"Trouble, trouble, trouble," Ukko muttered to himself as he stood on tip-toes to peer in through the shutters of one of the larger dwellings. "Never a thanks for saving his skin, oh no, treats me like a child, bossing me around. Sit down, shut up, keep your fingers to yourself..."
Ukko sniffed the air, catching the pungent whiff of the piss wafting up from the trenches out beyond the village's perimeter. The repulsive little runt smiled to himself and scurried off in the direction of the latrine pits. Muck clung to muck as often as not, making the latrines interesting places for a curious dwarf to loiter. People liked to gossip; it was, the dwarf understood, a fundamental flaw in human nature. Secrets got spilled and it was amazing the kind of stuff people shared with their pants down around their ankles.
Lurk around long enough and a diamond would bob up among the turds.
He ducked down, making himself small against the side of the wall, and peered around the corner into a narrow alley crammed between the rows of houses. Ropes had been strung from the rooftops across the alleyway, and wet sheets pegged from them snapped in the breeze. Seeing no one, Ukko ducked beneath the trailing sheets and scuttled forwards, following his nose.
At the first crossroads the little dwarf knelt, stirring the dirt with his fingers and then kissing them with his lips superstitiously. He looked in all three directions, craning his head as he listened to the noises carried across the afternoon. A hooded figure moved between the sheets. It moved with uncommon grace, fleet of foot and light of step. Ukko had watched enough women in his life to know when he was looking at one, even with the heavy cloak and hood drawn up to hide her face. Her body was too slight to pass for masculine.
"How much trouble can a woman be?" Ukko mumbled to himself, and set off after her as she disappeared around a tumbledown section of wall. The answer to his question came soon enough: plenty. She looked furtively over her shoulder five times before she made the next turn; as though she sensed someone was there. She didn't call out or challenge him, and not once did she actually fix her gaze within twenty feet of where Ukko lurked. He couldn't help but grin as the thrill of the chase gripped him. He scuttled forwards, ducking down into a doorway as the woman turned, the right side of her face silhouetted against the white sheet in front of her. There was something vaguely familiar about her profile; it niggled at his mind as he followed her down two more narrow alleyways into the communal latrines. He knew her, and what's more he knew he did, but for all that certainty Ukko couldn't place her face. That disturbed him. It was as though some kind of glamour had been laid across it, one that caused the mind to slip and slide around recognition.
But it would come to him.
She entered the latrine pit. He crouched down beside the doorway and waited, vaguely aware that there was something perverse about listening to a woman relieve herself, but he'd promised no mischief, not that he would sit and stare at the walls while his mind slowly crawled up them. "Besides," he muttered to himself, "a bored Ukko's a bad Ukko and a bad Ukko always gets into trouble, so I'm only doing what Sláine told me to do," and with that rationalisation, the dwarf slunk closer to the doorway, pressing his ear to the crack where the woman had left it slightly ajar. Instead of grunts and sighs he heard hushed voices. Ukko edged forwards, straining to overhear, but he was too far away to make any sense of the low whispers.
The latrine pits were open to the elements, to allow the rain to soak the lime and slake the stench. Practicality meant that there was no roof over them, which in turn meant that with a little improvisation Ukko could get a glimpse of whatever skulduggery was going down in the latrines. It's just a look, he thought to himself, no one ever got in trouble just looking. So he leaned back, craning his neck to check the alley behind him, then both left and right, before boosting himself up and scrambling at the wattle as he struggled to heave himself up the pitted wall until his chin was perched on the top and, straining, he could peer over.
The woman had her back to him, the hood pulled down to mask her completely, but she was not alone. A hideously deformed face looked back at him, eyes milky white, raw pink scars criss-crossing the sunken sockets where the man had been brutalised by knives. He wore ill-fitting sackcloth rags, but strapped across his back were twin blades, wickedly curved and honed so sharp they cut the shadows the blind man wreathed himself in.
Ukko tried to sidle along the wall into a position where he could see at least the side of the woman's face. His toe scraped the wattle causing both woman and warrior to turn instinctively towards the sound. He ducked down, fingertips clinging to the top of the wall and counting to forty in his head before he dared poke his head up above the wall again.
