The hind nodded.
‘Do you think he is the one?’ she asked suddenly in a whisper.
‘I don’t know,’ said the stag. ‘They say that he denies it. He won’t have any of the Herla talk about it. Says his oaken fawn mark is no sign of anything. But there are many who don’t believe him. What have you heard?’
The hind shrugged.
‘All I really know is that he helps animals. And not just the Herla but all Lera. He can speak their language.’
‘Yes, I’ve heard that too,’ said the stag.
‘Then he has power,’ said the hind gravely.
‘But even that he denies is anything very special,’ said the stag, shaking his head, ‘or so they say. He claims that all Lera can do it if they try.’
‘But he can heal?’ asked the hind hopefully.
‘Oh yes,’ answered the stag. The hind was reassured.
‘I tell you what,’ said the stag suddenly, ‘why don’t we travel together? To be honest I’ve been a little lonely since I left my herd and four eyes are better than two. I heard wolves last night.’
The hind readily agreed and the two new companions set off through the heather. They chatted happily in the warming sunshine as they went and soon they were delighted with the pleasure of one another’s company, for the day was uncommonly beautiful and since that dark night when Herne’s Herd had fled the Standing Stones, a new spirit of freedom and hope had been stirring in the High Land. Besides, their hearts were full of expectation for they were both on a strange pilgrimage.
‘So, I wanted to know if you can help my chicks,’ said the pheasant nervously. ‘They say you can.’
She ruffled her feathers and looked up pleadingly at the deer standing above her. The stag was an eight-pointer, and though his two brow tines were slightly misshapen he was uncommonly pleased with the head, especially now he had come out of velvet.
‘No, I’m afeared I can’t,’ answered the stag falteringly, stirring in the grass.’It’s not being me you want. You’re seeking out for Rannoch. I saw him last on the west hill.’
The pheasant thanked the deer and flew off to find him. Haarg shook his head as the pheasant took off, for it was a relatively new sensation to be talking to a Lera like this. He wasn’t very good at it but he was proud that he was one of the deer who was beginning to master it, though he found it much easier to do when he wasn’t in antler.
To be in antler. Haarg marvelled at what had happened since his herd had left the red river and the stags’ antlers had come. The herd was cured and the Slave Herds gone, and it was all thanks to Rannoch.
Rannoch and his friends had decided to join them after they had come down from the Standing Stones two years before. They had settled in the valley they now occupied, near the Great Mountain, and, as more and more Herla in the High Land had learnt of the overthrow of Herne’s Herd and come down to see the strange newcomer with the fawn mark, their ranks had swollen to over two hundred red deer.
Haarg looked out across the herd now and nodded as he saw the stags away on the hill and below them in the wide bowl of the valley, the hinds grouped loosely together and set well apart. He spotted Liath among them and smiled to himself again. Since the skirmish above the river and the healing of his antlers, Liath treated him with a new respect. Well, perhaps that was only to be credited. He was an Outrider after all.
‘An Outrider,’ muttered Haarg to himself delightedly, ‘an Outrider.’
Haarg stirred with satisfaction as he rolled the strange word around his tongue. In fact he still couldn’t understand why Rannoch had refused the title. When they had discussed the future of the herd and Thistle had insisted on naming the Outriders, Rannoch had been strangely disinterested.
As Haarg thought of his friend a confusion entered his mind. Rannoch was nearly seven years old and his head had its full growth. He had the strong build of a royal and by rights he should have led the herd. He was expected to have mated too. But since his meeting with Herne’s Herd just the opposite had happened. Rannoch had become very solitary, spending his time tending to the wounds of any Lera that asked. When Anlach had come the year before and even the friends had begun to argue over the hinds, Rannoch had shown no interest at all, but instead had gone away on his own to look for leaves and berries.
As the herd watched Rannoch helping and talking to the Lera and tending to the wounds among the stags and the hinds, they were all grateful for his strange powers and they knew that he was different. Yet it seemed to cause Rannoch himself nothing but pain. All of them knew better than to talk about the Prophecy that he had brought with him out of the Low Lands – except in private, for the habits of belief die hard and many among the Slave Herd still muttered of Herne’s Hope.
