by M. K. Hume
Blinded to anything but the human who had invaded its secret place, the boar scarcely felt the blade that pierced its chest before being deflected by the heavy breastbone. The spear was torn out of Caradoc’s fingers and he was forced to throw himself out of the boar’s path. Bleeding, the creature shook its head ponderously and turned once more to attack its enemy.
Separated from his spear, Caradoc drew his sword and faced the boar with this wholly inadequate weapon.
‘Keep back,’ he screamed to his hunters. ‘Use your blades to discourage it from making good its escape – and for God’s sake pull Huw out of the mud so he can’t be injured any further.’
Although his servants were shouting at him, the king blocked out their voices as a distraction. The boar charged again, and Caradoc attempted to hack at it with his sword. But this animal was a twisted hulk of muscle, sinew and bone, so the sword’s blade did little damage other than causing it to squeal with pain. Inevitably, Caradoc would have been gored by the boar’s tusks had it not been for the treacherous leaf mould under his feet. He slipped, lost his footing and the enraged animal rushed past him.
But years of brutal combat training had made Caradoc strong and agile.
The king turned the slip into a rolling tumble that brought him back to the spear which was half-buried in rotting leaves and crushed brambles. After a brief search, Caradoc snatched it up, wedged the shaft into the earth and braced himself to face the massive boar once again.
The animal hit him like an ocean wave. Only a highly trained, iron-muscled warrior could have kept his grip on the shaft of the spear as the charging boar forced itself down onto the spearhead, determined to impale the enemy on its great, curving tusks. Only a hand’s span from the beast, Caradoc was driven inexorably backwards by the power of the boar’s legs. Its red eyes glowed with malevolence, and the huge head weaved from side to side as it tried to reach his flesh. And then the boar’s eyes clouded over and became blank.
The animal’s heavy weight fell to the ground. Nerveless, the head and legs kicked and twitched once or twice – and then the ugly creature was dead.
Heaving and panting from the strain of his exertions, the king rolled away from the dead boar to extricate the spearhead from the body with his knife. He was obliged to place one foot on the carcass for leverage, because the spear had been driven through the breastbone and was firmly wedged inside the heart of the beast.
Caradoc was finally able to yank the spear free with a nasty sucking sound, as if the body was determined to keep the Dumnonii weapon forever. He muttered a low curse of disgust and motioned to one of the hunters to come forward.
‘You can cut off the tusks now,’ Caradoc instructed Rowen. ‘Once you’ve had them cleaned, you can detail one of the men to present them to the crofter as we promised. As for the beast, you can leave it to rot where it lies. Beasts of this size are full of worms and the meat is so old and sinewy that it’s not worth the trouble of butchering it and taking it back to the fortress. Let the bastard rot! I’d prefer to spend the time finding some assistance for Huw.’
Pulling a strip of rag from around his neck, Caradoc began to wipe the blood from the spearhead as he made his way out of the clearing and through the underbrush to where the horses had been left.
‘How is Huw?’ he added as an afterthought to the nearest hunter. Caradoc wasn’t callous by nature or careless of his servant’s hurts, but his mind was still engrossed with the terrors and efforts expended in the killing of this boar.
‘We need to take him to a healer, if one can be found,’ Rowen replied. As the captain of the household guard, he had a good rapport with his king and was free to inform Caradoc of bad news without fear of retribution. One of Caradoc’s many good attributes was his preparedness to accept blame, if the situation demanded it.
‘Tell me quickly, Rowen,’ Caradoc’s voice was clipped and his pace through the brambles picked up as they retraced their steps.
‘His leg is broken and I’ve ordered it to be splinted, but he’s also been gored in the upper chest where there are two nasty furrows. You know what the tusks of such boars are like. They’re filthy, like the animal itself, and Huw’s health will deteriorate quickly if we can’t get him to a healer.’
‘Agreed! But we’re a long way from any villages. Where’d the nearest healer be found?’
