"Some people ask me where my stories come from" said Tanais, putting his fiddle down. Carefully, he wrapped it in its silk scarf and placed it back in its case. "Indeed, I've been asked if some of my stories are `true' or not," and closing the lid of the fiddle case, he flicked his black-tipped ears in wry amusement at the one question he would never ever answer.
Sitting down and propping the fiddle case against the tree stump he had been sitting on, Tanais reached for his tobacco pouch and proceeded to fill a long clay pipe with some leaves as he pondered the question a little more.
"Some of my stories do come from other bards," he conceded. "I've even been lucky enough to trade a few of my tales with some of the few real storytellers left in the land," and he gently tapped one paw against his forehead. "However, some of my best stories have come to me in the form of dreams. Some have been rather... prophetic, whereas others have just been... well... dreams." and the fox shrugged as he brushed some of the tobacco from his lap.
"Some of my most powerful dreams are about my friends," he said and glanced at Magda Wolf, who was sewing a tear on an item of her clothing, "and not all of my dreams take place in the past or the present" and he shifted in his seat to look at Magda face on. A gentle smile spread across the fox's jowls. "Every now and then I have a dream that takes me and my friends into the future."
Tanais paused, letting those words sink in before putting his pipe down. Sniffing the air and deciding that tonight would be a good night to tell one particular tale, he drew a wide circle around him with his right paw. "If you'll gather round and I'll tell you of one dream I had not very long ago". Sitting back in his favourite chair and pausing only to let his companions move a little closer, or to settle their drinks, he began his tale:
"It must be a long way into the future." began Tanais, "Magda and I were sitting at a camp fire," and he frowned at the memory "we were in a war, or rather it was the night before we were due to fight in a battle. Magda and I had been friends for many years and our paths crossed many times throughout our long and adventurous lives. We had grown to respect each other as friends and our `alliance' was well known throughout our peoples as a productive and generous one. In addition to our friendship, I often offered Magda and her army the simple and honest magic of the bard: of song and storytelling, of rune and moon reading." and the fox looked up into the night sky and squinted slightly at the thin silver crescent of a new moon.
"Wolves can see many things in the moon that foxes cannot see" said Tanais as he turned his muzzle back to the earth and quickly added "Indeed, Foxes can see things in the moon that Wolves cannot," and he bowed his head at Magda Wolf. "I have often been consulted for this small talent."
Tanais turned so as to address Magda directly -- she had finished her sewing and was discreetly cleaning her swords. "Your brothers sat opposite us at the next camp fire and you and I just sat talking, discussing `small beer and great sages'. I was winding gut for my strings whilst you were drawing maps in the dirt -- going over the plans for the next day's battle."
Turning his attention to his audience, Tanais frowned. "We talked. We talked a lot and I noticed she was deeply troubled by the next day's likely outcome. We talked about the attacking army -- and again I sang to her a few songs I had picked up from their bards a few months earlier". Tanais sat and scratched at an itch behind an ear. "You see, bards write songs to safely convey news from one land to the next. It is... our way."
By way of explanation, Tanais sighed. "A few months back, I was wandering their kingdom and in passing I heard a song sung by a soldier bard that told of an impending invasion of our southlands." Tanais said "I feigned interest in the tune and traded the song for something `equally harmless'. It was a dull tune, the rhyme and rhythm were fairly ordinary I suppose... but the words contained news of an impending attack on our kingdom.
"I rushed back to our kingdom as fast as I could, and although there was considerable traffic in my direction despite the rapidly freezing weather, I was able to cross the river easily enough. I hired the best horse I could afford and rushed to Magda Wolf's city encampment. She knew something was wrong as soon as I rushed into her camp -- frozen, ragged and exhausted. I sang her the song even before I had a chance to formally or informally greet her.
"Immediately she summoned her brothers, who had by now all become generals and had gathered together her army. She sent messengers to amass the western and eastern armies to meet at the point where the river dividing our two kingdoms was at its nearest; but even riding their fastest horses, the delay meant that they would not arrive until a week, possibly two weeks after our arrival.
"And still the weather got worse. The journey from the city to the southlands was a gruelling one. And with an army of just seven or eight hundred soldiers -- most of whom were travelling on foot -- the unusually harsh winter took its toll." Tanais took his cap off. "Some good soldiers never saw their cubs again."
Leaving the thought of a cold winter and the loss of loved ones to sink in as he pulled his hat a little further over his head, Tanais shivered. "We had finally made it to the designated point. The enemy had already breached the river and had a good bridge built. Part of the forest had been cleared to supply the wood for the bridge and there were camps of some one or two thousand soldiers stationed both sides of the bridge. We camped just before a large bowl-shaped field that blocked the way between us and the enemy encampment.
