Back on shore there was activity in the fields. The soil had thawed and was soft enough for the plough; planting was going on in earnest. When it wasn’t frozen solid the land between the mountains and the sea was fertile and, if unravaged by war, it could produce enough food to support the people quite comfortably. The rough grass of the higher pastures was good enough to feed the brown sheep, and the cultivated land was now extensive enough for many a good herd of cattle to feed on fields that were lying fallow - and to fertilise them, of course. A land flowing with milk and honey, then? There was milk, certainly, but the honey would have to wait until the summer when the bees had fully wakened from their hibernation and had collected sufficient nectar to feed their own armies, with enough left over for the tables of their keepers. A small cloud of dust signalled the return of a light patrol from wherever Owain had sent them.
In all the landscape I couldn’t spot the distinctive figure of my troubled friend, Ieuan ap Talog, High Druid of the Kingdom of Strathclyde. In the past, in Erin, his disappearance would have meant that he had retreated to his inner cave, or gone wandering in the woods and glades where no-one would find him for hours, or even days. I had no idea where any hideaway of his might be and so I decided to walk up to the forest’s edge. Perhaps I would come across him but if not there were herbs and roots to be found to replenish the small store in my bag.
I told the sentry at the gate where I was going and was advised to watch for wolves.
“Our King has ordered that the wolves should be hunted until there are none within the kingdom but they’re still numerous, and bold after a hard winter.”
“Or desperate with hunger,” I replied. “Thank you for the warning; I’ll be on my guard.” I had just got down to the lands below the Rock when a woman came running out of one of the huts.
“Father! Thank the gods! Help me please, my son…my son…” she burst into tears. I asked where the boy was and she indicated the hut, unable to speak. I followed her in and found a brodach, an older woman, and a man - probably the younger woman’s husband - mopping the brow of a child of no more than six years of age. The brodach stepped away to give me room. I knelt down by the pallet on which the boy lay, ignoring the mud on the floor. He had a fever and was breathing feebly.
“How long has he been like this?”
“A week, Father,” the older woman replied.
“Magister or Saint, mother.”
“You’re a Christian?”
“Yes. Now what happened? Exactly?”
“It was nothing out of the ordinary, Magister, not to begin with. He went swimming early in the morning and then complained of a stomach ache just after midday. He wouldn’t take his food. By evening he was vomiting, the following day he had the runs and his temperature was right up.”
“Where was he swimming?”
“Upstream of the Castle, Magister, we’re very careful about that. The tide was slack, too. We won’t let him swim downstream, with all the rubbish that comes out of there. But you can’t stop a boy from going where he wants with his friends.”
“When did he stop sweating?”
“Just this morning, my Lord.”
“What have you given him?”
“He couldn’t hardly hold anything down. I tried nettle soup, peppermint cordial and mustard vapour. Nothing’s helped. We have been up for five days and nights trying to keep his temperature down.” She paused, then continued, hesitantly. “I hope I did no harm?”
“No, mother. You’ve kept him alive. More than most could have done.” I stood up. “He has a dangerous infection, and we’re close to the crisis - indeed we’re in it.” I sighed. “I don’t know if I can save him,” the mother wailed, “but you’re fortunate. The High Druid of the Kingdom has great healing powers. I’ll give you something for your immediate use, which will keep him alive. You need Father Ieuan to restore him.” I reached into my bag and sorted through the half-dozen or so small - and dwindling - bundles of dried vegetation I had in there and selected two. “This should be infused with warm water - not boiling - it must be just a little more than hand hot, and a cloth soaked in it held under his nose and lain on his chest. This one must be made into a soup and he must - must - drink it, even if you have to pour it down his throat drop by drop. You,” I called the man over, “go to the Keep, use my name - it’s Magister Anselm - and ask for Father Ieuan, the High Druid. Tell him what’s wrong with your son and that I sent you to him. I’ll go looking for him in the woods. Keep looking for him until you find him or I send word to you.” The man nodded but hesitated at the door. He looked as if he wanted to ask something. I followed him outside, leaving the women with the boy.
