Tŵm the woodsman
replaced the waisted, conical wicker eel-trap under the undercut bank of this
familiar bend in the Nant, which wound its way south through this forest. Its pretty
banks were overgrown with Breci
bushes of many different varieties, which the Druid healers prized and were a
precious extra avenue of income for the crofter. This valuable shrubbery faced
stiff competition from blackthorn, holly and wild-rose this time every year, as
it had throughout this bountiful summer. The Breci bushes were flanked by
formations of tall and soldiery ranks of sun-reaching nettles, and he had cut a
broad swath of them down around each great bush. He did his best to help-out
with his sickle throughout these weeks when he had time but the ferocious
bank-side growth here was prodigious. All he managed to do each season was to
trim-back and reconfirm the avenues through these dense shrubs needed at
harvest time, which was just around the corner.
Summer
was maturing after a successful and portentous Beltain, which had caused an
abundant crop growth throughout the land and most people’s thoughts now turned
to not only the great celebratory gathering of the ripe grain, but the swiftly
following autumn and the day of the Dark-Lord himself. This lively, lily-strewn
brook was full of life and its Gods’ given bounty sustained and supplied his
family with clean water, many fish and a range of nourishing aquatic and
bankside food. Tŵm knew every bend and snag of this river and he
raised himself from the grassy mud of its bank, brushing the debris from the
knees of his woollen bracs, before picking his staff up from the ground and
standing up straight with a groan, his other hand pressed to the familiar and
constant pain in his lower back. Wiping his hands on the rough wool of his mantle,
Tŵm
looked around for his dog.
“Come
Marroc!” He said turning to head back down the lane toward the thatches of his
croft, but he stopped dead in his tracks as his brave elk-hound hadn’t moved a
muscle and had the strangest look on his long shaggy face at that moment. His
body was quivering with a barely controlled emotion, which clearly hovered
between excitement and fear. Facing the broad northern lane, his dog was
tilting his head from side-to-side, trying to identify some sound he could hear, but Tŵm could not.
The woodsman stood tall then and peered down the long drover’s lane that snaked
out of sight into this dense forest. The long-familiar spirit of this forest
stirred then, like smoke recoiling from an opened door and a breeze ushered
from this northerly direction, which was most uncommon. Marroc began to howl
forlornly at that moment, his ruff standing up the whole length of his back
like a long brush and his head was thrown back, as he yowled and yammered in
fearful excitement. Tŵm was deeply
concerned at this mysterious behaviour in his courageous hound but he was a
doughty Brython by necessity and he stood his ground, lifting his chin and
sniffing the curiously disturbed air that caressed his face.
Suddenly
birds began to appear from the north of all different species and were flitting
like winged acrobats through the trees toward him and then there were thousands
of them, clamouring over his head now and filling the air of the forest with
their raucous alarm cries. All were fleeing south in great consternation and
the woodsman stood rooted gripping his staff tightly, as he had never heard nor
seen the like of it in all his long life. The deer came next and dozens of
these athletes of the animal world covered the ground swiftly and with huge
frightened bounds. They flashed past him without pause and the noise in the
forest was suddenly deafening, as great lumbering Elk kicked-up clouds of dust
ahead of the foxes, which came tearing south ahead of a whole host of smaller,
scurrying animals. Every living thing in this forest it seemed was heading
south, south-east, south-west and running for their lives.
Tŵm’s nerve
finally broke before this terrified, terrifying onslaught and he ran for home
as if Arglwydd Lug Ddu himself had risen early and was at his heels with a
branding iron. He knew something terrible and something monstrous was
approaching from the north, as did every creature in this forest and they fled
from it in abject terror, and this woodsman did the same with his dog tearing
past him, his tail tucked right under him.
As
Tŵm
stumbled through the gate and into his enclosed croft he was yelling like a
raving lunatic, but all his family were already out of their thatches, no-doubt
alarmed at the great and unseen uproar in their forest. They all now stood
gaping in superstitious terror to the north as whatever cataclysmic force came
their way, it became clear they would never flee whatever approached in time,
as the very earth itself trembled now with its coming.
The
thundering avalanche of fleeing animals suddenly tailed-off and the ensuing
silence was both eerie and profound, unnerving all these superstitious werrin. Marroc
was loyal and courageous though and he stayed with his family, still going
berserk and running in circles around them, with his fur standing up in terror
and barking fit to bust. Tŵm and his family drew themselves sombrely into a
line, with him at the centre and they held each other’s hands tightly to face this
doom together as a family, come what may. The earth beneath their bare feet began
to tremble and the leaves on the trees around them rustled as they shook with
this frightening and mysterious advent.
“Arglwydd
Cornonnyn, Camulo Fawr and Beneficent Brigida help us now
in our hour of need!” Tŵm prayed the triad gruffly and his two youngest
began to wail in terror and he spoke gently to them. “Now-then Anwen bach and Arthwr
iawn no tears please, remember we are
Brythonau!” He said evenly in his beautifully lilted, musical accent and Arthwr
bit his lip, but his younger sister cried-on and fat tears rolled down her
chubby cheeks.
