by R Magnusholm
“Proportionally speaking, Liz, a year ago you were vegetarian.”
“I was also old and fat.”
“Not that fat. And not that old,” he said amiably.
“You never gave me a second look in the office.”
“I was a married man,” he cried in mock indignation.
She chuckled. “That didn’t stop you from watching every other piece of skirt.”
“Ahem, I . . . I didn’t.”
“Oh yes, you did. Every passing piece of skirt.”
“Not every.”
They glared at each other in pretend annoyance, then burst out laughing.
From where he sat, propped up in his basket, George watched them, gurgling and smiling.
John couldn’t remember a time when he’d been so relaxed. He supposed it was the change of scenery, the escape from their stockade, and the boating adventure. The open river, the infinite azure of the sky, sunbeams on water, lapping wavelets—all combined to soothe his soul. But somewhere deep within him stirred a dark undercurrent of unease, twisting and turning and tainting the joy of the moment. Things never stayed well for long. How could they?
Liz said, “John, how do you feel about spending the night here?”
“Positively.” He grabbed a clump of grass to wipe goose fat off his hands. It was an unusual type of grass, already yellowing and heavy with drooping seed heads. He wondered where he’d seen it before. “Liz, what’s that?”
Liz reached to take it from him. “Why, it’s oat-grass.” She examined it closely, and her eyes widened. “No, not oat-grass, the seeds are quite large. Actual oats. Some wild variety.” She rubbed them between her hands, blew off the chaff, and popped them in her mouth. “Well, if we decide to become farmers—” Suddenly, a yawn overcame her. “I’m going to have a nap.” She picked up the baby basket and headed into the shade under a weeping willow.
John watched the water in the channel recede from the shore. The color of weak milky tea, it churned alarmingly. The bulrushes by the entrance to the cove, which had been submerged up to their brown cones, now poked two feet above the surface. The lower the level dropped, the more violent the current became. Who’d want to swim across that? Not him. This branch of the river wouldn’t freeze over in winter, either. Beyond the channel, the tidal swampland spread for another mile, further separating them from the mainland. With the reeds flooded nearly to their tops, it was impassable at high tide. Perhaps they were safer here than in the woods.
If only this islet were bigger and further away from land . . .
Besides, the island had no beavers to cut wood for them, and no hazels to feed them. The water flowed out of the cove, leaving behind a soggy meadow and a wide fringe of mud by the shore. Half a dozen fish dashed away to escape being stranded, their dorsal fins cutting long streaks across the surface.
Suppose he installed fish traps at the cove’s mouth? A few stakes interwoven with willow twigs driven into the mud would stop any larger fish from escaping at low tide.
Yes, he could do that.
His stomach filled with greasy goose, he watched drowsily as a heavy lump of driftwood rushed downriver, twisting and turning. The tide would be ebbing violently for at least another hour. No one would want to swim across while the water churned like that.
He stretched by the fire and dozed off.
Chapter 81
Running with Bulls
40 miles northeast of Camp Bramble
On the afternoon of the second day after leaving the Salmoner village, Gnorrk’s warband came upon a large herd of aurochs barring their way. The vicious beasts grazed in a meadow between two swamps and refused to budge.
“We could go around them,” the scout leader suggested. “But that’ll be quite a walk.”
“How much time would we lose?
“Half a day.”
Gnorrk scratched his head. They’d been marching since dawn, and every muscle in his body ached. He wasn’t a cub anymore.
“We make camp here,” he ordered.
The aurochs might be gone by morning. With the fire burning in their camp, Gnorrk had no fear of the heavy beasts charging and trampling his troops. Earlier, he’d noticed that even when a fire burned downwind from wild animals—as was the case now—creatures big and small kept away.
The next morning dawned cold and misty. Gnorrk shivered, shaking off droplets of dew that had settled on his fur overnight. As he sniffed the air, it became obvious that the auroch herd hadn’t moved anywhere. He stood, listening to their eerie mooing as the camp stirred to life. After so much walking on the previous days, his legs cramped, and he didn’t relish the prospect of a half-day detour. Moorgs’ village lay only a day’s walk to the south, and Gnorrk looked forward to Sunriser hospitality and to eating lots of cockles and mussels. Maybe there’d even be oily seal meat, too. He smacked his lips in anticipation. After two days of walking and eating mainly mushrooms and grass, he and his warriors had become grumpy.