“If the boy lives, Magister, will he…” the query died on his lips.
“If he comes through this crisis, with Father Iuean’s help, he’ll have no ill effects at all. He’ll grow up strong. He won’t be a burden on you.” The man nodded and jogged off up the hill to the Castle. I had great confidence in the Druid’s Gift: while I could keep the boy alive for another day or so Ieuan could restore him to health, given time. I had seen him pull people back from the jaws of Death, or what looked very much like it. Coivin and I had both benefitted from his Gift. I scratched at my ribs at the memory of the beating that had broken them. Coivin had received even worse but in two days, he was up and about and able to ride again. It was miraculous.
Eighteen months later he was dead. At my hand. There was nothing Ieuan could have done to bring him back.
Why had the little family not called the Druid earlier? Or one of the more junior Druids not called in on his rounds among the people? Any cleric’s first duty was to the people, be he Druid or Christian. I would have to ask when I next saw Ieuan.
I made my way more urgently up to the woods. It was more likely that Ieuan was in the Castle, getting his wits and disposition back on an even keel, but he might be in the forest. The boy would live for another day without him but the sooner he was found, the better.
I had reached the edge of the forest when another thought struck me: the size of the family I’d just visited. The father was young, a junior warrior by his bearing rather than a farmer - the hut was just by the foot of the Rock, well away from the fields. The mother was no great age either, early twenties at most. The invalid boy was five or six, so where were the other children? I would have expected to see two at least, maybe three and possibly four; and I’d felt no indication that the woman was pregnant. Strathclyde was a busy kingdom and had been for years, beset by enemies within and beyond its frontiers, but not even the most professional army fought in the depths of winter. Most didn’t fight at sowing or harvest-time either. Across the known world there were bulges in the birth rate in January, June and September, to reflect the return of the army: so where were the younger children?
The father could have been wounded in battle, of course, and unable to sire any more - but he had jogged off without any sign of sensitive injury. Maybe they’d died? That was possible, but all of them? I was unaware of any great sickness sweeping through the infant population in the last few years, in Strathclyde or anywhere else. Infant mortality was a fact of life, but only one child after all these years together?
I snapped my fingers and called myself a fool. The man I’d thought the boy’s father probably wasn’t the father at all: the most likely explanation was that the true sire had died, in battle or otherwise, and this one was a second husband. The young woman would consider herself lucky to get him as she wasn’t the young virgin soldiers are supposed to prefer, and there weren’t that many men who would take on another’s children.
I turned to look back towards the Castle and its grounds and could see the dwelling containing the sick boy quite clearly. There was a commotion outside and the bent figure of Ieuan could just be made out approaching the hut, two guards with him. He had been found, which meant that I could get on with locating my plants and herbs without distraction.
I didn’t have to wander far into the wood
s before I began to find what I was looking for. There was wild garlic, whose scent always reminded me of Padhraig’s cooking. It cleaned the blood and helped speed convalescence, as well as adding piquancy to cooked meat. Dandelion, for a tonic, and the base of my own medicine. The early leaves of some valuable flowers could be perceived as well: I recalled the litany I’d been taught as I collected a few from each plant. Rosemary for remembrance, Pansies for thoughts - both useful for brain-fever; Fennel and Columbines, and Rue, the all-purpose herb of grace; some nettles (the best gift from the Romans) and their ever-present companions, dock. My arms were nearly full and I stuffed my haul into my bag anyhow then tied the ends of my rope girdle around so that they wouldn’t get in the way as I sought the last and most valuable quarry - and there it was! Through the trees I could see a clearing where a stream spread out to become a pool, and hanging over it were three willow trees. Their bark, when purified and ground down, was a marvellous remedy against headaches, inflammations and pains of all sorts. It was another major constituent of my own post-Vision medicine.
As I used my small knife to lever off some of the precious fibrous wood - being careful to damage as little as possible and so leave the tree flourishing for others who might have need of it - my eye was caught by something that looked like it might be a clearing, on level ground away to my left and lower down. It looked, of itself, unremarkable, and I wouldn’t normally have paid it a second glance but I felt that I should investigate further. I had that special feeling. From years of experience, I didn’t tend to ignore such feelings. My Gift was not to be ignored.
