There is no place in this world anymore for an old wolf.

This should not come as a surprise to me for there was never any place for me to begin with. Thus, I shall at last go to the west where the Tuatha went, and I shall find the peace I could not find here, nor in any land save perhaps my own as it once was. I will take the path across the ocean and the straight way to the Blessed Isle will bring me peace at last.

I have been happy here, if only for a while. When I reached this place I thought I had found the end of my journey, but no journey ever ends until the ending of the world.

I will be glad to look upon my brother again in the sunset lands when my time comes. We shall meet again as we promised.

And thus I leave this tale, my tale that my daughter and the sons of my daughter shall keep for me until the bones of their new buried mother lie bare in the sacred ground where the Queens of Ulster were ever sent back to their mother Eire.

My tale begins far to the east among the cold lands of the Schwaben, the Suevi in the hills that you will pass through as you seek the mountains, the land that was named Agri Decumates until the empire fell three hundred years or more before. This is where I was born, the firstborn son of the King Fendefric of the Olfrlingas. I nearly killed my mother coming out of her, so large was I and I have continued that to this day. Some call me a giant.

I was born to be the king. This I knew from the moment I could understand it. All through my childhood I was taught what a king should know, how to fight, how to make treaties, how to marry.

My brother was born when I had seen but two winters. At his birth, the wise woman cast the runes and said 'This boy will serve a god'. My father asked which one. She said 'none that you know'.

His birth was much to the disgruntlement of my mother who wished for a daughter. One son is highly desirable, two is good but only as long as both do not live. An heir and a spare, as I have heard it said. A daughter could have been given to another king and cemented an alliance. Still, two sons was a blessing enough and better than two daughters. Myself, I adored my fair little brother, who as a child was as beautiful as our mother, where men would look on my father and I and exclaim that there must be a mirror between us that shows the past or the future. I played with him in the snow and among the trees in the summer and it was I that taught him to use a sword and took him into the caves of our friends the Dokkalfar, the Nibelungen to see the wonders there. It was I that kept him warm at night with black fur.

At my coming of age, I received my claw and he at his a sword. There are no swords for one such as I nor claws for such as him. They were of finest workmanship and beautiful each in their own way. My brother asked of me.

'Why do I have a sword, brother?'

'You are a man now.' I said

'You are a man too.'

'I am a wolf. You know this. Have you not seen it?'

'You look like a man. You speak like one.'

'At heart I am a wolf, who wears the skin of a man. Like our father. You are like our mother, who is the daughter of a man. These things simply are. Only Wotan Allfather can say why.'

'I would I could ask him.'

'Then you must become a shaman and hang upon Yggdrasil til he comes to you.' I said, and I was smiling as I did so. He nodded, very seriously.

'I shall become so.' He said.

Shortly afterwards he asked leave to study with the shamans far to the north. Our father gave it with pleasure, for it was an honour to have such a one in the family. I did not see my little brother again for many years.

When he returned, for the sending of my father to his skyfather above, he was tall and strong and he wore the mark upon his face and the look in his eye of one who has hung dismembered on the tree and found what he sought and also not what he sought.

'Well?' I asked him. 'Did you find your answer?'

'Yes.' He said. 'But I am forbidden to speak it.'

'That is well.' I said. 'You will sing our father's death then? And our mother's, for she says will not live without him.'

'I will.'

'And will you remain afterwards and advise me? I would fain have you by my side, brother.'

He smiled at me. 'I will do this thing.'

So we stood together by the fire and wept together. And he stood by me as I underwent the ordeal and gained the mark of the king, we mirrored each other's souls.

One day in high spring he came to me asking for leave to wed his beloved, a highborn Suevi shieldmaiden named Agnethe and I gave it gladly. She was as the young new corn and proud and strong like a she-wolf and they were happy together, though they did have some loud and fiery shouting matches at times. I welcomed her into my hall and welcomed each son and daughter they brought forth, beautiful nieces and nephews all, a few the very image of their uncle. It is good to be a favourite uncle and dandle a child upon your knee, yet not have to change their breechclouts. Dear Agnethe found me so many brides, but I did not want to wed yet. I desired a woman as wild as I and there are few of those about.

When the summer came, behind it flew my wyrd on wings of black flame. It was the Franks. They were filling the world with themselves and they came at last into our mountains and though we rode out against them, they were too many. It is my shame that I did not fall in battle that day, a shame that has haunted me till now when all shames are forgotten at the end of my days. I lived, but so did my people, scattered among the Franks. We were made to live with them and thus like a plague among close crowded townfolk did their religion spread to my people so that they forgot Wotan and Thunnor and Frigg and knew only Iehovah and the Sun Lord Adonay Ieshua and his virgin mother, Mariam of Nazareth. At last it reached my own brother and that was enough for me. I told him that I must go away, for I could no longer be king of a people if my way was not as their way and that he must be king now in my place. For my love for him and for my people were both great and I would have both loves comfort each other in my loss. I promised to meet him again at the end of our lives. At first I thought I should give up my life and go to my ancestors in my shame, but that was not to be so. For as I slept, little and fitfully knowing what I must do, the Allfather came to me with Huginn and Muninn upon his shoulder and spake thusly 'Go West. Life is peaceful there.'

