately; “Well, did I do it or not?”

  “Yes you did!” Sewell said sharply from the open doorway.

  The children all jumped with fright. They looked up at the dhruid with fear and surprise. Ranald was behind the grey robed figure, as they strode into the room. Mawrin watched from the doorway.

  None of them had heard the adults approach.

  Sewell coughed. “I think that the time for playing tricks is over Uwan, it is obviously overdue that you begin your training proper.” He turned his head to Ranald, “Are you agreed?”

  “Aye, I think that he’s about ready for you now Sewell.” Ranald walked over to the small boy, who now cowered at the foot of his elder brother’s bed. “Get your things into a bag.”

  “Aye Da’” Uwan said disconsolately.

  “Sewell said that you were doing something ‘stupid’, that’s why we ran upstairs.”

  “It is more than ‘stupid’, chief Ranald.” Sewell pressed. “If Uwan’s natural abilities are not harnessed and he is not trained in the proper way, he could destroy himself with the power he so obviously holds.”

  Ranald grabbed Uwan by the arm, pulling him to his feet. “Get your things into a bag.” Uwan walked to his bed and began collecting his belongings.

  “You are his family.” Sewell addressed the room. “You will say your goodbyes to Uwan at this doorway.”

  The young occupants of the room nodded their heads silently. Each fastened their gaze on the dhruid.

  “He will be taken from you now, and begin his training properly, and under dhruid supervision.”

  None of the children missed the barb in Sewell’s tone.

  “When he walks out of this doorway, he is lost to you all. He will talk to no one else but dhruids for a period of one year. This will be the first year of his ‘cleansing’. It is his time to shed his ties in the clan, and is precious to him. Any of you wishing to contact Uwan must do so through me. Under no circumstances will you attempt to make direct contact with him. If you do so, Uwan will be punished. And punished severely.”

  Mawrin, who had been outside in the stairway, pushed into the room, and began to assist Uwan to pack.

  “After his first year of cleansing, he will be banished from the clan for one year. He will take himself to a place of solitude and await his calling in the dhruidhood. In this year, he will talk to no one at all. Not even dhruids. If it is found that he has made contact with anyone, he will be punished by death.”

  The gasps around the room punctuated each point.

  “There will be no failure in Uwan’s quest to be a dhruid. If he fails he will die.”

  “Die?” Benelek squealed.

  Sewell looked
directly at the Brigante boy. “He will die!” He snapped. “You will never see him again. That is the law.”

  Uwan stood near the table in the centre of the room, a bag slung over his shoulder.

  “Say your goodbyes Uwan.” Sewell said. “You are leaving now. You belong to me.”

  With the sound of sobbing dwindling behind them, Sewell preceded Uwan down the circular steps that ran between the outer and the inner wall of the broch. There was no need for Sewell to force the boy, he followed sullenly, keeping close to the dhruid’s robes. Uwan’s last memory of his mother was going to be of tears streaming down her face.

  Sewell led Uwan to the dhruid quarters, their way lit brightly by the full moon shining in the dark evening sky

  ~ ~ ~

  With the same full moon shining through veiled clouds, two pairs of eyes, deep in Votadin lands gazed upwards at the opalescent disc. Winnie and Kat’lana lay on their backs, heads close together, eyes glazed and tired from a long period of scrutiny.

  “What do you see Kat’lana?” Winnie enquired again. She had asked the question many times before, but the answer had begun to change as Kat’lana’s eyes wearied. For the last few moments, the question had remained unanswered.

  “I see a face, Winnie!” Kat’lana suddenly replied, the surprise in her voice barely hidden. “It’s Calach’s!” She squealed.

  “Hush, lass.” Winnie’s broad smile filled her face. “Look harder, look beyond the moon, try an’ see through it.”

  “I’ll try Winnie, but I saw him. As clear as day.” Kat’lana said resignedly.

  “Try an’ see behind the moon.” She continued. “Behind the moon lies your power. By seeing past it, you’ll unlock the strength within you

  She gazed at the moon with all the concentration her mind would allow. She had long since felt the cold dampness of the grass creep into her tunic, almost running over her shoulders, like tendrils of some low lying creeper, slipping over her body. She was cold, even beginning to shiver, but she kept looking at the moon. Gradually, the constant effort in keeping her gaze, made her loose her focus slightly, and the half disc blurred, then the shape shifted a little into an indistinct, hazy figure. Kat’lana’s voice took on a slow, slurred timbre, her words merging with one another, but still intelligible. She started a low, almost gravel-voiced description of what she saw.

  “It’s Calach all right Winnie, but he’s changed.” She began. “He’s older, in fact he’s quite an old man. And he’s scarred; right down his face, over his eye, an’ that’s almost shut wi’ the scar.”

  Her sobs began to break into her monologue.

  “Oh, Winnie, it’s horrible! His eye’s really bad. Is this definitely going to happen?” She sat up suddenly, cupping her face in her hands, tearing her eyes away from the moons shining globe. “His hair’s grey!” She screamed through her hands into the night.

  Winnie sat upright, and turned to face Kat’lana. She moved round slightly to get a better look at the expression on her face, then started to chant in a whispered monotone. Gradually she took Kat’lana’s hands from her face and held them, cup-like in front of her. Kat’lana’s tears had run into the palms of her hands, the incandescent disc reflecting on their tracks. She stood upright with no support from Winnie, seeming to glide into a rigid, formal stance, her arms swept back stiffly from her body, chest pushed forward and upward, and head thrown back in worship.

  “Oh Winnie!” She screamed. “Winnie!”

