Forging the Blade/The Wilderness Years, Chap. 8, pt. 2/2
kageorge@EROLS.COM
Sat, 16 Jun 2001 10:49:52 -0400
Forging the Blade - Part I
The Wilderness Years
by MacGeorge
Disclaimers and Acknowledgements: See previously posted
Part 0
NOTE: The html version, complete with graphics and author's
notes (translations, historical references, etc.) can be
found at:
http://www.wordsmiths.net/MacGeorge/wip.html
Chapter 8, part 2
~~~~~
Duncan helped the able-bodied men bury the dead and tend the
wounded. They also buried anything that had a clear
Campbell identification on it, and covered the disturbed
soil with brush. It would be best if it was assumed the
party had passed this way on patrol and left for more
promising territory. No one would go looking for them for a
few days, at least, and by then the wagons would have
reached safety, and this small party of men would have
disappeared into the mist. They also now had sufficient
horses to mount the whole group, and Duncan unexpectedly
found himself on the Campbell leader's big bay stallion, and
the new owner of a fur-caped cloak.
The other men had backed off as he approached the fine
animal and no one challenged his right to claim it. Just as
they had backed off each time he had tried to join any small
group that had gathered to talk, or share a skein of water,
or simply rest for a moment. It quickly became obvious that
Simon may have accepted his services as a fighter, but the
others were leery of having anything to do with him. Duncan
tried not to let his feelings show on his face. He just
held his chin high and busied himself by working harder,
refusing to take a break, digging the shallow graves until
his palms bled.
They rode out at last, and when it became clear that Duncan
was being given a wide berth, separating him from the rest
of the group, Simon sought him out, riding at his side.
They rode in silence for awhile, until Duncan asked Simon
what his plans were.
"There's an abandoned manor house west and south of here at
West Monar where the others will meet up, but I think it
best that we circle around to the east and south of there,
and scout for anyone taking too close an interest in the
spot. It may be weeks or months before we rejoin them, you
know, and we'll be riding hard, hiding from the King's men.
Meals will be scarce and comfort even more so." Simon
looked over at him, understanding in his eyes. "You owe us
naught, MacLeod, and I canno' make the men unafraid of you.
I would understand if..."
"I gave you my pledge, and I meant it," Duncan interrupted.
"It matters not that they fear me."
"That can be no kind of a life," Simon protested.
Duncan's mouth twisted in a bitter smile. "Let it go,
Simon. At least what I do here has meaning."
Simon raised a dubious eyebrow at him, but then one of his
men called to him, riding up with a question and giving
Duncan a dark look, so Duncan fell back. It would not do to
have Simon's judgment or leadership questioned because of
his developing a friendship with a demon. But Simon called
him back, and Duncan turned.
"Here!" the chieftain called, and tossed Duncan his own
claymore. Simon nodded approvingly when Duncan reflexively
caught it by the hilt. Then he wheeled his horse around to
join his men.
~~~~~~~
Simon had not exaggerated the hardship the MacGregor men
endured. They were constantly on the move, rarely staying
more than one night at a single campsite, moving south, then
east. The Earl of Argyle's men, the MacKinnon Clan, the
Colquhouns, all their septs, and any of the King's soldiers
were all on the lookout for the band of outlaw MacGregors.
The group grew gradually as more men joined them, and their
sense of commitment and kinship was strong. While there
were plenty of squabbles and fights and petty arguments
among them, each knew the others would defend them all with
his life.
Through it all, Duncan stayed an outcast, openly spat at and
cursed by the other men, especially when they struggled with
hurts and soreness and wounds from their small skirmishes,
but he always came away unscathed despite the unbridled
ferocity of his fighting style. He refused to let them know
how much it bothered him. Instead, he let his hair go wild,
and left his beard untrimmed. If he was truly something
less than human, it seemed natural for him to look the part,
and he liked the look of terror in his opponent's eyes as a
wild beast cut a wide swath through their ranks.
The only ones who were civil to him were Simon, who was
respected by his men, and Angus, who was clearly the men's
favorite. Angus laughed easily and often, and at night
would pass around his jug of whiskey and tell wild tales of
MacGregor heroes. Sometimes at night one of the men would
pull out a pipe and another a drum, and the men would drink
and sing and dance until the moon had set. Duncan usually
stood watch on those evenings, patrolling the edge of the
camp.
One such night he found Simon sitting on a fallen log,
looking up into a star-studded sky on a rare cloudless
evening. He wasn't wearing a cloak, and his shirt shone in
the moonlight like a beacon. "You should be with the
others," Duncan observed. "They love it when you relax with
them and share their stories."
