Chapter 1
Footprints
Olwud’s sandal stopped next to a strange shape in the grass. He swept his cloak over a shoulder to squat down.
“Judd! Come and look at this.”
Judd left the sheep grazing nearby and padded over, wagging his scraggy tail. He sniffed at the grass and his black scruff bristled as he backed off with a growl.
“Have you ever seen anything like it, Judd? It's a footprint, and it's huge. What kind of creature leaves a track like that?”
He chewed his thumbnail as he counted four toes, each the size of his head. “It must be a giant!” He said, remembering his favourite childhood story. “But, I didn't know they were real...” It was said the giants lived in an ancient age before the tribes came to Opple Isle, so how could they be here now?
Invisible ants tickled his stomach as he placed a grubby hand on the flattened grass. Still warm. There was no doubt the owner of the footprint passed this way earlier that day.
He closed his eyes and fingered his way around the warm shape, trying to feel out another clue. The footprint sank deeper into the peaty soil at the front, near the toes, telling him it had been leaning forward, rushing.
How long would the strides of a running giant be? He straightened up and searched the soggy grass for more tracks.
And his jaw dropped. Giant footprints littered the ground all around him! At least seven sets of them came down from the moorland hills to his left.
Battered crook in hand, he pulled his wool cloak tight. On a normal day he'd be out grazing the flock until sunset, but this changed everything.
“Quick, Judd,” he said, spinning on the spot. “We'd better get back–”
The footprints led off in the same direction. The giants were headed straight towards...
“Home!”
Olwud belted down the sodden hill, his heart thumping like a hunted rabbit’s. His sandals skidded out to the sides and his stomach lurched as he fought to stay upright. He was going to fast! He jabbed the crook into the mud to gouge out a trough and slow his descent.
Judd went flying by.
“Whoa, Judd,” he called. “Get back to the flock, lad. I need you to stay with them.”
Judd skidded to a wet stop and barked twice to say he understood. He hung his head and started back up the slope.
As Olwud caught his breath, he noticed that no smoke seeped from the hut in the vale below. Where was Da, then? He should be out on the roof, fixing the leak. It wasn't like him to put off a job...
He checked on Judd behind and then resumed his dash towards home.
Even the familiar smell of dung offered no comfort as he reached the firmer ground within the higgledy-piggledy fences of the homestead. He unlatched the sheep's gate and glanced back up Kittor, where a black spot darted around behind the hazy flock.
Pigs in the next pen started to squeal.
“Not feeding time yet,” he said as he rubbed mud from his cheek and headed down the straw path with rough log fences to either side, trying to shut out the chorus of honks, bleats and whineys.
As he came to the mud hut called home, he ducked under the straw-thatch roof to enter the shaded room with upright beams and hanging woven blankets. On the opposite side of the rock-ringed fire pit was a hunched over man, his face buried in clean hands.
“Da! Come quick. Footprints on the fells! You won't believe the size of them.”
Da didn't move a muscle.
“They passed right by the homestead. Come and see!”
Olwud's father turned up his face with tears shining in his grey eyes.
“Da, what's wrong? Are you crying?”
“Don't be stupid.” Da gave a heavy sigh and rose to his feet, brushing back long hair with trembling hands.
Olwud watched him pace, his face contorted under his spiral cheek tattoos. This wasn't like Da. He could solve any problem that came his way. Couldn't he?
“They came here,” Da said. “The Karnok. I'm sorry, son. We have to leave.”
Olwud's world came to a stop.
“But, this is our home…” His own words sounded far away.
“Not any more, son. Opple is changing. We have to go. Today.”
“Where? What do you mean?”
Da fixed him with bloodshot eyes and grabbed his shoulder so tight it hurt.
“We both knew this would happen one day. We don't belong here any more. You'll understand when you're older.”
“But I'm nearly thirteen! I’ll be a man in the summer. Why don't you just tell me what's going on?”
“I wish it was that simple.” Da stepped back to pick up a pony-skin pack from the shadows. He pushed it into Olwud's chest and the sudden weight pulled him a step forward.
Puzzled, he frowned up at Da's weathered face.
“Since you were small, you always wanted to learn magic. Well, now’s your chance. There's someone at Ronsbry who will teach you if you deliver a whole flock of wool to him. I know this is all very sudden, but I have packed all you'll need for the journey and you do know the way.”
“We're leaving home just so I can sell some wool?”
“No.” Da's eyes fell to the blackened space where no fire burned. “We’re leaving home so we can both be men of destiny. You go your way, I go mine.”
“But, why can’t I come with you?”
Da shook his head.
“To be a man, you have to start acting like one. Today, we go our separate ways, son. You don’t know the life I had before I met your mother, but it's caught up with me. I can’t take you, I’m sorry. Besides, you’ll soon be your own man. You don’t want me telling you what to do all the time, do you? The only advice I can give to you, is be true to who you are. Get to Ronsbry. Find the Guardian.”
Olwud's head buzzed like angry bees. He wasn't ready to fend for himself in the world. Not yet. The pack dropped at his feet.
“No. I don't want to. I want to come with y-”
Da leapt forward, his fist raised. Light exploded in his head and the ground tilted up to hit him in the back. He retched but nothing came.
Da’s shadow fell over him.
“We can never escape who we truly are, Olwud,” he said. “Get to Ronsbry. Find the Guardian. Go!”
An angry river raged in his ears as he jumped to his feet and stormed towards the light of the doorway. Without a thought, he kicked out at a pile of clay pots and the largest imploded. The stack collapsed with a smash, spilling broken shards across the floor. Olwud shouldered his pack with a grunt as he stomped out into the midday sun.
* * *
He lurched to a stop on Kittor's rugged summit and bent over, trying to work out why his sandal was sticking to his foot. Blood. He sighed. Something twisted in his chest as he thought about Da.
A cold wind blew up from the vale, sending a shiver right through him. He grabbed the hem of his cloak and wiped his nose, remembering his early hunting lessons among the browning trees of the Kernwy Forest below. The vale around the homestead had been his home his entire life. What was he supposed to do now?
He slumped to the ground and held a palm to the burning egg over his left eye as a chill soaked up through his tunic.
Life wasn't fair. He'd lost Ma to the fishing accident when he was just a boy and now he was losing Da too. Why was this happening? He wasn't a bad person, was he? He curled and held himself tight because nobody else would...
Judd padded up to rest a greying chin on his arm. Olwud rubbed is eyes as the black nostrils twitched and the flock settled nearby to graze on the long grass.
“You're a good dog,” he said, taking Judd in his arms. “Why can't people be more like animals, eh? Let’s be best friends forever…”
Judd panted and smiled as Olwud rooted a waterskin from his pack, splashed his face, and then unlaced his sandal to wash away drying mud and blood. Water bit into the wound near his big toe. So he found his raven-skin pouch and picked out a small ball of cobweb. He tore off a piece and pressed it under the flap of skin.
“Right then, Judd,” he said, wrapping his foot in a strip of frayed cloth. “It's up to us now. We have to care for the flock on our own. Da wants us to sell wool to some Guardian at Ronsbry.”
Olwud rose to his feet and shook his head. “But I've got a better idea. There's someone I want to speak to first.”
Judd let out a long yawn that ended in a squeal and turned up his watery brown eyes.
“You and me, Judd. Let's track down some giants.”