Fire Bringer (61 page)

So the years passed and the Herla flourished. In the High Land and the Low they roamed through the gorse and drank from the lochs and the burns. They padded through the forests and drifted across the great moors, but wherever they went, whether among the trees or to the high barren places of the Great Land, they knew that in their antlers the forest was always with them. At Anlach they fought for their mates and to lead their herds but never again did they kill one another, unless nature herself stepped in to sap their strength through their wounds. With time and in the birth of their fawns the terrible marks that Sgorr had inflicted on the Sgorrla’s heads vanished from the herds.

The Lera also flourished. They ran free and hunted each other too, and though the strange whispering that had brought them together to fulfil a prophecy faded from the Great Land, in time to come the badger and the mole, the otter and the raven would tell each other stories and say that once all the animals had been able to understand one another, though only the creatures of the sea know the truth of it.

Man flourished also in the Great Land. Man who would fight and kill and kill again. But nevermore did the men from the north come in their tree ships to the Western Isles. For after the battle that was fought on the shores of the sea, the Great Land was talked of as Scotland and the Norsemen’s king, whose name was Haakon, sailed away to his home and grew old in his great dwelling, dreaming of the lands he had once ruled and listening to the ancient Norse sagas.

The herd had moved well to the north of the High Land and now a single stag was walking slowly along the slopes of the mountain above them, away from the deer. He was very old, nearly fifteen, and he looked tired. Although there were sixteen points on them, his antlers had long gone back. When he got to a patch of level ground he stopped and sank wearily to the earth. His muzzle was grey and his eyes were misty. Rannoch lifted his antlers towards the horizon. Across the blue, the billowing white clouds rose like mountains before him.

‘Herne is up there,’ whispered the stag to himself, ‘and Starbuck.’

Then Rannoch shook his muzzle.

‘Or is that just a story?’ he said to himself sadly, his eyes clouding over and his nostrils swamped by the complex scents around him that he could no longer interpret. ‘And am I just an animal?’

With the years everything had become so distant to the deer. The mark on his head had completely faded now. Since he had been overthrown as Lord of the Herd and Willow had gone, he felt more and more alone. But Brechin, who was already an old stag himself, was a favourite among the Captains of the Outriders. Peppa, his second calf, had her own fawns and Rannoch’s bloodline coursed strongly though the herd. Thistle would surely lead them one day.

Rannoch closed his eyes. A breeze came up, rustling the grass around him, and Rannoch suddenly stirred. He fancied he caught a voice on the wind.

‘Who’s there?’ whispered Rannoch, looking around him.

‘Rannoch?’

‘Herne,’ he whispered, ‘is that you?’

‘Come then,’ the voice seemed to say.

Rannoch’s heart was pounding and strangely he suddenly remembered the boy.

‘One more journey, then, before it’s all over?’

If only he had the strength. If only he was a young stag again.

Then suddenly Rannoch was running, running like the wind. His antlers were strong and proud once more and in his hoofs was thunder. The red deer was climbing the sky, lifted up on the great slopes of white, free to run with the Herla for ever.

On a mountain high over Scotland, lying still in the heather, lay the body of a single red stag. Rannoch had passed into eternity.

The Prophecy

‘When the Lore is bruised and broken,
Shattered like a blasted tree,
Then shall Herne be justly woken,
Born to set the Herla free.
On his brow a leaf of oaken,
Changeling child shall be his fate.
Understanding words strange spoken,
Chased by anger, fear and hate.
He shall flee o’er hill and heather,
And shall go where no deer can,
Knowing secrets dark to Lera,
Till his need shall summon man.
Air and water, earth and fire,
All shall ease his bitter pain,
Till the elements conspire
To restore the Island Chain.
First the High Land grass shall flower,
As he quests through wind and snow,
Then he breaks an ancient power,
And returns to face his woe.
Whenthe lord of lies upbraids him,
Then his wrath shall cloak the sun,
Andthe Herla’s foe shall aid him
To confront the evil one.
Sacrifice shall be his meaning,
He the darkest secret learn,
Truths of beast and man revealing,
Touching on the heart of Herne.
Fawn of moonlight ever after,
So shall all the Herla sing.
For his days shall herald laughter,
Born a healer and a king.’

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

The Sight by David Clement-Davies

1 The Stone Den

‘I cannot tell my story without going a long way back.’ Herman Hesse, the prologue to Demian

In the beginning was a castle high on a craggy precipice. The air around it was so cold that it seemed that the sky itself would crack like ice. Night was beginning to fall around its walls and the great stone stairway which rose up and up towards the castle through the vaulting pines. The huge, weathered steps disappeared into darkness and the shadows reaching out from the forest far below clawed their way towards a little village nestling just beneath the cliffs.

All around the sky was draining of colour, the air growing pale and bloodless, as the dying circle of the sun finally disappeared behind the crags. Beyond the castle the range of the Carpathian mountains rose into the distance, like mighty clouds frozen into lonely monoliths below an infinite heaven.

The conifers climbing the valley slopes were laden with snow and their tops smoked eerily in the coming darkness. Now and then a mound of snow would topple to the forest floor with a muffled thud that quivered through the air like the boom of distant thunder. It was the only sound in the wood. The stillness that settled now across the country was as deep as the blackness beginning to swallow up Transylvania, the land beyond the forest.

