Daughter of the Witcher Ch. 01

She hugged him for a moment and then he waited while she pulled on her heavy shirt and they walked outside to eat.

When she walked into the house, she told her brother Kotan that it was time for his lesson and he nodded. When he was gone, Louhi began to help her mother with the preparations for the evening meal and she told Margit what had happened.

"I always knew that you were the one who would learn to walk the witcher's path." She sighed and hugged her daughter for a moment, "I have taught you what I could, Louhi. Now you must learn the rest, if it is what you truly want to know."

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The animal was grazing as cautiously as always. The heavy snow over the night hadn't made things any easier as it nudged its nose along, seeking for a bit of moss.

The young buck raised his head then, pausing to look and smell -- and listen.

Off to his side only yards away, Louhi stood at the edge of the trees, with her bow just slightly drawn, willing her breathing a little stiller. His last bit of careful hopping through the drifts at the edge of the woods and into the clearing had required her own quiet attempt at pursuit and for a twelve year-old girl, the snow was deep.

She wanted to sigh and give this up. Looking at the animal, she didn't think that she had the power in her draw to do much more than strike his shoulder with her arrow, never mind wound him anywhere near fatally.

But they needed the meat.

She waited a little longer, her will and her thoughts having a calming effect on her breathing. The reindeer lowered his head and began to eat.

Louhi drew her bow back all the way and before the skittish buck could form another worried thought, she released.

Her arrow hit the buck, who bunched his leg muscles tightly in the beginnings of his crouch to spring away, but another arrow sailed past the girl and thudded in just behind the shoulder and the buck dropped to his knees and rolled onto his side a moment later.

Louhi watched the fog of his breath and after two; there were no more puffs of it.

She looked behind her to see Gunnar striding over through the drifts as he came from a slightly different direction.

Louhi stood up straight, "I don't have enough in this bow. Not in my arm either. I would have only hurt him."

"That was not what this was for," her father smiled, "There was nothing wrong with your hunt -- and that was the important thing."

He looked around the clearing and saw the eyes of the other predators looking back. "Come. Stand by me while I butcher enough to feed us. We will have to leave something for those ones to eat so that we are left alone. We have all the wolf pelts that we need in what we wear and the ones in the tent."

While Gunnar worked and explained the method to his girl, Louhi paid attention and asked questions. She also devoted some of her awareness to the other animals around them. Once or twice, she noted the hunger there as a drive, and she sent other drives to those ones. The pack diminished in size each time, several individuals peeling off to bound away shaking their heads in confusion.

After several long minutes of working at it, Gunnar hefted the carcass over his shoulders and they walked off. Their sudden absence brought the pack out of hiding to trot over and sniff at the tracks which ended abruptly and went no further. It lasted only a moment and then the first of the snarling growls broke out among them as their pack structure was enforced and the weaker and lower ones drifted off a little, hoping that there might be something left for them out of the little meat and guts which remained to be fought over.

Miles away, Gunnar's mother clapped her aged hands together in happiness that their hunt had gone well. Hours later, Louhi sat in her simple clothes as the elder witch began to teach her more.

"Your father and I have a gift for you, granddaughter," she smiled a time later, as she produced a bag made of rawhide out of the air of the shadows. Louhi thanked them as her hand closed over the small bag which hung there before her.

Opening it and reaching in, Louhi smiled and drew out several pieces of the two sets within. Bits of polished bone and a few rounded pebbles from a stream bed lay in her hand. Each one had a symbol carved or scratched into its surface with great care.

Her grandmother moved her head to toss her long white hair over her shoulders a little as she smiled, "It is time for you to learn of the ways to know."

Louhi smiled happily as she felt her grandmother's arms around her and she leaned back a little as the old woman reached around to order the pieces of one set, explaining the significance and reason for each one and kissing Louhi's cheek now and then as she went.