"They had chosen their site well and were well entrenched and looked ready to move. Magda stood on the mound and looked out onto their camp and sniffed the air..." Tanais looked bashfully at his friend before turning to his audience. "Magda Wolf looked incredible. She was proud and wise and much older than any of us are now. There were flecks of grey hair in her thick black mane. Her faithful battle sword, the one she is cleaning, was still with her, but it had deep chips in the blade that made it useless as a battle weapon -- it was more of an ornament these days. But still she brought it along with her". Tanais eyed the hilt very carefully. "And it was well that she did. According to many songs, that weapon had been imbued with the spirit of every great battle wolf that had held it before her."
Tanais moved and crouched in front of the wolf as the fire cracked and sent tongues of flame into the night. "You were an old yet still very beautiful wolf Magda. Your wisdom had seen you through many battles and many wars and it had seen you to an old and proud age. Each one of your soldiers was worth many of their men, but they were tired and you knew that -- the journey had exhausted them and instinct told you that you'd have to order them into combat before the second and third phalanx had a chance to arrive. Instinct also told you that you didn't stand a good chance of winning."
Tanais reached for a stick half-protruding from the fire and lit his pipe. Forming coils of white smoke around him as he stood up and addressed the rest of the listeners.
"So we sat. It was quiet and thoughtful and somehow very painful -- as if this was the last time we would talk together. Magda was telling me about the likely strategies they would employ, scraping map after map in the dirt. I sensed the hopelessness in her voice... I felt desperation and a blackness enter her heart.
"I looked into the dying embers of our small fire and pondered some of the things she had said. Her army was weakened and outnumbered and were, by all accounts, going to have to fight after just setting up camp. But what worried me most was the way she sat in front of the fire -- balefully prodding at the embers -- going over her battle plans again and again in the vain hope that she had missed something out. She looked as if her army had already been beaten and that saddened me greatly".
Noticing the fire was getting low, Tanais walked over and again jabbed at the embers, prodding it back into life before throwing a few strips of kindling and a couple of logs on it to keep it alive.
"Suddenly a thought crossed my mind. It was a wild and crazy thought, and it came from a supposedly magical wolf song I first read about as a cub many years ago -- but I had never heard it sung, or at least, sung with the incantations that gave it its power.
"It is one of the lesser known of the `epic' songs -- the Galas -- sung in an old language that tell of a great battle wolf's spirit that comes to the aid of armies in dire need." Tanais paused, searching for the name of the song before continuing. "And with many of the old songs, there is a wicked twist at the end. In this song the spirit wolf would only help armies whose soldiers were honest and true. If just one member of the army had been dishonest, if they were corrupt, or if they had lied to their fellow pack members in any way, then the spirit wolf would turn on them and wreak havoc upon the army that had called him into this world -- no matter how just their cause. Those old songs are very powerful and second only to healing songs in their potency. Although I'd never dare sing it myself, I knew it as the Gala Caélin Ffenoc, or `the Song of Fennoc the Spirit Wolf'.
"Without the incantations or music, I've told the Caélin Ffenoc to Magda Wolf many times in the past. Indeed, it is one of her favourite battle stories. So I sung her the first few lines of the Gala to catch her attention and simply said, `I think our basic approach is wrong here'.
"Magda looked at me with her deep and thoughtful eyes. All the pain and confusion had left her, her mind was racing with new possibilities concerning my suggestion I had somewhat cryptically put her way. She sat and thought and finally beamed a huge wolfish grin. I remember she said just two words to me, `I see' and then she stood up sharply and gathered her brothers around her. As I continued winding on my string, she talked with her brothers, explaining her plan -- their heads finally nodding in accord.
"As if by way of sealing the agreement, Magda raised her muzzle to the sky and howled. It was an impressive and some would say a frightening sight. She howled a deep and sonorous cry that seemed to fill the air. Soon after, her brothers joined in. It took a while to recognise, but they were singing the incantations to the Gala Caélin Ffenoc! Of course I'd gently hummed them to myself in the past, but coming from the muzzles of fully trained battle wolves it took on a quality all of its own."
Tanais sighed wistfully at the memory of the song. "But this was a new way of singing the song. Their harmonies were layered according to an old and very ancient style, a style that I had never heard sung before. And as they sang, our solders slowly woke up and joined in.
"And then something strange happened. As Magda Wolf, her brothers and the entire army howled, I became aware of a thickness in the air... a shape slowly formed above the camp. It was hard to see properly by the light of our campfires. Indeed, light seemed to be sucked into the shape -- and slowly the darkness thickened into the form of a large black wolf. Its eyes glowed with the pale light of the red moon and its feet were lost in the darkness of the night sky.