When he did the pair of them had huddled in so close their voices barely carried, but Ukko heard enough to wish he hadn't heard anything at all:
"I must visit with the Lord Weird, Balor," the woman said, drawing the cloak about herself, long white fingers playing over her throat where the edges of the cloak met, "see to the preparations; you know the herbs the enchantment requires, all are indigenous to the forest save this." She held out a small pouch which the warrior took and secreted about his person in one smooth motion that belied his blindness. "I will join you in the forest at sunset. See that the channels are open so that I may communicate with our sovereign."
"It shall be done, mistress," the warrior, Balor, said.
"Good. There is much still that remains to be done, the fool Ragall is in with the council even now, begging to be put out of his misery."
"That is most fortunate, mistress."
"Fortune has nothing to do with it, Balor. Careful schemes bring their own rewards, like any game of strategy, you plan ahead, anticipating your opponent's moves. Kilian Ragall plays like a child. Everything about the man is so utterly predictable, even his death."
"Yes, mistress."
"Predictability is good, Balor, never forget that. Better an opponent whose every move you can presuppose than one who is going to surprise you at every turn."
"Yes, mistress, predictability is good, as is fortune, but neither are a match for skill."
"Spoken like a true man."
"I do not deny my sex, mistress." The blind man reached out, his fingertips caressing the woman's face. Her hood fell back, revealing lush long locks of dark hair. "Just as I do not deny yours."
The woman took his hand in hers and lifted it to her lips, kissing each callused fingertip lovingly, then she pushed him away with surprising force. "Do not presume to touch me again, warrior, unless you want your fingers chewed off next time."
Balor laughed, a chillingly mirthless sound coming from the blind man's mouth. Ukko winced. His grip slipped and a heartbeat later he lost his balance, his foot scraping down the wattle before he caught himself, cursing. Balor turned slightly, inclining his head so that his scarred eyes bore into the wall three feet below Ukko's hiding place - level, precisely, with his traitorous feet.
The dwarf held his breath, not daring to move a muscle even though his arms began to burn from the exertion of holding himself up for so long.
"We are not alone," Balor said, his white-blind eyes eerie in the half-sun half-shadow.
"Who is there?" the woman said, turning to follow the direction of his blind stare, and Ukko saw her face full in the light. There was something repulsively familiar about her beauty - and she was beautiful, the lines of her face, the curves and shallows, but she was ugly too, through her eyes into her core - and it was so, so familiar, but after years of drunken whoring she could have been any lover spurned, wench plucked, barmaid seduced and abandoned, cherry plucked, widow entertained or maiden deflowered.
Ukko bit his lip, closed his eyes and slunk lower, inch by inch until his feet were dangling no more than six inches above the dirt. He dropped to the ground, grunting as he landed, and took off on his heels, running even as her shrieks of: "Kill him, Balor! Gut him on your swords! Rip out his tongue! He cannot be allowed to talk!" hounded him out of the latrines and back into th
e warren of alleyways and damp laundry.
Feet slapping harshly against the dusty earth, Ukko threw himself over fences and under hedges, pulled down sheets and knocked over barrels of rainwater to muddy the trail, desperate to put as much distance between himself and the trouble he had found.
And despite the fear coursing through his veins, Ukko grinned fiercely every terrified step of the way; he couldn't help it, he was having fun.
"I bring tokens of appeasement," Sláine said, gesturing to the black metal Cauldron and the oilskin-wrapped book stolen from the Lord Weird.
"So you did hope to buy our forgiveness?" Cathbad said, "Tell us, Sláine son of Roth, how cheap did you think it would be?"
"You offer us a pot to cook in, or is it a pot to piss in?" Ansgar said, chuckling bleakly at his own humour. "There's no food, lad, didn't you look around the fields on your way in? The harvest was blighted. Our bellies are empty, boy."
"Then I would say I am buying your welcome for precisely the right price, Ansgar, and yours druid, all of yours."
"Are you touched, lad? Wandering alone addled your brain? It's understandable, I suppose," Raif of the Bloody Axe told the council.
