Wolfskin

by Juliet Marillier

  That same summer, Eyvind and Somerled visited the cat woman in her strange small hut above the tree line, near the top of Bleak Hill. The seer had another name, but folk always called her the cat woman, as if she were only part human. The old woman’s powers were both feared and respected. She received visitors only when she chose. Karl went up sometimes to chop wood and deliver a sack of grain or a round of cheese. Occasionally, the woman ventured down the mountain for some festival or gathering, and they said if she was given enough ale, she would chant to the spirits until her eyes rolled back in her head, and she’d speak in a strange voice, and tell of what the future held. Men liked to hear of their destinies; farmers were eager for tidings of seasons to come, fishermen wanted advance notice of storms, merchants were keen for predictions of where the best bargains might be sealed. The cat woman did not always tell good news, but her warnings were useful, and she was received with great respect, and gifts.

  Eyvind would have preferred to spend the day hunting, but when Somerled heard about the seer, there was no stopping him. He must go there before Ulf came for him again; he must know what she had to tell. Besides, it was an adventure.

  Ingi gave them a little tub of sweet butter to take, and eggs nestled in a bag of down. The weather was fair and bright but chill for the season. It was a long journey, a full day there and back. They made their way up beyond the tree line and out onto the rocky hillside. Eyvind slowed his pace to accommodate Somerled, but not as much as he would once have done. They saw deer moving silently down in the woods, and an eagle overhead, but there was no hunting; this expedition sought only knowledge. From the narrowed intensity of Somerled’s eyes, Eyvind thought he knew what it was his friend wanted to hear. But he held his tongue. One did not question Somerled at such times, unless one wanted a response that stung like a whip.

  The cat woman’s hut was turf-covered, set low, almost as if the earth had chosen to grow up around it. A small goat grazed on the roof; from the wood pile, a monstrous, thick-necked cat watched them through slanting yellow eyes. Black chickens scattered, squawking. She wouldn’t be needing the eggs, then. From a hole in the turf a thin plume of smoke arose. Eyvind called out politely, then stooped to go in; the doorway was hung with a strip of coarse cloth, no more.

  Inside, the place was dark and small, and crammed with objects strange and wonderful, bizarre and magical. Masks hung on the walls: faces that were beautiful, wild, blank-eyed, dangerous. The bones of a long, thin creature were laid out neatly on a stone shelf; an iron pot steamed on the central hearth. There was an odd, pungent smell—not unpleasant exactly, just the sort of odor that renders one suddenly, sharply awake. Somerled came in behind him, and stopped.

  “We’ve brought some butter and a few eggs,” Eyvind said politely. “My mother sent them. Ingi, that is.”

  In the shadows beyond the fire, the cat woman stirred. She rose to her feet and moved forward until the light from the smoke hole fell on her face, a face remarkably unlined for one so old. Her skin was very white, as white as the long hair that fell unbound below the strange cap she wore, which seemed made of dark skin on the outside and pale fur inside. Her eyes were like fine blue glass; around her neck she had a string of beads that almost matched them. As she moved, her gown made a faint tinkling sound, as if it were hung with tiny bells.

  “Perhaps you don’t want the eggs, though,” Eyvind added. “I see you have your own chickens.”

  “Gifts are welcome,” said the cat woman, motioning to a dresser of stone slabs by the far wall. “You can set them there, if you will. Your mother is a kind woman. Your brothers came here. I remember them.”

  Eyvind smiled, hoping he did not appear too nervous.

  “I hear you tell fortunes. I want you to tell mine,” Somerled said abruptly. “I hope you do not lie, or invent tales when your skills desert you. It is a calling that attracts cheats.”

  “Somerled—” Eyvind hissed, seeing the change come over the old woman’s features. One did not offend a seer. Surely even Somerled knew that.

  “I do not perform at folk’s beck and call, like some fairground creature,” said the cat woman quietly. She turned to Eyvind. “This is no brother,” she observed.

  “I’m sorry. His name is Somerled. He is my friend, who comes to stay with us sometimes. We were hoping…that is—”

  The cat woman gave a faint smile. “I have told their future, the warrior and the farmer, and I will do no less for you. But I owe your friend nothing.”

