A Lofty Perch

Ardo sat perched in a tall tree, looking for signs of game on the plain beyond the edge of the forest. The brief Torvaldsland summer had arrived and life was blossoming all around him. His nostrils were filled with the astringent scent of pine resin, some of which he picked from the bark of his perch and stowed in his pouch; pine resin had many uses, but Ardo used it mixed with powdered charcoal to make a strong glue with which he mounted arrowheads to the shaft of his hunting arrows. He often gave a few pieces to Aellah the Jarlswoman and Healer, which she used in several of her medical preparations. 

Distant movement registered on his peripheral vision and his head swung quickly to allow him to focus on the source of the movement. Nothing showed, but with the patience of the hunter he kept his eyes on a distant bush. After a while he relaxed and allowed himself to scan a wider area. Movement again and his green eyes pulled focus on a deer which seemed to be limping, injured somehow. He thought about sliding down the tree to track the hapless beast, but in a flash the deer was set upon by a kur! The large bipedal canine moved with alarming speed, burying its huge claws and teeth into the stricken deer. Ardo watched horrified as the kur tore the poor deer apart in a savage feeding frenzy. The deer was being eaten alive!

Ardo took the time now to study the kur; it was a sorry-looking specimen, probably an outcast or a stray, but nonetheless a dangerous and fearsome creature. Ardo was glad he was down wind of it, for even a mangy kur was a dangerous opponent for a man, no matter what his skill-at-arms. Kurii were as smart as humans and had much better hearing and sense of smell, so Ardo stayed perched in his tree until the dreadful kur moved on, dragging the remains of the deer behind it.

It was then the memories of the kur raid on his former village of Søtvann came flooding back to him. The raid had cost the lives of his companion of many years, Holga, and that of a damn fine bond maid Ama. Ardo had been knocked unconscious and he had fallen into a fissure in the rocks, where he lay until he regained consciousness; by which time the raid was over and Søtvann had burned to the ground.

For a moment a surge of intense hatred overcame him; hatred for the vile kurii and all of their kind. This was tempered by the memory of brave Mamut, his friend. Mamut had saved his sister and daughter, at the cost of his own life. Ardo looked to the sky and imagined fearless Mamut, his place above the salt on Odin's table in Valhalla. Ardo's hatred was replaced with a smile of pride as he remembered his brave friend, and that his daughter was now apprentice to his sister Maeve, safe now as a potter in Kassau.

Ardo slid down the trunk of the tree carefully, and then his interest was piqued by a fine tabuk buck, perfectly posed in range of his longbow. 

Ardo knocked an arrow and did what he did best.