‘I don’t understand. How can he hold that against you?’
That’s a difficult question, Gaelen. Many people assumed I would try for Hunt Lord. In truth I would have lost, for Cambil is -and always was – worthy of the role. But had I stood and lost, he would have known he was considered the better man. Because I did not stand he will never know.’
‘Is that why Agwaine doesn’t like me?’ asked Gaelen. ‘Because his father doesn’t like you?’
‘Perhaps. I have been very selfish in my life, doing only that which I enjoyed. I should have acted differently. If I am nominated for the Council again I shall accept. But that is not likely.’
From the house below they heard Kareen calling. Gaelen waved at her, but Caswallon remained where he was.
‘Go and eat,’ he said. ‘I will be down soon.’
He watched the boy running down the hillside and smiled, remembering his own Hunt Day fifteen years before. Every lad in the Farlain over the age of fourteen, and not yet a man, was teamed with three others and sent out into the mountains to recover a ‘treasure’. Skilful hunters would lay trails, hide clues and signs, and the teams would track them down until at last one team returned with the prize. For Caswallon the prize they had sought was a dagger, hidden in a tree. Often it was an arrow, or a lance, or a helm, or a shield. This year it was a sword, though none of the lads-knew it.
Every year Caswallon helped lay the trails and delighted in his work. But this year was special for him, for Gaelen would be taking part.
He removed from his pouch the strip of parchment Taliesen had given him and he re-read the words written there.
Seek the Beast that no one finds,
always roaring,
never silent,
beneath his skin,
by silver wings,
bring forth the
long lost
dream of kings.
After the meal Caswallon would read the verse to his new son, even as, all over the Farlain, fathers would be doing likewise. There were times, Caswallon considered, when tradition was a wholesome thing.
In the wide kitchen Caswallon’s young son Donal lay on a woollen blanket by the hearth. Beside him slept the pup Gaelen had brought home; it had grown apace in the last two months, showing signs of the formidable beast it would be in the years ahead. Kareen sat beside Maeg opposite Gaelen, and they were all laughing as Caswallon entered.
‘And what is amusing you?’ he asked.
‘Rest your poor bones at the table,’ Maeg told him, ‘and tell us, gently, how Gaelen here dumped you to the earth.’
‘It was a wicked blow and I was unprepared,’ he answered, seating himself beside the boy who was blushing furiously.
‘Have you been bragging, young Gaelen? he asked.
‘He has not,’ said Maeg. ‘Kareen herself saw the deed done as she fed the chickens.’
‘Fed the chickens, indeed,” said Caswallon. ‘It could not be seen from the yard. The lazy child climbed the hill and spied on us, for a certainty.” Now Kareen began to blush, casting a guilty glance at Maeg. ‘In fact,’ said Caswallon, smiling broadly, ‘on my way back here I saw two sets of tracks. One had the dainty footprints of young Kareen, the other I could not make out except to say the feet must have been uncommonly large.’
‘So!’ said Maeg. ‘It’s back to jibes about my feet, is it?’
‘You have beautiful feet, Maeg, my love. There isn’t a woman in the Farlain who could match them for beauty – or length.’
Throughout the meal they good-naturedly sniped at each other, and only when she began to list Caswallon’s faults did he open his arms in surrender and beg her forgiveness.
‘Woman,’ he said, ‘you’re full of venom.’
After the meal he gave leave to Gaelen to seek his friends, and read him the druid’s parchment. ‘Do not be late home. We’ve an early start tomorrow.’
Later, as Maeg and Caswallon lay arm in arm in the broad bed, she leaned over him and kissed him gently on the lips. ‘What troubles you, my love?” she asked him, stroking his dark hair back from his eyes.