Fiction: "Earl Went Hunting"
Jun. 3rd, 2008 01:33 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lwoodFirst published in Idunna 76, Summer, 2008*
Earl dismounted from his horse and let his woolen cloak slide from his shoulders as the late summer’s dawn strengthened around him. Barker and Blackie, the family dogs, quivered with anticipation at the young man’s side as a gentle breeze blew fair hair from a strong, clear brow.
There, all around the banks of the pond, the geese were still sleeping.
Earl threw his cloak across the saddle. His parents had gifted him with the stout, shaggy horse less than a month ago, when he showed them he could make a bow and arrows as good as Father’s. They’d said that if he could make weapons like a man, he should surely be able to cover ground like one. Then, only last night, Mother had finished making the bowstring from flax that you could hardly tell from the hair on her own head once they were braided together.
Earl had made a little poem so his bow and arrows would know what they were for and repeated it to them as he unwound his new bowstring.
He wondered, not for the first time, how he could make sure the bow always knew that poem; it would probably help bring down more geese--maybe even an aurochs!
Twin black noses rose as the dogs scented the air. Earl scanned the marsh again--there. One greylag goose was half-uncovered in the waving reeds, charcoal and silver in dawn’s golden light.
He nocked the arrow, drew back the string, took a deep breath...
The morning’s silence broke into raucous honking as the arrow flew, and found, its target. Barker and Blackie launched down the hillock and into the mire, baying as they came, and the entire flock took off as one.
A moment later, the goose Earl had hit broke formation and plummeted to the water, some hundred paces away. Barker reached the kill first, and together he and Blackie returned to shore.
“Good dogs!” Earl threw bits of dried meat to the dogs from his belt pouch, then looked around. “But we don’t have to go home quite yet...”
* * *
Late that afternoon, Earl rode through the gate of the farmstead and held his prize high. “Mom! Mom! I got a goose!”
Mother was seated outside the main hall. She looked up from her embroidery and nodded with a broad smile. “I see, dear.” Her eyes twinkled under her hood. “I see several good fletches in your future, and a good roast too. Ambat, Drott, see to that, would you?”
Earl handed off goose, cloak, and horse to the thralls, then sat beside his mother. “So. Mom? Who’s Uncle Rig?”
Mother nearly dropped the tablecloth she was working on. “Whyever would you ask, dear?” Her eyes, no longer on her needle, held his.
“You and Father talk about him sometimes, and you told me I’d find out when I was older. Well, you said that if I could make weapons like a man, I should be able to go about like one, and I think that if I can go about like a man, and hunt like a man, why, I must be older enough to know. Aren’t I?”
“It’s ‘old,’ not ‘older.” Mother said absently. Her slender, flower-white hands smoothed out her aproned skirt, the way they always did when she was looking for the right words. The pause drew out into a long moment. “I think...I think you’re right. We’ll talk about it after dinner.”
“Why not now?”
Mother laughed. “Because your father should be there! He’s reckoning his householders’ estates today, and you’d be with him if you hadn’t talked him into letting you go hunting!”
Earl smiled. “Yes, but I’d nearly talked him into coming with me when we heard them fly in last night--if he had, you’d have more geese now!”
Mother laughed some more. “I suppose so. Anyway, yes. I do think you are old enough to learn about your uncle Rig. Now go wash up!”
Earl grinned, and strode off to do just that.
* * *
“...and that’s all we know about him, son. As your mother never had any more children, Rig may well have been one of the hidden folk, the huldre, or even something more... that’s often their way, to help a couple in that kind of trouble.”
Earl blinked. It was all rather a lot to swallow. “Oh.”
Mother’s brow furrowed in concern. “But why ask now, Earl?”
“I...” Earl stood from the bench. “I think it’ll be easier outside, somehow.” Without waiting for an answer, he walked toward the door, shouldered into his cloak, and pulled on his boots. His parents, intrigued, followed after.
The three of them stepped out into a clear night, the sky carelessly scattered with stars.
“When I heard the wild geese yesterday, everything seemed...seemed too small for me anymore. Does that make any sense?”
Mother rolled her eyes, but said nothing. Father, on his part...nodded. “These lands, this hall...?”
“Everything! The world! I don’t know, I...” Earl trailed off, his shining eyes caught in the starlit web. “Where do the geese come from, when they fly here? Do you know? Yes, it’s somewhere south, but every farm one may visit for many days’ ride all see the same geese at the same time. And one day, every spring, the geese get right up and fly away back there--wherever that is.”
Without taking his spellbound eyes from the heavens, Earl said, “I would like to know that. I think I would like to know...many things that I cannot find out in a day’s ride, or even by riding the moon right around.
“I think this Rig, whether alf or dwarf or one of the Powers, I think he knows...And I think he wants me to find him.”
Father smiled. “Well, I know a young man’s wanderlust when I see it. We either let you go and pack your horse--or you go anyway, on foot if you must. You’re of an age for it, and I’d sooner you were prepared than otherwise. Mother?”