"Most likely drunk like his old man," Anrai Ardal said gruffly. The man had little liking for Roth, Sláine remembered - and he remembered the cause. Old Anrai had been sweet on his mother, Macha, and had never forgiven her for choosing Bellyshaker over him at the Feis Samain dance twenty-some years ago. It was a jealousy Sláine could understand. He didn't rise to the bait.
"Let the boy speak." A familiar voice cut across the rabble. "Not that he's a boy any longer." Gorian, warlord of the Red Branch, rose to his feet. He looked every inch the king where Kilian Ragall had appeared a pretender dressed up in a better man's furs. Beside him, red-headed Murdo grinned approvingly. "So, young Sláine, it only seems like yesterday I was interceding with Grudnew on your behalf. Do you remember the vow you made when you took the Red Branch?"
Sláine nodded. "It is writ on my soul."
"Then remind us all of it."
"We are Sessair. We are proud. Unbreakable."
"And tell me, Sláine, when you look around this chamber do you see proud unbreakable men?"
"No," Sláine said.
"Neither do I, lad. Now, tell us of the gifts that you believe worthy enough of our embrace, let's see if they're silver or coal."
"You do not recognise it, warlord?"
"Other than as a grand cooking pot? No, lad. Should I?"
"Light a fire, warm the pit, and see if the miracle of the Cú Roi is enough to remind the hungry of the bounty our Goddess offers the faithful."
A flicker of understanding lit up behind the druid Cathbad's eyes; the old man had an inkling of the treasure Sláine had returned. Indeed, he is long-lived enough to have seen it before the sundering shattered the Cú Roi of Goibniu into pieces and scattered it to the four winds, Sláine thought to himself.
"Light the fire," Gorian said, coming down to embrace Sláine wrist to wrist. "Soth! But it is good to see you again, boy. I had no liking for the way you were driven out," the warlord said, his voice pitched low enough that his words were for Sláine's ears only.
"Thank you, Gorian. May Danu reward your faith," said Sláine. He turned to face the remainder of the Spiral Council and slowly unwrapped oilskin to reveal the bark-covered book of vellum that the Lord Weird had poured his darkest desires into. "With this book we win our freedom from the yoke of oppression, my people."
"With a book? Do we read fairy tales to the skull swords until they fall asleep from boredom?" Madad the Quarrelsome heckled, shaking his head in disbelief at the gullibility of his own people, so desperate to believe that salvation had walked in out of the Death Winter. The gristle of the warrior's nose had been sliced off to reveal a huge cavity in the centre of his face. The maiming left the once fearsome warrior looking comical with his shaved scalp and his single tuft of flame-red hair like a unicorn's horn hanging down over the centre of his forehead.
"You are quick to judge, Madad," said Sláine, holding the precious Ragnarok book in his hands and lifting it so that all could see precisely what it was. "Dian, my friend," Sláine looked around for the young druid who stood still in the doorway to the chamber, out of the light from the oculus. "Come, I would ask you to read the first line of Ogham to the doubters. Perhaps your words will silence them."
"No need, I can read the scripts," Cathbad said, reaching out for the book.
"No, druid. I would have my friend read them, you can confirm his translation if need be, but Dian will address the council."
Dian, uncomfortable between the two men, friend and master, looked to Cathbad for instruction. The older man inclined his head in acquiescence. "Read to us, young Dian. I believe I speak for everyone assembled when I say that we are most eager to hear the secrets of this most secretive tome."
Dian took the book from Sláine, his hands trembling as he cracked open the bark cover and scanned the first few words. He looked to Sláine: "Is this true?"
The young warrior nodded. "Every word, my friend."
"How on earth did you come by such a thing?"
"That is a long story, one for another day."
"What is it?" Gorian asked, "What does it say?"