The only trees that were coming into leaf at that time were birch; those surrounding the clearing were bare. Other than the fact that they weren’t birch or pine, I couldn’t tell what they were from this distance. I finished my task with the willow-tree, put a fair bundle of bark into my bag and made my way towards the open space.
As soon as I went among the trees again the clearing disappeared from sight but I was confident of the direction and the call to go there: I would find the way. It was quite a coincidence; I wouldn’t have noticed it from anywhere but the pool’s edge where I’d been harvesting the bark, and I’d certainly not seen any sign on the way up the hill. It was with a tingle that I felt that God was guiding my steps, and with foreboding that I found the undergrowth getting thicker along the route I wished to follow. I just managed to keep my habit from being badly damaged by the brambles and clinging growth that obstructed me, and I was forced lower and lower in my determination to get by. Nowhere else in the forest had I encountered such growth. I couldn’t say it had been planted there but it did seem to have been encouraged.
The vegetation was getting so thick as to be virtually impassable but the urge was even greater, so I pushed and cut my way through. I couldn’t protect my habit from rents completely but I’d managed to minimise the damage when I reached a clump that looked to be completely impenetrable. It was tangled and dense and rose from ground level to a height of over six feet. It was more hedge than undergrowth and I had no idea how I would get through it. But the urge to do so was very strong. I could just see a thinning of the canopy a short distance ahead: the clearing was very close. I looked carefully to either side to see if there was any way round but there was none that could be discerned. I looked around and up but there was nothing to guide or assist me. I knelt on the ground to look for any raised area, or lighter patches but there again I saw nothing. I felt helpless for a moment and was ready to give up and turn back, but I didn’t.
“You wanted me to come here, Lord, so I’d better just find a way through. It must be here somewhere, or very close. I’ll find it,” I said aloud.
A strange thing happened then, almost as if the tangled growth recognised my determination and gave up the battle. I started to pull myself up to a sitting position and a clump of thorn bush came with me. I stopped to pick it off my habit and could see that it wasn’t attached to the ground. It was dry and bare of green leaves but so were nearly all the bushes in the forest. Only a few ground plants had started on their summer coats.
I shifted my position so that I could get a hand round the back of the mass that had been attached to me. My arm was scratched quite extensively but I would deal with it later. I felt a void behind and tugged the bush, tentatively: it came away easily. I pulled it to one side and was rewarded with the sight of a tunnel, about four feet high, going into the hedge at an angle. I crawled along it and encountered a sharp left-hand bend and could see reflected light. I continued towards it and had to turn equally sharply right. The end was about six feet away. I crawled through and out and stood up to look around myself, hands on hips.
I was at the edge of the clearing with just a few trees between me and the open ground. A glance at the nearest tree confirmed that it was oak, the sacred tree, as were its fellows. Those surrounding the clearing were arranged in a perfect egg-shaped oval. Egg: the symbol of life. The smaller end pointed east towards the rising sun. The ground was about a hundred feet across its narrow axis, half as much again along the broader. A line of pruned oaks created a short avenue from the north to an inner circle about thirty feet in diameter. The circle was the symbol of the Wheel of Life and the avenue continued beyond it on to the southern end. I had been in enough similar places - larger and smaller - to know where I was. Beyond any shadow of a doubt, it was a Druid glade.
The Druid religion’s initiates and priests had always, from before the Milesians came to Erin, practised their secret rites well away from the prying eyes of ordinary folk. Indeed, the penalty for spying on their rituals was death but I wasn’t afraid. I was a Christian but a convert; I had been a Druid, a full Initiate. I wasn’t forbidden on this ground.
This glade was well hidden but I didn’t waste much time considering the reason. The distance between the fertile coastal plain and the inhospitable mountains was not great. Barriers like the hedge were a protection for the unwary as much as a guard to keep the glade pure. In any case, the thickness and rough state of the grass around the area indicated that it was quite old and probably no longer in regular use.
