Fire Bringer (47 page)

But now something happened that, for a brief time, subsumed not only thoughts of Sgorr or the Low Lands, but of the Prophecy too. Anlach arrived.

The stags began to fight for the hinds and soon the chill air was echoing with the bellow of rutting deer and the knock and clatter of jousting antlers. Heads were lowered in a conflict more primitive and consuming than any battle against Sgorr. Nature was stirring again in the deer’s veins, turning them against one another, testing their strength and challenging them to prove themselves in the greatest battle of all; the battle for survival.

As Rannoch looked out on the rutting stags his heart was deeply troubled as it had been ever since that night among the Standing Stones. For his time with Herne’s Herd had indeed had a deep effect on him and he was still wrestling to understand why.

He thought he had found an answer to his quest up there on the hill when he knew for certain that he was not Herne. He thought too that he had found a way of being free and living as a Herla. But as they had settled with the herd and tried to build a life, Rannoch had found that the violence that had so terrified him among Herne’s Herd, that he had smelt on the jaws of the wolf and sensed in the fearful glen, dwelt in the heart of the Herla too. In his own heart.

He had sensed it first when he had been with the boy and his antlers had come. And he felt it now as the deer jousted and boxed and fought for the hinds. Somewhere in him, Rannoch too longed to test himself against the other deer, to fight for his own hinds and to make his stand. To fight for Willow. Yet he was a healer, he knew that now, and he wanted to help things, not to harm them. And what he had told Birrmagnur about his power was true. When Anlach came and the blood rose in him, the ability to heal and to understand the Lera seemed to grow dim and fade.

Many times Rannoch would think of that and of the Prophecy and shake his head. So much of it seemed to be true, so much impossible. But deep inside, Rannoch was glad that his confusion meant that he could ignore those words that Blindweed had first mouthed to the calves. For with the years he had begun to think more and more of one line of the Prophecy that made him tremble: ‘Sacrifice shall be his meaning.’

He was thinking about the words now and all across the herd stags stood bellowing sentinel to the hinds that they had won in the rut when Birrmagnur came walking towards him through the grass. He looked grave.

‘I’ve found you at last,’ said the reindeer quietly as he arrived.

‘I’ve been looking for berries and horse chestnuts,’ began Rannoch, as cheerfully as he could.

‘Rannoch,’ interrupted Birrmagnur, ‘the others asked me to find you and tell you. They’re going away.’

‘Who?’

‘Thistle and the Outriders. They’re going south.’

‘They’ll be destroyed,’ said Rannoch quietly. ‘Is that what they really want?’

‘Rannoch, I’m going away as well,’ said Birrmagnur, dropping his head.

‘You, Birrmagnur? You’re going with them?’ The reindeer shook his head.

‘No, Rannoch, it’s time I found my own kind again.’

‘But why? Why don’t you stay with us?’

Birrmagnur paused and chewed the air.

‘What is it?’ said Rannoch.

‘It is not right, my friend,’ said Birrmagnur, ‘that Thistle is looked on as Lord of the Herd.’

‘I will not fight him.’

‘Nor Sgorr?’

‘No. The Outriders can do nothing against Sgorr.’ Birrmagnur nodded.

‘I’m sorry for you, Rannoch,’ he said, gazing at the white oak leaf on Rannoch’s brow, ‘but there’s other news. Willow has submitted to Thistle. She has joined his harem.’

Rannoch looked back at his old friend but he said nothing.

‘They have not had time to mate, and now they are going south she will join him. Peppa too.’

‘But they can’t,’ cried Rannoch with horror, ‘not Willow and Peppa.’

‘That’s what they plan to do.’

‘Thank you for telling me,’ said Rannoch sadly.

‘Rannoch,’ cried Birrmagnur suddenly, ‘you must choose. Choose to help them or not. Or fight Thistle for Willow. But you cannot continue to live like this.’

Rannoch was silent.

‘Well,’ said Birrmagnur, ‘I will come and say goodbye again. First I must make my farewells among the herd.’

As Rannoch watched his friend walking away he felt desperately alone. He looked out across the hills and there in the distance he saw Thistle moving slowly down the slope. In the valley below the Outriders were waiting for him and by his side Rannoch recognized the companion of his youth, Willow.

‘We’re all here,’ Thistle said as he reached the assembled deer. It was a ragged-looking bunch. ‘How many are coming, Braan?’

‘All forty-eight Outriders from the loch,’ answered the stag, ‘and with your thirty Herla, that makes about eighty.’

