by Helen Gosney
“Thank you, Rowan, I think he’d have liked that,” Tadeus wiped away fresh tears, “Cedars. He liked cedars. Not the flashy golden ones, though, just the plain old dark green things. We always sat under one in the Great Square when we played chess.”
“Then we’ll plant a cedar for him, when you’re ready to do it. They do well here, especially the plain dark green ones. It’ll make a fine memorial for a fine man.”
“Yes, it will. Thank you for suggesting it.”
**********
They were all subdued over the next few days, thinking their thoughts. Tadeus spent quite a bit of time wandering at the edge of the forest. Rowan quietly sent one of the dogs with him, in case he went further than he thought, or got turned around and lost. He did the same whenever Rill wandered a bit far afield.
The old priest also spent quite a bit of time watching as Rowan rode Mica, Soot and Ashen in their advanced training drills and he found it to be utterly fascinating. As an ex-trooper, he could see beyond the beauty of the movements, and understood, as he never had before, the tales of Rowan having ‘flying horses’. Of course Ashen wasn’t as experienced at it as the two older stallions, but he was showing definite promise and Rowan had great hopes for him. Tadeus found that the less advanced moves that all the horses learnt were still eerily familiar to him, even after so long away from the Guard and a stray thought intruded upon his sadness.
Rowan halted Ashen beside Tadeus one morning after he’d finished his work.
“You truly could stay, you know, Tadeus. There’s plenty of room, and plenty of work to do if you felt like it. Or you could just watch the foals play and the trees grow, like Griff and Honi and I do sometimes,” he said softly.
You are a damned mindreader, Tadeus thought.
“I’d like that more than anything, Rowan, but I… I’m a bit like young Cris, not certain where to go to from here. Though I think he’ll wake up one day and see that there are pretty girls here in Sian too.”
Rowan smiled at him.
“Aye, I think that too. But as for you, Tadeus, you don’t have to decide right now. You’re staying for the bunny run, aren’t you? ‘Tisn’t long now, and Soot will give you a fine ride. And Cris has been practising as well.”
Tadeus’ eyes lit up. He was thrilled to be riding a superb horse like Soot around, and he’d been looking forward to the run through the forest. And nothing he did now could alter anything anyway.
He’d certainly have been happy to travel back to Gnash with Cris, but he doubted the ratcatcher would be going home now. And really, he wasn’t sure that he wanted to return there, either, with Hess gone. He could simply join the brothers of the One in the neat little timber Tabernacle in the town and think about retirement there. Or he could ride Soot into town, tell them he was leaving the priesthood, and stay here with the horses. Suddenly he wanted that more than he’d wanted anything for a long time. He decided he’d wait until after the bunny run before making a final decision, but he knew in his heart that the decision had already been made.
**********
12. “the bunny run”
The day of the bunny chase dawned bright and beautiful, but a few darkish clouds to the west hinted at rain to come. Rowan and his friends were up and about early, as always. They set off for the starting point after breakfast, meeting up with Moss and Chinook on the way. Rill went with them to see them off, but he didn’t feel confident enough of his riding skills to take part. It was probably the best decision he’d made in a while, Rowan thought privately, and he could amuse himself until the run finished and all the hunters came back for a latish lunch. He’d probably find himself roped in to help the cooks in some capacity.
“Are you coming with us too?” Cris asked the trolls, surprised.
They both nodded happily.
“We’ve never seen anything like this, so we thought it was about time that we did,” Chinook said as he mounted Lavender.
“You’ll be careful through the trees, won’t you?” Rowan said, “The mares aren’t as used to it as everyone else’s horses, not at speed anyway, and they might get a bit carried away with it all.”
“Do not fret thyself, Rowan. Chinook and I have been practising. And your father has promised to keep an eye on us, in case we get carried away in the heat of the moment,” Moss said.
At that moment Rhys appeared from the trees. He was riding Rook, another of Soot’s sons, and a full brother to Raven.
