The Boy with the Bronze Axe

by Kathleen Fidler

  “But once our people used to do that. You have told us so yourself, Lokar,” Tresko reminded him.

  “Which of you would be prepared to give himself as a sacrifice?” Lokar challenged the crowd.

  The people shifted about uneasily on their feet, but no man came forward.

  “You see, Tresko? To take a man by force from any tribe would destroy the peace that has been among us for many years,” Lokar told him.

  Tresko was not silenced. “There is no need to take any man of the tribes of Orkney, so there is no need to disturb our peace. We should seek one who is not painted as we are for the Festival, who does not carry the mark of the tribe of Skara.” He pointed to Tenko. “There he is! The boy with the shining axe who came out of the sea!”

  “No! No!” Lokar cried, aghast at the suggestion. Birno gave Tresko a threatening look.

  “Yes, yes! He is not one of us. He will do for the sacrifice,” cried a chieftain from the eastern tribes. They were relieved in their minds that none of their people was to be chosen for sacrifice.

  “Sacrifice the stranger! Sacrifice the stranger!” the cry rose from them. It grew and grew, echoing from one tribe to another.

  Tenko stood as if turned to stone, his face pale. He knew he was in greater danger than ever before in his life and he could do nothing. If the tribes went mad with bloodlust he would be killed on the stone of sacrifice. Lokar stood between him and the excited crowd.

  “No! This lad should not be killed. He has brought good and not ill to the tribe of Skara. He has destroyed our enemies in the sky and the sea. He brings us new ways of life from our kinsmen in lands over the sea.”

  Birno took his place alongside Lokar.

  “This boy belongs now to my family. He has been accepted by the tribe of Skara. Whoever lays a finger on him will have to deal with me first,” Birno declared.

  The shouts of the other tribes sank to an uneasy murmur. Tresko, however, was not finished.

  “If he has been accepted by the tribe of Skara, why then does he not carry the marks of the tribe in paint as we do? He is a stranger and strangers should die!”

  Birno swung Tenko round to face the crowd. He pulled open Tenko’s tunic and displayed the sign of the sun painted on Tenko’s chest.

  “There is the mark of the Sun God. There is the sign of Skara!” he shouted. “This boy is one of us. Kill him and you will answer to me for it.” He swung round to Tresko. “Blood shall be answered by blood, Tresko!”

  Tresko quailed before him and drew back afraid.

  An angry defeated murmur rose from the crowds. The tribe of Skara made threatening gestures towards the tribes from the east who demanded the sacrifice of Tenko. They waved their fists at Tresko. Lokar knew it would take little to set them fighting one against the other and then the Sun God would have his blood sacrifice indeed. He held up his hand for silence.

  “Be quiet, my people!” he commanded. “Remember you stand within the sacred ring of the Sun.” He cast a look up at the sky. Lokar’s great dignity was impressive indeed. One by one the men of Orkney fell silent. There was a stillness in the Ring of Brodgar like the hush before a storm.

  Lokar spoke. “This boy belongs to the tribe of Skara. You have heard what Birno said and you have seen the mark of the tribe of Skara on the boy’s chest. If you men of the south and east and north kill him, then the men of Skara will seek revenge. If you break the laws of all our tribes then you will bring war upon us. The peace that has dwelt among us for so many years will be broken. Evil will sweep over the land.” Lokar raised his arm impressively. “The God of the Sun who speaks to you through me demands obedience and not sacrifice. He will have peace and not war. If you disobey, the Sun God will hide his face from you. He will speak to you in a terrible voice.” Even as Lokar spoke a dark cloud drifted over the face of the sun. The crowd felt the shadow sweep over them and shifted uneasily. From out of the cloud came a flash of lightning and the sudden sharp crack of thunder. The men of Orkney flung themselves on their faces. Only Lokar remained erect, his arm pointing upwards.

  “The Sun God has spoken. He will have no sacrifice. He commands that there shall be peace among you. He will show his anger to the one who raises his hand against another man. Rise now to your feet. Each chief will give the hand of friendship to Birno, the Chief of Skara, who has erected the great stone for us here today. Then we will sing the chant to the sun.”