  Kat’lana’s body shook in spasms and with a final violent thrust upward, she went limp and fell into the waiting arms of the older woman. With more strength than she should have had, gently lowered Kat’lana to the moist dewy grass.

  “Tell me what you saw Kat’lana.” She murmured quietly, as she swept Kat’lana’s hair from her face. “Tell me what you saw, for the place behind the moon holds no secrets.”

  Kat’lana opened her eyes, took a deep breath and half whispered, half croaked, “Oh Winnie, I know who gave Calach the scar.” She paused. “I know who sliced down his face with a sword and took away the sight from one of his eyes.”

  Winnie held her breath as Kat’lana continued.

  “Calach trusts him.” she continued, “How could he have done it?”

  “You’ve done well Kat’lana. This is the first time you’ve came from that place with a memory.”

  “If this pain is a’ that lies behind the moon, I’d rather have no more part of it.”

  “Oh, there’s more. But not always pain, sometimes joy and love.”

  “But Winnie, I saw who did this....”

  “Hush, lass. What you have seen is but one facet of the future. It is but one possibility. Many times you will see what is not going to pass. Only by living through it can you know the difference.”

  “If he does this thing to my Calach, the traitor will die for his efforts.”

  “You saw this also?”

  “No. That was my promise to myself. The traitor will die.”

  ~ ~ ~

  “Like this, Lachlan.” Calach slipped the arrow past his hand and knocked it tight on the bowstring. He spoke in the barest of whispers. His pupil was watching close. “You’ve got to feel the bow as part o’ yourself.”

  His bow was Calach’s most treasured possession; he had bought it from a trader who had passed through his home settlement of Lochery last summer and it had been the finest piece of workmanship Calach had ever seen. When Calach had seen it on the trader’s wagon, and felt the tension which the combination of bone and yew could deliver, he knew that he just had to have it. He had then set to work, with the guile of a man far beyond his years, to barter for the bow. In the end it had come down to otter pelts; twenty in all, five of which he’d had to borrow from his best friend Aysar, but the bow was worth every one. Although he had tried not to let Calach see it, the trader had also been happy with the deal; the Caledon pelts were of great value for they were acknowledged as furs of the very highest quality; the best in the Norlands and would fetch a good price in the ‘civilized’ lands of the south, where the soft fur of the otter was rare.

  Gently his fingertips caressed the bowstring.

  “Then you ready yourself, an’ get set to stand, feet quite wide apart.” He rose from a very low squat; into a half crouch position, his bow held horizontally, his left arm straight, the bowstring taut, the end of the arrow under his nose. He had only just put his head over the tall bracken. His younger brother rose with him. Their prey was totally unaware of their presence.

  “You feel steady here, ready for the release.” he hissed towards the young Caledon boy. “In one movement, you rise and sight your target, you swivel your bow upright an’ you let loose the arrow. It has to be a smooth motion, or you’ll jerk the bow an’ miss the shot. I count to three, nice an’ steady, one; stand up, two; swivel the bow, three; let loose the bowstring. When I do it now, you count in your head when I rise up, alright?” Calach’s arm was starting to shake under the tension of the bow. Lachlan nodded that he understood and looked to his front.

  As they rose together, Calach turning his bow vertically, the hare came into sight over the bracken cover. Lachlan hardly had time to count at all, when Calach had fired, his arrow striking the animal in the side, pinning it to the grassy slope. Calach then charged over the dense bracken greenery towards the patch of grass where the rabbit and its colleagues had been feeding.

  When the young boy had joined him, Calach already had a grip on the still wriggling ball of fur and had his dirk in his other hand.

  “Do you want to do it or will I?” Offering his brother the dirk, handle first.

  “I will!” Lachlan laughed, taking the dirk. He neatly spun it in the air, caught it carefully by the blade, and struck the hare on the skull with the heavy handle. Calach watched as Lachlan cut the throat of the hare and let some of the blood drop to the grass, he then spat into the blood, and with his foot, ground the combined liquids into the earth beneath.

  “Lugh. For you.”
the boy said solemnly.

  “Good lad,” Calach smiled, reassured that his brother knew the proper way to give thanks to the earth spirit for the gift of food. It had been a long time since they had spent so much time together. “Next comes the lesson of how to feel the prey.” He continued, “When you’re trained enough, you should be able to find your quarry blindfolded. I’ll show you sometime.”

  “Sometime soon?”

  “Aye.”

  He stood and ruffled the hair of his younger brother.

  “Right Lachy, go an’ find Aysar wi’ the horses, an bring him back here. This is where we’ll make camp for the night.”

  “Aye, Calach!”

  Calach watched his younger brother retrace his steps up the hill and into the dense woodland. They had been making slow time on their journey, but Calach had decided to travel away from the glen floors, where they would meet both Caledonii and, now, Meatae clan villages, which were generally in the fertile valleys or down by the river or lochside. Within a few moments, he saw an excited Lachlan leading Aysar and the horses towards his position.

  “Right then Lachlan, do you want to help Aysar an’ me make the fire an’ skin the hare, or do you want to hunt for more?"

  “Silly question, I’ll take the hunting any day.” Lachlan, beamed with delight at being given the chance to hunt on his own. Even back at Lochery, he was always shadowed by Fetasius or Benelek or by one of the other children. This was the first time that he had ever been away from the settlement for longer than two days. At the feast of midsummer, Lachlan had been proud to have his third finger tattooed in the Norland clan style. He was one year nearer becoming a full warrior and, although he had not taken on any of the hunting tasks required of him, he relished the possibility of getting a deer or a boar on this journey with Calach and Aysar, who both now showed seven tattooed fingers.