  Out of the corner of his eye, Eyvind saw Somerled’s mouth tighten.

  “I have another gift, if you’ll accept it,” Eyvind said quickly, before Somerled could speak again and make matters worse. “I made this. Perhaps you might like it.” From his pocket he drew out the weaving tablet he had carved. Now that he looked at it, he could see that the little dogs were not as regular as they should be, some of their expressions more comic than noble. He hoped she would not be offended. “It’s not a bribe, or a payment,” he added hastily. “I know such knowledge can never be paid for. But you can have it, if you want.”

  The cat woman sighed; an odd sort of sigh, as if she bore a burden too heavy for her. Then she took the small thing from his hands, touching the pattern with a finger, lightly.

  “Send your friend outside,” she said.

  Somerled glowered.

  “Send him outside. Such tellings are private. You know that. You first, then the other.”

  In an instant, Somerled was gone. There was nothing there but a sort of angry vibration where he had stood. The cat woman did not chant, or roll her eyes, or call on the spirits. She sat by the fire, and bade Eyvind sit by her.

  “Give me your hand, Eyvind. You are grown as tall as your brothers: like a strong young tree. What is it you want to hear so badly? Let us light the candles, one on this side, one on the other. And throw a pinch of this on the fire—ah, that’s better. Now, let me see you in the light. A fine young man. There’s a great gift for kindness in you, I see it in your eyes. A rare gift. And yet, your path will take you far from such ways. What do you want to know, Eyvind?”

  “Will I be a Wolfskin? Will I pass Thor’s test?” His words tumbled over each other in their eagerness to get out. “And when? How long must I wait?”

  He thought she would not speak at all, so long she took to answer. She gazed at his palm, and into his eyes, and then at the candle flame, and the look on her face was almost pity. His heart shrank. She had seen that he would fail, and was not prepared to speak it.

  “Tell me!” he blurted out finally. “Tell me, whatever it is!”

  The cat woman sighed again, and blinked, as if returning from a far place. “Oh, yes, you’ll swing your axe in the very forefront of it, lad. A cleaver of skulls, a smiter of the strongest, fearless and proud. The best among them, you’ll be. And soon; more than one year, less than two, I think. Thor has his mark on you; he had from the first.”

  Eyvind could feel the grin stretching across his face, and the proud beating of his heart. “Thank you! Oh, thank you.”

  “That’s not all.”

  “It’s all that matters to me. It’s all I want: all I ever wanted.”

  The cat woman frowned. Her long fingers were turning his hand over, turning it back, touching the scar that began above the wrist and disappeared under his shirtsleeve. “You should hear what is to be told, all the same. For it is not solely your own future I tell here, but that of others, those whose lives may be touched by your choices. You have a long and strange path ahead of you, Eyvind; you see only the glory of your existence as Thor’s right hand, but that is by no means the sum of it.”

  “What could be better than that? What could be more important?”

  “There are lessons to learn: secret knowledge to be found where least expected. There is a deep well of treachery, and a bright beacon of love, and the path between them is narrow indeed. There’s the rarest of treasures laid by for you, son. Make sure you don’t let it go.”


  “Treasure? I suppose I’ll see some of that, when I’m a Wolfskin.”

  “I suppose you will,” said the cat woman gravely. “But that is not the kind of treasure I mean. Now go, son. Do not lose sight of yourself, in the midst of it all.”

  “Thank you. I won’t,” said Eyvind, but he did not understand her words, nor did he care, for he had received the answer he wanted and his heart was aflame with joy.

  He waited outside for Somerled, and tried not to overhear. He stroked the cat; it sat quiet, purring, but he could feel the bunched muscle in it, and see its knife-sharp claws. It was a wonder there were any chickens left.

  It was hard not to hear them. Somerled’s voice was crisp and clear, the old woman’s soft, measured; and yet it came to Eyvind’s ears as if she intended her words to reach him. He would have moved away, but the cat had its claws in his sleeve now and a look in its feral eye that said, You’d better keep scratching my ear or I’ll show you what I really am.