Caradoc’s servants looked back at him with blank eyes. Suddenly, one of the older servants snapped his fingers as a thought came to him.
‘The Wise Woman of the Red Wells lives a few miles to the north of here in the direction of the sea, master. I’ve heard she’s knowledgeable on healing matters as well as being a seer.’
‘Aye! I’ve heard of her, but I’m told she never leaves her cottage and she’s never made herself known to me. I can’t tell you if she’d be willing to help our man. At least she’s close!’
As they spoke, Huw groaned and gave signs of returning to consciousness. Even now, so soon after the goring, the wounds were red and bleeding desultorily, while his upper body was covered with darkening bruises.
‘Wash the wounds down thoroughly and prepare him for travel to the Red Wells, Rowen,’ Caradoc ordered his captain before turning his attention back to the wounded man.
‘Can you hear me, Huw?’
‘Aye, sire, I hear you. Will I ever walk again, my lord? I don’t know how I will get on if my leg becomes useless.’ The young man’s face was pale under his usual tan at the thought of being crippled, the probable fate of any man who suffered from a broken leg. Huw could see the splints of rough tree branch that had been bound to his lower leg and he groaned between bitten lips at the realisation of a severe breach in the bone.
‘I don’t know, Huw. As far as I can judge, the break in your leg is clean and simple. We’ve put a splint on it to keep your leg straight while we take you to the healer who lives at the Red Wells. We could carry you on a stretcher, but I believe it will be best to move you on horseback. But this journey will be uncomfortable, so you can expect to feel a great deal of pain.’
Huw nodded his head courageously as he accepted that there was no other option available to him.
‘I think I can ride, but I doubt that I can control a horse very well.’
‘Good lad! We’ll carry you to the horses and put you on the quietest pack animal we can find. Once we get you settled on its back, we’ll find some way of supporting your leg for the journey.’
Carrying the wounded man on a stretcher by foot would make the journey to the Red Wells interminable and Huw would be unlikely to survive the journey if infection set in.
With a general’s skill and organisation, Caradoc had arranged for Huw to be tied to the saddle with his broken leg padded with a length of soft wool to spare him from the shocks of his steed’s gait. Scarcely pausing to drink a draught of beer, or to cleanse their bodies and sluice their faces with water from the stream, the cavalcade set off on a long and pain-filled trek.
‘The horses are well-rested so we’ll travel for as long as the light and the terrain permit our continued movement. Huw needs to be with the wise woman as soon as we can safely get him there,’ Caradoc said.
As the party mounted, Caradoc noted that flies had already found the carcass of the black boar. The insects were laying their eggs in its glazed eyes and the ragged gashes in its head where the huge tusks had once been rooted.
The miles were weary and long, while the hunters were forced to rest on several occasions when the light and weather deteriorated. Huw bore the travails of the journey bravely, but he was barely conscious and lolling in the saddle by noon of the next day when Caradoc saw a thin wisp of smoke stir in the still air ahead of them.
Caradoc increased the pace by urging his horse from a walk to a trot, even though the fine animal was weary. The king had already decided that Huw’s condition was so urgent that they
should continue to the Red Wells without pause, and the men and horses would be permitted to rest once the party had reached the cottage of the wise woman. The wounded man had been untreated for close to twenty hours now, so the wounds on his torso were red and beginning to show signs of the inevitable infection. Huw needed urgent treatment from a healer if he was to survive.
The cottage rested in a fold of land between low hills and the sounds of running water from a stream could be clearly heard by the huntsmen as they drew their horses to a ragged stop outside a low door that had been scrubbed to the brilliance of unmarked, silvered timber. The flint walls caught the gleam of the noon light and reflected intermittent glints of blackness where the walls had been wet earlier in the day. The roof of the cottage was neatly thatched and the building had no openings other than the single door. Smoke from the fire pit was escaping through a hole in the roof, but it was the only sign of habitation that could be seen in the quiet dell.