‘If Rannoch had been with us we could have trebled that,’ said Thistle bitterly. ‘Another twenty stags came from the north last week. But the rest of the herd listens to him and they fear Sgorr.’

‘It’s a pity Haarg won’t come,’ said Braan. ’He could have added to our numbers too. But he says he can’t leave Rannoch, not after everything he’s done.’

Willow looked sadly at Thistle as they talked of Rannoch. But she knew now that her duty lay with her friends.

‘I wish he would change his mind,’ said Braan. ’Even if this prophecy isn’t true, to have him with us would lift the Outriders’ morale. If the Sgorrla heard of it, maybe we could persuade some of them to desert.’

‘Our best plan is to try and get as close to Sgorr as possible,’ said Thistle, ‘like we discussed. Then if a group of us can infiltrate the herd and kill him. . .’

Braan nodded, though the thought of what lay ahead of them filled none of the deer with any confidence. Thistle saw the look in their eyes and he tried to raise their spirits.

‘Captain Tain,’ he said firmly, ‘Captain Bankfoot. You will take ten Outriders and scout ahead as we travel. We must not be seen. It’s vitally important.’

Bankfoot and Tain lifted their antlers.

‘But have we time to say goodbye to him?’ said Willow. Thistle looked keenly at Willow.

‘Yes,’ he said at last, ‘but you must hurry, we’re leaving before Larn. Winter is almost here and if we don’t beat it, we won’t be able to cross the Great Mountain until the spring. Who knows what will have happened in the Low Lands by then?’

The friends looked at each other almost guiltily. None of them could really believe that this was where their journey with Rannoch was coming to an end.

‘Willow,’ said Thistle, ‘you don’t have to come, you know. None of my other hinds want to. You can stay here with the herd and be safe.’

Suddenly Willow’s eyes blazed.

‘Thistle,’ she said frostily, ‘you called me at Anlach and I came. You are my lord now. Do you think I fear the danger?’

‘And you, Peppa?’ said Thistle.

‘I’ll stay with my sister,’ said the hind, though she was looking at Bankfoot.

When Willow found him, Rannoch was sitting on his own in the grass, ruminating sadly. Peppa, Bankfoot and Tain had already said their farewells and Rannoch looked deeply distressed. Again he had tried to dissuade his friends from going south, but it had been to no avail.

‘Rannoch,’ called the hind quietly as she walked up. Rannoch turned his head immediately.

‘Willow.’

‘Rannoch, I have come to say—’

‘I know,’ interrupted Rannoch, getting to his feet. ‘I wish I could say something to—’

‘You can’t, Rannoch. I have decided. My duty lies with my friends and. . . with Thistle.’

Rannoch smiled almost bitterly.

‘He’s a fine stag,’ he said.

‘He’s brave,’ said Willow coldly, looking intently at

Rannoch, ‘and he has a good heart.’ Rannoch nodded.

‘But you have a good heart too, Rannoch,’ said Willow suddenly, ‘and you were brave. Once. I would have stood with you. If. . . if only you. . .’

Rannoch winced, but he didn’t answer the hind.

‘Why don’t you come with us, Rannoch? We’ll fight Sgorr together.’

‘You can’t fight Sgorr like that,’ answered Rannoch, ‘and I’m tired of fighting.’

‘But they need your help,’ said Willow.

‘The Lera need my help too.’

‘The Lera. Are they more important to you than the Herla? And what of the Prophecy?’

‘The Prophecy is a lie, Willow. I’ve told you.’

‘I know, you’re not a changeling. But can’t you see, Rannoch? So many of them believe it. They need to believe it. At least it gives them hope. With you leading us, perhaps we would have a chance.’

‘A chance to do what? To destroy our herd?’

‘Our herd,’ said Willow scornfully. ‘You call it a herd? When the best Herla in it refuses to lead? When at Anlach he won’t even. . .’

Willow caught back the words. Rannoch looked hard into the hind’s brave and beautiful eyes and in their glitter he caught a hardness that came close to contempt. But again he said nothing.

‘Then I was right,’ said Willow at last, shaking her head.

‘Right?’

‘To accept Thistle. At least he acts like a stag.’ Now it was Rannoch’s turn to grow angry.

‘Then he can die like a stag too.’

Willow stared back at Rannoch. Her eyes were flaming.

‘You’re a coward, Rannoch,’ she cried furiously, turning on her haunches, ‘a coward.’

‘Willow,’ whispered Rannoch. But the hind was gone.