  “Tell me the truth,” said Somerled.

  There was a little pause. “Is it the truth you seek, or merely the confirmation of what you have already decided will be so?” asked the cat woman.

  “It does not become an old crone to play games with words,” Somerled snapped. “I seek the truth, of course. Why else would I come here? But perhaps you are a fraud. Perhaps you tell only fabrications, to fill folk’s heads with impossible hopes.”

  “What if I tell the truth and it does not please you?” she asked softly. “What then? I cannot always give good news. The world is a harsh place, Somerled. You’ve good cause to know it.”

  “What does that mean?” Somerled sounded angry, and yet she had not even begun her foretelling.

  “You know what it means. Your path has not been an easy one. As it began, so it will continue. Show me your arm.”

  A short silence.

  “You did your friend no favors,” said the cat woman, “in binding him to you thus.”

  “Is it foretold, then, that I should proceed on this uneasy path quite alone? With no friend at all by my side?”

  “I did not say that. Eyvind will sacrifice much to adhere to his promises.”

  “And what future have you foretold for him? A short but glorious life wielding the axe for Thor? My friend is a simple fellow with simple dreams. If you see that for him, he will be well content.”

  “If you would know, you must ask Eyvind. Here, it is your future we examine.”

  “Come on then, out with it! What do you see?”

  “Take a pinch of this; throw it on the fire. Now look at me.”

  Then there was nothing for a long time, so long that Eyvind wondered if the cat woman could not see any future for Somerled, or perhaps a future she was reluctant to tell. When at last she did speak, it was slowly, as if she chose each word with caution.

  “Blood and passion, treachery and death. Beyond that, there is…there is…”

  “What? What?” hissed Somerled.

  “It is not clear. There are two ways here, and it cannot be told which you will choose. In each there is a journey. One way holds power and influence. I see a man there who is a king; many follow him. The other way…that is a strange way indeed, through waters uncharted, with gulls and seals for companions.”

  “It is enough.” Somerled’s voice had changed. The edge was gone; he sounded, if anything, relieved. “You speak truth, I see that. There is no doubt which of these paths is to be mine. What recompense do you require for this telling?”

  “I want none from you,” said the seer. “Your friend’s gift is enough.”

  “That? What use is a trifle like that? Why don’t you ask for silver, or fine amber, or a sheep or two? You’ll never get out of this hovel that way.”

  “You have much to learn. Now, it is time for you to go. Your friend waits.”

  The cat withdrew its claws, and Eyvind watched Somerled come out of the hut, his face impassive, though the eyes were bright.

  “What did she tell you?” Eyvind asked as they made their way homeward down the rocky hillside. He could not tell Somerled he had overheard; there had been certain things said that were surely not for his ears.

  “What I expected,” Somerled said. “That I will be a man of power and influence. Not here, but somewhere far away. I am well pleased. The old woman speaks true. What did she tell you?”

  But Eyvind did not reply, for he was thinking. He went over in his head the seer’s words to Somerled. They had been carefully chosen, no doubt of that. But they had seemed to him somewhat less certain than Somerled believed. Still, Somerled was never wrong, and he himself did tend to muddle things sometimes. He decided to say nothing about it.

  “Eyvind?”

  “Oh. She told me I will be a Wolfskin, and soon. She seemed quite sure.”

  Somerled lifted his brows. “Everyone knows that,” he said dryly. “It’s written all over you. If every fortune were as easy to tell as yours, my friend, we’d all be seers.”

  They did not speak farther of these matters. But as they came down the steep slopes above the forest, Eyvind’s mind was still turning over what each of them had been told and what it might mean, and perhaps that was why the accident happened. He had always been a careful hunter. He looked after his weapons well and used them correctly; he observed rules for his own safety and taught them to those who went with him after boar or deer. When he hurt himself, which was not often, he knew what to do about it. They were still close to the northern limits of Hammarsby land, nearly a half-day’s walk from the longhouse, but well down the mountainside from the seer’s hut. This was a place where few men passed, a track through the forest known only to the most persistent of hunters. It was a quick way down, but difficult. The ledge they traversed was narrow, with a long drop on one side and a rock wall on the other. Eyvind went ahead, Somerled followed a few steps behind. It was extremely cold; one would not have believed it could still be summer, for even here, in the shelter of the great trees, the air cut like a knife. Above them the dark tops of tall pines blocked out the sunlight, leaving them in a deep world of shadowed gray-green.