Dian cleared his throat and raised his eyes from the page. "I, Slough Feg, servant of Carnun, Horned God of the Forests, speak, hear my words that they may sour the earth and bring on the deluge, for this land is corrupt, pustulant, putrescent. This world is vile, the bitch Goddess has turned her back on her people but the great wyrm knows, yes the great Crom-Cruach knows and feels the wounding of the soil. Only the cleansing of the filth will do. The rotten must be purged. The filth of humanity, the pox of blood and shit and piss must be driven from the land, to the dirt returned..." his words had a distressingly hypnotic rhythm to them, the poetry of insanity drawing the listener deeper and deeper into the nightmare woven by the words.
"Nothing more than the ravings of a madman, surely," said Gorian.
"Read on, Dian," said Sláine said, knowing full well the promises to come, and the impact they would have upon the Spiral Council.
"The darkness of the world, the winter of mankind, is upon us, but soon the winter will be glorious spring, the souring will cease and the deluge from the heavens will bring deliverance, the scourge of the living cleansed, the canker of flesh scoured from the hills and the fields. There shall be no relief, no salvation, no testament to the will of the bitch Goddess because I am great, my reach long, my loyalty unflinching, my drive relentless. I loved her once, was faithful and pure, the purest and most faithful, but no more, no, no more. I know my master's mind, the voice of his reason, the reason of his voice. I, Slough Feg, the Lord Weird, servant of Crom, speak, and all of Albion, forests and field, sea and stream, will listen to my words and know fear for I bring the end of her reign with the rain. The seas shall rise up and swallow the land whole, the skies shall break and the unbelievers drown. Only then shall the Death Winter's grip on the land slacken, only then shall the will of Crom relent, only then shall the bitch Goddess suffer as she made me and mine suffer. Vengeance shall be me, sayeth the Horned Man, Lord of the Forests, Haunter of the Trees, Bringer of the Flood."
"Can it be?" Dian looked up, his face blanched white with fear at the insidious lure of the words he spoke.
"Who is this monster?" Gorian asked, shaking his head to be free of the vision the words of madness had conjured in his mind.
"He is the demon who, with his skull swords, killed my mother and so many of the wives and children of Murias," said Sláine. "The book is the darkness of his mind, the perversions of his spirit, laid down. If the druid Myrrdin Emrys-"
"The Lord of the Trees? Impossible!" Cathbad interrupted.
"- is to be believed the book holds his schemes to bring on the end of the world as we know it. With it, I believe we can thwart him."
"And we're supposed to listen to a vagabond son of a drunkard?" Madad'
s sudden outburst earned him scowls from Murdo and several other Red Branch warriors close to him.
"Silence!" Gorian bellowed, wheeling round on Madad, "unless you want to lose another piece of your face?"
"Couldn't make him any uglier," Murdo chuckled. Despite being poor, the joke broke the spell Dian's reading had placed upon the chamber. A hubbub of urgent chatter spread from seat to seat as the warriors leaned over to whisper with their neighbours. Few bar Cathbad and Dian knew who the Lord of the Trees was, or how impossible it was for Sláine to have spent his exile in the company of what to them was little more than a myth.
Gorian turned to Sláine. "The council would know more of your travels, and what you know of the threat that gathers at our door. I suspect you know far more of this menace than we do as you have walked among them, and no doubt fought them hand to hand, while Ragall has scraped his knees so desperate to please them."
Before he could say more Cathbad grabbed Sláine by the shoulder and twisted him around. "You met the Lord of the Trees? How is that possible? How? He has been lost to us for centuries."
"Not merely met; serving the Morrigan I delivered Myrrdin from his prison and returned him from the El Worlds, Cathbad."
"He walks among us, even now? I... I..."
"You can thank me later," Sláine said, and to Gorian, "Much of the land south of here has soured. No crops ripen, no herds fatten, but that is not the worst of it. Feg uses ancient lines of power to drain the earth itself of its power, leeching the life out of Danu. In Carnac thousands of standing stones act as foci for his evil. He uses the might of the Earth Serpent to raise great sky chariots kept aloft by blood magic."
"No, surely... no... blood magic taints the land... defiles it."
"The Lord Weird has no care for Danu, druid. You heard his thoughts, she is the bitch Goddess he once loved, nothing more, and like any lover spurned he would hurt the one who hurt him."
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