"I sat transfixed as the wolf passed from camp fire to fire. It sniffed at each soldier and circled our camp perhaps a couple of times. Finally, and with one great bound, it jumped over our camp fire and loomed in mid-air, looking at Magda and her brothers with its pale red eyes.
"The wolf said nothing, but looked at me as I wound my gut string almost mechanically as if I had forgotten what the lower half of my body was doing and I instinctively knew that it was saying `join in, you are part of this pack now'."
Tanais looked at his feet and kicked at a clod of earth. "Oh, my yipping was nothing compared to the wonderful harmonies coming from Magda and her wolf army, but I did join in, and do you know what? It seemed to fit into the howling. Weaving in and out of the harmonies, craftily wending its way over the campfires and finally coming to join with the rest of the spirit wolf." Tanais smiled at the thought. "I too became part of the great wolf -- looming up there in the sky. He looked down at me and my wolf brothers and sisters with deep satisfaction in his eyes. Suddenly and without warning he leapt across the divide and launched himself at the enemy army."
Tanais opened his fiddle case and pulled it out, gently polishing the neck with his silk scarf before turning to his wolf friend. "Magda, you and your brothers were far too busy concentrating on howling to notice his departure. You sat there with your eyes shut, it was as if you were concentrating on the purity of each note, as if each howl had to fit. The feeling of brotherhood and warmth coming from our camp was incredible! I felt part of that, but also... I felt a... little `apart'. I have always felt that sense of being apart." The fox sighed, but then he visibly perked up. "After all, I am a wanderer, I am a traveller. I don't call anywhere home as such. So, still yipping, I rushed to the highest point on the hill so I could see the spirit wolf descend upon the enemy".
Tanais grinned at the thought. "It was a marvellous sight. My eyes were used to the darkness and I could clearly see the foot soldiers and the officers sitting up next to their fires. I could even see their generals stomping wearily out of their tents at the rear to see what was going on.
"Before they could do anything, the spirit wolf leapt into the centre of the camp and ran from soldier to soldier. He didn't bite, he didn't attack. He just padded silently between and around each soldier, sometimes passing right through them! Most soldiers were paralysed with fear. Those that could move visibly cowered behind their weapons. Some of their bravest soldiers vainly and half-heartedly tried to slash through it as it passed, but their blades just passed through like cutting through a cloud.
"And the spirit wolf turned around and looked straight at me. It was a frightening sight and yet it was a marvellous feeling. I looked down and realised that the string I had been winding was finished! But not only that, it had been strung in my fiddle, tuned and ready to play! So, I put the fiddle under my chin and started to play.
"It wasn't a song I knew of. Indeed it seemed to come from the spirit wolf into me. I heard the music forming in my head as it continued to pad around the enemy soldiers whipping up a sense of dread and panic. So I played what I heard inside my head. The song only used the one string I had just made and it was a very simple melody, but it was an eerie sounding tune". Tanais took another puff from his pipe and realised that his tobacco had gone out, so he put the pipe down.
A hint of pride entered into the fox's voice. "Of course the string I had made was a fine sounding one. The notes it made seemed to fill the air and float around the howling, adding form and substance to their song. As I played along to Fennoc's song, it seemed to act as a focus for all the fear and dread the spirit wolf was whipping up in the enemy camp, until finally a soldier broke away from his camp fire and ran towards the bridge. This was followed by another and then another, until very shortly the whole army -- Generals and all -- started running for the bridge. Once over the other side they carried on retreating as the wolf skipped and chased them into the forest and beyond."
Tanais picked up his pipe and had another go at coaxing it into life with a splint taken from the edge of the fire. This time he was successful. "We never saw the spirit wolf again. But some say it lives in the forest and guards the closest point between the two kingdoms..." and he caught himself, "But that's another story".
Tanais sat down and puffed thoughtfully on his pipe, trying vainly to blow a smoke ring. "Shortly after the retreat, tales began to spread and songs started to appear, songs about the great Magda Wolf and her tireless army protected by one, sometimes a dozen spirit wolves. Knowing the power of these songs I knew that the land would be safe from further attack for a very long time."
Tanais put his fiddle down and looked at a reflection of the moon, shining off of the deep brown varnish of his fiddle. "I took the string off my fiddle shortly after their retreat... a string like that has only one purpose and it's not to be played, unless we need to call that spirit wolf again. So I wound a new one the next day."
At that, Tanais quietly put his fiddle back into his case. Closing the lid he sat in front of the fire, puffing on his pipe, looking at Magda Wolf and then peering into the dying embers, lost in his own thoughts gently humming the Gala Caélin Ffenoc.
(C) 1995 Clive Grace. All rights reserved.