Simon looked up at him, then let his gaze take in the vast
night sky. "I've known most of them since I was a boy," he
said softly, his thin lips curving into a sad smile. "And
I've heard their stories many times before."
"Yes, but to have such a family," Duncan said wistfully, and
settled onto the log beside him, watching their breaths fog
and disappear into the chill, clear night air. "Tis a great
gift and a great comfort, especially knowing they trust you
so, and will follow you even to their deaths."
Simon looked down, studying his hard, callused hands. "Tis
no comfort, Duncan, to know men will follow you to their
deaths. I've seen too many die, made too many mistakes. I
wish..." His voice trailed off and he didn't finish the
thought.
Duncan studied the man beside him. They were not so
different in age, yet Simon seemed much older, wiser. "What
do you wish?" he urged.
"I wish we could all just find a nice, small croft
somewhere, settle down with a pretty lass and raise some
bairns, no matter that they weren't called MacGregor."
"Aye, but you'd have to set aside your name, your clan, let
your family's history and heritage disappear forever, and
all this," he gestured to the fighting men still drinking
and singing below and behind them, "would have been for
naught."
Simon laughed silently, shaking his head. "Duncan, don't
you know we canno' win this fight? There will always be
more Campbells, or men just like them, and there will always
be a King who wants to make an example of rebels."
"But you canno' let them take away all that you are, your
entire history, without a fight! You're a Highlander, and
the Campbells are but the sassenach King's toadies." Duncan
was appalled at the thought.
Simon looked at Duncan for a moment, then nodded sadly.
"Aye, I know. And this is what we do, eh?" He pushed
himself to his feet with a tired sigh. "I suppose I'd
better join the men, then." Simon paused, as though
reluctant to return, and studied Duncan a moment. "And you,
Duncan? What do you wish?"
Duncan looked away, scanning the dark horizon, not wanting
Simon to see his face just then. "I wish you a good night's
sleep, Simon."
He felt Simon's hand on his shoulder briefly, before he
heard the man's footsteps retreat, then he heard Angus call
out to their leader, making a bawdy joke about what he had
been doing so long away from the fire. The men's laughter
drifted on the wind as Duncan once again made the rounds of
the perimeter of the camp.
~~~~~~~
It was over a week later that they were almost cornered by a
patrol of King's soldiers near the old MacGregor ancestral
lands, in a glen near Crianlarich along the river that
emptied into Loch Lomond, and they were forced south,
leading their pursuers further away from West Monar. They
now numbered almost a half a hundred, making their movements
more difficult to conceal. Duncan spent much of his time
hunting for food for the group by himself. Their ostracism
was easier to bear if he kept himself occupied and out of
sight.
He had brought down a good-sized stag, and was bringing it
back to camp when he realized from a distance that something
was wrong. The fires had been doused, and the men were
moving quickly, gathering their belongs and finding their
mounts. He rode in and dismounted, pulling the stag from
his horse's withers, but then letting it drop to the
ground. He made his way towards Simon, who was standing
amidst his captains.
Simon's eyes flicked to him, and he nodded his head,
indicating that Duncan should move closer. The other men
reluctantly made way for him. "They are coming from two
directions," Simon was saying. "The MacKinnons are
gathering to the west of us, and the Colquhouns from the
northeast. The Earl of Argyle has camped his men to the
north, and they've got lookouts all along the river, so we
canno' cross to the east. What they are trying to do is
clear - drive us straight towards Glen Fruin, with no
northern retreat."
"Well, we all know what happened the last time the
MacGregors fought at Glen Fruin!" one man snarled. "We
slaughtered the lot of them, and we'll do it again."
"Nay, Dougal," Simon hissed. "They outnumber us more than
two to one."
"And every one of us is worth any three of them," someone
else said. "I say if they want a battle at Glen Fruin, then
they shall get one!" The men murmured in agreement, nodding
and shifting their weight, as though ready to do battle at
that very moment.
"And I say it would be suicide," Simon announced. "We
should disband, scatter, and regroup in the hills west of
Inverness."
"We're tired of running, Simon," Angus MacGregor stated
firmly. He stood with his arms crossed, big and strong as
an old oak. His iron gray hair was tied back in a messy
tail, his ancient baldrick scarred and battered, his plaid
tattered and stained, but his expression was resolute.
"Damn you, Angus!" Simon hissed. "Would you have us all
die, leaving our families unprotected?"
"Our families are unprotected," Dougal chimed in again. "My
wife and son have been without husband and father these past
five years. It is time to make a stand!"
"What stand?" Simon demanded. "What purpose would it serve
to get us all killed?"
