Quest for the Faradawn

CHAPTER II

Brock’s forecast of Tara’s reaction to his ‘find’ turned out to be completely accurate. As he came into the main chamber bearing his little charge she simply got up on her hind legs, put her two front paws on her hips and rocked in silent astonishment from side to side. She had thought none of the antics of her boar could shock her any more, ever since the time he had gone off with their two cubs Zinddy and Sinkka to explore the streets of the nearby village and brought back with them a dog they had befriended. This dog, who was called Sam, still visited them at fairly frequent intervals with news about the village. His master was one of the men who waged war on the wood and Sam would bring them advance knowledge of when he and the others were coming. The friendship with Sam had therefore turned out to be very useful; but this!

‘This time you’ve gone too far. An Urkku; a member of the race that has persecuted and tortured our ancestors for generations, and not only ours but the ancestors of every living creature in this wood. Have you forgotten the tales of your great-great grandfather who was chained to a barrel and then had fierce dogs set on him to pull him to bits? And when he beat one lot, they set another lot on to him, and another, and another, until finally he was tom apart. And have you so soon forgotten the story that reached us of the killing of the entire sett over in Tall Wood that happened some ten full moons ago. They pumped some kind of poisonous air down the sett which made them vomit and which scorched their lungs so that they died a most horrible death. And this little thing here when it grows up will be a member of the Great Enemy! What are we going to do with it? How will we protect it from the other creatures in the wood, who hate the Urkku, if anything, more than we do? What will it live on?’

But somehow, when she looked at the helpless little creature lying on the earthen floor of the sett, it seemed so remote from the race of which she had been speaking that it seemed a different animal and her heart went out to it. It met her eyes with its wide smile and happy gurgle, putting out its little hand to grab at the air. She looked back at Brock, who had said nothing in reply to this avalanche of questions because there was nothing he could say. He was not the kind of badger who could leave a creature to die in the cold, and the only thing he could do was to bring it home. Besides, and he hadn’t explained this yet, partly because he didn’t quite know how to and partly because he wasn’t certain whether Tara would understand anyway, he had a feeling that the whole thing had somehow been meant to happen and that he was really only playing a part that had been chosen for him.

He went up to her and they rubbed noses; she closed her eyes with pleasure and Brock thought how much he loved her. He began to stroke her head with his front paw. ‘Our cubs aren’t due until the Awakening and I thought perhaps it could have some of your milk until then. We could have it in here with us until it grows too big and I am sure that berries and fruits and toadstools will be as tasty for it as they are for us. Don’t worry; it will be all right.’ He wanted to say more but he was so exhausted that his eyes had closed against his will and he began to drift off into the world of sleep. ‘Wake me at Sun-High,’ he managed to mutter and then he rolled over on to the heap of dead bracken that was piled into the corner and began to snore heartily.

Tara then took the baby over to the far side of their large round room, and laid it to rest on the cushion of meadowsweet she had collected and saved from last year for her own cubs. The smell of the meadowsweet tended to overpower any other smells and so was extremely useful for cubs and, she supposed, human babies as well. She then took off the various layers of clothing and material with which it had been wrapped and put them in a comer to take out and bury later on. There was one article, though, which she decided to keep; it was a beautiful multi-coloured silk shawl and Tara liked both the colour and the feel of it. In later years, she thought, the little male creature lying there so peacefully might be glad of some reminder of his past; some link with his heritage. This shawl she carried over to one of the walls of their room and, having dug a small hole in the wall, placed it in and then covered it with soil. By the time she had finished, the baby had begun to screw up his little face again and started to cry. ‘He must be famished,’ she thought and lay down next to him. She hoped that her teats were full enough with milk; if not, she would really be lost as to what to give him to eat. Still her own cubs were due not too far away, as Brock had said, so she should be all right. She pulled the baby up towards her and drew his face near her teats with a paw. For an agonizing minute or two nothing happened but then, to Tara’s intense relief, he began to suck. Physically he could have been one of her own cubs suckling, but emotionally she felt very strange; here she was, giving food from her own body to a baby human. It would have been odd enough if she had been suckling another sow’s cub but this was a different animal and an Urkku at that!

Yet despite this strangeness she also felt the warmth and tenderness that Brock had experienced earlier towards the baby, and she undeniably felt a sense of excitement and adventure as she sat cradling this strange head in her paw and feeling the baby suck.