Caradoc eyed his surroundings with suspicion, for no king rules long if he is not constantly alert to new places and the dangers that can be hidden within them. This croft seemed harmless, with neat beds of vegetables and herbs. Fruit and nut trees were heavy with ripening fruit, while small enclosures held a cow and a calf. Several sheep were cropping grass contentedly; a scattering of hens, ducks and two very unhappy geese flapped their wings at the approach of armed and mounted men.
‘Knock at the door, Rowen. You can rouse the wise woman while we find water to cool down Huw’s wounds and allow the horses to drink their fill.’
‘Someone is coming, my lord,’ Rowen replied, his body suddenly rigid and watchful.
Shading his eyes from the light, the king stared towards a coppice of thick trees where a woman, wrapped in a thick cloak of homespun and carrying a heavy basket, was picking her way between tussocks of grass. Two large and shaggy hounds were loping along ahead of her.
When the dogs sighted the group of warriors at the front of the cottage, they stopped dead and growled deep in their throats as their pelts raised in ruffs down their spines. The woman used her free hand to make a motion that clearly told them to remain silent while she walked forward, her skirts swinging with the movement of her womanly hips. The dogs followed obediently, despite their downcast heads and their watchful pale-yellow eyes.
Caradoc recognised the breed immediately. One of their sires had been a wolf, and the intelligence and obedience of these hounds rendered them more dangerous than other kinds. The king’s hand itched to finger the sheath of his knife but he refrained from drawing his blade.
Instead, he advanced cautiously and stopped a few feet from her. Spreading his hands wide to show the dogs that he carried nothing that could harm their mistress, he permitted them to sniff at his boots and leather trews.
‘I am Caradoc, King of the Dumnonii, and we have come to you because Huw, one of my huntsmen, has been gored by a savage boar that was terrorising the district. We have ridden to you in haste, knowing that such wounds can be fatal. Can you help us?’
The woman lifted the hood of her cloak and revealed a quantity of chestnut hair and a pair of striking blue eyes.
‘Yes, sire,’ she said in a rich contralto voice that made the hair stand up on the back of the king’s neck. ‘I’ve been expecting your visit.’
Caradoc felt as if someone had driven the air from his lungs. ‘You say that you’ve been expecting me . . . ?’
‘Yes, King Caradoc. The red waters rarely lie so I have been collecting the simples I will need to treat your servant’s wounds. I will comply with your needs, because the gods have deemed that you will satisfy mine. I will inform you at a later time of the payment I will require of you once your huntsman is well again. Do you agree to abide by my terms?’
Caradoc forced himself to look into those alien eyes that seemed like two slivers of strangely opaque glass, so that he was unable to read the mind that lay behind them.
He glanced back at Huw who was almost fainting on his packhorse in his weariness and pain.
‘Yes! Your terms are acceptable – because I have no other choice.’
CHAPTER IV
A Strange Bargain
Something sweet is the whisper of the pine, O goatherd,that makes her music by yonder springs.
Theocritus, Idylls, No 1
As the king ceased to speak, without questions or time for reflection, the wise woman swept past him to approach the packhorse with Huw firmly wedged into the saddle.
‘Please, my lord, take this brave fellow from his horse and lay him down on a pallet inside my cottage. You may come with him and check my quarters yourself, if you desire.’
Caradoc had been considering how to ask this same question, so he flushed and shivered again at the seeming ability of this woman to read his mind.
The wise woman’s cottage was quite unlike anything that Caradoc had ever seen. Sweet lavender and herbs were drying on racks in the rafters just above head height and a huge blackened pot was releasing the delicious aroma of a mutton stew. Convenient hooks hung from the ceiling to carry hanks of wool that were waiting for spindle or loom, all of which lent a soft haze of muted pastel colours to the roof area. A number of coloured weavings softened a single bed that had been placed by the fireplace, while a pile of worn blankets in large baskets had been arranged for her hounds who leaped into them, then settled down to watch their mistress with adoring eyes.