But there was life in the wood; a single pair of hungry, searching eyes. They were moving rapidly through the twilight, glittering furiously in the shadows as they came. Their intelligence, the ancient cunning of the predator, and their febrile, nervous brilliance made them seem thoroughly human. But they were far from human – for they belonged to a Lera, a wild animal. There was a longing and profound curiosity in those strange,semi-transparent orbs, and as night swelled they became even more aware of the shadow world around them.

As the darkness thickened, the wolf’s pace through the trees grew even faster and its pupils opened wider, seeming to draw in the last rays of light. Then, as it came to a sudden stop at the edge of the wood and peered out towards the glow of fires twinkling from the village at the western edge of the valley, those eyes changed colour. For the wolf has a power that Man himself has always longed for, the power to see in the dark. Gold suddenly turned to a brilliant greenish yellow.

It was a grey wolf, very common to Transylvania, but its strength and size was unusual. It was clearly a Dragga – an alpha male, dominant in its pack – but it was bigger than most. Its fur was a beautiful glittering silver grey, though its tail was tinged with red. It had a strong, handsome face, with brilliant white fangs and gums as pink and healthy as the flesh of a new plum.

From where the wolf was standing he could just spy humans moving about on the edge of the village, stooping in the night to collect wood for their fires, and his nose curled into the beginnings of a snarl. But suddenly a wind raked the forest, and in the surrounding air giant flakes began to flurry from the heavens. The wolf swung up his head and there was fear in his eyes. ‘It’s starting again,’ he growled bitterly. ‘The cave. I must find the cave.’

The wolf started to run once more. To ordinary eyes he was almost invisible against the snowline and he seemed to float as he came. His ears were up and his senses so alert that his muscles quivered as he ran. But he had hardly gone any way at all when he heard the snap of a twig in the wood. He swung round instantly and the snarl that came from his jaws had a killing threat in it. But as another muzzle appeared through the trees, the wolf relaxed a little, although his eyes were still blazing.

‘Palla,’ he cried angrily, ‘don’t ever sneak up on me like that. I thought you were a Night Hunter.’

The female coming towards him was a dominant also, or Drappa as wolves call them, but she had a beautiful sleek muzzle and bushy, silver ears. She was as lean and graceful as a mountain leopard. Only her swollen stomach and the exhaustion in her tread spoke of the cubs that now lived in her belly. Palla was close to her time.

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Author's Afterword: The Phoenix Tale

It is the greatest privilege to write for children. Not only are they the most acute critics, and passionate supporters too, but some of the finest literature, from Rudyard Kipling to Philip Pulman, stands in that tradition of very special storytelling. Yet the best children’s’ books, just as they often create doorways into ‘other’ worlds, are also a doorway into the entire world of adult reading. Fire Bringer is a long and complex book, enjoyed by adults too, while a writer writes primarily to entertain, move or challenge themselves first. So this edition is published as that strange beast - a ‘cross-over title’ - and is for anyone who will find pleasure in it.

The inspirations for Fire Bringer were many, not least the book Watership Down, and when it came out I was lucky enough to get a very positive quote from Richard Adams. It formed perhaps through my university days in Scotland, and especially travels to the island of Uist in the Outer Hebrides.  It took specific shape during what I hope is detailed research into the real natural history of deer, and enjoying many rides in Richmond Park.

Since writing Fire Bringer, which is still my favourite novel, and its very successful publication in Britain and America, it has brought me many thrills, and some spills. I have been lucky enough to tour widely, in Europe and America, to meet some fabulous characters, and to have received the most wonderful letters, from younger and older readers. Yet I have also had hard battles, with agents and publishers, and in the end I grew very disillusioned with the politics of modern publishing and marketing. I had a confrontation in New York especially, that might be worthy of Rannoch and Sgorr, and so decided to really fight back.

Hence the birth of Phoenix Ark Press, ‘the Storyteller’s Publisher’, built by writers, for writers and artists. The Phoenix is of course the mythical bird that rises from the ashes, the Ark a protective emblem, both for animals and perhaps animal storytellers too. It is a little cottage industry, but in that we hope to maintain something essential, in this world of frantic branding, and massive bestseller-led competition, a real respect for the writer’s craft, and a deep a love of story. I hope you will join the adventure, and perhaps share in some of our creations, but you can find us, now, at
www. phoenixarkpress. com
. There you will also be able to share, free, a serialized story as it’s written - Dragon in the Post. It would be wonderful to have you come along. DCD 2011

Other Phoenix titles you might like

For Children and Adults

The Sight by David Clement-Davies

Michelangelo’s Mouse by David Clement-Davies

For Adults

Ice by Dominic Sands

The Blood Garden by David C Davies

While all care has been taken to lay this out correctly, mistakes can only be rectified by notifying us at the blog –
www. phoenixarkpress. com
. For permissions to quotations please see the printed book. In chapter quotes capital letters have been left where the line naturally breaks.

This eBook edition published 2011, with a new afterword, by Phoenix Ark press Limited, 75 Vanbrugh Court, London SE11 4NR.
www. phoenixarkpress.com