And so the next day I did as I was bidden. I left my most treasured possessions deep in a secret cave and took with me only what I needed. A little food, a warm coat some armour, a knife for food and I set out for the setting sun. I travelled for many months. I was given hospitality at the halls of Frankish lords and their Salian cousins when I reached the land of the Belgae. At last I came to the sea. I had never seen the sea before. But I had been told there was another land across it, the Island of the Mighty, Albion of the Romans, Prydain. It occurred to me that the Allfather had not told me when I should stop going west, so I had best keep going as long as I could. I took ship from the shore with some dark-skinned traders from far to the south. No-one else would allow such a wild stranger on board, but gold has ever turned the eyes of men and the gold of a king had I then.

We landed on the shores of Caer Went that is now East Anglia and I smelled first the marshes of that land, but the reek was as heaven to me, for it was the smell of land and I had the a terrible seasickness and always have. I far prefer the solid ground beneath me. I bid the dark men farewell, for they were off to the north to trade fine cloth for iron and bronze and finely crafted things and set myself on the roads to the west. As I walked I smelled something strange but familiar.

Soon I was met by a part of riders in costly attire and the leader hailed me and asked whither I was going alone in their lands at such a time. I said I was naught but a simple traveller going west to seek my fortune. Though I understood it, their tongue was strange to me then, but now I know they had become a little british and caught their strange half-roman, half-gael ways of speaking as I have no doubt I have myself enow. The head of their party, an upright man with stern brow and a fine red-gold beard looked me over and said 'thy hands are the hands of one who has carried arms and thy bearing is one of nobility. Thy cloak, though worn, is fine. If thou art a simple traveller then I am a welshman.'

You must understand that this word 'welsh' means in our tongue slave or bondsman, for so the britons were to my people in that land.

'What are you fleeing, o simple traveller?'

I lifted the hood from my face and stood to my full height. 'I flee shame and dishonour, sir. I ask of whom I beg forgiveness for my deception.' The men around the noble stranger gasped and the one closest to him said. 'Can it be that you do not know the Bretwalda, the High King of Britain?'

'Hold, Eni.' The Bretwalda said. 'Canst thou not tell he is but recently come from across the sea? Do his clothes not smell of brine? I am Raedwald of the Wufingas, what is thy name?'

It was then that I recognised what I had smelled earlier and it was another of my kind. I saw Raedwald smile and show his sharp teeth.

'I am Fendegist of the Olfrlingas.' Answered I.

'Why then we are certainly cousins of some kind.' Raedwald said. It was clear that he too knew of what kind. 'I say thou shalt return with me to my hall and stay a while.'

'You are truly kind, Bretwalda.' Said I.

And so I went to the hall of Bretwalda wondering if I had indeed found what I sought, a kingdom that did not bow before the Nazarene and forbid all gods but their own. It seems I was only partly mistaken, for Raedwald showed to me his place of two altars, one to the christian god and one to the gods of our people. He told me that in his hall, at the insistence of his wife Berhta all men should worship what God they wished and call their skyfather by what name they chose. He said that the priests of the christian church had almost persuaded him to renounce the gods of our people altogether, but his wife would not allow it. Berhta reminded me greatly of my brother's wife. Indeed, it seemed as if Raedwald, his younger brother Eni and his wife held up a mirror to my own life. I felt at home in his hall in a manner I had not since I had departed my home. Raedwald and his wife and brother and his three sons welcomed me.

But again my wyrd cast a dark cloud over me, for one cannot escape one's dishonour even among friends who knew nothing of it. (Raedwald did not ask me why I quit my throne..there was another dispossessed one in his hall, named Edwin, so I can but assume he made a habit of it. I spoke to Edwin of Northumbria but briefly, long enough only to understand our shared pain.) For into the hall of Raewald there came the servant of my enemy that was in Rome, and his name was Augustine, fresh from converting the Kentish King and on his way to strut like a painted cockerel before the Bishops of Cymru.

I stayed well out of his way, as did the queen and the others who remained faithful to our gods, and poor Raedwald was left alone to justify his double altar to that one, who, thinking nothing of women but evil assumed the decision was his alone. I avoided Augustine well until his last night in the hall when he found me at the Feast of Spring.

'You sir, I have seen you often, and always your back. It is surely rude not to introduce yourself.' He said, speaking our tongue crudely, and with a harsh gaulish and latin accent.