  One by one the painted chiefs came forward and took Birno by the hand. Many of them spoke to Tenko too. Tresko hid himself, skulking behind the men of Skara. When all had saluted Birno the tribes stood waiting for Lokar’s signal. He raised his arms towards the sun. Birno broke into the chant with his powerful voice and all the people sang. Across the moat the wives and families joined in too. Kali sang with all her heart, the tears of relief that Tenko was spared rolling down her face.

  “Now go to your families and eat,” Lokar commanded.

  The men of Orkney crossed the earthen bridges to their families. They stepped lightly, as though a burden of fear had fallen from their shoulders. Only Lokar knew how narrowly war had been prevented among the tribes. In all his days as priest of the sun there had been peace. Now the crisis was over he felt empty and drained of strength. It was with difficulty he controlled the trembling of his limbs.

  “Let me put my hand on your shoulder, Tenko,” he said, “I am a feeble old man.”

  “No, no, you are not!” Birno told him. “Who but you could have held the tribes by your will? There was strength indeed.” He took Lokar by the arm. “You need food like the rest of us.”

  Lokar leaned on Birno and Tenko. Slowly he made his way back to the place where the tribe of Skara had assembled. Out of respect for the wise old priest they had waited to eat. Birno led him to a large stone that served as a seat.

  “Stempsi has food for you. I will go and bring it,” he said.

  As Birno passed Tresko he stopped. “Do not think that your wickedness will go unpunished. Some day, Tresko, you will go too far. Remember this! If you so much as lay a finger on Tenko you will have to reckon with me.”

  Tresko shrank back and said nothing.

  Tenko brought water in his bowl for Lokar from a nearby spring. Lokar drank the water thankfully. As he handed back the bowl he said, “Sit beside me, Tenko. I have something to say to you.”

  Tenko sat at his feet.

  “There will come a time, Tenko, when I shall be no longer with you. That time may not be far off. I wish you to make a promise to me.”

  “Yes, Lokar.”

  “No matter how sorely you are provoked you will never plunge my people into shedding blood.”

  “I promise that, Lokar. Before I would do that I would take my boat and go back across the sea.”

  Lokar shook his head. “You must not do that either, Tenko.” The old man’s eyes gazed afar off, as though he were looking at something Tenko could not see. “There will come a time of sorrow and disaster to the tribe of Skara. Then they will look to you for help. You must not fail them.”

  “I will not fail them, Lokar,” Tenko told him steadfastly.

  8. The Day of the Fog

  When the excitement of the Festival of the Sun had died down Tenko grew restless. Life at Skara seemed quiet and uneventful. Tresko and Korwen kept out of his way. The children helped with the flocks and herds. They took the boats out to the rocky reefs and brought back limpets and crabs and flatfish. In the long summer nights they sat on the sand dunes round the village and worked on bone ornaments and stone axes.

  One day Kali found Tenko sitting moodily on a sand hill just above the Bay of Skaill. He was staring hard at the two boats.

  “What is wrong, Tenko?” Kali asked.

  “Nothing ever seems to happen at Skara. I might as well be a cow or a sheep.”

  Kali looked alarmed. “Do not say things like that, Tenko. Why were you looking so hard at the boats?” In her heart she was fearful that Tenko might take his boat and leave them. She
did not know of his promise to Lokar.

  “I was thinking of a way they could be made safer. Sometimes they roll over in heavy seas.”

  Kali felt relieved that that was all that was in Tenko’s mind.

  Tenko went on, “Listen, Kali! At the Festival of the Sun I talked with men of other tribes. One of them was a man from the north who had taken over a day’s journey to reach Brodgar. He told me there were other islands to the north … many islands. I should like to see those islands.”

  “I knew there was something troubling you,” Kali said unhappily.

  “There is always something in me that will not let me be still, Kali. Always I want to find out what lies beyond the next headland – over the next hill. But I want you and Brockan to come with me and find out too.”

