Forging the Blade/The Wilderness Years, Chapter 3, pt. 1/2
kageorge@EROLS.COM
Fri, 11 May 2001 12:42:27 -0400
Forging the Blade/The Wilderness Years
by MacGeorge
For ratings, acknowledgements and disclaimers, please see
part 0, previously posted.
Chapter Three, part 1
He slept at last, waking slowly, and only when the sun was
full up. The zeal and purpose that had driven him for days
had leached away, and he felt tired and listless, yet oddly
uneasy. He was torn between a desire to curl up and sleep
forever, and an abiding need to move, to get away, even
though he had no sense of destination. Finally he roused
himself to check his snares, finding nothing in them. He
made what repairs he could to his torn breeches using a long
pine needle tied to threads he had pulled and twisted from
his old shirt, now reduced to a few small rags. At last he
broke down his camp, slowly gathering his meager store of
belongings: his cloak, his weapons, including the bow and
arrows he had managed to fashion, his old plaid, the small
water skein he had worked so hard to make.
He checked his snares again just before he left, but the one
rabbit they had caught was very young, and he pondered
whether he should kill the creature for the small amount of
meat it would provide. The thought provoked a startling and
ugly vision in his mind of the brutalized carcass of the
boar. It stopped him cold and he had to swallow the bile in
his throat at a memory he had managed to put out of his mind
all day.
But as he did, he realized that was what had pushed him to
move on. He didn't know what to think anymore. About
himself. About who or what he was. Maybe he was a demon,
after all, like they all said - a danger to those he cared
about and the safest thing to do was get away. He knew he
couldn't face them anymore, not with their accusing words
and fearful looks.
He let the rabbit go, watching it scurry away into the
evening dusk, back to the safety of its warren and the
familiar comfort of its family. He had set out to prove his
worth, but all he had done was confirm his own worst fears.
And yet something inside still insisted, against all logic,
that he was not evil. At least he didn't want to be.
He recalled a vivid dream he had once had, long ago, while
still a child. He had seen himself a grown man, imposingly
tall and muscular, clad in a long, dark coat. His older
self seemed confused and uncertain, facing some enemy he
didn't know how to defeat. He remembered waking with the
singular phrase echoing in his mind. "Do you not know that
good will always win over evil?"
And that was, he decided, all he could rely on. If he was a
demon, then he would just have to fight his own nature. No
one, not even the devil, was unbeatable.
The sun had set, but Duncan knew the trails and paths well
enough, even in the darkest hours of the night. He had also
learned more about stealth in the last few months than he
had ever expected to have to know. Jean MacClure's pony
snuffed his hand in recognition as Duncan quietly opened the
pen and led him out. He had silently pulled the small cart
over the rise with his own muscle before leading the horse
away from the house as quietly as possible. He found Robbie
MacClure's peat shovel inside the pony's small shelter. It
was old and battered and not as sharp as it should be, but
it would have to do.
Once out of earshot of the house, Duncan hitched the pony to
the cart and led him down towards the peat bog in a small
valley about halfway to the shores of Loch Sheil. There
were sometimes one or two laborers at the bog during the
day, but no one would be there in the dead of night. Long
after moonset, he worked in the precise, practiced motions
of planting the flat-bladed spade in careful, even rows,
shearing off piece after piece, piling it, then stacking it
in the cart. He worked until his hands bled, his shoulders
burned and his biceps trembled, but kept going until the
cart was full.
He led the pony back, pulling the poor old gelding along as
fast as it could go. He had already taken too long, and
wouldn't have enough time to pile the peat by the house
before the family awoke, as he had hoped. The sun was just
beginning to lighten the sky by the time he topped the rise,
but he figured he could just leave the pony and cart in the
front and quickly slip away.
But Jean was waiting, standing in front of the house,
watching for him.
He slowed and stopped, not knowing whether he should go any
closer. At last Jean came forward, took the lead from his
hand and led the horse to the front of the house.
She began unloading the peat and stacking it in neat rows
against the wall. Duncan hung back for a few moments, but
couldn't just watch her work, so he stepped closer and they
silently toiled, side by side. When the cart was empty,
Jean had still said nothing, and moved inside the house and
closed the door.
Duncan stood, stretching his strained shoulders and
breathing deeply to catch his breath after all the
exertion. He brushed a little of the dirt off his hands,
then unhitched the pony, leading him into the pen, then
pulled the cart around to the side of the house where he had
found it. He came around front to gather his things, and
Jean was there, holding out a cup of water.
"Thirsty?" she asked.