As the two females sat together and the old woman began the lesson, Gunnar got up and lifted the tent flap to step outside into the darkness. He looked around a little and then he looked up at the stars and the flicker of the aurora there above him. After a moment, he walked over to a tree and urinated before he walked back into the tent and it sank into a pit of utter and impermeable blackness which covered and surrounded the tent and the horses who were long past asleep.

Gunnar was troubled over something which he could do nothing about, and so, after another cup of mead, he lay down and went to sleep.

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Things had changed during the intervening years in the village. Gunnar's sister had become a widow and there were rumblings in the village as lines were drawn. They were invisible lines, to be sure, but they were still there and every bit as real as though they'd been drawn in blood.

The long and inexorable coming and entrenchment of Christianity had always been a bit of a concern to any who still kept to the old ways, but that in itself hadn't been the issue. What caused the lines to be drawn was the ever-present and constant preaching to the new faithful. By itself, it was no trouble to anyone, but it was never kept to just the preaching and the parables.

Almost from the beginning -- and it had been a couple of centuries now, and there had always been a certain part of the content which taught that the old ways were evil and wrong.

Pagan was one thing, Gunnar thought.

Wrong was something else.

It had been easy to think of these things as absurd at the onset. But as time went on, the message began to sink in and the message then took a turn from what was a guide on how to live one's life to what was wrong and bad about what had gone before.

As often happens, the flock swallow what is made easily swallowed and no one stops their nodding to consider just who might have something to gain in what -- if the flock was stirred enough, would amount to theft and destruction of a neighbor's property.

With no clear lord in the area, other than one young son of Gunnar's sister, there was a power struggle in the offing at some point. Olaf was an old man, but he drew his men together and had them build a wall around his home, Gunnar's and the hall of Gunnar's sister.

By now, Louhi was a tall and willowy young woman of eighteen. That summer, Gunnar had taken his girl to learn a little more at the hands of his mother, whose health was beginning to fail her. They spent a week there in the tent at her summer home and then she passed.

As Louhi wept, Gunnar looked after everything and a few days later, the pair rode on to the woman's winter home farther on and closer to Lapland than Sweden.

The old village lay abandoned from long before, but that had been the home of Gunnar's mother and her people from ages past and it had been the home in later years to her and her husband, before he'd passed on some years before.

"Why do we go?" Louhi asked, from the back of her horse.

"There are things to be done there," Gunnar said.

At the old homestead, Gunnar got their horses settled and he looked at the supply of wood. Not liking what he saw, he began to cut more and Louhi helped him, learning the most economical ways to do it in terms of effort and time.

That night, as Louhi began to feel the stiffness in her arms beginning, she was thankful that there was now enough wood for a sauna after the meal. To Gunnar's people, this was a way to sweat out one's weariness and living as simply as they did, it was a familial thing a lot of the time. As such, it was a sexless place and time. As they sat or reclined on the birchwood benches in the hut, Gunnar considered that he now didn't like his beard and the bits of bark which it had gathered during the work of the day.

After a long while at it, they stepped outside and cooled off a little, before jumping into the small lake there for a brief swim together.

"I have questions," she said as they sat on the little dock-like affair and Gunnar rolled his eyes.

"Your entire life," he said quietly," you have had questions. I think that most children learn to speak so that they might get by in the world with others. In your case Daughter, I believe that you learned to speak so that you could ask things."

He smiled and sighed, "Ask me then."

"I wish to know about loving."

It came out of her like a statement, just as many of her requests came on most any topic. Gunnar looked over, "Has your mother not spoken of this to you at all? I thought that she had."

"She did," Louhi nodded as she looked back, "but still -- "

He sighed, "But still you need to know more. I know you, Louhi. Well, I cannot show you, so if there is something which you must know to feed your never-ending curiosity, then ask and I will do my best."

Her specific questions had more to do with a few mechanics and also a little about emotions. Gunnar was a little surprised, but then he told himself that in the framework of what she asked, it was much the same as any other topic and they spoke of things until the time when the mosquitoes drove them inside.

