‘Are you bored, young Ravenheart?’ he asked.
Kaelin shook his head. The truth was that he loved to roam the mountains with Jaim Grymauch. It made him forget for a while that, as a highlander, he had no real future in a world ruled by the Varlish. He could not even admit publicly to being a Rigante. The clan had been outlawed twenty years before. The wearing of the pale blue and green Rigante plaid was an act punishable by death. All Rigante males in the area had been forced to change clans – most becoming Pannone. Those who refused and took to the hills were ruthlessly hunted down and murdered by the beetlebacks. A few hundred had fled into the bleak northern mountains, where they survived by raiding and stealing. They were known now as Black Rigante, and every few years strong forces of beetlebacks and musketeers would enter the mountains seeking them out. Ten years ago a small settlement of Black Rigante clansmen had been surrounded and slaughtered, though almost eighty beetlebacks had been killed in the raid, and two hundred injured. They lived now in an uneasy truce.
No, Kaelin Ring was never bored while with Jaim. ‘Do you have a poem for the bull yet?’ he asked.
‘I thought I had,’ replied Jaim, ‘but now I’ve seen him I realize it’s inadequate. I shall work on another.’
Kaelin grinned. There were some who thought Grymauch’s bull-stealing verses were simply indications of the man’s vanity. The one-eyed warrior was as well known for his rhymes as for his raiding. Many of his songs were sung at festival feasts, and Kaelin knew at least twenty bull-songs by heart. He also knew that vanity had little to do with Grymauch’s poems. Aunt Maev reckoned it was merely Grymauch’s deep, hypnotic voice and confident movement that mesmerized the animals. But Kaelin believed the verses’were the links in a magical chain between Grymauch and the bull. He had twice seen the big man walk into starlit fields, take the chosen bull by the nose ring, and gently lead him away from all he knew.
Tell me the soul-name story again, Grymauch,’ he urged.
‘By the Sacrifice, boy, do you never tire of it?’
‘No. It brings me closer to my father somehow.’
Jaim reached out and ruffled Kaelin’s black hair. ‘Where would you like me to start it? The fight with the Moidart, the flight to the mountain, the coming of the stag?’
‘The stag. Tell it from the stag.’
The sky was lightening as Jairn began his tale. ‘We were sitting on a ledge of glistening grey rock. Your father was mortally wounded and knew it. He had few regrets, he said, for he was a man who always did what he thought was right. In terms of the clan he led he had lived true. Yet he was filled with sorrow that he would not see you grow, and that he had found no soul-name for you.’
Kaelin closed his eyes, picturing the scene.
‘We sat quietly, him and me, and then we heard the howling of the wolves. They were hunting. Canny creatures, wolves. They know they cannot outrun a stag. It has far more stamina than any wolf. So they hunt as a team. Four or five of them will harry the stag, chasing it for a mile or two. The forest lord is not, at first, concerned. He knows the wolves cannot outlast him. What he does not know is that the wolves have formed a circle of death. And that others of the pack are waiting further down the trail. As the first wolves begin to tire the second group takes up the chase, driving the stag towards a third in a great circle. The killing run goes on and on, the wolves tightening the circle, until, at last, the exhausted forest lord turns at bay. By now all the wolves have come together for the kill. This, Kaelin, is what your father and I saw. A proud and massive stag, a right royal beast if ever there was one, upon the hill opposite where we sat. He had a wonderful spread of horn and he stood weary, yet defiant, as a dozen wolves closed in on him. Ah, but it was a sight to see. The bravest of the wolves darted forward, and was tossed high into the air, his body dashed against a tree, his back broken. Then the other wolves charged. There was no way for the stag to win. No way. It was finished.’