A chill night, long ago. A desolate landscape, moon-washed, its copsewood petrified by frost. From afar, a solitary hunter going about his business would have seen an unnatural reddish-orange glow framing the hills to the North-West. He might have halted in his quest to wonder at this unfamiliar sight, to muse upon its source, but more likely would have assumed just a trick of the ether, some unexplained afterglow of a forgotten sunset, and continued to follow the invisible trail - the pattern, instilled from childhood and now instinctive, of signs and smells, clues and traces - in pursuit of boar, or deer, or bear.
Nearer now, as the hunter stole his way through the forest cloaking the shallow valley, weaving silently, expertly, through the maze of trees half-seen, half-sensed, his ears attuned to the least rustle of the leaf litter, the tiniest snap of a twig, he might have thrilled to the faint crackle and spit of a distant conflagration. And as he lifted his eyes skyward, he would have seen the black bulk of the Tor rearing up above the trees, its silhouette obscuring the view of more distant hills, and would then have witnessed the shower of sparks that spewed from its summit, to rise in eccentric spirals until absorbed into the night sky.
The urge to know more, to seek an explanation, would seize his spirit, and as his pace quickened involuntarily, his eyes would defy the discipline of his craft, and instead of straining to spot any minute disturbance of the ground in the faint moonlight filtering through the trees, would remain fixed on the spectacle now displayed, ever closer.
All stealth and caution abandoned, he would soon be in full flight, passing soundlessly through the confusion of trees with the confidence of intimate knowledge, but with no regard for the quest which so recently absorbed his concentration and stretched every sinew.
Emerging from the forest, nearing the base of the Tor, he would hear for the first time the clamour of a multitude, steadily swelling in volume, at first chaotic and discordant, then gradually coalescing into an ordered chant: rhythmical, insistent, compelling. By now, the chase forgotten, he would be gripped by an insatiable curiosity. Climbing steadily, breaching hedges, skirting copses, he would come at last to the summit, where he would encounter the mighty outer rampart of the hill fort. Now the roar of the inferno within and the tumult of incantation would not only assault his ears, but would seem to take possession of his very soul, with an urgency which demanded his attention.
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An excited throng of babbling humanity is streaming its way up the hillside. Insinuating himself, unnoticed, into its midst, he passes through the great gateway, and into the enclosed interior of the encampment, where, as the spectacle unfolds before them, men, women and children alike yield up, as one, a collective gasp.
There are more people than our hunter has ever seen in one place before. He witnesses scenes of ritual entrancement: whirling bodies - most naked except for the livid blue and white of the dyes which adorn them; massed ranks of chanting druids in enveloping robes of pale cloth; drummers beating hide-covered drums with furious intent; tongues of fire that lash at the unwary, and swathes of dense swirling smoke which engulf them. By now his head is swimming with the intoxication of the occasion: he begins to feel delirious as the feverish, frenzied carousal ebbs and flows around him. And then, at last, as he swoons on the verge of dementia, as the pulse of the rite reaches its climax, and the baying of the crowd rises to a deafening crescendo ...
Silence.
A tall, authoritative figure steps forward: gaunt, white-bearded, austere. The hunter recognises, from remembered legend, a Great High Druid of the Defnas tribe, his raised arms, with palms turned outwards, the signal to silence the throng. He is clad in robes of a magnificent golden hue – a colour of fabric unknown to the hunter. On his head he wears a crown of plaited laurel, and at his left shoulder his cloak is fastened by a spectacular brooch of burnished bronze, its metallic gleam riveting the hunter’s eye.
There is a tingle of excitement. The assembled host presses forward, and the air seems to buzz with their collective expectation. All eyes are fixed on the ceremonial enclosure, where a small party advances from the shadows into the blaze-light, at its head a white-cowled priest, his arms, with fists clenched, outstretched before him, a cloth of purple draped across them. Immediately behind is a group of three - two more druids flanking the pathetic figure of a boy of no more than fifteen summers. Sparsely clad in a leather tunic, his shoulders bare, he stands, head downcast, visibly trembling. His arms are bound behind his back. In the fire’s glow his sweat-beaded skin bears an unnatural copper cast.
The High Druid turns to face the party, his back to the crowd. Feet jostle and necks strain to gain a better view. Eyes closed, face raised to the black sky with arms held aloft, he is murmuring some kind of invocation, too quiet to discern, but this produces a reaction from the stilled multitude, a sudden stirring of anticipation, although none dare utter a sound. Then at length, his communion with the Gods complete, he lowers his arms to receive the proffered object. The bearer steps aside. He turns again, and with both hands upon the hilt raises above his head a long, broad blade of iron. Its lustrous surface, multi-faceted from the blows of the hammer which forged it, flashes orange and gold, reflecting the flames of the blazing pyre, and as he holds it aloft, turning this way and that in provocative display, a savage cry goes up from the horde - a frightful, blood-curdling bellow that implores, cajoles - demands satiation.