“Aye, Rowan, don’t worry. I’ll see they’re safe. We might even catch up with you after you’ve lost everybody else,” he laughed. The trolls were happy to simply travel behind everyone else and watch the whole thing unfold. They certainly had no interest in galloping through the forest like mad things, as some of the younger foresters undoubtedly would. And they wouldn’t be the ones walking home leading an exhausted horse, either.
“Aye, you just might. I’m certainly planning on losing as many of the buggers as I can,” Rowan said, knowing full well that the other foresters’ sense of which way to go was just as reliable as his own. All the same, he thought he could probably temporarily lose a few.
**********
“Gods, there’s so many folk here,” Cris said in amazement as he took in all the people milling around in the big open area outside the timber yards.
There had to be nearly two hundred mounted foresters and dwarves, with several other trolls on foot and some hunters with a small pack of dogs.
“Dogs? Surely that’s, er, cheating, isn’t it?” Cris said to Rowan quietly, knowing how sensitive the hearing of most foresters was.
Even so, Conor heard him, and turned to him with a grin.
“It probably is, a bit, and we wouldn’t have done it with Griff, but Rowan’s fair game in the bunny run!” he said, “Even when he’s riding Raven rather than Mica or Soot.”
“Tadeus has got Soot this year, and Mica’s having the day off. But don’t fret, Raven will do well too. Especially when he’s not got Griff’s great weight to cart about,” Rowan laughed, unworried by the hunters’ dogs. A couple of times in other runs they’d caught up to him, but not given him away to the hunters and he’d cantered up to the finishing line with the dogs running happily behind and no hunters in sight.
“Now, Cris, are you happy with Holly?” he added.
He’d offered Ashen to Cris, but the little ratcatcher had found the grey to be a bit feistier than he was used to, and now he was riding one of Soot’s daughters, a gentle black mare with a surprising turn of foot. Cris had reluctantly decided against riding his own mare, Bess, as she wasn’t used to running in the forest and he didn’t want her to injure herself. He’d been riding Holly at every opportunity for a few weeks. At first he’d been surprised by her excellent manners and lovely smooth paces, and then he’d been shocked by her speed as she’d firstly cantered, and then galloped beside Rowan and Ashen in the forest. He felt a bit disloyal to Bess, but he found that he liked Holly very much. As for Ashen, he was being ridden by Conor’s friend, Violet.
“Yes, Rowan. We’re ready to give you a run for your money!” he said.
“And you, Tadeus?”
“Rowan, I’ve ridden a hell of a lot of horses in my time, but none of them has been as good as this fellow,” the priest patted Soot’s glossy black neck affectionately. His own horse Hazel was a good beast, but it didn’t compare to Soot, and of course it, like Bess, had no experience of galloping in the trees.
“Well, I’ll see you all at the finishing line, then. Be safe,” Rowan said as he turned and walked Raven to the edge of the crowd.
“Be safe, Rowan!” all of the hunters chorused happily, sure that this was the year that they’d finally catch him. Raven was a fine horse, and surprisingly speedy, but he was a big horse of very nearly eighteen hands, and he simply wasn’t as swift and agile as Rowan’s other horses.
Rowan headed off up the track at a canter. Of course, every horse there tried to follow him, but their riders managed to restrain them.
“How much start do you give him? Ten minutes or so?” Cris asked Conor. Conor was riding a tall, strong-looking grey mare: Cloud, one of Mica’s daughters. They were riding with Tadeus and a group of Conor’s friends and kin, and all were determined that this was to be their year. Of course all of the other bunny hunters were thinking the same thing.
The foresters around him laughed.
“Bloody hells, lad! If we gave him that much damned start we’d never see him again! Ha! We’ll be doing bloody well to actually see much of him anyway,” Cato, a big man with his hair in the twin braids of the Mist Fern clan said, “No, no! If he was riding Mica or Soot, we’d be starting about… now…” Rowan was about a hundred yards away, “But since he’s got Raven, with all respect to the beastie, we’ll give him a bit more of a start… probably up there where the road turns again.”
Rowan disappeared around a bend, and when he didn’t reappear as the road twisted back, there were curses and mutters of “that crafty bugger! He’s already in the bloody trees!”
There was a sudden blare of horns.
