Rewind- part 5 (Caramon)

Entering his rock/peat hut Caramon could smell the after scents of a recent vision quest.

“Rhiannon?” he called out just as his beautifully voluptuous wife swept the hides aside showing her location to be their sleeping chamber.

“Come to me my husband. I am wet and my centre longs for your touch.” She beckoned slowly backing as he entered their inner most room, keeping the same teasing distance between them. When she could back no further she spread herself atop the hides and blankets as one would a festival meal, slowly drawing her hands up her legs pulling her leathers up with them. Never one to turn down a ‘meal’ Caramon enjoyed the tastes and sensations only his mate could provide. As they lay gathering their breath and wits Rhiannon whispered to her man using words rather then the grunts and moans of the past several minutes.

“I have spoken to ‘The Ancestors’.”

“Did they tell you to rut my brains out” Caramon asked grinning.

“No Caramon they said as the chief of our tribe I must cast you out.” She replied holding his face so she could see in his eyes the understanding of the import of her words.

“I was not meant to survive the battle with Wormwood.” He stated twisting out of her grasp and sitting up, her words confirming a fear he had felt since his recovery.

“You are strong my love but our people will not believe that strong and you were bitten. It will be only until the next cycle that you remain human, your destiny is to be one of the ‘Shadow Walkers’. In the morning the tribe will meet and I will be made to pronounce you ‘outcast’.”

“Do you fear me?” he asked pleading with her, for the answer he sought, with his eyes.

“Not this night.” She answered as she bent to breathe life back into his withered manhood.

Rhiannon and Caramon waxed and waned the entire night, enjoying pleasures the two had so long thought forgotten under the weight of the acceptance of their separate tribal responsibilities. Too soon the first guinea crowed signaling his coming exile. Caramon slipped from beneath his lover’s; his wife’s; his chieftess’ grasp not wanting to rouse her as he prepped for his journey.

Gathering provisions for three days and spare togs he stuffed them into a bladder. Securing his sabers he flipped the bladder over his back, hefted his staff and parted the furs overhanging the entrance to his ‘love’ room. Looking once more at the most beautiful woman his eyes had ever beheld he cold but marvel at the love she was capable of in choosing to lead her people. Feeling his groin stir he left with that thought still clinging to the edges of his mind.

“I will miss you my love. Journey safely my wolf, my Phaedrus.” Rhiannon mumble to herself as tears falling from her hazel eyes.

Stepping out into the thickening dawn Caramon looked over the huts of his people content that in spite of loosing their shaman they would do well under the guidance of his wife and chieftess, Rhiannon. Setting course Caramon mac Bochra journey west out of Skara Brae wishing to remain in darkness as long as possible.

Slowly the edges of the memory grew faint and spidered inward until all that remained was the wispy fragments felt as one awakens from sleep. Carefully Phae finished wiping down the sabre with the oilclothe he had in hand and placed it gingerly atop its twin. Wrapping both in a cracked and weathered animal bladder he secured both in the ornate box that was their home. The box in turn was placed in a cubby beneath the bar to await the time when the hunt would be resumed.