  It was as though a stone was lifted from Kali’s heart when she knew that Tenko had no thought of leaving them behind.

  “The large boat will not take three of us very fast if we have to carry meat and water for a journey. The smaller one is apt to roll and it would be hard for either you or Brockan to handle it in the open sea. I have been thinking of a way to make the boats safer.”

  “How, Tenko?”

  “There are still three small branches left from the tree we found. I am going to cut three notches in the side of each boat as they face each other. Then I am going to shape a notch like this at the end of each branch.” Tenko drew a T-shaped notch in the sand. “I shall fit the notches on the branches into the notches on the boats, and the branches will link the boats together.”

  “I understand. It is a good plan.” Kali clapped her hands.

  “Then, over the three branches we can stretch a sheepskin tightly. It will serve to hold the branches in position and make a platform by which we can pass from one boat to the other. Will you help me with it, Kali?”

  “Yes, yes. You know I will.”

  “Come now! Let us start work on it at once. We will bring the branches from my bed where I have been keeping them safe.”

  Kali hesitated. “Tenko, we ought to ask our father for permission to make this journey.”

  Tenko frowned. He did not wish anything to stand in the way of his adventure, but he knew that what Kali said was right. He thought hard for a minute. “Very well,” he said at last. “I will ask Birno and Lokar. If they are willing, then that is enough.”

  Kali and Brockan went with him to Birno and Lokar. When Tenko outlined his plan Birno looked doubtful. “These are dangerous seas, Tenko, and the shores are bounded by rocky cliffs. You would be voyaging along unknown coasts.”

  “That is true, Birno. I promise you that I will not venture too far. I will go no further than two days’ journey. I want to see what is beyond the headlands to the north.”

  “Why do you want to go, Tenko?” Lokar asked.

  “There is a restlessness in me, Lokar. It comes on me like a sickness. It is as if I am seeking for something I have not found. I must see what lies behind the mountain, beyond the headland.”

  Lokar turned to Birno. “Our people came from far lands, Birno. It took them many thousands of moons, many generations of men, to reach this island. But always in them was the urge to find new lands. Maybe here in Skara we have grown too contented. Tenko, Kali and Brockan are our people of the future. Let them go on their adventure. It might be that Skara could vanish in a night and our tribes need new lands.”

  “Skara vanish in a night! Our strong stone dwellings disappear like a puff of smoke? Come, Lokar, that is not possible.” Birno laughed.

  “Do not laugh, Birno.”

  A strange uneasiness fell on them. Tenko broke the silence.

  “May I take the boats and go then, Birno? Have Kali and Brockan your leave to come with me?”

  “Very well, Tenko. But you are to take no risks, remember! No chasing strange monsters in the sea!”

  “I promise that, Birno.”

  “And you will be back in the Bay of Skaill by sunset on the second day?”

  “I will try to do that, Birno.”

  Lokar added a word of warning. “If you meet strange tribes be friendly towards them but do not trust them too much.”

  “I will heed what you say, Lokar.”

  They started work at once on the boats. Birno sometimes lent a hand with the work too. He also made extra paddles for them.

  “We all know how easy it is to lose paddles,” he said.

  At last the boats were united by the wooden struts and the sheepskin. Tenko had made the first catamaran to sail the northern sea. He was thrilled with his achievement and bounced up and down in the smaller boat.

  “Look, Birno! It will not sink! It would even be hard for the waves to overturn it. It will be difficult to steer, perhaps, but we shall soon get the knack of it.”

  All that afternoon they practised paddling the boats round the Bay of Skaill. Birno, too, tried his hand. “It is a good craft,” he said. “It does not rock and roll in the waves.”

  “I shall handle the smaller boat. Kali and Brockan can take the larger one. My stronger paddling will make up for theirs and help to steer the craft,” Tenko planned.

  The next day was a fine, still day with no wind. The sun rose early in the north-east, a red ball of fire. Tenko and the children were up at sunrise and packed the sheepskin bags with the meat Stempsi had cooked for them. She added a small bowl of wild honey. This was a treasure indeed. It was not often a nest of wild bees was found and it was not easy to smoke them out and get the honey. Birno took six hollow horns of cattle out of his keeping-place behind his bed. These were precious possessions too.