“Here we go, laddie,” Cato said, “Be safe, now!”
“And you!” Cris managed as the hunters surged forward.
He’d expected it to be a bit of a melee to start, and it was to a degree, but everyone sorted themselves out quickly and set off after their quarry. The foresters and trolls on foot melted into the trees, their dogs barking happily before settling down to the business of the chase. Most of the mounted hunters turned into the trees where Rowan had, but a few said something to the effect of ‘he’s headed for the ridge line, we’ll go ahead and try to cut him off’, and they galloped off down the track.
**********
13. “just muddled the trail nicely”
Rowan urged Raven into a good ground-covering canter as he left the hunters. It felt strange to be riding such a big horse, but he knew that Raven was strong and brave, and probably faster than anyone really realised. He could jump anything too. They rounded the bend and took a sharp turn to the left and into the trees. Rowan smiled happily to himself as he thought of the hunters waiting patiently for him to reappear along the road. He patted Raven’s neck and said, “Ha! They’re going to be waiting for us for a bloody long time, aren’t they, Raven? We’ll give them a bit of a trail to follow here, then ‘tis the rocks and creek for us, my lad. For a bit, anyway.”
Raven ran easily through the trees, jumping any obstacle that presented itself, and Rowan was pleased with his mount. He heard the horns sound behind him and laughed again. He’d fooled them for longer than he’d thought he might. Good. He splashed through a little creek, went a bit further and doubled back, then headed for a nice patch of rocky ground where the tracking would be difficult. Then he dismounted and led Raven up a narrow, rocky defile that had likely never had any horse travel it, save one that was with Rowan. At the top he stopped to give Raven a bit of a breather and waited to watch his pursuers go by.
Ah, here they come, he thought. The usual lot of younger, overly enthusiastic hunters galloped past beneath him, jumped the creek and thundered off into the trees. He smiled to himself. They’d just muddled the trail nicely for anyone following. Tadeus was riding close to Conor and Cloud in the next knot of people. Rowan smiled again as Soot cleared a big log with no trouble at all, the old priest obviously having a wonderful time as the stallion carried him easily through the trees. He was pleased to see that Tadeus had put his sorrow aside for the day.
Rowan looked next for Cris and Holly. Ah, yes, there they were. The mare wasn’t overly big, in fact was really a bit small to be a troop horse, but she was perfect for the little ratcatcher. She was keeping up with Soot and Tadeus well, even though the priest was a far more experienced rider than Cris. Ashen was doing well too, a bit ahead of Tadeus. There were shouts and horns sounding through the forest below him and to his right. The leaders must have run into the lovely big brambly thicket a quarter of a mile or so away, just as he’d thought they would.
The frontrunners came back, cursing and swearing, and muddling the trail further. Rowan was pleased to see his father and the two trolls canter up and stop a little behind a group of dwarves and their tough ponies. He smiled as he saw Rhys looking around, and smiled further when his father’s gaze moved to the outcrop on which he lay. He stood up for a moment, waved, then turned and ran back to Raven and headed off down the other side. He was delighted to hear sounds of pursuit far back along the ridgeline: he knew, as those folk didn’t, that there’d been a small rockslide along there and the way was impassable by horse. He’d started the slide himself just a few days ago, for exactly this situation.
**********
Rhys laughed to himself as Rowan waved to him. Gods, he’s a bloody cheeky bugger, he thought. Even knowing where he is, there’s no way we can get our horses up there. Well, he and most of his clan likely could, but it wouldn’t be easy and by the time they got up there Rowan’d be long gone.
Moss leaned towards him and said quietly, “Was that Rowan up there?”
“Yes, Moss, but I don’t think we’ll tell the others just yet. They’re having too good a time trying to find him down here…”
“…where he’s not!” Chinook finished happily. He was enjoying this ‘bunny hunt’ very much. The forest was beautiful, the day was fine, and his mare was carrying him well. Rhys would see that none of the horses came to any harm, and it simply didn’t matter that they were riding slowly at the back of the field. He wouldn’t put it past Rowan to quietly join them at some stage anyway… perhaps after he’d passed the halfway mark and was on his way back to the town and the meal that awaited everyone there. For a moment Chinook thought of his Bridge, waiting for him at Den Sorl. Never mind, my dear one, he thought, Lavender and I will be back with you soon, and I’ll have lots to tell you.