He nodded, and took the cup, finishing it quickly. She
refilled it from the bucket she had brought outside, and
handed it to him again. Their fingers brushed, and she
almost dropped it, so he was careful when he handed the cup
back not to touch her.
"I...I made you a meal," she said. "It's not much, but..."
"Thank you," Duncan answered. "You've been very kind." It
sounded awkwardly formal, but he couldn't really think of
anything else to say.
"Nay," she whispered. "I don't know what you are, Duncan,
but I cannot believe you're evil."
It seemed passing strange that she would say that only after
he had managed to confirm his own worst fears.
"I don't know what I am, either, but it is time for me to
leave Glenfinnan, Jean. I just wanted to do something to
repay you for..."
"Treating you like a friend, a clansman?" she inserted with
a hard, cutting wave of her hand. "Like a man who has
treated me and my bairns with naught but kindness?" She
crossed her arms and turned away, her back stiff. "I'm a
coward!" she said, almost to herself. "A coward and a fool,
just like the rest of them." She picked up her skirts and
marched into the house, returning a moment later with a
large bowl of hot porridge laced with thick buttermilk.
Duncan took the dish almost reverently, warming his hands on
the smooth wood of the carved bowl. Holding a spoon in his
hand after months of eating with his fingers seemed
momentarily awkward, but the taste and smell of the salted,
butter-thick porridge flooded his mouth with juice and for a
few moments, his world shrank to a very small space between
his mouth and the bowl.
When his spoon scraped the last of it off the sides and he
had licked the utensil clean, he looked up to find Jean
watching him with undisguised pity. He felt his face flush,
and he looked away, wiping his mouth. He mustered as much
dignity as he could and handed her back the bowl.
"It was very good," he said stiffly. "Thank you."
"Would you like some more?"
"No." It wasn't easy to say, but it came out almost
normally. "I really should be off." He reached for his
things.
"Really, Duncan. There's plenty to spare."
"I said, no!" he snapped, settling the plaid over his
shoulder and his claymore at his waist. He relented a
little, knowing she meant well and cursing his own dark
temper and stiff pride. Perhaps it was the demon, fighting
to control his actions. "The sun is up and someone might see
me here, and you'd have no end of trouble for that."
"Where will you go?" she asked.
He shrugged, looking up at the horizon. "North, most
likely. I hear there are wide stretches there with few
people to fill it."
"Well, then," she said softly, "Godspeed, Duncan."
He nodded, but couldn't meet her eyes, turned and walked
away. He headed up a long slope, and turned at the top of
the rise. She was still watching him and raised her hand in
tentative acknowledgement. When Duncan turned away, it felt
like something was tearing away from his soul.
~~~~~~~
It was a long walk over steep terrain, and he tried to do
most of his traveling in the early morning and late evening
when it was light enough to see, but he was less likely to
meet others. Even so, he periodically crossed paths with
another as he traveled through lands dominated by the
Camerons, then the MacDonalds. He made the mistake of
giving his name at a chance meeting with an aged MacDonald
clansman out watching his small herd of sheep. The man
backed off and swung his staff at him, set his dog to attack
him, then started yelling a "Hail, Mary" in a frantic bellow
that scattered his herd.
He should have known. Gossip, stories of inter-clan
rivalries and tales of ghosts and mystical events spread
quickly in the Highlands, sometimes distorted beyond
recognition. Whatever had been said about Duncan MacLeod of
the Clan MacLeod, the tale had rendered his name a curse,
and he would find no welcome anywhere amongst the clans.
He made northern progress in fits and starts, and while food
was a little less scarce than it had been in earlier months,
being on the move all the time kept him from staying near
regularly used animal trails and easily finding game.
Evenso, he surprised himself late one evening when he
brought down a fat partridge with an arrow. The shot was
more luck than skill, especially given the rather crude bow
and arrow he had fashioned from poorly seasoned oak, but he
still felt a surge of happy pride in the achievement - until
the automatic and ingrained wish that he could share the
moment with his father and his clan struck him like a sharp
slap in the face.
The thought filled his mind as he retrieved the bird. Never
again would he feel the sense of warmth and completion when
he shared his life with those he loved, provided for them,
protected them, taught them...and they him. He swallowed
the hard constriction in his throat, pulled out his dirk and
dug out the arrow, cleaning it and returning it to his
quiver. He tied the bird's feet together with a strip of
leather and hung it from his belt.
Never again.