And now the stupid, stinky beasts blocked his way. To vent his anger, he picked up a stick, snapped it in half, and dropped it on the fire. He watched the smoke drifting away. If only it blew toward the herd. Some fifty paces away stood an auroch bull, pawing the ground. It turned its huge horned head to stare at Gnorrk. A tight mass of shaggy brown bodies moved beyond the bull, lowing. Fallen branches cracked under their hooves.
Guided by an impulse, Gnorrk lit one of the reed torches and picked up a couple of spares. Holding the torch in front of him, he cautiously advanced on the herd. At first, nothing happened, but then the bull stopped pawing the ground and backed off a few paces. Gnorrk stepped forward. The auroch retreated before him. In Gnorrk’s mind, a plan began to form. Ten paces ahead, he saw a mass of dead pine boughs on the ground that had broken off a tree and dried to an ocher red. Perfect.
He hurried forward and thrust his torch into the dry fronds, lighting them up. The wind blew the pungent smoke in his face, making him cough and gag, but he didn’t mind, because the bull fled into the press of the herd, which retreated en masse. Gnorrk hoped they’d leave altogether, but the aurochs stopped some distance off and began stripping leaves from young saplings.
Gnorrk turned to face the half dozen bodyguards who had followed him. Some held unlit reed torches. “Listen up. First, we get something to eat. Then we chase the aurochs away.”
His warriors regarded him dubiously. No one had ever heard of aurochs being chased away. Always, it had been the aurochs who did the chasing.
After an unsatisfying breakfast of blueberries and birch leaves, Gnorrk sent his troops to collect armfuls of reeds and dry pine branches. They brought them into the clearing and sorted them into bundles. Gnorrk divided his fifty followers into five teams. In each team, one would hold a lit torch, and the others would carry the spares and gather more flammables as they advanced.
“The wind is blowing from the southeast,” Gnorrk said. “The herd is south. We strike their left flank and move fast. Once we bypass the herd, the wind will blow smoke at them, and they’ll run.”
“What if they don’t run and trample us instead?” someone asked.
Gnorrk glared at him. “What if you’re a coward?”
There were no more objections. The twelve Salmoners who accompanied them didn’t understand the Woodlander tongue, but they grasped the concept of carrying spare reed bundles.
Gnorrk lit the first torch. “After me.” Without checking if anyone was following, he ran at the auroch herd at an oblique angle.
The nine warriors of his team took off after him, whooping and yelling a battle cry. Although, normally no amount of yelling or whooping caused aurochs to retreat, this time the herd shied away at Gnorrk’s approach. He ran after them with wild abandon, pausing now and then to set fire to clumps of dry grass.
The aurochs retreated, mooing angrily, and the ground shook under their hooves. Gnorrk dashed to a patch of withered reeds at the swamp’s edge and set them alight. With flames shooting higher than
his head and sparks flying, he laughed and roared, seeing the aurochs in headlong retreat. Gnorrk’s fur was singed, but he didn’t care. One old bull was either too slow, or too old to run fast, and soon Gnorrk jogged alongside it, a torch flaming in his paw.
He passed the torch to one of his retinue and grabbed the club that hung at his belt. His first swing rebounded off the auroch’s back. The beast whirled on him, its wicked horns glinting in the diffused sunlight, its bulging eyes reflecting the flames.
The nine warriors of Gnorrk’s team swarmed around the huge beast, and one warrior threw the blazing torch in its face. It hit the bull between the horns in a shower of sparks. The animal bellowed so loudly that Gnorrk’s ears hurt. Then it turned tail and fled.
“Get it,” Gnorrk roared. “Kill!”
With their clubs raised, his warriors rushed past him, and the woods echoed with their eager shouts. Gnorrk lit a new torch from the one dropped and followed. What amazing luck, he thought. Not only had they chased the herd off and cleared the path; now they’d have fresh meat, too.