What does it matter if he believes it or not? thought Haarg to himself suddenly. We are free, aren’t we? Maybe Herne has come already.
Haarg walked over to a single apple tree nearby and looked up at the delicious fruit hanging from its boughs. He stretched upwards with his mouth but couldn’t reach, so he tilted his head and struck at an apple with his right antler. The top tine just caught it and the apple fell to the ground where Haarg picked it up in his lips and bit deep into the flesh. There was a satisfying crunch and a bubbling spurt of juice as the deer munched happily on the fruit.
Haarg suddenly caught a scent in the air and he turned to see a stag running towards him.
‘Captain Tain,’ he called with pleasure, and trotted over to meet him.
‘Hello, Haarg,’ said Tain cheerfully. ‘I’ve just been over the eastern hills and several more Herla have come in. Anything to report?’
‘Not really,’ said Haarg.’I saw Captain Bankfoot this morning and he says everything is well.’
‘Good,’ said Tain. He was a ten-pointer and he nodded his fine head of antlers. ‘The hinds are a little restless, though. They can scent Anlach. The stags too are beginning to argue and they’re moving in closer to the hinds.’
‘Nothing abnormal, then.’
‘No. Except this morning I was talking to a couple of black swans by the burn and they had news from the south,’ said Tain.
Since he had first begun to understand Crak back on the Great Mountain, Tain of all the deer, apart from Rannoch of course, had become most skilled at talking to the Lera.
‘Bad news?’
‘Yes. The Lera there are terrified. They say something terrible is happening in the Low Lands and it’s because of the Herla. Sgorr is on the move, Haarg.’
‘Sgorr,’ whispered Haarg, conjuring with the name.
‘What’s he like, Tain?’
‘I was only a very young fawn then,’ said Tain, shaking his head, ‘but if half the things they say about him are true, he must be very terrible.’
‘More terrible than Herne’s Herd?’ asked Haarg nervously.
‘Who knows? But his cruelty cries out across the Low Lands. Those stags who crossed the Great Glen last spring and managed to avoid the Sgorrla, they were so frightened they couldn’t talk about it for moons. They say he even tortures the Lera. I’ve heard some very dark tales.’
‘Has Rannoch said anything else about it?’ asked Haarg. Tain paused and shook his head.
‘You know how he is,’ answered Tain a little sadly. ‘I think he just wants to live as a Herla and forget about Sgorr. I can’t really blame him,’ added Tain. ’He’s been through so much.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Haarg, ‘and we all have much to be grateful to him for.’
The two captains began to graze in the evening and soon the simple pleasure of munching on fresh grass and feeling the late summer breeze on their backs had carried away all unpleasant thoughts of Sgorr and the troubles of the Herla in the Low Lands. Below them the hinds looked up and felt comforted by the sight of the Outriders on the hills. Two hinds were walking together now, talking quietly.
‘Can you feel it, Willow?’ said Peppa, looking around her as they walked.’Anlach’s nearly here.’
‘Yes,’ replied Willow, ‘the hinds know it’s coming and I saw two stags fighting yesterday over Selif.’
‘It’ll be good for the herd to have some new fawns.’
‘Yes, Peppa, and good for you to join a harem. Several stags are interested in you, you know, and there’s always Bankfoot. You know how he likes you.’
‘But what about you, Willow?’ said Peppa. ’It’s time you thought about mating. We’ve been here two years now.’ Willow suddenly looked a little sad. Neither Willow nor Peppa had mated, though they were very old to have their first fawns. The herd was settling into a kind of normality but their strange journey had gravely disrupted the natural rhythms of their lives.
‘Oh no, I don’t think so,’ answered Willow quietly.
‘But you’ll have to eventually. It was all you could do last Anlach to avoid it and you know how keen Thistle is. He’ll be even more determined this year.’
‘Thistle?’ snorted Willow angrily. ‘I’ll never stand with
Thistle. He’s changed so much, Peppa. Grown so arrogant.’
‘We’ve all changed, Willow. And I suppose it’s only natural. Thistle’s a royal now and even Bankfoot fought last year.’