He stood for a long time, knee deep in rough underbrush at
the top of a hill, looking out across the land that had
given him birth. Far below to the northwest, towards the
sea, he could see a dark green shadow of a long stretch of
forest. He had not headed to Donan Woods because it was too
close to those who knew him, even though he had always felt
at home in that mysterious, much fabled forest. But now,
there wasn't a village as far as the eye could see.
Wandering far from all men, indeed.
He headed northwest.
~~~~~~~
It was a beautiful forest, full of pine and oak, alder,
aspen and birch, the floor a soft, green carpet of moss and
ferns. The light filtered down in golden streaks when the
trees thinned out a little, but mostly the sunlight was only
seen up in the high branches, splintering into shards of
white if you looked up towards the sun. Duncan followed the
path of an old creek bed. The ground began to slope
downward, and where the old branch met its original source,
the sound of running water was music to a tired, thirsty
traveler's ears.
The weeks passed in solitude as a cool, wet spring gave way
to a warm summer, and Duncan mostly avoided thinking about
anything but survival, except at night in his dreams. He
kept a lookout for a likely place to winter, since the rude
lean-to he had built from pine boughs would hardly suffice
during the long, cold months to come. He marked the passage
of time by the cycles of the moon, and the growth of the
plants. The wild strawberries came earliest, along with a
noticeable increase in the rabbit population. He soon had
enough of the small pelts to fashion better footwear and
leggings, but he wished he had more tools to work the skins
and sew them together.
He had a rather terrifying brush with a bear one late
afternoon while exploring a cave as a potential wintering
site. Even as he stumbled, rolled, scrambled and finally
dashed away, the bear's snarling roar echoing in the woods
behind him, he wondered if he would eventually have to
challenge the animal for ownership of the cave. Winters in
the Highlands were long and brutal, and without real
shelter, demon or no, he would end up as food for the
wolves.
It was already high summer and he had only managed to store
some roots and grains he had found. The thought that he
might ultimately have to find refuge in a village somewhere
made his guts churn. Death from cold or starvation seemed
preferable to being reviled by a people whose respect and
affection he had always cherished.
Things looked up when, following some red deer one warm
afternoon, he discovered their salt lick at the outer edge
of a small, hidden valley where brackish water stood in
soggy puddles, never seeming to soak fully into the ground.
He managed to chip out some large chunks, which might just
give him some means to preserve some meat for the winter
months.
Having found a place where he knew they would come, he
eventually managed to bring down one of the deer, carefully
cured its hide and, for a few days, ate enough to finally
dull the gnawing hunger that had dogged him for so long.
Then he carefully cut the rest of the meat into thin strips,
smoking, drying and salting it against leaner times. As
grateful as he was to eat at all, he was getting royally
sick of a diet of just meat and was pleased when the wild
berries began to ripen in high summer.
One afternoon he found a whole hillside of blueberries.
They were small and barely ripe, but they were plentiful,
and he ate until his hands began to cramp from picking.
Then he got a stomachache, but it wasn't as bad as he might
have expected, given that he had hardly had any fruits or
vegetables in months. It was a bare, struggling, lonely
existence, but he did learn to appreciate small pleasures,
such as finding a fallen log of a beautiful old oak,
undamaged by rot or insects and aged enough to use to carve
a new bow, more arrows, and even a bowl and spoon so he
didn't have to eat with his hands like some wild animal.
There were days when the sun was warm, there was food in his
belly and some sense of satisfaction from his achievements,
that he was actually able to lie in the shade of his small
camp and drift to sleep, and the dreams that came to him
were all good - of days when he and Debra Campbell walked
together, their hands barely touching, but so aware of each
other it seemed their heartbeats sounded as one.
Of games with his many cousins, mock battles with crudely
carved swords, kicking a rag-stuffed pig bladder through the
village. Of nights sitting by the hearth, his mother
working the tangles out of his hair, listening to his father
talk to the other men of the village, talking politics,
planning raids or just discussing the raising of cattle or
sheep, how and when to get them to market, how to insure the
welfare of their small community.
But afterwards he felt the loss of everything important in
his life even more keenly, sometimes awakening with his face
wet with tears, and he wasn't sure whether such
memory-dreams were better or worse than the nightmares that
regularly startled him out of sleep with his own cry of
terror still ringing in his ears.
Then there were the demon-dreams, as he labeled them in his
mind. Frightening glimpses of faces he could have sworn he
had never seen, but which seemed so familiar, bright flashes
of swords always coming at him, sensuous dreams of a woman
with long, flowing dark hair that left him aching with
sexual desire. They had nothing to do with his life as he
knew it and had to come from the demon -- he thought of it
as a separate entity from himself. He had to. It was the
only way to stay sane, especially when he would bruise or
cut himself accidentally, then watch as his skin healed
itself in a tiny shower of flashing blue lights. After
awhile he stopped looking and did his best not to think
about it.
