By Patrick Johnston

In those days the streams and rivers teemed with fishes of all kinds. The children would swim and play games and tickle trout which they would bring home in their small wicker baskets. And the forests were wick with small game, that came easily to their snares and traps. Often a hunter might bring home a forest sow or a deer, and they would strip the meat and feast, and dry some in long thin strips in the smoke of their fires. The pelts and skins they would put to use, and the bones and the sinews and the teeth also. In the marshlands there were frogs, that were easy to catch, and their meat was good. In the autumn there were fruits and berries. Sour apples and sweet brambles. Near the end of the summer, they would cut down their grain, and there was plenty for the women to make heavy flat slabs of bread and dark cloudy beer throughout the lean cold months. And they would drink the bitter draught and become filled with the spirits and laugh and tell tales around the fire. And the spring would bring forth its plenitude, and the people would live well in the verdant places. And it was good.

In the old days, my people honoured the old gods, and the nymphs of the streams, and the dryads of the pools, and the spirits that lived in the cool springs, and in the rocks and boulders, and in the trees and glades, and the sprites that tarried in the marshes and bogs, each their own, and each honoured in the manner special to their own names and ways and needs. And spirits there were too who were given guardianship and sway over each and every creature that runs or crawls or flies or swims, from the smallest ant to the mightiest of stags. The hares that punch in the springtime. The woodpecker that taps in the trees. And each of these too was honoured after its own fashion, since their ways were not as our ways were. Each had its name, and each had its story, and they told their stories to their children so that they might know them and honour them too, as is the way of things. And the people gave thanks to the fish, as is the way of things, when they caught them in their nets. And they gave thanks for meat and beer in their bellies. They gave thanks to the yew for wood of their bows, and to the birds for the feathers of their arrows, and to the sky and the sun and the moon. And it was good.

In the days of the grandmothers, my people would sometimes meet with the old forest people in secret glades and hidden places and exchange gifts of words and food, and secret signs and totems that might please the gods and the spirits of the water, and the trees, and the rocks and stones, and the creatures of the forest. Small of frame and dark of skin they are said to be, although none that are living yet has met them. The mother of my grandmother was a wise woman and much loved of the people, since she stood guardian and servant to their arrivals and departures in this world. She is said to have met with old ones but three times in the course of her long years. This my mother told me. They were filled with wisdom, and magic, and were mightily skilled in the ways of the forest, for that had been their home since the beginning. Some of the folk say that they have caught glimpses of them deep in the forest. I do not know. By my mother’s telling they would only be seen by men if they willed it so. You could blunder through their secret places, and never would you know, nor if they walked in your shadow as you stalked a deer. I believe though to this day that one watched me once, when I was barely more than a boy, as I skinned and cooked a squirrel deep in the forest. The dappled light, the smell of damp earth and cooking meat, the dark shadows of the forest. Nothing more than a feeling. I do not know. Maybe they abide still, in their hidden places. Or, maybe, they are gone from this world and all their wisdom and magic with them. And maybe the old gods are gone too, as the nymphs of the streams and the spirits of the trees surely are.

In the days even before the grandmothers, men would come from the North, or from the East; sometimes as enemies to steal our crops and take our children and women to be their slaves or their wives; sometimes to trade metal for pelts and furs; sometimes to settle in the lands close to our lands, and to live in peace and friendship, and in the hard times our people might help their people and in a like way their people might help our people. And they shared with us their new knowledge of ways and things that were new to us, and we shared with them our old knowledge, and these things were new to them. And as is the way of things with men and with women, some of their men might take one of our women as their own, and in a like way some of our men might take one of their women, and it was good, as it strengthened the bonds of kin and friendship between the peoples until they were like as one people.

And, when men came from the North or from the East, with them they brought their own gods, and their gods were different to ours in name, but alike in the stories of their ways, and temperaments and in their dominions. And we knew them to be the same gods as ours, or least ways their closest kin. But they did not know the names of the spirits of the forests or the rivers or the rocks or the bogs, and neither did they know their stories. But they brought with them their own spirits of the things of the world, and the names and the stories of these spirits. And some of these spirits came to join with the spirits of old and become one, their stories blending and growing. And some spirits pushed out the old spirits and where the old spirits went away and were lost or died. And some of the spirits were simply forgotten since none remembered to honour them or tell their stories.

And as the generations came and went, and the young girls in turn became mothers and then crones and then ghosts, more men would come from the North or the East, to raid, or to settle or to trade, bringing their gods with them. Some were alike to gods of our own, but others were strange to us. Some could abide in friendship, but others were to each other as quarrelsome neighbours, and others still were as mortal foes. And the land became a scramble of tribes, and sometimes there was war among the tribes and sometimes peace. But even when there was peace, the people were not as one people because they all cleaved to their own stories.

And as time passed, where once the rivers and forests and bogs teemed with life, the fish and the game and the creatures of the marshland became more scarce. Some say that this was because there were too many hunters and fishers. I do not know. But I do know that it became our way to rely more and more upon the grain that we could grow, working the land with the toil of our hand and the sweat of our brow. And as time passed, the time for toil grew, until from dawn to the setting sun, the fields eat the strength of the people so that like the world serpent that eats its own tail, in turn they might eat.

I am the head man of my people, their king, chosen by them to guide and protect, and it is my honour and my duty. Their fate lies in my hands, as mine lies in theirs, and the pleasure of the gods. But last year there was too much rain. Endless days of rain and the harvest failed. The hunting was poor since much of the game has vanished. We scavenged for roots and acorns in the forest. But there was no beer or bread in the winter. And many died that might otherwise have lived. The oldest ones and the youngest ones alike, but also strong people who succumbed to illness and from hunger had lost the strength to fight. The oldest grandmother died, and then also the next oldest, and the next, taking their knowing and their wisdom with them. And my people were ragged and pitiful. And life was terrible.

We tried to save enough grain to plant in the springtime, but some was spoiled in the floods, and some was stolen by raiders who were as desperate as ourselves. The grain we were able to plant will scarcely bring sufficient yield even if there is sun and rain in perfect measure, and each on the days when it is most needed. If the gods will it so…

I fear greatly for my people.

I fear greatly for my people, but I do not fear for myself, although my fate is clear if the harvest should fail again this year. On a moonless night the drums will start to beat. The elders will come for me – my woman and sons will be with them – bringing a handful of strong young men in case I should resist. Then I will be proud and scornful and tell them to send the young men away, which they will do. And they will feel ashamed that they brought the warriors. And that will be my last victory in life… Then they will bind me with ropes, and bring me out before all of the people, and tie me naked to a post. There will be a great fire, and they will dance, without prejudice, and carrying hefty sticks. As the spirit takes them the dancers will approach me and beat my body, but not my head or face, with their sticks and their curses. And this I will deserve since I will have failed them as their King. I will have been abandoned by the gods, failing to find their favour.

And when dawn nears, and the drumming stops, they will bring blades and incantations and slice off my nipples. This will ensure that I can never be king in the afterlife, since how can the life-flow come from one with no nipples? And they will cut off my prick and balls to show that I was unable to bring fertility. They will throw my prick and balls onto the fire before my eyes as I bleed, and they will cut open my belly and pull out my entrails and I will smell the shit and the meat and the gush of fluids. And finally, they will strangle me with a cord of rope until I am truly dead and throw my body into a bog, weighted with rocks to ensure that the bog will take me. And all this will be right, and as it should be. And a new King will take my place, and perhaps the gods will return their favour.

I fear greatly for my people if the harvest should fail again. If the harvest fails, my people will suffer and die. I would ask the gods for guidance. I would pray and make sacrifice. But I no longer know which of them are real.