"Try to get some sleep, little frog," he smiled as they parted, "Tomorrow, the work begins anew."

The next morning, she found her father outside in the shed which was the forge. Gunnar was looking through some piles of metal, separating out what was only iron from what was steel. After that, he went further, carefully examining the steel and discarding a lot of it.

"Light the forge," he said quietly and he kept looking.

Louhi was willowy, but it wasn't all gentle curves. Her life had always been an active one and she was a very strong girl, though much of her strength lay hidden. She got to work, knowing somehow that this was important to her in some as-yet unspoken way.

When she told him that she had a bed of hot coals prepared and banked, he stood up and turned to her as he lay some pieces down on the anvil.

"You can wear what you like for this, Daughter, but no matter what, there will be sweat in the mix."

Louhi nodded and gave it a thought before she went back inside and came back wearing an old and too-small pair of pants. She tied her long white hair back and nodded that she was ready. Gunnar laid a few pieces into a crucible and swung it out over the center of the coals.

He pointed to the bellows, "The work begins now."

He helped things along with a few quiet words and the steel began to glow and soften in the crucible a few minutes later.

As his daughter worked, he went outside and drew some water and told her that she should use some of it to cool off a little while he took over for her at the bellows.

They spoke a little of what was to be done and Gunnar watched as Louhi washed her face and ran as much of the cold water over her neck, throat and breasts as she could in imitation of what he'd done.

"More on your neck," he said, "Front and back. There are thick veins there and they lie close to the skin. Cool them down and you help yourself a lot."

When she was ready, Gunnar took up a few forms and looked them over. There was one which he sought to see more than any other and he finally found it and saw that it needed only a little more casting sand added. The bag of it felt cool to his fingers and he was thankful that it hadn't dried out, because if it had, then they might as well stop now.

With a lot of care, he moved the form onto the bench and he began to caution her about working with molten steel.

Louhi nodded as she listened. But when he was done, she only said that she'd seen him work steel and iron all of her life. She only needed the experience of having done it; that was all. "I know that seeing it and doing it is another thing completely, "she said.

"Can I try first with a smaller form?"

He nodded and added a second form to the bench. "This one first, Louhi."

He brought the crucible to the bench and stepped back, ready to help, but his daughter picked it up, her biceps swelling as she did and she carefully poured out the metal.

"Is it enough?" she asked and he nodded, taking the crucible and placing it back over the forge. He found a second crucible and threw pieces into that so that there would be enough later on. Then he joined Louhi, who had already begun her quiet prayers over the red steel in the first mold.

With the second crucible's contents melted beside the first, Gunnar carefully poured one into the other and came back.

"These have never been used before," he said quietly, "I made them last year for you while you were with my mother. They were made for this time, Louhi."

She nodded and asked for him to bring the large crucible over so that the second pour could be done.

With two hot molds on the bench, the pair stood and chanted n the old way as it slowly began to harden.

The next day, they took turns, beating out the blades for the first time. After a lot of talk between them, he kept the stone turning as Louhi began the grinding for the overall shape.

It took a lot of time, but the two of them worked side-by-side together, stripped to the waist in the heat as she shaped the steel to his demands and then beat it out a time or two afterwards for each blade with several quenchings in the large trough.

Gradually, Louhi began to see just a hint of a sparkle to the metal and Gunnar nodded, saying that the process was going well.

"It is a bit early for my taste," he said, "but you have followed the path with each step and never faltered, so it is time for this."

There wasn't much beauty to them. Everything had been done out of a sense of purpose and efficiency of use. As she stood looking at them lying there together there on the anvil that evening, she made a quiet comment about it.

"Most of what men carry is made pretty," he said, "shiny and gleaming. I have blades like that as well. I think that a lot of time is spent to make them so by the craftsmen, so that they will sell, after all."

She leaned against him a little and thanked him. As he put his arm around his daughter's shoulders, Gunnar grinned, "Now that you know all of my secrets, you can make all of the pretty ones that you like."