The terrified bull galloped after the herd, but it was limping, and the pursuers soon gained. They ran on both sides of the huge beast, raining blows with their clubs. Thwack. Thwack. Thwack.
A single hit by a bear club would have killed a lesser animal, but the bull remained unaffected. It seemed to Gnorrk that they’d never bring it down, that they’d have to give up pursuit, when the bull tripped over a fallen log and hit the ground nose-first in a cloud of dust, for there had been no rain for days. Its right horn plowed a deep furrow in the forest floor.
His warriors surrounded it, hitting it from all sides, but the mighty beast shook them off and gained its feet, bellowing irately. The answering bellows echoed from the distance, but no aurochs turned back to help their beleaguered brother. Gnorrk glanced over his shoulder and immediately knew why. Behind him, the undergrowth was aflame, cutting off their way back. Well, Gnorrk had no intention of going back. Driven by the wind, the flames moved fast, but fortunately, they traveled northwest, whereas Gnorrk needed to go south.
The bull fled before them once more. With the warriors of other teams converging on their quarry, the woods rang with the ululating battle cry: “Kill, kill, ki-i-ill!”
Up ahead, a tangled thicket of brambles barred the escaping bull’s path—not unlike the one where the ugly dwarfs lived. Perfect. The bull had nowhere to go. But instead of stopping, or even slowing, it lowered its head sideways, and with its right horn tore the thorny brambles as if they were just harmless grass.
That’s what aurochs need horns for, Gnorrk realized as he chased after the beast down the narrow path freshly ripped through the barbed vines. The auroch’s tail swung behind its huge rump, and its hocked hind legs kept pounding the ground. Strongpaw, the scout leader, rushed past Gnorrk, leaped over a trailing bramble strand, and delivered a sideways blow to the bull’s hind leg.
The club cracked against bone. With a bellow of pain, the animal surged forward, but its limp increased. The bull cleared the bramble patch and tore into a reed bed, stagnant water splashing under its hooves. Gnorrk chased after it and swung his club at the bull’s hind leg.
His weapon struck with bone-jarring force. The beast missed a step as its right back leg collapsed beneath it. It skidded on its rump, shaking its head violently and tearing the reeds with its huge horns. Incredibly, it gained its feet again and tried to escape, limping badly. On three legs, it didn’t get far before Gnorrk’s entire war party surrounded their victim. Their clubs rose and fell. The bull swung its deadly horns around. Soon someone would get hurt if Gnorrk didn’t say something.
“Hit the hind legs,” Gnorrk ordered, pushing his way through the jostling throng of warriors, each eager to deliver a blow. “Hit the legs, you idiots.”
Somebody must have heard him, because suddenly the bull collapsed, sitting down heavily. Its sides heaving, the huge beast glared at its tormentors, and bloody spittle blew from its nostrils with each exhalation.
The bears surrounded it and started working it over with their clubs.
“That’s what I call tenderizing meat,” Strongpaw said. He stood leaning on his club, a wide grin on his furry face.
“Let them youngsters have fun.” Gnorrk sat down on a mossy log that lay across the slough. He patted the space next to him. “That was a wise move to knock his legs out from under him.”
Strongpaw took a seat, and they watched in silence as the meat—still alive on the hoof—was softened. The clubs rose and fell rhythmically. Whack-whack-whack. Blood spray flew into the air. The bull bellowed in protest. Eventually, its lowing lost its vigor, and the beast stopped thrashing its huge head and swinging its horns. There was no point, really.
One warrior climbed on the bull’s back and started bludgeoning it over the head, between its horns.
“A tough skull,” Strongpaw remarked idly. His feet were submerged in the swamp. He pulled out his right foot. A fat leech hung from his big toe. “Ah, there you are, sucker.” He tore the leech off and popped it in his mouth.
Gnorrk didn’t reply. In his mind, he kept replaying the chase. The way the bull had ripped apart the patch of brambles gave him an idea.
Later, as the warband sat, devouring the well-tenderized meat, Gnorrk began elaborating on his idea and making plans. The ugly dwarfs hadn’t heard his last roar yet. But, by the Blessed Bear in the Enchanted Woods, they will.