Willow smiled at the thought of her old friend. Though they were nothing compared to Thistle’s antlers, Bankfoot had five tines on each of his antler beams.
‘A Captain of the Outriders,’ she said proudly.
‘I do miss him, Willow,’ said Peppa suddenly. ’Bankfoot, I mean. I miss all of them. The hinds and the stags have grown so far apart.’
‘Yes, but that’s natural as well,’ said Willow, ‘though I miss them too.’
Peppa saw the look in Willow’s eye.
‘Perhaps he’ll fight for you this Anlach,’ she said softly. Willow shook her head.
‘No. He’s so distant nowadays. Always up in the hills tending to the Lera. He doesn’t seem to care much about the doings of the herd. Why should he be any different this year? And last year it was so upsetting to watch him, Peppa. How he hated it when the stags began to fight for the hinds. I think it caused him a physical pain. He kept telling them to stop it. Saying that we should live in peace and friendship and that we hadn’t learnt anything from Herne’s Herd. He kept talking about wolves and things. And, you know, I think what happened up there among the Standing Stones deeply affected him, Peppa. Changed him in some way. Thistle is always saying so. He keeps jeering at him.’
‘Don’t,’ said Peppa, ‘it’s too awful the way Thistle pushes him.’
‘Yes,’ agreed Willow, ‘but in some strange way I think Thistle’s disappointed with him. You know how set Thistle is in his ideas and he’s determined there should be a Lord of the Herd. He thinks we’ll all go to ruin if there isn’t.’
‘Thistle wants to be the lord himself, that’s why. He’s always showing off his antlers.’
‘Part of him wants to be Lord of the Herd, Peppa, but I think part of him just wants Rannoch to fight for it. He tried to get him to fight again last Anlach, remember, though Rannoch wouldn’t have anything to do with it. Just went off into the hills.’
Peppa shook her head again.
‘You know,’ said Willow in a whisper, ‘I even asked him. Rannoch, I mean. I asked him to fight for me. But he wouldn’t.’
Above them the evening star was already shining down on the herd. It shone down on the twins and Tain and Haarg on the hill, on Captain Bankfoot who was sitting in the heather enjoying a thick bush of delicious whortleberries and on Captain Thistle who was standing on the southern edge of the valley, ruminating as he gazed out into the distance. It shone down too on an old hind called Bracken who was lost in her own fearful thoughts near the burn, and on a royal stag with a white oak leaf on his brow who was up on the hill talking to a pheasant.
‘They’ll be fine,’ said Rannoch to the pheasant in a gentle voice, ‘as long as they get some fresh water to drink. Now I’m sorry, but there are others to tend to.’
‘Thank you, Rannoch,’ said the mother bird, rising suddenly into the air. ‘If we can ever do anything in return—’
Her voice was interrupted by another from behind the stag.
‘You never give yourself a rest, Rannoch.’
Rannoch swivelled round and smiled when he saw who it was.
‘Birrmagnur,’ he said with pleasure, ‘it’s good to see you.’ Rannoch paused.
‘But I hope nothing’s wrong,’ he added. ‘You’re not wounded, are you?’
‘No, my friend,’ answered the reindeer, ‘though I could do with more of your company. I’ve hardly seen anything of you in two moons.’
‘No,’ said Rannoch, ‘but there’s so much to do. Especially with so many Herla coming from the north.’
‘You have a great gift, Rannoch.’
‘It’s nothing,’ answered Rannoch immediately. ‘Just berries and leaves and listening to their needs. It doesn’t come from me.’
The reindeer lifted his head to the breeze.
‘From Hoern?’ he said.
‘Perhaps. But we all know instinctively what’s good for us, Birrmagnur.’
The reindeer nodded. Since he had decided to stay with the herd for a while he had thought long and hard about Rannoch and the oak leaf on his head. He was worried about his friend. Again and again he had heard Rannoch telling them that the Prophecy was false and that all they had to do was live as Herla. Yet he himself seemed to find it so hard to live a normal life.
‘You look tired, my friend,’ he said quietly.
‘I suppose I am. I’ve had some strange dreams lately.’
‘Of Hoern?’
‘No, about Sgorr. And a deer on a hill in the moonlight. They frighten me, Birrmagnur.’