She hmmed softly. “I should think I’ve seen wanderlust once or twice, at that. But.” The knowing smile disappeared from her voice as she went on. “This chasing after Rig...he didn’t seem to me to be the sort of--person--that one might be able to follow easily, and, once found, one might regret the finding. This, too, is often the way with the Powers, if you’ll recall.”
“Well, there’s a simple test, if he’ll lie still for it.”
“Have him sit out in the grove?”
“Yes; just so.”
Earl had neither eye nor ear for his parents. He saw only the stars.
* * *
The next evening, Mother and Earl walked toward a grove that was well-known as a place of power.
“So, Mother, we go up there, I wrap up in my cloak and...what?”
“Well, you try not to sleep, but if you do, you’ll dream. If you don’t sleep, perhaps you’ll see or hear something. Either way, by morning, you’ll know what to do.”
“But it’s cold!”
Mother chuckled. “You’d better come up with an answer quickly, then, hadn’t you?”
“I have an answer: I’m going to follow the geese until I find Rig.”
“Rig...never struck me as a goose sort of person. Your father and I think you’re on the right road, but seeking the wrong sign. This is one way to work out--oh.”
From the grove ahead, a person too tall, too broad, too handsome--too real to be entirely human strode toward Mother and Earl.
“I...I don’t think you’ll have to go too far to find Rig, Earl.”
“...oh. Is that...?”
Mother sighed, the way she did sometimes when talking about some bright joy now long passed. “That is, Earl. That is. Go, now. Father and I will be here, whenever you come back.”
Her voice nearly cracked on the word ‘back’, but Earl had no ear for it. He passed her and kept going. Within ten paces he was running, and his clear tenor voice called out “Rig! Rig!” as he ran.
Mother’s tears were silvered by the moonlight as, with longing and sorrow, she watched them go.
Sorry for the short length and scant detail--I was writing to spec, and the spec, she was short. Anyway, my contribution is the least thing in this issue of Idunna, available as a perk of membership in the Troth.
-- Lorrie
* -- To be published in mid-June, 2008
dpaxson asked me for some fiction for the "Kinder Corner" children's feature in this issue of Idunna. After last issue's Ostara feature, I thought I'd write something with a more YA (Young Adult) appeal.
The bones of this story can be found in the Rígsþula of the Elder Edda, stanzas 25-35, as is appropriate to the issue's theme of "Heimdall". It is not necessary to have read the poem to make sense of the story, save for one detail: once upon a time, a gentleman named Ríg came calling to the home of a married childless couple, landed nobles with some few holdings. He slept "between" them for three nights, and nine months later the wife, named Mother, had a son named Earl.
Earl dismounted from his horse and let his woolen cloak slide from his shoulders as the late summer’s dawn strengthened around him. Barker and Blackie, the family dogs, quivered with anticipation at the young man’s side as a gentle breeze blew fair hair from a strong, clear brow.
There, all around the banks of the pond, the geese were still sleeping.
Earl threw his cloak across the saddle. His parents had gifted him with the stout, shaggy horse less than a month ago, when he showed them he could make a bow and arrows as good as Father’s. They’d said that if he could make weapons like a man, he should surely be able to cover ground like one. Then, only last night, Mother had finished making the bowstring from flax that you could hardly tell from the hair on her own head once they were braided together.
Earl had made a little poem so his bow and arrows would know what they were for and repeated it to them as he unwound his new bowstring.
Limber-Legs, listen now! Earl’s been longing
For fresh goose-fletch, for fine arrows.
Swift-Shooter, True-Flier, hear now, hearken,
Fast find swan-heart, else find the fen!
He wondered, not for the first time, how he could make sure the bow always knew that poem; it would probably help bring down more geese--maybe even an aurochs!
Twin black noses rose as the dogs scented the air. Earl scanned the marsh again--there. One greylag goose was half-uncovered in the waving reeds, charcoal and silver in dawn’s golden light.
He nocked the arrow, drew back the string, took a deep breath...
The morning’s silence broke into raucous honking as the arrow flew, and found, its target. Barker and Blackie launched down the hillock and into the mire, baying as they came, and the entire flock took off as one.
A moment later, the goose Earl had hit broke formation and plummeted to the water, some hundred paces away. Barker reached the kill first, and together he and Blackie returned to shore.
“Good dogs!” Earl threw bits of dried meat to the dogs from his belt pouch, then looked around. “But we don’t have to go home quite yet...”
Late that afternoon, Earl rode through the gate of the farmstead and held his prize high. “Mom! Mom! I got a goose!”
Mother was seated outside the main hall. She looked up from her embroidery and nodded with a broad smile. “I see, dear.” Her eyes twinkled under her hood. “I see several good fletches in your future, and a good roast too. Ambat, Drott, see to that, would you?”
Earl handed off goose, cloak, and horse to the thralls, then sat beside his mother. “So. Mom? Who’s Uncle Rig?”
Mother nearly dropped the tablecloth she was working on. “Whyever would you ask, dear?” Her eyes, no longer on her needle, held his.