He was soon satisfied and Tara laid him down carefully on the meadowsweet and covered him with strips of birchbark on top of which she laid dead bracken. He was very soon asleep and Tara set about cleaning the room; dragging out all the old and soiled bedding and putting new fresh stuff on the floor from the piles around the outside of the room. She occasionally ran her paws along the roof to clear it of cobwebs for the ceiling was latticed with the roots of the Great Beech and the spiders liked to build along and at the side of them. She finally went over to the entrance to the tunnel and ran her paws down the three large roots that framed the doorway; one at the top and two down either side. This had been done so often through the centuries that they were now a wonderfully rich dark brown colour and they shone and felt smooth to the touch. There were also little gashes down them where, on the darkest wettest nights, badgers had been unable to go to the scratching post outside the sett and so had sharpened their claws on the two old hard roots at the side. These scratch marks always reminded Tara of the past generations of badgers who had lived here. She wondered how they had died; how many had been killed by the Great Enemy and how many had simply gone peacefully in their sleep.

When she had finished her housecleaning she went through the door and up the short passage which led out to the wood. She put her nose out into the air and immediately had to screw up her eyes to protect them from the glare, for the sun was shining brightly from a clear blue sky and was reflecting up from the snow which lay in thick white smoothness all around. She could tell without looking that the sun was high in the sky, shining down through the branches of the Great Beech. It was time to rouse Brock. She backed down the passage (for there was no space to turn round) and had to wait awhile when she was back in the room to let her eyes adjust to the light. She went over to Brock and gently placed the tip of her nose against his. He awoke without a start, yawned, stretched and got up.

‘Hello,’ he said sleepily and then saw the baby. ‘Oh my goodness,’ he exclaimed as the events of the previous night began to come back and the full impact of what he had done dawned on him.

‘You wanted me to wake you at Sun-High,’ Tara said.

‘Yes; there’s a lot to do and not much time. I heard the Midnight Bells last night and you know what that means for tomorrow, so I must call a Council for tonight. And then there is this baby Urkku. Did you manage to feed him?’ Tara nodded. ‘Good. But some of them won’t like it and they may even try to kill him. They will have to be told, of course; we could never keep him secret when he gets bigger and it’s better to tell them now when he is so helpless and harmless than later when he begins to grow and look more like an Urkku. It’s a bad time, though, with the deaths and injuries that the Enemy will cause tomorrow. I must go and tell Warrigal to summon the Council and then we’d better have a talk with the rest of the sett.’ He went towards the door. ‘Everywhere looks very clean,’ he said, and vanished up the passage.

He emerged into the day and, like Tara, was almost blinded by the glare from the snow. ‘It’s too bright,’ he muttered, ‘too bright.’ But the warmth of the sun felt wonderful on his back and face. It seemed to spread through his body and fill him with new life. He barked quietly twice, looking up at the Old Beech. There was no reply. ‘He’ll be fast asleep,’ he thought. He barked again. Suddenly he felt someone behind him and turned round. It was Warrigal the Wise, standing blinking at him. ‘Don’t do that,’ Brock said. ‘You frightened me.’ You could never hear Warrigal; it was almost uncanny the way he could fly, even through branches and thick rhododendrons, without making a sound.

‘You want me to summon the Council,’ Warrigal said. ‘I heard the bells last night as well.’

‘Yes,’ said Brock. ‘Call them for tonight. And listen, Warrigal; there’s another matter which I want to raise and which I should like to mention to you briefly now.’ Brock felt it would be prudent to tell Warrigal about his strange guest and get him on his side before the others were told. Everyone admired Warrigal for his knowledge and what he advised was always regarded with respect by the rest of the wood, albeit somewhat grudgingly by some of the loners like Rufus the Red. He also felt that a private chat with him might clear his own mind on a few matters before the whole affair came out into the open. Badgers and Owls had been allies in the protection of the Wood as far back as the beginning of legend. The Badgers’ knowledge of the ground and the Owls’ command of the air made a good combination. They were both creatures of extremely ancient heritage and tradition, unlike some of the more recent additions like the pheasants and squirrels, and between them they could muster a great deal of knowledge and intuitive wisdom. Brock therefore felt that if anyone could understand his feelings of the previous night, it was this trusted friend. Besides, the fact that he had a baby Urkku down in the sett this very minute was quite a devastating piece of news and it was a nice change to be able to tell Warrigal, who always seemed to hear all the news first, something which he did not already know.

