[Arry]

‘What’s that she said?’ whispered Madoc turning round to where the old woman had disappeared into the shadows. ‘Something hungry? And coming this way?’ He frowned and cocked his head toward the nearest shuttered window. ‘Can’t hear a thing, save for the wind and the snow as it mashes against the wooden siding.’

‘Well I heard something moaning when she was talking.’ Willem’s eyes grew wide as he spoke. ‘Reminded me of something.’ He let the images form from the old stories that he’d heard. ‘You know how granda used to tell those tales his granda used to tell him? The one about where he and his brother lost a nanny from their herd, is what I’m thinking of. T’ the west there . . . where the Grey Mountains touch the forest. They hunted high and low among the mountain ash and the firs. There were things in there, granda said, that walked among the trees. Like shepherds to them as we be to our goats.’ He took a sip from his cup and went on. ‘Granda said they were careful to keep out of sight and out of the way of those creatures. Not that they looked fierce or mean or such. But so concerned with their flock were they, that it seemed they would have no regret or the slightest reluctance about trampling right over you if you got in their way. And anyway what I was trying to say was that he said they had a booming kind of voice and a sort of echoing moan when calling to their trees.’

‘It’s just the wind as has you spooked,’ said Andwise. ‘You know we’ve been on those slopes many a time, and seen no such creatures as granda spoke of. The trees were all rooted nicely on the mountainside, ash and fir alike. And not a bit of calling passed among them as I remember.’ He chuckled as he raised his mug to Willem. ‘Now, not saying granda’s tetched or such, but mayhap the cider he’d brought for his lunch had turned hard. And its spirits set him daydreaming.’

Willem eyed Andwise and snorted. ‘If granda said it happened that way, then that’s the way it was!’ Madoc shrugged, not wanting to choose sides and went back to considering his cup of wassail.

‘Granny!’ Willem turned round in his chair and leaned forward to where Old Goody sat. ‘Begging your pardon, Granny . . . but about that Green Man fellow. I know you said he’d given his limb for the Yule fire, but you don’t suppose he’s reconsidered the giving, has he? And come to take it back . . . ?