“Stay away from him, Mia. He is not of this village. We can’t trust old men of the woods around our small daughters.”

“He was nice. He told us a story about the blackbird who said that beauty is not in glossy black feathers. It is in the colors inside our chests.”

“I said STAY AWAY!. Who else went to see him?”

“Just Jax and Kai and me.”

“I’ll speak to Gilen and Mai, but you listen to me and stay away.”

Jenah instructed Mia to keep stirring the stew and went to see Gillen and Mai. The two were young for the role of elders, but since both Wind and the Grey One crossed over these past two winters, they were the eldest.

“There is something wrong with that guy,” snarled Sass, Jax’s older brother. “He might be touched by the Evil.”

“Bring in some wood for the fire, Sass,” growled Gilen..

The young’un left grumbling.

“Did he hurt Mia?”

“No  . . . not that she said. He is powerful strange and attractive to children.”

“Have you or Wils spoken to him? Where does he come from?”

“Wils said he was ‘a little light in his boots, and mostly spoke the ‘traders tongue.’”

“Is he peddling something then?”

“No . . .  Wils said he barely spoke and used gestures like the traveling traders, but Wil said he understood him. He said ‘it was like he was inside my head.’”

“I’ll bring it up at council. He chooses to live up there in the lean-to? We have huts available down by the fens, since the last of the Wix crossed over.”

“Wils said he said something about the ‘whining bugs and dung hole.’ Wils couldn’t make no sense of it.”

“I’ll bring it up at council.”

Gilen had taken to holding the village council every tenday, since the sick of last spring. Many still whispered that the Wix family had died of the Evil, and the villagers were now suspicious of each other never mind any stranger.

There was that incident with those traveling traders from the South. Gillen had been away hunting and hadn’t been in the market that day. Young Fayn had sworn that the trader tongue gesture  was the “Evil Eye,” directed at her baby-not-yet-come. She has been touchy since she lost the last one. One thing lead to another and the villagers had driven away the traders hurling stones, and placed that gate up across the trade road. This leaf-fall, traders had been sparse, and what with the poor grain harvest there was more talk of the Evil in the village.

“Jenah has told me of the old man in the lean-to up the hill,” said Gilen after the opening salutation to the Spring God. “Have any had dealings with him?”

“Weird. Talks without talking.”

“My Kai says he tells stories. She likes him.”

“THAT’S what I’m worried about,” said Jenah,  a little louder than Gilen thought was necessary.

“He smells of a dirt-stew – all herbs and greens, and I don’t know what he eats; there is often a fire up there, but he’s never ask for a coal. He can’t have carried one all this time -he’s been here for three tenday councils.”

“Did any give him a coal?” demanded Gilen, more than a little concerned now.

There were many head shakes and murmurs “No.”

“My Kai says he has a bag of fire-starters.”

Murmurs of “Evil,” “Evil,” “Evil.” filled the room.

“Now hold on. The Grey One started fires and so did Wind” said Gilen.

“’Tis true,” said Wils, “and I have the Grey One’s fire board and stick, but I have not the knowin’ and doin’ to make it work.”

“Lack the magic or head muscle, maybe.”

“I didn’t see you so able, Duns,” snarled Wils.

“Steady. Fighting among ourselves will not help. Wils, you have talked with the stranger. How calls he himself?”

“Gilen. It’s strange. I do not remember him saying, bit I thinks he calls his name, Matluzek.’

“That’s right. That’s what my Kai said. Matluzek, the storyteller.”

“Strange name”

“Evil!”

“l’ll go talk with him at first sunwarm. Mai, do you think I might talk with your Kai tomorrow at fastbreak.”

“After her chores, please, Gilen, I have such wrang getting’ her to do the morning chores that she gets no breaksfast till they’re done.”

“I may have to try that with Jax,” chuckled Gilen. “And then could I talk with Mia, Jenah.”

“Well I told her she was not to talk with that stranger, so don’t make me a liar, but you best be prepared, so maybe yes. Right Wils?’”

“Don’t see the harm in it.”

 

Next morning Gillen talked with the children. Jax, his son, said “Sass says he’s Evil and bewitching to little girls.” His eldest son was having a hard time. He was still sore smitten with the Wix girl that died in the sick last spring. The loss changed Sass dark. On some further questioning Jax admitted that he had liked the old man, and loved the blackbird story. It made him feel better about himself.

Gilen spoke with the girls, Mia and Kai together and they couldn’t stop talking of the story.

“We all have colors inside us and they are all different and beautiful.”

“But the blackbird gave a little of his glossy black for feather outlines and circles so they could see their own beautiful colors.”

They also talked about the fire-starter bag, and another bag called a pole-changer, but they didn’t know what that was. Gilen had to admit he was intrigued and after a carrot and small potato he headed up the hill to see this Matluzek.

 

The lean-to was set in a clearing, facing South, so the afternoon sun came in. There was a stone fire-ring in front. On the east and west sides of the fire-ring were what looked like chairs, but made of stone. A smaller knee-height round stone in front and a larger flatter stone behind it. Gilen couldn’t remember these stone formations and he had walked these hills many times. But they couldn’t have been moved here; the seat stones were much too large for a man to move by himself and the chair back stones would require at least three men. Yet, here they were.

Matluzek, gestured for him to sit in the west chair.

Afterwards, Gilen couldn’t remember the spoken words of introduction. He remembered telling Matluzek that Gilen meant “vow” and that he was pledged to the village safety. Somehow he learned that Matluzek meant “light bearer” and that the old man had walked there from a very long way off.

Gilen and Matluzek spent the afternoon talking and sipped a tea that Matluzek shared along with a fruit he called an “apple,” which he said grew wild just two hills to the north.

Matluzek showed him his fire-starter bag and how to use it. Gilen realized that what Wils was so proud of, replacing the fir board with oak, lengthened the time to start a fire, and replacing the charcloth with fresh flaxcloth, meant that any spark burned out before it could light kindling. Matluzek’s fire-starter bag also had a bow to make moving the spindle easier on the hands. There was also a crystal, and a star metal rock and a flint ax, but Gilen couldn’t remember how they were used.

Matluzek told him to move the dung hole to the other side of the village, away from the spring, and to move or destroy the houses next to the fens. No one should live there for at least five all-seasons after the dung hole was moved.

There was much that Gilen could not remember afterwards. Something about moving those rocks by the pole-reverser using the power of the Earth to attract or repel. There were things about honey and bees, about herbs for wounds and pain. But it was all a blur, after the crowd surged up the hill shouting “Evil! Evil”

Young Fayn had lost her baby-not-yet-come and cried out in her pain “That Old Man is Evil!”

One of the first stones Gilen in the head and everything went black.

After, he learned that the villagers burned the lean-to, and destroyed the fire-starter bag and the old man’s dried food, herbs and possessions. Matluzek got away clutching what must have been the pole-changer bag.

“He must have been Evil. How else could an old man like that move so fast. He was gliding across the ground, his feet barely touching it. He disappeared and our fastest runners could not catch him.”

Gilen wished he could remember more about what the old man had told him, but the headache and dizziness seemed to be consuming more and more of it.  “Wasn’t there something about “women carrying a baby-not-yet-come should not drink tea of that fluffy white flowered plant, the wild carrot?”

Another white flash took Gilen’s memory and he collapsed back onto his pallet of furs on the floor.