As they sat on the dock that night in the darkness after the sauna, she turned to him.

"One day, Father, I will want to seek for a man."

Gunnar's eyes opened and he choked slightly on the week beer that he was sipping, but he recovered and nodded, "Yes, of course. Go on."

"The trouble is that I do not wish for any of the usual fools," she said.

He asked her to explain and she said that there had been times when she'd liked a boy in her time, and it had happened a few times already, but in every case, it had eventually come down to the same thing every time.

"I am different to them," she said, "I see a boy who I might like for me and each one sees only that I am the witcher's girl.

My hair is too light they say-- and that comes from the mouths of some fairly tow-headed fools, but they see enough of a difference to remark on it. My skin is a little darker and it is another thing to remark upon, though in the light of day, it is almost nothing."

Louhi snorted, "One fool even told me that my eyes were the trouble, being too light for his taste.

I told him that he was getting too much light in his eyes, and then I closed one of the problems for him with my fist.

Twice I tried to go on regardless and what I found was that some boys like to hit a girl. It is not something which makes sense, if you consider that I might have wanted them enough at some point down the path to please them."

She sighed, "I have not done anything yet, and already I feel as though I waste my time."

Gunnar turned, "You say that someone hit you?"

She nodded, "It began well enough, I guess. But after a time, I could tell that he wanted everything and right then. I refused, pushing him away.

Two different boys, at different times. Each one, they slapped me."

Gunnar's eyebrows rose at that. "What, ... what happened then?"

She shrugged, "No one hits the witcher's girl," she said, "They had little in the way of minds to begin with."

She shrugged, "I took the rest."

He suddenly remembered the two instances in the area back home where a young lad had become suddenly catatonic and had died a few days later.

She sighed heavily, "What I want is, ... "

She looked at him, "What I wish to find for me is a man who is gentle and kind and who might love me for who I am. I only know of one such man, Father, and that cannot be, obviously. I asked Mother about it and she told me that it was not uncommon in her time long ago to find that a man wants to slap a girl. She told me that it was a problem for her, though she killed most of them.

Is that true, what she said?"

He nodded, "Your mother has killed men before. She has never told you, since the knowing of it would have done neither of you any good when you were little, but she was born the daughter of one of their leaders in her clan. He was the king of their tribe and she could do as she wished a lot of the time."

Louhi looked sad to him and he knew why, so he held her and offered the best 'wisdom' that he thought he could. "I know what you would want. My want is that you are happy. All that I can tell you is that it might be a long hunt."

He kissed her head and looked down toward where her face was against his chest, "Perhaps what is needed is that you find someone -- anyone just for the purpose of learning what it is that you would have at the end of the hunt, but I cannot say."

She nodded, "You always give good counsel, Father. I cannot even say that it is worth the effort and the misgivings otherwise. Can I have a chance if I find someone for it?"

He nodded, "It is your choice, but if anyone hits you, there will be blood."

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Margit slammed the door, furious.

Her son came to her, asking what was the matter.

"I have just heard demands from an idiot," she seethed, "He came to tell me that since we are not of the same faith as everyone -- which is almost a falsehood -- that we must leave the land since we do not belong."

She turned to him and said, "Go and prepare a few of the horses. We will leave this night with only a few things and ride to where your grandmother lives."

Kotan stood dumbfounded, a fit and strong young man of almost twenty winters. "Why?"

Margit wanted to spit. "Because there were more than twenty of them here on my doorstep, Kotan. Can you fight twenty men alone? I cannot.

It is not the worst of things, son. They are cowards and they will not do a thing to us here and now, where Olaf's men would kill them without a thought.

But if there are twenty at the least, there are more and they will return after dark. I choke to have to lose my home, but I will not lose my son over something stupid.

I will talk to Olaf," she said, "you do as I have said."

For the second time in her life, Margit ran from stupid men that afternoon. She and her son rode off quickly with only a few of their belongings to their names.