Birrmagnur grunted.
‘Some more deer came over the Great Mountain fleeing from the Sgorrla. The news is very dark.’
‘I know,’ said Rannoch sadly, ‘and it’s not just the Herla. All the Lera are suffering too. Some of the things I’ve seen! I wish I could do something to help them, but as long as Sgorr has sealed the High Land at least we are safe.’
A strange look came into Birrmagnur’s eyes.
‘You know some of them still mutter about the Prophecy. They think you will free the Low Lands. They say you should fight Sgorr.’
‘Fighting,’ snorted Rannoch suddenly, and the passion in his eyes surprised even Birrmagnur. ’Fight Sgorr, fight Thistle. Is that all the Herla can think of?’
‘It’s probably because the stags are growing more restive with Anlach coming again.’
‘Anlach?’ said Rannoch with a faraway look, as though he was trying to remember something. It was already growing dark around them.
‘Yes, Rannoch. Don’t you feel it?’
‘Yes, I feel it,’ answered Rannoch quietly, ‘as much as Thistle or Tain or any of the others. But I hate it, Birrmagnur. It reminds me of Herne’s Herd.’
‘But Rannoch,’ said Birrmagnur, ‘don’t you want to be an Outrider? Don’t you want mates and calves of your own?’ Rannoch looked down sadly over the herd. He was thinking of Willow and he missed her desperately.
‘I don’t know, Birrmagnur,’ he said, shaking his antlers.
‘All I can think is that I don’t want to become like them, like Herne’s Herd. They worshipped violence. And you know, when Anlach comes it seems to do something to me. Sometimes I can’t understand the Lera any more.’
‘But isn’t Anlach natural?’
‘Birrmagnur,’ said Rannoch suddenly, ‘will you come with me? I want to show you something.’
Rannoch turned and led the reindeer over the brow of the hill. He ran straight through the long grass to a spot he had visited many times before. It was a patch of once muddy ground which had dried out with the summer, and now the circle of earth was cracked and parched. Birrmagnur pulled up with distaste. His nostrils were suddenly filled with a foul scent that made him start in disgust as he looked down.
There, in the centre of the earth, were
two skeletons. The bones had been picked clean and had settled on the ground opposite each other. Birrmagnur gasped as he saw, in between the two opposing skulls, two pairs of antlers resting on the ground. They were still locked together.
‘It’s Skein and Tannar,’ said Rannoch sadly. ‘Do you remember them from the Slave Herd? It happened last year during the rut. They must have locked antlers and not been able to free themselves. They starved to death.’
‘Hoern’s breath,’ said the reindeer, shaking his head sadly.
‘Herne!’ snorted Rannoch.’Is this really Herne’s way, Birrmagnur? Is this what He asks of us? All this fighting. There is so much pain and violence in the world. I think that if Herne exists He must be terribly cruel. Crueller than Sgorr, crueller even than man.’
The reindeer was silent for a while. He was deeply moved.
‘I’m sorry, Rannoch,’ he said at last. ‘I wish I could help you.’
The two friends fell silent as they walked back towards the herd. The evening was bright with a half moon rising and they were coming down the eastern slopes when they saw Bankfoot running towards them. He looked frantic.
‘Rannoch, Birrmagnur, thank Herne I’ve found you. You’ve got to come quickly.’
‘What is it, Bankfoot?’ said Birrmagnur.
‘H-h-herla,’ said Bankfoot in his distress, for the Outrider had almost lost his stutter and it only came back when he got very excited. ‘All stags. There must be over forty of them coming up the valley.’
‘More High Land incomers?’ said Rannoch.
‘No, Rannoch. They’re from the south.’
‘Sgorrla,’ gasped Rannoch, and though he had just been talking to Birrmagnur of his hatred of fighting and violence, the instincts of the Outrider drove him and his two friends straight towards them.
When they reached the newcomers they were reassured, though, for the stags had bunched together in the middle of the herd and they seemed to be talking calmly enough to the deer who had gathered round them. Willow and Peppa were there and Bracken too. Tain was running down from the hill and Rannoch slowed as he caught sight of Thistle standing before the newcomers.