[piosenniel]

The Right of First Kill


‘At last!’ Valr flicked the reins against his mount’s neck, pulling up beside his brother. He was eager to be off on this, his first great hunt. The skin on his arms twitched in anticipation, mirroring his horse’s own excitement.

‘Ssst!’ Falarr glanced quickly toward their father, then back at Valr. ‘Quiet, now. It would not do to criticize, or seem to criticize, the Lords. They do things in their own time.’ He reached a gloved hand toward Valr, clapping him on shoulder as much to ground his brother’s energy as to offer a sympathetic gesture.

Grímr motioned them up beside him. The host had remounted and as swiftly as Uldor urged his own mount ahead the others briskly followed. ‘Now remember, the Lords should blood their lances and blades first. If we see a boar, we’ll give a yell out to Uldor and drive it toward him.’

‘Just Uldor?’ Valr asked, wanting to fix this rule in his mind. His father’s words had carried a certainty about them; the accompanying look on his face emphasizing the importance of what he was saying.

This was not the first hunt Valr had been on, thought it was his first as a hunter. His part on those previous times out with his father and brothers and sometimes his father’s friends had been to scout the prey and with shouts and noisy wooden clappers to drive the game toward the hunters. ‘Tis the first step toward being a hunter,’ his brothers had told him, reciting by rote the instruction of their father. ‘Noting the habits of the animal you wish to bring down, thinking as it would think will help you first to find where it has been and where it’s gone and what it will do when found and cornered. So was I taught by my father and him his father before. And so will it be with my sons.’ They had grinned as they had spoken to him that first hunt when he was nine years old, their twinned voices sing-songing the words. ‘Enough!’ he recalled his father had chastened them. ‘Let’s hope he doesn’t send the quail all higgledy-piggledy as you did, Falarr!’ Valr had taken those words to heart, both the instruction and the gentle admonition.

The hunters fanned out as the chase progressed. Valr’s eyes scanned the area they were passing through, old habits kicking in as he did so. Were this my brothers and father, he thought, his eyes fixing on a scattering of oaks with their thickets of low growing bushes beneath, then I would head that way for sure. He turned his horse toward the trees; his eyes flicked toward Falarr as he rode off, grinning widely at his brother. ‘Come on!’ Valr urged him. ‘Here’s your chance to show me you aren’t the bumbler father made you out to be.’

The two made a wide berth to the right of the trees and undergrowth, darting round to come toward them from the side farthest from the other hunters. There were acorns scattered beneath the boughs in the small clearing, some trampled in the soft dirt, some only empty shells, and overlaying all was the sharp-hoofed patternings of animal hooves criss-crossing the ground.

‘Good eyes, little brother!’ came the hushed whispering of Falarr as they neared the area. ‘Let’s see if there’s one fine hog left hiding among the leaves.’ With a gleam in his eye, Valr nodded at his brother, and giving a quick kick to his mount’s flank he urged the horse forward at a measured pace.

There was a scuffling sound in the thicket followed by an increasingly angry squeal. From beneath the cover of the shrubs a swarthy, hefty figure shot out and away from the approaching men.

‘Father!’ Valr cried, seeing Grímr approaching riding toward them. ‘Head him off!!’ Grímr rode at the charging boar, turning him more toward the other hunters.

‘My Lord! My Lords!’ Valr shouted, waving his lance wildly in the air toward Uldor and his brothers who rode apace off. ‘A boar.....a boar for your lances!!’