"It would serve history," Angus said quietly. "We have let
them harry us for as long as I can remember. I'm getting
old, Simon, and I'm nay willing to go back w' my tail
between my legs and give up my name, only to serve the
Campbells as some tenant sheepherder, watching my
grandchildren grow up without pride or clan. I'd rather
they remember the MacGregors as men who fought and died for
their freedom in the same place where we won our greatest
victory." He looked around over the crowd. "Are ye with
me, men?"
The men looked at each other, some with uncertainty, but
others with fire in their eyes, their chins held high.
"Aye!" stated Dougal firmly. "We're with ye." He drew his
claymore, holding it over his head. "S' Rioghal Mo Dhream,
eh, lads? Who is the bloody Earl of Argyle to tell us
different?"
"No!" Simon pulled down Dougal's arm and yanked him around.
"We should not throw away good men's lives for the sake of
pride!"
"And do ye have none?" Dougal demanded. "Pride is all we
have anymore. They've taken our land, our name, our
history. We have followed you for years, Simon MacGregor.
No one questions your courage, and you know I'd give my life
for you and yours, but we've nay had one real battle in all
that time. One chance to show what we're worth. I say now
is the time, and Glen Fruin is the place, where we
slaughtered our enemies once before." A chorus of 'ayes'
echoed through the crowd, which had enlarged to include most
of the camp.
"They'll be waiting for us, damn it!" Simon answered. "We
cannot win this battle."
"As Dougal said," Angus responded, "Any MacGregor is worth
any two Campells or MacKinnons, and any three sassenachs.
I'm ready to fight them, whether you lead us or no'. The
question is whether you are with us, Simon MacGregor."
"Damn you, Angus!" Simon said again in a choked voice and
turned away, standing with his back to them for a long
minute, his fists jammed hard on his hips. The group was
silent and tense, awaiting his answer. When he turned back
at last, he look slowly over the crowd, taking the time to
meet each man's eyes. Oddly, he ended his gaze at Duncan,
and the two men shared a long look. Finally, he broke the
stare and took a deep breath. "Aye," he said quietly. "I'm
with you, as I have always been."
At that, Dougal raised his claymore high once again. "S'
Rioghal Mo Dhream!" he called, and Duncan could hear the
slide of many swords slipping from their scabbards, as the
crowd took up the chant.
"S' Rioghal Mo Dhream!" They shouted together in a
deep-throated roar, and then shouted it again, and again,
until the rhythm broke and they began laughing, slapping
each other's backs and joking about how many enemies they
would kill. Duncan was eerily reminded of his father's
stirring words just before the battle at Glen Garvin, and a
cold shudder walked across his shoulders.
Simon watched the celebration in silence and Duncan moved
closer.
"Is there no way to win?" Duncan asked him quietly, but
Simon shook his head, his lips pressed tightly together.
"You should leave us now," Simon told him, catching his
forearm and squeezing it to emphasize his point.
Duncan frowned. "Nay. I pledged you my life as well as my
sword arm."
"I release you from your pledge, MacLeod. You should not be
a part of this insanity. I'll not have more needless deaths
on my conscience."
"My death is unlikely," Duncan squeezed Simon's shoulder.
"And is not one that should trouble you or anyone else,
Simon MacGregor." He didn't want to hear the man's token
protest, so he turned and headed back to his horse. Even if
they were all to die in battle before long, they would still
need to eat, and he had a stag to butcher before they broke
camp.
~~~~~~~
The days passed in a blur of exhaustion. No matter which
way they headed, except south, small groups of King's
soldiers or Campbells or MacKinnons or others would be there
to turn them back, and Duncan realized Simon had been
right. They were being artfully herded south, through the
narrow neck of land between Loch Lomond and Loch Long. They
ate cold rations, their food quickly running low, and their
horses tiring. They almost managed to catch a contingent of
about twenty redcoated soldiers and engage them, but the men
slipped away, and their western flank was harried by a band
of yelling MacKinnons. The body of MacGregors had to turn
to protect their stragglers. While they did, the redcoats
slipped away.
But Duncan charged after the redcoats alone, unwilling to
relinquish the chase and catching two slower riders from
behind and dragging them down off their mounts. He managed
to gut one and seriously wound another before their
companions turned to assist. He got away, but not without
sustaining another blood-soaked tear in his shirt he would
not be able to explain. He headed back towards the
MacGregors, but had to duck around a group of a half dozen
blue-and-black kilted riders, and it was almost dawn before
he found them again, deep in the forest south of the village
of Craggan, where Simon had told him there was a crofter who
was sympathetic to their cause - a former MacGregor whose
father had changed their family name to Orr.