~~~~~~~
Duncan had waited since long before dawn, watching the mouth
of the only cave he had found that was large enough to
provide real shelter. Unfortunately, its current occupant
had already demonstrated his determination to keep the space
for himself. The bear had gained weight since their first
encounter, bulking up for the winter to come, and was even
more intimidating than he had been when Duncan had scrambled
away in terror at the beginning of the warm season. But
Duncan had been watching all summer. And waiting. The
trees were now just beginning to turn gold, the mornings
were getting chilly enough to mist breath, and Duncan had
decided that the bear would have to either find someplace
else to hibernate, or have his hide become Duncan's new
sleeping pad.
He would be smarter this time. He had nothing to prove to
anyone, and did not wish a repeat of his ugly battle with
the boar. He had settled in the crook of an oak tree about
fifteen feet off the ground, upwind but within easy sight of
the cave opening. He had been observing the bear closely
for weeks now, and the animal usually emerged well before
dawn, spent the day hunting for food, and returned a little
after dusk.
Duncan had no intention of trying to corner the bear in his
own lair, nor did he wish to get into a one-on-one battle
with an animal who, on his hind legs, was taller than he
was, and outweighed him by a several hundred pounds. It was
not yet light when the bear lumbered out of the cave, rising
briefly on his hind legs to sniff the morning air. Then he
casually wandered off to the east, towards an area where the
blueberry bushes were plentiful, if picked almost clean this
late in the season. Duncan waited until the animal was well
clear of his cave before he slipped down from the tree, and
followed.
It took a day and a half and four arrows before the bear
finally began to falter. Duncan had stayed between the
beast and its cave, driving it back each time the wounded
animal sought shelter. After awhile, he felt a certain sad
kinship with the animal, driven away from its home, in pain
and having no understanding of why he was being tormented
so. At last, the bear lay down and didn't rise, his sides
heaving for each breath, arrows embedded in his back, his
neck, his leg and his chest.
When Duncan drew close, the huge animal rolled its eyes at
him and tried to rise, only to collapse back with a sad,
groaning growl of pain.
"I'm so sorry, ye poor beast," Duncan whispered. They were
the first words he had spoken aloud in months and his voice
was rusty and hoarse. He could have just waited, but the
bear's suffering was too painful to watch and at last he
risked getting raked by those long claws, moving in quickly
and using his sword, driving it deep into the massive body.
In seconds, it was over.
But it was only the beginning of the task, of course. As
tired as he was, the skinning and butchering of the bear had
to be done immediately. Flies and scavenger birds were
instantly attracted to the smell of blood, and he worked
well into the next day before he had the blood drained, the
meat sufficiently cut up, the grease captured as best he
could, the hide stretched tight on a frame, and all of it
moved from the site of the slaughter and into the cool shade
of his new home almost a mile away.
The place stank of bear scat and would take some time to
clean out, but he was too exhausted to care, and barely
managed to put down some pelts against the cold hardness of
the earth before he slept long and deeply.
The next days were a blur of work as he alternately smoked
the meat, scraped the hide, cleaned out the cave, hauled
water, and caught brief naps to keep himself going. But his
endurance surprised even himself, and when he finally went
down to the creek, stripped and washed away all the sweat
and blood and grime, he realized he was still lean, but had
lost the scrawny, painful thinness that had made his body
embarrassing to look at at the beginning of the summer. He
needed to start working with his sword again, he decided.
It would build his arm strength, and the mark of a man's
worth was in his ability to protect himself and those he
cared for. He would not relinquish that, even if he lived
alone to the end of his days.
~~~~~~~
The birch and aspen leaves had turned yellow, the oak and
ash trees gold, then brown and were falling like rain with
every gust of cold northwest wind that tugged and pulled at
his cloak. He was on a desperate search now for any edible
grasses, grains or nuts to supplement his store of dried
meats. In his heart, he knew it was not enough, that his
meager supply of food would not last through the bitter
months ahead, but his choices had dwindled to none, so he
kept going, using a staff he had carved to sweep aside
leaves and uncover any possible treasures hidden beneath.
Through trial and error - sometimes grievous and painful
error - he had discovered which mushrooms were edible and
which were not, which berries made his insides cramp, and
which did not. Certain tree bark could be steeped into a
tea, certain grasses could be cooked into a mash that, while
tasting bitter, filled his stomach without making him sick.
Certain roots were edible, if not particularly palatable.
