Shadow of the Wolf

Chapter Two-1

Chapter TwoI had been aware of my powers ever since I was a young boy working my father's acres in the shadow of the Eildon Hills. At first it was a small gift, the ability to find things that others had lost, a knife, an article of clothing, a mislaid coin, but then I realised that I could see things others could not. Even today I cannot properly describe it, save to say that it is more than a feeling and less than a concrete object. I can sense a picture, but I cannot control what I see, and can rarely understand when I see it.

True Thomas had told me to follow my mind, but that was not such an easy thing to do. How could I follow a mind that had neither form nor pattern? I knew that the evil had come from a mountainous area of the north, but this Scotland of ours has many mountainous areas, and most are in the north. I had much territory from which to choose, and no one to guide me to any of it. Strapping my border lance to my saddle and my sword on my hip, I bade farewell to the tower of Eildon and headed hopefully north.

Now, for those who do not know the geography of the country, let me explain a little. Scotland is a small country, the northern third of the island of Britain that lies off Western Europe. The south, my own borderland, is an area of sweet valleys and rounded, wind-cropped hills. This is the battleground, the buffer area between Scotland and our predatory neighbours of England.

North of the Border land lies the fertile central Lowlands, where the cities of Edinburgh and Stirling sit, each beneath its own defending castle, and to the north, past the walled town of St John's Town of Perth waits the Highlands, where I was bound. There is a coastal plain that extends all around Eastern Scotland to Aberdeen, the Moray Firth and Caithness, but that was not my way. If I was looking for mountains, then I must strike into the high country, the granite heartland; the dangerous territory of the Gaelic clans.

Despite the constant threat of English invasion, we inhabitants of the south looked north with some trepidation, for the Gaels were people of a different calibre. As Scottish as we were, they also had their own distinct culture and language, both more ancient than our semi-Norman traditions of castle and courts, jousts and chivalry. While we had lords and earls, they had chieftains and chiefs, and I knew I would be an outland man there, an outsider. Yet if I were to do as Duke Albany bid me, I must penetrate the rocky fastnesses of the north, unearth whatever evil I discovered and destroy it. Is there any wonder that sleep fled from me that night?

From Edinburgh I took ferry across the Scotswater, or the Firth of Forth, that great bite of ship-dotted water that allows access to the fertile centre of the country. The ferry, an open craft powered by brawny women who laughed at my lack of seagoing experience, brought me to the shores of Fife, where a broad man mending a torn fishing net jerked a thumb northward when I asked for directions.

“You want the Highlands?” This sombre faced man asked. “Then Godspeed and God help you, for there are men there that would spit you for fun and eat you for breakfast.”

His companion, a red faced woman in a striped dress, nodded sagely. “Hell mend you, Borderer, but you'd be better turning back right now and heading home. Rather a hundred Englishmen than a single Highlander.”

Thanking them for their advice and encouragement, I led Bernard, the same hardy brown gelding I had ridden at Otterburn, found the road north and followed. My second horse, on which I had piled my armour and other necessaries, followed meekly. It was a spiritless grey, whom I named Regal.

Since that day in Edinburgh Castle I had experienced no more visions, so I travelled more in hope than expectation, one aching step after another through the fertile fields of Fife. There were hills here, the steep sided Ochils with their slopes riven by rivers and there were small hill foot towns filled with great-shouldered miners.

I spent a restful night in Castle Gloom, that strange fortress of the Campbells with the tumbling waters of the Burn of Sorrow on one side and the Burn of Care on the other, thanked my host for his hospitality and took the steep trail into the Ochils. These were different hills, with the outer slopes bringing me to a windy plateau not unlike the Border Cheviots but I could sense the presence of witches among the serried valleys and wind-tormented rocks and hurried on. I was not yet ready to meet such people.

But they, it seemed, were ready to meet me. The vision came unheralded, unwanted and without any understanding.

I was standing in the stark hall of a castle with a bitter wind outside and savage men all around. They spoke a tongue I did not recognise, but which was familiar to me in some way, and I was dressed in bright white. Looking down at myself, I saw pretty green slippers and a bracelet of flowers around my left wrist, and I knew I was not Fergus Scott. I also knew I was kept safe, although there was a dark shadow ahead, and when I looked into the mirror of standing water, the face I saw was not my own.

“Who am I?” I asked, and the voice came from the dark walls around.

“Ask not who you are, my pretty. Rather ask why you are here? What is your purpose in this place of death?”

I did not know the answer, but I was suddenly more deeply afraid than I had ever been in my life.

“Where am I” The voice was not my own, and I could not prevent the tears that prickled in my eyes, until the tall bearded man put out his hand and patted my shoulder. He was smiling, but I could see the malice behind his eyes and I screamed silently for the only man who could help me.

“Fergus”

But Fergus was not there.

I travelled northward yet, to St John's Town of Perth, secure behind its moat and the silver sheen of the River Tay. I found lodgings with the Black Friars, stabled my horses and took a stroll around the town with its tall buildings, plethora of churches and the roaring taverns filled with merchants from half of Europe. Eventually I mounted the encircling wall and gazed around.