Colossal
mounted men in armour appeared like Gods from between the trees suddenly, with thunderous
steeds, shining mail, tall spears and long bronze shields and there were thousands
of them. Tŵm
almost sagged to his knees with relief, seeing the Lynx emblems on the pale
green banners and tabards of the Southern Brythonic outriders and his wife did
exactly that, falling to her knees, still convinced that the world was coming
to an end. The terrifying curse of Rome which every soul feared had not arrived
on their doorstep and they were not all doomed.
“Tad,
look at them!” Dewi his eldest said with a rapturous voice, his young eyes as
big as dinner-plates as countless ranks of mounted warriors appeared between
the trees, moving with a waving rhythm in their saddles. In their pendulous
gait, these armoured warriors threaded their equally armoured mounts through
the trees and deadfall of this forest in southern Caint, and their enormous
iron-shod shoes made the very earth itself tremble beneath their feet. Thousands
of chariots followed these horsemen and their rumbling, rattling transit was
almost deafening. Armed and mounted soldiers stretched as far as the eye could
see now, to both east and west of them. Hundreds of big cavalry horses trotted past
their enclosure, the riders looking magnificent in their shining mail, Lynx
tabards and steel helmets and their long, flowing cloaks were Caswallawn’s pale
and royal green.
“Yes
Dewi and you know too where they go, and who they are soon to face.” Tŵm answered his
son with a growl but his eyes never left those moving, glittering ranks. “They
do this for us boy and for all Brythons who cannot fight for themselves against
such merciless might. Never forget that – any of you!” Tŵm barked this
out, his eyes glittering as he surveyed this fated army. His shocked and
subdued family behind him looked at Tŵm gravely, as a harsh word from their father was
as rare as snow in Eiddew. Their father’s wisdom was reflected on the faces and
in the eyes of his children, as they looked in wonder at the armoured might of
their King’s men marching to war in their names.
King
Caswallawn was heading south in arms and Tŵm the crofter felt compelled to add his respect
and honour to those men, and before his relieved but awestruck family. With his
eyes glittering, the head of this Prydeinig household adroitly captured one of
his chickens as it rushed past in panic and as Dewi helped his Mam back to her
feet, Tŵm’s
rich, musical voice carried out from his enclosure and over the noise of this
great outpouring of Brythonic troops.
“Arglwydd Cornonnyn, you are the man in the trees and the green man of the woods, he who
brings life to the dawning spring each year. You are the deer in rut mighty
Horned One, who roams the autumn woods and you are the everlasting ruler of the
animal Kingdom. You are the hunter circling round the oak great lord, he who
wears the antlers of the wild stag and yours is the lifeblood that spills upon
the ground each season!” Tŵm spoke the ancient words and his eyes filled
with the tears of his lifelong devotion. Drawing his dagger smoothly and with
one swift stroke, he cut the head off the flapping chicken in his left fist and
held it up for all to see. “God of the green, Lord of the forest we offer you
our humble sacrifice and beg for your blessing and your protection for our
valiant warriors, in their forthcoming struggle for survival against the
foreign tyrant Caesar!” He prayed loudly,
and his strong and proud, lilting voice drifted
across this dusty enclosure and on through the ranks of trees and oncoming
soldiers, as the flapping bird squirted its lifeblood to the dust and its own
severed head at Tŵm’s feet. The boys looked at their Tad with
both surprise and pride at the oath and the spontaneous sacrifice, their eyes
glittering with the shared emotion and perhaps the unspoken promise of a roast
chicken dinner.
This was an event that would go down in
Prydein’s long history as well as this family’s that much was clear to all but
the youngest, and they bore proud witness to the lords, champions and warriors
of Caswallawn’s great passing to war. This simple but proud family of southern
werrin stood for a long time entranced, before the women broke first, as their
work is never done, but Tŵm and his boys stood there pointing to this House
and the other for almost an hour, as all the different colours and cygils of their
Nation passed them by. This seemingly endless passage of horses, chariots and warriors
eventually thinned but the rear-guard stopped nearby for the night and the
forest became alive with their myriad campfires twinkling in the dark. Bereft
of wild animals, the forest had a completely different atmosphere this night and
as the woodsman and his family settled down to sleep in their round central-thatch,
the soldiers' murmuring could be heard all around them.
The
hearth was set for the night with the young ones under fur together, the boys were
in their stacked beds and Tŵm lay on his comfortable pallet under thick bear
fur, with Marroc stretched-out at his back and his wife in his crook, as all
Brythons slept and so did he, his dreams filled with dazzling, armoured
warriors.
The
forest seemed to whisper to itself for hours after this momentous event but
following three haunting but effective owl hoots from somewhere in the dark, it
became as silent as the grave.
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