He had even found a hive of honey bees earlier in the
summer. The memory of the sweet, golden taste still had the
power to fill his mouth with juice. He paused at the top of
a rise, with much more of the horizon around him revealed
now that the leaves had fallen or been blown away. A minute
smudge against the brown-green of the trees in the distance
drew his eye. He stood and watched, and it took him awhile
to recognize what he was seeing.
It was smoke from a fire.
His heart gave an unnatural and uncomfortable lurch in his
chest. He had never wandered that far to the west, given
that it was in that direction, toward the sea, that he was
likely to encounter other people. But this could be no more
than a few miles away. Had they been there long? Were they
planning to invade his territory? He smiled at his own
presumption. It was hardly his territory. If it belonged
to anyone, it had been to the bear whose dark fur now served
as his sleeping mat.
He hadn't seen a human face or heard a voice besides his own
in at least half a year. Perhaps he should take a closer
look, just to make sure they weren't a threat.
~~~~~~~
It was a small hut that had clearly been there for many
years. There was a carefully tended garden in the back,
protected by dense and intricately woven fencing made from
gathered twigs and branches, designed to keep out deer and
rabbits, as well as the two or three chickens and one
rooster he could see pecking around in the clearing. His
mouth watered just from the sight of the ragged tops of
carrots, of a small trellis for beans, and a long row of
cabbages, beets, turnips and other vegetables.
An animal pen was attached to the side of the house, with a
portion of it covered against bad weather, and a dirt path
led away from the doorway down a hill and out of sight
towards the creek that ran nearby. A second garden appeared
to be planted right in front of the cottage, with neat rows
of herbs and flowers rising up from the dark earth. Wood
was piled under the eaves next to the door, along with a
wooden frame where long loops of dyed wool in bright blues,
greens, reds and yellows were hung, and someone had painted
intricate patterns around the doorframe and windows in
colors that were long faded from the weather and the passage
of time.
The thin stream of smoke he had seen from afar rose from a
stone chimney, but blew away quickly in the steady, autumn
wind. Duncan settled on his haunches, hidden in the shadows
of the forest near the edge of the clearing, watching. It
was something he had learned a great deal about in the past
six months. Patience and stillness. The sun had almost set
by the time the door opened and a woman emerged, her head
and shoulders wrapped tightly in a dark woolen shawl. She
was small and squat, moving stiffly but steadily, carrying a
bucket into the small pen, and Duncan saw a fine Highland
pony step out from the shelter to greet the woman, snuffing
eagerly at the bucket she carried.
"Ah, ye likes yer oates, do ye, my lovely?" the woman's
voice was high and grating, but it sounded like music to
Duncan's ears, nonetheless. The chestnut mare with the
bright white blaze all the way from her forelock to her
flaring nostrils, nodded as if in answer, then eagerly
bumped at the pail with her nose. "Easy, lass, don't be
greedy. We've got to make it last 'til the next trip to
market, ye know." The woman patiently held the bucket as
the horse ate, gently stroking the mare's withers with her
free hand. "It'll be getting cold soon," the woman spoke
conversationally. "'Twill be a hard winter, I fear. These
old bones are already startin' to ache." The horse reached
the bottom of the pail, her lips scraping noisily against
the metal. "That's it my lovely. We'll go to market in a
few days and you can bring back some fine oats and some
grain and all sorts of nice things for us both, eh?" The
woman gave the horse a final pat on the rump, closed the pen
behind her and shuffled back into the house, the chickens
scurrying behind her. Before the door shut, Duncan got a
glimpse of a crackling fireplace and clumps of herbs hanging
from a beamed ceiling.
The night closed in around him, the only light from the
quarter moon hanging low in the sky, and the dim gold from
the fireplace seeping out from behind the cottage shutters.
At last, even that faded, and Duncan crept forward,
carefully opening the gate to the elaborate fence into the
garden. In a few minutes, he had dug up some late carrots
and found a head of cabbage, and pulled up some turnips. He
climbed back out of the garden with his treasures and
slipped back into the shadows of the forest, then paused,
squatting again in the dark. He couldn't bring himself to
just slip away like a common thief.
He pulled off his cloak and untied the rabbit pelt
underlayer that kept out the cold. It was his best work so
far, sewn together with care to form a large shawl, with a
strip that could be used to tie it on at the throat. He
crept back to the garden and lay the pelt over where he had
taken the vegetables, hoping it would be considered a decent
exchange for the food, then - his conscience almost clear -
he headed back to his cave deep in the woods.
~~~~~~~
Continued in Chapter 3, Part 2