  “You can carry water in these. Fill the horns with water and tie a sheepskin over the end of each one. That will keep the water from spilling out.”

  “That is how the men long before us carried water on their journeys,” Lokar said. “Remember to fill the drinking horns again whenever you touch land.”

  At last they were ready for their adventure. They pushed their craft into shallow water and got into the boats. Birno, Lokar and Stempsi watched them go, Stempsi with misgiving at her heart.

  As though he could read her mind Lokar said, “Have no fear, Stempsi. This is a voyage Tenko must make for the sake of the people of Skara.”

  The strange craft carrying the children grew less and less in size. They watched till it rounded the Point of Verron.

  All that morning the children dug into the sea with their paddles and the catamaran moved steadily northwards, helped by a gentle south-west breeze. Now and again Tenko ordered them to rest and they laid their paddles on the floors of the boats and relaxed. The urge of the tide drifted them northward. Though Tenko followed the shore he took care to keep the craft well out beyond the ground swell near to the cliffs. It was a cruel rocky shore of great headlands fringed by jagged reefs. The sun mounted higher in the sky and the children grew hungry and thirsty. Still Tenko pulled on, looking for a break in the chain of cliffs. A great headland towered to an immense height above the water. Tenko began to think he might have to turn back. Kali was flagging in her stroke on the paddle and Brockan had a blister on his hand. Then, all at once, as they rounded a sharp reef they came on a small sandy bay. A stream of water flowed down between the green hills and spread itself in shallows at the head of the bay.

  “This is the place where we will rest and eat,” Tenko decided.

  He swung on his paddle and pulled the craft round. The two boats headed between the reefs into the bay. They leaped out when the water grew shallow and pulled the catamaran well up the beach beyond the high-tide mark. They flung themselves down on a grassy dune, glad to rest.

  Tenko was the first to recover. He went down to the boats and brought back three water-horns and a skin bag of meat.

  “Sit up and eat,” he told the children. “You will feel better after food.” He handed a mutton bone covered with meat to each of them and took one for himself. They tore at the meat with their strong teeth and drank from the horns. For a while they were
too busy eating to talk.

  “We will rest till the shadow of that rock reaches the pool,” Tenko decided. “Then we will fill our horns at the stream and pull out into the bay again. How is your blistered hand, Brockan?”

  Brockan was a tough young lad. “It does not hurt so much now.”

  “Let me see,” Kali demanded.

  The blister was red and angry-looking. She knew Brockan would suffer in silence and say nothing.

  “We must do something for that, Brockan, or else you will have to give up using your paddle.” She seized the soft sheepskin bag in which they had carried the meat. “Is the edge of your axe sharp, Tenko?”

  “I always keep it sharp.” Tenko took out the axe.

  “Hold it with the edge upwards, Tenko.” Kali took the bag and holding the edges of it tightly she pulled the bag over the sharp edge of the axe till it split. Turning the bag this way and that she managed to cut a square of soft supple skin.

  “Give me your hand, Brockan.”

  She fitted the sheepskin round his hand like a fingerless mitten, leaving the thumb free. Then, with the bone needle she usually carried and a thread of sinew, she sewed the mitten over Brockan’s hand and secured it at the wrist by sinews fastened round it.

  “Is that comfortable?” she asked Brockan.

  “Yes. Much better.”

  Kali looked about her. There was a soft green moss on a rock. Kali knew this moss had healing properties. She gathered some and went back to Brockan. “Tuck this inside your palm over the blister. It will make a soft pad inside the covering.”

  Brockan was comforted and relieved. “I shall be able to wield the paddle all right now.” He did not wish to fail Tenko on this voyage that meant so much to him.

  “We will fill the horns again at that stream and then we will push on further,” Tenko directed.

  They followed the stream inland for a short distance till they came to another stream running into it. Here the water tasted fresh and free from salt.