A Different Kingdom(64)
Other beasts stalked the snow-filled woods. The men gathered in the biggest hut around the fire pit to talk over strategies for spring, and ultimately to reminisce about past winters, the terrible, dark times. Four winters ago a manwolf had stalked the village and killed a woman. They had hunted it into the next spring, and in the hunt Fuinos had been taken, though they had killed the beast with wolfbane-poisoned spears. But Fuinos had lived, and so they had had to kill him as he changed, the werewolf blood blackening his veins; and then they had eaten and burnt the beast he had become, out of respect for the man he had been.
Other things also. There was the time the Knights had come in a great troop to push the tribes southward into the haunted woods, and they had been trapped with their back to the river and to cross had had to bargain with the troll who controlled the ford. Thus they had laboured to decipher riddles whilst the enemy had closed in. The troll had been a hearty sort. He had enjoyed telling the answers as much as he had enjoyed posing the questions. He had let them pass—the Wyrim had a greater tolerance for the tribes than for any other humans— and he had then baited the Knights as they galloped up, drowning three who had tried to cross without considering his riddles.
The winter settlement which the tribe would occupy until the turning of the year was small, and Michael came to know that the group of men who had attacked the village had not all been of the FoxPeople. Some had been Badger-Folk, others stag men. They were all one people in the end, splintered back in some ancient time. They did not hate the villagers. Occasionally they even helped them, when the Brother who lived with them was willing and the Knights were far away. But more often there was an uneasy truce between the two peoples. The pair of fox men caught in the village had been there to trade, but they had been cheated by the villagers and had lashed out, injuring one. The villagers had been about to bum them as there was a troop of Knights in the place. At any other time, and with a less zealous priest on hand, things might yet have been settled more peaceably. But the Fox-Folk had gathered up men from the neighbouring tribes with swift runners, and a huge force of at least forty warriors had been in on the attack. The Fox-People numbered only some three score individuals, of whom fewer than twenty were fighting men. They were dwindling, they said, as were all the tribes. Slowly the beasts and the Knights and the seasons were wearing them down, and soon they would be gone.
They were an odd people, convinced of their own doom and yet refusing to yield to any outside force. They could have settled down decades in the past and become villagers like the rest, but they had refused because of some obscure tradition now lost. They were soldiers, they said. They did not work the land. But when asked where this knowledge had come from, they could not say.
Ringbone, Michael found, was the perfect teacher and mentor.
He was sombre, sober, but endlessly patient. Only rarely would a grin light up his filthy face, making him seem almost young. It was impossible to guess his age, as it was impossible to guess the age of any but the oldest and youngest of the people. They were all lean and dark, but broad in the shoulder and incredibly quick, as sure and swift of movement as wild animals. The women were slight and dark also; beautiful when young, but growing old quickly. Swollen joints and rheumatism plagued the old people, and they would wander off into the trees when they felt their time had come. Sometimes their body would be recovered and burned, sometimes it would be lost, a feast for the animals. The Fox-Folk were not a sentimental people, though they valued their children above everything.
Cat was as able as a hunter as any of them, and sat in on their councils, her pale face a sharp contrast to their dark ones and the tangle of Michael's beard. They were a little in awe of her, Michael thought, for she could outrun many of them and had a way with the forest animals which was unique. They considered her to be something of a witch because of how she loved the wood. They said the trees spoke to her. She and Michael were together always. She was his shadow, the flip side of his life.
Michael's 'fire-stick' remained unused, though it and the sword gained him much respect from the men. The respect survived even his first clumsy attempts at hunting and snaring. He was something of a warlock to them. Perhaps it was because they would glimpse movement up in the trees when he was out with them, or hear laughter far off in the wood. The Wyrim watched over him, they said. And they considered him lucky.
He would find things in his path in the wood—a posy of heartsease, a pheasant hanging from a branch, a ribbon-bound twig, a pair of magpie feathers—and he would know that Mirkady was keeping his word. The Forest-Folk were out there, overseeing mm and looking after Cat, who was almost one of them, after all.