His exhausted horse stumbled into the small, crowded
clearing. Sleeping men were scattered everywhere, and he had
to step over snoring bodies to reach the stone and thatch
hut. The door was wide open and the entry was blocked by
Angus' large frame, but the older man turned aside when
Duncan tapped him on the shoulder.
"Well, we wondered where you'd gotten off to," he said with
a tired smile. "I suppose you took care of a few redcoats
for us, eh?"
Duncan just returned his strained smile and ducked into the
room. Simon had spread his painted sheepskin maps on a
table, and barely acknowledged Duncan's presence. "We'll
split the men, sending a third around this western valley
towards Gare Loch. They will hold position at the southern
end of this hill," he gestured in an arc, and instructed the
captains on when the various flanks he had set up were to
move in, anticipating that the MacKinnons would close with
them at the northern end of Glen Fruin. Duncan said
nothing, knowing they were probably too few in number to
reasonably split up into smaller groups, but figuring Simon
was trying to give at least some of them an opportunity to
escape the slaughter if they weren't all caught in a single
cluster on the battlefield.
Later, he walked with the MacGregor chieftain to the nearest
rise to watch the sun come up.
"Will you remember us, Duncan MacLeod?" Simon asked softly
after several moments of silence. The sun's rays had just
broken the horizon, splintering the sky into rays of peach
and gold and blue. "That's what they want, you know. To
die with honor. To be remembered with pride."
"I will remember," Duncan said, and then the two men were
quiet, each with his own thoughts as they watched the sun
rise over the long, narrow valley known as Glen Fruin.
~~~~~~~
It was a slaughter. Redcoats attacked from the south, then
fell back, drawing them in, then MacKinnons fell on them
from the west and the Campbells blocked the northern
retreat. Duncan stayed at Simon's side until the chieftain
was pulled from his horse, then Duncan dismounted, fighting
back to back with him. When Simon was wounded in the thigh
and stumbled, Duncan held him on one side and Angus on the
other. They would have taken their leader from the field,
except there was no place to retreat, and Simon, gray with
exhaustion and pain, shook off their help.
Another wave of attack broke over them from the east this
time, and Duncan went down, a sword piercing him deep in the
belly in a breathtaking blossom of agony. He woke amid the
groans of the dying and a pool of his own blood, and looked
around. There were only a few left standing, Angus among
them, straddled over Simon's body, swirling his huge
claymore in a circle, a look of almost fierce joy on his
bloodied face. Dougal was with him, but wounded, his left
arm hanging uselessly.
Duncan charged in with a yell, drawing their attackers off,
but only for a moment, when he heard riders pounding close
behind him and he was flung to the ground again. He heard a
scream of agony, and a choked cry from Angus of "S' Rioghal
Mo Dhream!" He tried to rise to his feet, but a blow on
forehead dazed him, then a sword pierced him, back to
front. He felt blood rise in his throat and pour over his
lips, and as hard as he tried, his legs refused to hold him
up.
~~~~~~~
It was too quiet. All Duncan could hear was his own harsh
breathing and a few distant groans. All he could see was
blood, and mud, and death, and mist, the heat still rising
from open wounds and severed limbs.
Then a horrifying silent scream in his head sounded and he
clapped his hands to his ears. Not again! This time he
didn't even want to look.
"Get up," a ringing voice ordered.
Duncan snatched up his sword, ready to fight once more, but
his legs refused to cooperate and he realized they were weak
with a kind of pure terror that no number of King's men
could inspire.
"Get up!" the voice said again.
Duncan squinted against the bright light of the setting sun,
where a strange figure was outlined in the mist.
"You've better things to do than lie there on your ass," the
man said.
"Who are you?" Duncan asked, not certain if he really
wanted to know.
"Someone who knows more about you than you know about
yourself."
"Are you a demon?"
~~~~~~~
The man made an odd sound Duncan could only assume was a
laugh. "I've been called that," the stranger admitted,
coming closer, stepping carefully through the mud and over
bodies. "And worse." The vague shadow resolved itself into
a lean man wearing the finest clothing Duncan had ever seen,
white silk hose, elaborately embroidered pantaloons in a
style that would have made Duncan laugh if blood and fear
weren't still choking his throat. A short, beautifully
stitched cape was draped over one shoulder, and the whole
outrageous outfit was topped by a matching cap whose
feathers drifted gaily in the slight breeze. "I'm Connor
MacLeod of the Clan MacLeod."
"Connor MacLeod!" Duncan barely managed to gasp, and he came
as close to fainting dead away as he ever had in his life.
The bizarrely dressed man stepped close, inspecting Duncan
with a dubious smile and frighteningly intense blue eyes.
"And like you, my friend, I have a hard time dying," and he
reached out to help Duncan to his feet.
To Be Continued...