I crossed the open ground to the inner circle. The grass was dew-damp and cool underfoot although not enough to penetrate my shoes. My ankles got wet as the grass was long but I was used to it, it didn’t bother me at all.
Within the inner circle was a slab of stone; the old altar, once used for blood-sacrifices. I made straight for it and stood in the place the presiding priest would have regarded as his own. I was facing due south, which meant that the sect that had used it was not one of the out-and-out sun-worshippers. Their altars faced east, towards the dawn. So this place wasn’t dedicated to golden-haired Lugh, the sun-god, son of the Daghda. More likely Tanaros the Thunder god had been worshipped here then, or a local deity of which I wasn’t aware - but the south could also be the direction of the Underworld, the kingdom of the Hollow Hills. I looked around for any indications that would guide me but there were none. It was a perfectly ordinary Druid glade. The altar had been scrubbed so that the top surface was almost clean but some blood still adhered to it. That was to be expected. They were so keen on blood sacrifices that the sea itself would be unlikely to wash the stone completely spotless. But it also indicated that it may be in more recent use than I’d originally thought. Probably a few chickens had met their end here as the adherents had sought to read messages in their death-throes and bloody entrails. The Roman legions had effectively ended the more grisly practices of the ancient cult.
I put my hands out and on to the altar; I was going to lean on it and drink in the atmosphere. I liked the feel of ancient places of worship and the devotion that had inspired them. The atmosphere was usually peaceful and quiet, even though many of them were associated with blood-sacrifice. In older times, before the coming of Christ, people had conducted their worship as well as they could, their rites and rituals being a pale imitation of the real Sacrifice to come. God seemed to remember where His people had done thei
r best to worship. Most old places still had the resonances of their earlier role, imperfect as it was. Many had been reconsecrated and perhaps the time would come when I could persuade Owain to allow a small chapel to be raised in this high and lonely place. It might be suitable.
I rested my hands on the altar and was completely unprepared for what happened next.
It hit me like a physical blow. It felt disgusting. It had a texture as if it was covered with cold slime. It heaved like a bog – like a living creature from a nameless and evil swamp. Gorge rose from my stomach. I recoiled and my body doubled up for a moment while I tried to retch, but there was nothing to come; the evil was outside, not within me. I lost contact with the altar and, as suddenly as it had started, the attack was over. I stood up again and looked around, confused for a moment. I had not so much a real and present headache as the memory of one, although I knew I’d had no Vision. Not, at least, the sort of Vision I was used to.
I approached the altar again, and with greater caution. I studied it with care but noticed nothing out of the ordinary. It was a large slab, probably of granite, polished on the top surface where it had been cleaned. Veins of quartz were visible and they shone like lightning where they intersected the sacrificial plane. Down the centre was a narrow groove and the top sloped slightly from either side towards it. This was to keep and collect blood and to channel it to a chalice at the eastern end, to my left. So far, there was nothing unusual.
Tentatively I reached out with my left hand and touched the solid stone again. I experienced a vaguely nauseous feeling, but nothing overwhelming. This was not reassuring, however, and it was with great trepidation that I brought my right hand over to the altar and placed my two palms on the top. It was as if I’d completed a circuit, the experience was the same as before. I leaped back in alarm and the feelings faded as suddenly as they’d arisen.
It was very quiet in the glade. No birds sang, no animals disturbed the grass, no breeze rustled the branches. The peace had attracted me and set my mind at ease but this wasn’t a calm peace. It was the stillness of Dread. There was evil at the heart of this forest and I had no place there. My Druidic training would not protect me if I was found by anyone who used this Glade, of that I was sure. I couldn’t tell how long it had been since the last Meeting but of a sudden I was certain it hadn’t been very long ago. What I was sure of was that I should leave, and quickly. Even if there was no Meeting planned for the immediate future (it was full daylight, after all), the sooner I was out of it, the better. An attendant might appear at any time.
The Monk (Prince Ciaran th Damned Book 3) Page 9