  It was quick. One instant Eyvind was moving with surefooted confidence along the ledge, the next the ground had crumbled under his feet and he was falling, helpless to stop himself, the tree branches dancing crazily above him, the air whistling chill around him, and with a sickening crunch he hit the earth far below the ledge. For a moment all went dark; he drew a single shuddering breath, and then there was the pain, savage, spearing pain through his thigh, and he ground his teeth hard together so as not to scream. Dimly he registered the frantic, scrabbling sounds of Somerled’s rapid descent down the hill to his side, the gasp of the other boy’s breathing. Don’t scream, Eyvind ordered himself. Thor watches you. It is a test. He opened his eyes and looked down at his right leg. It did not show much beyond a huge purple mark, which spread all up and down the inner thigh; not much beyond a certain swelling; little enough, for such pain. But Eyvind was a hunter. Through the mist of rising unconsciousness, through the dizzy blurring of his vision and the tremors of chill that began to course through his body despite his best efforts to still them, Eyvind recognized that the leg was broken and bleeding within, where it could not be seen. His mind put the pieces together: himself unable to walk, the cold, the loss of blood, and small, puny Somerled the only aid at hand. He might die. Far worse than that, he might survive and be crippled. A Wolfskin must be whole, and strong.

  “Somerled?” he whispered as the darkness came closer.

  “Shh, don’t try to talk.” Somerled’s voice was strange, coming and going; his sheet-pale face kept blurring as if this were a dream. “I’ll go for help. Where does it hurt? Here?”

  Eyvind did scream then, as Somerled’s careful fingers gingerly made contact with the wounded limb. And when Somerled ripped off his shirt and bound the leg as straight as he could, with strips of stiff bark on either side, Eyvind’s howl of agony echoed through the empty woods until he
clenched his teeth hard to still the sound, for he could see the fear in the other boy’s eyes. The splinting done, Somerled rose to his feet, slung his small pack on his back and looked down at the shivering Eyvind, frowning.

  “Cold,” Eyvind managed. “Bleeding. Bonesetter. Karl…”

  “I can run all the way,” said Somerled. “There and back. I’ll leave you my cloak.”

  Eyvind looked up at his friend’s small, intense face; it was wavering, blurring, going dark. He tried to tell him; tried to explain that he would die of shock and cold before help could come, but his voice didn’t seem to be working anymore. All that came out was a sort of grating noise.

  “No good?” Somerled asked.

  “Cold,” Eyvind managed. “Too long…”

  “Right,” said Somerled. “You’ll have to help me, then. As far as we can go, walking. Then I suppose I’ll manage somehow. Never thought I’d have reason to thank you for those endless lessons about survival in the wild. Come on.”

  Eyvind could not remember much after that, except the pain, a pain so terrible he put his teeth through his lip, struggling to remain strong. He seemed to have a picture of himself leaning heavily on Somerled, and staggering, hobbling, weaving impossibly down the steep paths through the forest, and Somerled’s voice coaxing, encouraging, sharply ordering him to go on. He thought he could recall collapsing part-way down in the shadow under tall trees, the pungent scent and prickling touch of pine needles under his cheek, and his friend’s dark eyes staring at him from a face ghost-white with exhaustion. He remembered the familiar set of Somerled’s mouth, a look which said that giving up simply wasn’t an option. From what they told him later, he knew that here and there Somerled had stopped to adjust the makeshift splint, to prod him awake and force him onward. When Eyvind had eventually lost consciousness, Somerled had improvised a sort of sled from branches and bark, using the rope they carried, and dragged the other boy down to open ground. The man who doctored Eyvind said that if he’d been left up on the mountain while Somerled had gone for help, he’d surely have died before aid could come.