Surprisingly, and to Brock’s annoyance, the owl did not seem very shocked although he obviously had not known. He merely listened attentively, occasionally giving a long slow blink, while Brock told the whole story. When he had finished Warrigal looked down at the snow and shifted his feet slightly on the root where he was standing. He stood like that for a few seconds and then turned his head round, first to the right and then to the left, as if looking for anyone who might be listening. Then he stared hard at the badger. ‘Well,’ Brock said impatiently, ‘what do you make of it?’

‘If I am right in my belief,’ he said, with the air of someone who knew he always was, ‘then you, Old Friend, have been picked for a task which will go down in legend as the most significant event in the history of the animal kingdom. An Honoured Badger indeed; one whose name will live for ever along with the names of the great heroes of Before-Man and whose role in history may be seen perhaps as even greater than theirs.’

‘Stop, stop, for goodness sake,’ the badger said. He had begun to feel extremely alarmed; it was one thing being a Guardian of the Wood who shared responsibility with Warrigal and whose task it was to call the Council together for emergency meetings, but quite another to be told of all this stuff about legend and history and how he would become famous. The owl exaggerated, of course; he took everything seriously and tended to make the simplest of events take on significant proportions. Still he really did look grave.

‘But all I’ve done is rescue a human baby from dying of cold,’ he said, not really unaware of the enormity of that event but trying now to make it less important by talking about it as being less important. ‘Oh dear,’ he said, as Warrigal just stood there, looking at him.

‘Legend tells of an Urkku Saviour who arrives in the way your young friend arrived last night. I know no more than that. Your grandfather, Bruin the Brave, probably also knows of it but it is not a tale that is told often; partly because it is too unbelievable and partly because the ending has become lost in the mists of time. No one knows it,’ he added, remembering with a sigh that sometimes his poetic turns of phrase, of which he was extremely proud, were misunderstood. ‘The Elflord must be told; he, of course, knows of the legend and he will tell us how to proceed. I will see to that. In the meantime we must simply get the Council to agree to his remaining here, unmolested. Don’t breathe a word to anyone, except Tara, of the legend or of the Elflord. We must keep things as quiet and normal as possible, otherwise the Urkku might sense something different about the wood and begin poking around. Leave things to me tonight; I know how to handle the Council. Till Moon-High then,’ he said, and flew silently away.

Brock sat stunned, staring out at the field and thinking. He didn’t want to go back down the sett just yet; he needed time to collect himself. The mention of the Elflord had sent shivers of fear and apprehension down his back. He remembered his strange feelings of destiny and fate when he first saw the baby, but he had never dreamt that it would come to this. The animals all knew, of course, of the Kingdom of the Elves but very few of them had actually seen an elf, let alone spoken to one, and it was frightening to think that his name was to be made known to the Elflord. Warrigal had seemed very nonchalant about telling him, as if he ate with the Elflord every day but Brock didn’t really believe that the owl was that familiar with him. This was in fact the first time that Warrigal had mentioned the elves although, from certain oblique references in conversation, Brock had guessed that there was some contact between them and his friend. Still, it was extremely daunting to actually know of it; like everyone else in the Wood he had an uneasy fear of the elves even though they had never done him any harm. It was said that they had strange powers and could perform magic and that, although they normally used these powers for helping, sometimes they would use them to cause harm to an animal who had displeased them by threatening the stability of the wood. Stories were told of animals who had suddenly disappeared for no reason or who were found dead with no apparent injury. Brock therefore liked to keep these things at the back of his mind, and now, here he was, being brought to the attention of the elves, by what he was beginning to believe was an extremely unfortunate chain of events.

The sun was beginning to move down from the high place it had occupied in the middle of the day and had started to turn pale and watery the way it does on winter afternoons. The clear blue sky had given way to one streaked with wisps of grey cloud, so that now Brock was able to look at the expanse of snow which spread out before him without being dazzled.

The only sound to be heard was the three, evenly spaced ‘Toowitt-Toowoos’ of Warrigal as he glided, silent as a shadow, between the trees. This was the summons to the Council Meeting that night at which the leaders of the woodland animals would discuss tactics for the Killing tomorrow. The trees stood out, stark and black against the pale sky, each branch taking on an identity and character of its own and the twigs looking like the long bony fingers of an old woman. There was a feeling of utter calm in the scene before him which gave him a strength and resolve he had never before ex-perienced; perhaps because he had never needed it. He turned slowly and made his way back through the earthen passage into the familiar sett, with its comforting atmosphere of home.