“You and Father talk about him sometimes, and you told me I’d find out when I was older. Well, you said that if I could make weapons like a man, I should be able to go about like one, and I think that if I can go about like a man, and hunt like a man, why, I must be older enough to know. Aren’t I?”
“It’s ‘old,’ not ‘older.” Mother said absently. Her slender, flower-white hands smoothed out her aproned skirt, the way they always did when she was looking for the right words. The pause drew out into a long moment. “I think...I think you’re right. We’ll talk about it after dinner.”
“Why not now?”
Mother laughed. “Because your father should be there! He’s reckoning his householders’ estates today, and you’d be with him if you hadn’t talked him into letting you go hunting!”
Earl smiled. “Yes, but I’d nearly talked him into coming with me when we heard them fly in last night--if he had, you’d have more geese now!”
Mother laughed some more. “I suppose so. Anyway, yes. I do think you are old enough to learn about your uncle Rig. Now go wash up!”
Earl grinned, and strode off to do just that.
“...and that’s all we know about him, son. As your mother never had any more children, Rig may well have been one of the hidden folk, the huldre, or even something more... that’s often their way, to help a couple in that kind of trouble.”
Earl blinked. It was all rather a lot to swallow. “Oh.”
Mother’s brow furrowed in concern. “But why ask now, Earl?”
“I...” Earl stood from the bench. “I think it’ll be easier outside, somehow.” Without waiting for an answer, he walked toward the door, shouldered into his cloak, and pulled on his boots. His parents, intrigued, followed after.
The three of them stepped out into a clear night, the sky carelessly scattered with stars.
“When I heard the wild geese yesterday, everything seemed...seemed too small for me anymore. Does that make any sense?”
Mother rolled her eyes, but said nothing. Father, on his part...nodded. “These lands, this hall...?”
“Everything! The world! I don’t know, I...” Earl trailed off, his shining eyes caught in the starlit web. “Where do the geese come from, when they fly here? Do you know? Yes, it’s somewhere south, but every farm one may visit for many days’ ride all see the same geese at the same time. And one day, every spring, the geese get right up and fly away back there--wherever that is.”
Without taking his spellbound eyes from the heavens, Earl said, “I would like to know that. I think I would like to know...many things that I cannot find out in a day’s ride, or even by riding the moon right around.
“I think this Rig, whether alf or dwarf or one of the Powers, I think he knows...And I think he wants me to find him.”
Father smiled. “Well, I know a young man’s wanderlust when I see it. We either let you go and pack your horse--or you go anyway, on foot if you must. You’re of an age for it, and I’d sooner you were prepared than otherwise. Mother?”
She hmmed softly. “I should think I’ve seen wanderlust once or twice, at that. But.” The knowing smile disappeared from her voice as she went on. “This chasing after Rig...he didn’t seem to me to be the sort of--person--that one might be able to follow easily, and, once found, one might regret the finding. This, too, is often the way with the Powers, if you’ll recall.”
“Well, there’s a simple test, if he’ll lie still for it.”
“Have him sit out in the grove?”
“Yes; just so.”
Earl had neither eye nor ear for his parents. He saw only the stars.
The next evening, Mother and Earl walked toward a grove that was well-known as a place of power.
“So, Mother, we go up there, I wrap up in my cloak and...what?”
“Well, you try not to sleep, but if you do, you’ll dream. If you don’t sleep, perhaps you’ll see or hear something. Either way, by morning, you’ll know what to do.”
“But it’s cold!”
Mother chuckled. “You’d better come up with an answer quickly, then, hadn’t you?”
“I have an answer: I’m going to follow the geese until I find Rig.”
“Rig...never struck me as a goose sort of person. Your father and I think you’re on the right road, but seeking the wrong sign. This is one way to work out--oh.”
From the grove ahead, a person too tall, too broad, too handsome--too real to be entirely human strode toward Mother and Earl.
“I...I don’t think you’ll have to go too far to find Rig, Earl.”
“...oh. Is that...?”
Mother sighed, the way she did sometimes when talking about some bright joy now long passed. “That is, Earl. That is. Go, now. Father and I will be here, whenever you come back.”
Her voice nearly cracked on the word ‘back’, but Earl had no ear for it. He passed her and kept going. Within ten paces he was running, and his clear tenor voice called out “Rig! Rig!” as he ran.
Mother’s tears were silvered by the moonlight as, with longing and sorrow, she watched them go.
Sorry for the short length and scant detail--I was writing to spec, and the spec, she was short. Anyway, my contribution is the least thing in this issue of Idunna, available as a perk of membership in the Troth.
-- Lorrie
* -- To be published in mid-June, 2008
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Date: 2008-06-03 04:08 pm (UTC)-smk
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Date: 2008-06-03 07:26 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2008-06-03 10:29 pm (UTC)Send your check for $6 and a letter saying "I want Idunna 76, the Heimdall one!" to:
The Troth
PO Box 1369
Oldsmar, FL 34677-1369
Expect 6-8 weeks for delivery.
-- Lorrie