“Why the walls?” I asked a stout burgher who stood watchman on the stone parapet, “and you so far from the Border?”

In answer he pointed to the river, white with the sails of trading ships. “The English can come by sea as well as by land,” he told me, and then, taking hold of my shoulders, he swivelled me to face north. “And there are the Highland Hills, from where the caterans come.”

“Caterans?” It was the first time I had heard the term, and I stored it away in my mind, for that single word had a strange quality I relished, yet from which my mind I recoiled. Instead I studied the hills, wondering if this was my final destination.

“The caterans,” the watchman repeated. “They are the light footed men of the Highland glens. They come south to rob and steal and rape, and even carry away our women.” He looked at me with his eyes sombre. “It's best to have stout walls and a stout heart in this land, my Border friend.”

I nodded and surveyed the hills that were so unlike my Border hills, and unlike even the Ochils. They were taller, more defined, less rounded by wind and ice and human habitation. Yet they seemed older, great upthrustings of granite, with lower slopes dense with forests. They were dark mountains, stretching range after range to the north, seemingly becoming more tangled and wilder the further I looked.

“Aye.” The burgher leaned on his spear, his face lined. “These walls keep back the caterans, at least for now, but there are tales of a new leader up there.”

That was the sort of intelligence I sought. “Tell me more, pray.”

“There is little more to tell, traveller. The hills hold their secrets well, and unless you are one with the clans, you'll learn only what they wish you to know.”

“Well then, tell me what little you have.”

The burgher shrugged and shifted on his spear. “I have only hearsay, but the stories tell of a new lord up there, somewhere; somebody other than the usual clan chiefs”“

“Could it be Clan Donald? Their chief is a great man.” I ventured a guess.

“Donald of the Isles?” The burgher looked significantly westward. “Maybe so, but I doubt it. He has his own troubles and his own lands beyond the western sea.”

I left St John's Town the following day and followed the banks of the Tay to Dunkeld, the old capital of the Caledonians and the true gateway to the Highlands. It was an easy morning's ride through fertile countryside, but I noted that each farm huddled behind stout stone walls, and the few travellers I met carried sword or spear as easily as any Borderer.

“What news?” I asked of a party of four men, and they looked at me strangely before replying in Gaelic. I knew then that I had crossed the invisible border between the Scots speaking Lowlands and the Gaelic Highlands. The clothing altered too; in place of the tunics of the south, these men wore a single piece of plaid, designed in variegated hues that were both colourful and barbaric to my unfamiliar eye. Although these men were only peasants, they also carried weapons other than the stout staff of their southern counterparts, and I knew I must prepare myself for sterner tests ahead.

Dunkeld was a picturesque little town, strangely unprotected as it clustered around the walls of its impressive cathedral. The streets of little houses were close knit and friendly, and John Peblys, the Bishop, welcomed me with a smile and hospitality I came to recognise as typically Highland. After stabling Bernard and Regal, I was welcomed into the body of his community and questioned with great subtlety as to my intentions, destination and ancestry.

“My name is Fergus Scott,” I said, and that was nearly the last true word I spoke for many months.

“Fergus Scott?” The Bishop was a wise old man with a gleaming bald head and eyes that had survived all the evil the world could offer. “And where are you bound, Fergus Scott?”

“Northward,” I said, “for I think I have kin in the North Country.”

“I see,” the Bishop nodded sagely. “So you carry a lance and sword to meet your family.” His smile was kindly but cynical. “Well, Fergus, I wish you well in your endeavours, but it is a bad time to be travelling abroad.”

“A bad time?” I tried to appear innocent, but that man had seen too much to be fooled. “In what way, pray?”

“There is evilness in the north country, Fergus Scott,” the Bishop told me seriously. “And an active man like you may well ride that way.”

I nodded. “I heard that the evil comes from the Isles, and I am not headed that way.”

The Bishop shook his head. “There is no evil in the Isles. Donald controls his lordship from Islay and may extend into Ross, but he is basically a good man.”

Trusting the Bishop, I mentally struck MacDonald from my list of possible. “So from where does this evilness come, my good Abbot?”

When he looked at me I could now see deep weariness in the aged eyes. “From where does all evil come, Fergus? It comes from the Pit, and from the servants of the Pit.”

That did not help me at all. “I will try to avoid it,” I lied.

“I do not think that is your intention,” the Bishop told me, candidly. “And a stranger speaking an unknown tongue will not have his troubles to seek in the hill country, so I advise that you at least learn the language before you go any further.” His smile was more conspiratorial than religious, a man speaking to a fellow rather than a priest to a penitent. “Go to Tigh na bantreach uistean, the house of Hugh's widow. She will teach you all you need to know.”

I nodded, although I had no desire to spend time with some old widow woman. I wanted to be up and doing, not waiting and learning. “As you say, Father.” But even as I paid lip service to the bishop, I knew he was right, for if I was to travel among the Gaels, I had to know their language and as much of their culture as I could. No doubt this old widow would be a good teacher, and I could reward her with a coin or two, if they used such things up here. Already, you see, I had formed my prejudices about the Gaeltachd, the land of the Gaels that took up more than half the country of Scotland.