As Willow, Thistle and the others left the herd that Larn, a sudden bellow shook the air and they paused and looked back at the hill. Rannoch was above them. The six tines on each of his antlers scything the air, the red deer threw his head back and let out another bellow that rose in the sky, bitter and lonely and so full of pain that even the stags around him, driven by the blinding needs of life, stopped to listen. Then suddenly Rannoch turned and ran, as fast as he could, away from the herd and into the rain that had begun to sheet through the evening.

Rannoch ran through the night and didn’t stop until morning came, bleak and grey and with little welcome. His thoughts had exhausted him and now he lay down and closed his eyes, desperately trying to shut out the guilt that was threatening to overwhelm him. When the dream came, Rannoch murmured painfully in his sleep.

He was standing on the seashore and looking out towards an island. He had never been here before but he recognized the place and as he looked the water suddenly began to glow and a voice was whispering in its currents.

‘Rannoch,’ it said, ‘Rannoch, you have nearly crossed over. But before you can fulfil the Prophecy, you must know. Know the secret. Then you will be certain.’

Rannoch woke and shuddered. The morning had hardly advanced but the troubled deer got to his feet and ran on. It was Larn five suns later when Rannoch finally got back to the herd and saw that only a few stags now patrolled the hills. He paced restlessly towards the hinds. He was looking for Bracken.

He found his mother at the bottom of the valley, sitting on her own in the sodden grass. She looked older than he remembered and Rannoch suddenly felt desperately sorry for the poor hind. He had neglected her in the past two years, while he spent so much time with the Lera and the sick, and he realized that he had not visited her in nearly a season.

‘Mother,’ he said quietly as he padded up.

‘Rannoch,’ said Bracken, ‘Rannoch, is that you?’

‘Yes, Mother, how are you?’

‘Well enough,’ whispered the hind uncertainly, ‘and you, Rannoch?’

‘Well enough too,’ said Rannoch sadly, ‘though Thistle has won Willow. They have gone south to fight Sgorr. I fear for them, Mother.’

Bracken stirred. She recognized the names but in her confused thoughts she could hardly recall who Thistle and Willow were.

‘Mother,’ Rannoch went on suddenly, ‘will you tell me about my father? About Brechin? You’ve never really talked about him.’

The hind blinked back nervously at Rannoch.

‘I want to know about him,’ said Rannoch, ‘all about him. He was an Outrider, wasn’t he? I wish I’d met him, Mother. I wish he was here now. There are so many things I’d ask him. About being an Outrider, about the Herla.’

Rannoch had wandered a little away from Bracken now and his back was turned as he spoke. His voice broke into her thoughts, but suddenly the hind wasn’t listening any more. Her dim senses had been roused by something stirring nearby in the trees, twenty branches away. In the corner of her eye she saw a young stag and he was watching Rannoch intently.

‘I’m sure he could have advised me,’ Rannoch went on as Bracken got to her feet, ‘told me whether I should follow them. I can’t let them face Sgorr alone.’

But Bracken couldn’t hear Rannoch any more. The stag by the trees had dropped his antlers and, without a sound, he was running straight towards Rannoch. The old hind wanted to stamp, to cry out, but she found herself choked, paralysed with fear.

Suddenly Rannoch heard a strangulated bark. He turned just in time as he felt his mother’s flanks bump against his own. Beyond her was a stag and Rannoch gasped as he saw its head lowered, its antlers burying themselves in Bracken’s side where the hind had put her own body between him and his assailant.

‘Mother!’ cried Rannoch desperately.

The stag twisted and disengaged its head and Bracken fell forwards. Now there was nothing between the two of them and the stag lunged again. But the element of surprise was gone and in an instant Rannoch dropped his head and met the stag’s antlers with his own. They locked and both their bodies shook like trees in a wind.

They disengaged again and Rannoch scythed his head left and right, but his antlers met nothing but thin air. On the ground beside him Bracken was beginning to kick.

‘Mother!’ gasped Rannoch, and suddenly a fury awoke in him.

He lunged towards the stag. Again they met and now their antlers were caught, the tendons in their legs straining for dominion, their muscles beading with sweat. For ages they pushed backwards and forwards, their heads lifting and falling, until at last Rannoch managed to disengage again and lash out with his tines. This time his trez tines connected and his assailant bellowed at the pain that had opened viciously in his throat. And suddenly the stag was running, running as fast as he could. For he was trained to attack and kill in stealth and was not used to fighting a deer of Rannoch’s size except on his own terms. His mission had failed. But he would never make it back to his master beyond the Great Mountain, for Rannoch’s wound had been fatal.