Oh, yes, they will.
Chapter 82
The Wind
The river island on the Thames
John knew he was dreaming, because aurochs didn’t talk, and yet here they were, chasing after him and Liz, bellowing: Kill. Kill. Ki-i-ill! Deep down he wanted to laugh, but his feet kept pounding the trail as he fled after Liz while the ground shook behind him. The herd was gaining, though, and if he didn’t get into a tangle of thick boles soon, they’d stomp him to a bloody pulp.
His feet moved ridiculously slowly, as if he were running through syrup. Liz, however, flew ahead of him like the wind. And where was tiny George? Had they lost the baby? No, somehow George didn’t exist yet.
John half-flew, half-oozed through a gap between thick pines a split second before the first bull slammed its head into a trunk behind him, the impact jolting him awake.
He stretched and yawned, listening to the shrill calls of seagulls and the aspen leaves trembling in the wind. In front of their shelter, the fire had burned low. Their makeshift home consisted of the leather sail draped on the overhanging willow branches, and their bed was dry reeds.
George’s basket lay between him and Liz.
John lifted himself on one elbow and peered at the water separating their islet from the mainland. As expected, the tide was out, and this branch of the river flowed sedately through a much-diminished channel that had shrunk to some forty yards. On the other side, the retreating water had exposed a wide belt of black silt that appeared treacherous, but wasn’t. Yesterday afternoon, he’d swum across to measure the depth of the channel at low tide and found it at least ten feet deep in the middle. But that oozing silt, although sticky, wasn’t impassable.
Presently, he strained his eyes to see if his footprints remained on the opposite shore, but they’d been washed off by the tide that had flooded in around midnight.
A sudden unpleasant thought stole across his awareness. If the enemy wanted to cross over from the mainland, now would be the time.
He rose and stood by the shelter, stretching. A few coals glowed beneath a layer of ash in the campfire, and he added a handful of broken reed stalks and some sticks to revive it.
After filling the Arsenal mug with cold tea from the cooking skin, he walked down the flood meadow to the water’s edge. He waded in up to his knees, then to the hem of his kilt, and scanned the reeds on the other side, but nothing suspicious moved there or in the water. Which didn’t mean that someone hadn’t crossed over earlier.
John closed his eyes and cast his mind about, probing for dan
ger but finding none in the immediate vicinity. Yet still, like an invisible storm cloud, some undefined, diffused malevolence seemed to hang over the landscape.
He sensed himself being watched and whirled around. But it was only a fox peering at him from under a bush. How strange that he could read minds only of wolves and, to some extent, of other canines. He wondered what it would be like to read Liz’s mind, especially when they were making love.
Back in the shelter, George woke up with an insistent cry, and Liz stirred awake. “Gosh, John, where are you?” she called in alarm.
“Right here.” He grabbed a lump of driftwood floating past. “Just gathering firewood.”
He dragged the waterlogged piece of timber ashore, hoping it would dry out for the next time they visited the island. But fishing for firewood was no way to live. He caught himself longing for their bramble clearing, clean spring water, and nearly unlimited supply of firewood—a byproduct of beaver gluttony. But at least on the river island, he didn’t have to look over his shoulder every time he left the stockade. And wasn’t stockade another word for prison? Sure it was. Here on the river, they weren’t trapped. They were free.
Maybe the bigger island they’d seen in the estuary would have bubbling springs, industrious beavers, and no ursines.
And if there were tigers, he and Liz would hunt them down and kill them all, so George and any future children would grow up in a reasonably safe place. He shielded his eyes against the rising sun and peered downriver. Would the Ra be able to sail twenty miles before the tide changed? He supposed if they took advantage of the ebbing tide flowing out, and if the wind blew from the west, they’d reach their destination in three or four hours.
He studied the treetops swaying in the strong southeasterly wind and shook his head. They wouldn’t sail today.
While Liz tended to their baby, he refilled the cooking skin with water and stoked up the campfire to heat the rocks. After wrapping the remains of the goose in burdock leaves, he laid them by the fire to reheat them, then headed into the miniature forest to gather some herbs to flavor their ‘mineral-enriched’ tea.