A small pack of seven or eight dogs came through the trees. The lead dog barked once, then began to cast around for Rowan’s scent.
“They hunt silently,” Chinook observed, “The dogs they hunt with around Den Sorl are very noisy.”
Rhys shrugged.
“I’ve never really thought about it, Chinook. All of the hunting dogs in these parts run silently and only give tongue when they’ve sighted their quarry, or have lost the trail and are casting about, like now.”
The lead dog, a lean, leggy auburn-furred dog that was named, inevitably, ‘Red’, suddenly barked again and headed for the narrow defile in the rocks.
“Bugger me! Don’t tell me the bastard’s up there, Red!” the huntsman said in disgust, “Even if we follow, he’ll be long gone, and ‘tis bloody hard to get up there without risking a damned broken leg. No, laddie, we’ll go around this cursed ridge and hope to pick him up on the other side.”
“How about if I take Umber and Boof up there, Sammi? If Rowan has gone up that way, they’ll follow him,” another hunter said. “We can meet you on t’other side.”
“They’ve got Rowan’s own dogs chasing him?” Cris said, surprised.
“Yes, he likes for them to go on a good hunt like this. ‘Tis what they’re bred for, after all,” Conor said, “And we know they’ll always find him.” Of course that didn’t mean that they wouldn’t quietly abandon the hunters at some stage and disappear, to run at Rowan’s side.
Sammi considered it and nodded.
“All right then, Farle, but be careful,” he said.
“Don’t fret yourself, Sammi. If Rowan can get a bloody horse up there safely, I can get a couple of dogs up there. Truly, I’m more worried about doing myself a mischief than them. But yes, I’ll be very damned careful. I truly don’t want Rowan after me for injuring his dogs,” Farle laughed.
“Gods! Don’t even think of it!” somebody else said fervently.
**********
“Hold on a minute! Has anyone got some spikes?” Conor said quickly.
Several pairs were held out to him, along with comments of ‘what sort of forester do you call yourself, you daf
t bugger?’ and ‘how could you forget your bloody spikes?’
Conor blushed as he strapped on the nearest set of spikes and hurried to a huge Giant.
“What’s he going to… oh…” Cris said as the young forester ran up the massive tree as if he were running along the ground. The tree overtopped the knoll by a good way and Conor had an excellent view of Rowan running along a creek bed in a big clearing almost a mile away, Raven splashing happily beside him. Conor cursed luridly and came down the tree almost as quickly as he’d gone up. He returned the spikes and said, “Well, I saw him all right. He’s running along the creek in Dab’s Clearing, leading Raven. The Gods only know where he’s going to come out of the damned thing!”
There was a general round of cursing and shaking of heads. Tadeus was amused to hear that the forester women’s vocabulary was just as good as most of the men’s.
“But why’s he leading Raven?” somebody spoke up, “Surely the horse isn’t lame, is it?”
“No, it looked happy enough, and it was moving well,” Conor replied thoughtfully.
“He’s just giving his horse a bit of a rest, pacing it so it can go all day,” Tadeus said, “It’s an old trooper’s trick.”
“Takes one to know one!” Rhys laughed.
“Aye, so it does,” the priest agreed, “Mind you, it’s a good example to follow. We can’t expect our horses to gallop hard all damned day without falling in a heap.” He gave several of the younger, more eager foresters a hard look.
“You’re right, Sir,” one of them said, shamefaced, “’Tis good that you’ve reminded us.”
**********
14. “muddy, hot and sweaty”
The chase would continue for several hours, and Rowan certainly led the hunters on a merry dance. Among other interesting places, like the odd group of rocky towers known locally as the dancing trolls, he took them into the edge of Caleb’s Swamp, but not too far as it was quite dangerous further in. They emerged muddy, hot and sweaty, cursing again as clouds of tiny biting insects descended on them.