‘Yes! We’ll lay your young man down on my own bed until such time as I’ve examined his wounds and decided what we’re going to do with him,’ the wise woman told Caradoc as Rowen and Trefor carried Huw into the room on an improvised stretcher.
Caradoc gave Rowen his instructions for the servants and huntsmen. ‘You can set up an encampment downstream from the house where you can water the horses and prepare for a stay of several days. I’m not inclined to move Huw again, even if our healer should pronounce him healthy enough to travel. He’s exhausted and will be in poor condition for some time, even when his wounds have started to heal. We’ll probably send most of the hunting party back to Tintagel and retain only those men needed to aid the wise woman and myself. I’ll remain here until Huw is ready to leave.’
Caradoc turned his attention back to the wise woman who was efficiently stripping the clothes away from her patient. Caradoc concealed a smile when she slapped away the boy’s hands as he tried to hide his genitals.
‘I’ve seen better often-times, so no foolishness, please.’
When the young man coloured hotly and his head began to lower in shame, the wise woman took pity on him.
‘Well, perhaps not better, young man, although I’ve not measured you precisely. But there’ll be no more blither-blather for the moment, my dear.’ Her voice was gruff, but it was also kind.
While Rowen and Trefor obeyed their king’s instructions, the wise woman began to remove the improvised splint from Huw’s leg. She bit her lip in concern at what she saw and then moved to a narrow bench that ran along the back wall of the cottage. With the assistance of a long twig, she lit several lamps and set them into niches in the wall hollows designed for the purpose.
Then she found a jar that had been sealed with wax and a twist of rag. As she poured a small amount of a viscous liquid into a cup, she added a good pinch of chopped and dried herbs from another jar and then filled the cup with water from a kettle that had been boiling in the fire pit.
‘Now, young man, you’ll oblige old Saraid by drinking this nasty concoction of mine. Once you’ve drunk it all down, you’ll sink into a deep sleep so I can set your leg and help it to grow strong until it allows you to walk again. I’ll also be able to treat your chest wounds more easily if you’re asleep. I promise not to compromise your virtue while you’re in my power.’
Even Huw managed a weak smile.
‘You’re not that old,’ Huw whispered, as he swallowe
d every drop of the thick mixture. ‘Are you called Mistress Saraid, my lady?’
‘Of course! Close your eyes now, my boy, and Saraid will make you well again.’ Then, to Caradoc’s surprise, she kissed Huw on both eyelids as if she was his mother.
Touched, Caradoc watched carefully as Saraid stroked Huw’s forehead until he fell into the deepest of deep sleeps. Minutes later, she began to carefully stroke his leg from the knee to the ankle, although Huw stirred fitfully at her touch in the tender spots. Then, after making a few rapid calculations, she instructed Caradoc to take a firm grip on Huw’s hip. Finally, she grasped his unfeeling foot and lower leg and pulled downward with surprising strength.
An immediate clicking sound was audible.
‘We’ve got it already, Caradoc. Feel your way along the edges of the break, and you’ll be able to tell the bone is back in place.’
Saraid seemed to expect his assistance, so Caradoc ran his hand down Huw’s leg and realised that the jagged edges had been perfectly realigned back into position.
He looked at Saraid with renewed respect and wordlessly bowed his head to her.
‘That wasn’t an over-difficult manipulation, my lord, as long as the trauma hadn’t caused major damage to the flesh and the break is in one of the long, straight bones. There wasn’t any magic to the treatment at all.’ She grinned conspiratorially. ‘As you saw, even a woman can do it.’
With the king’s hesitant assistance, Saraid bound the leg with lengths of cloth and tied them off tightly enough to restrict movement while still allowing a smooth blood flow to run through the limb. Then she splinted the leg once again, using wooden stakes that had been shaped to fit snugly around a human leg. The device was then bound into position.