'Forgive me, o august one.' I replied, holding my temper by a short leash for I did not wish to shame Raedwald in his hall. 'I did not wish to intrude upon your most valuable time. I am Fendegist.'

'Are you not a christian then, or is that mark but a relic of your youth?' He asked.

'I do not serve the Nazarene.' I said, now biting back my rage at his impertinence.

He rolled his eyes. 'Like so many in this hall. Such disregard f...'

I do not know what happened then, only one thing I am sure of, it was not I that spoke then, but something that spoke through me with a voice like the whispering of the leaves of Yggdrasil the World-Ash and the roar of Fenris enchained in one. Perhaps it was Loki, for he is ever a troublemaker. I know naught, but that I spake thus.

'Thou hast dishonoured thy God by thy behaviour in this hall! In the house of Maria and Marta Ieshua the Nazarene was courteous and kind to those who waited on him and their guests and he did he not provide fine wine for those who invited him to their wedding? Thou who shalt bring down the gentlest and purest form of thy faith over a triviality of springtime celebrations to further thine own ambitions, I curse thee! Build thy church quickly, o blasphemer and in vain, for thou shalt not see it finished, nor shall thou see ten years more!' And then though I am no weakling, as voice left me I fell against the table. Augustine's face became as the fresh fallen snow and he muttered at me asking of how I knew of his plans for a church, before he fled the room in terror.

'Fendegist!' Raedwald was greatly angry with me. 'How dare you prophesy doom upon a guest in my house!'

I was shamed, for though I knew it was not I that spoke, I felt I had betrayed my friend's trust in me.

'Husband, you are a fool.' Berhta said, coldly furious. 'Do you not see it is not Fendegist that spoke against the christian, but some god, angered at the insults laboured upon him by that so-called holy man?'

At this the men and women in the hall stepped away from me, regarding me warily as if I had thrown a fit.

'Is it so, Fendegist?' Raedwald asked.

'I do not know.' I answered. 'I was filled with great rage at the slights, yes, but I would not dishonour you, my friend. But regardless, the damage is done, and I must make amends. I will go and make my apologies to the priest.'

Raedwald furrowed his brown. 'I will not see you so shamed and grovelling.'

'Say instead then I shall leave and say unto the priest that you have banished me from the hall for my insult. All here will know different but will not speak thus, but all honour will be satisfied.'

Raedwald clapped his hand upon my shoulder and there was sorrow in his eyes. I knew he did not wish me to leave, but knew it was best. I embrace him as a brother and then went to my room to fetch my things and left the hall of my friend. I turned my face west, as ever I knew I would, until I could go no farther and in the red light of the setting sun I saw a vision. Raedwald lay dead and his kingdom turned to blood around me, as his kin turned christian saints fought over it until finally it was taken by his enemies and at last by northmen and his line deposed. I wept for I knew what I saw would come to pass, and so, and so I could not stay nor could I return and warn him of his doom.

A hand rested on my shoulder. I turned to see who was there and saw a woman, cloaked and hooded.

'What fate have you seen, Fendegist King?' She asked.

'I dare not speak of it, lady.' I replied and her voice was that of Berhta.

'My husband sends word of his sorrow that he could not come and bid you farewell and asks that you should return some day.'

'I wish it could be so.' Said I. 'But my wyrd draws me ever westward.'

'Then I pray you find what you seek. And I have counsel for you, since you are going west. When I was but a child, my nurse was a slave woman of the british iceni and she spoke to me and told me tales of great glory from before our people came to these lands, of their british hero, Artorius the Dux Bellorum and High King of Britain. And she spoke also of his sister the enchantress Morgainne of the Alfar and the Isle of Avalon wherein she is the Lady of the Lake and dwells immortal beyond time and guards the ways of the old british gods till the christians are forgotten. So I counsel thee, wrap thyself in the cloak of a pilgrim, go to Somerset and seek the Summer Sea that surrounds the Isle of Glastonbury. If it is not dried up and the way gone perhaps there you will keep our ways alive forever as she does, if she is real and not a child's tale. For they will not last here, for all my husband's brave words about every man shall have his god will die with him.'

I looked upon Raedwald's lady and knew that she too had seen the doom of her husband and I wondered what strength there is in woman that she watches man come from her womb and die in a heartbeat. And I remembered my mother casting herself into the flames and knew what it was that had spoken through me.

'O Queen, I thank thee for thy counsel and will go where you say, if you will tell me the way to Somerset.'

'It is south and west. Thou willt find other pilgrims on the road, for there is a monastery on Glastonbury Isle.'

'I cannot go to a monastery.'

'It is not the monastery thou seekst. Now go, quickly, before I am persuaded to make you return to us.'

And so I left the queen to her doom and turned a little to the south. After all I was still going west. I met with pilgrims on the road from Londinium and Verulamium and Viroconium, pious and friendly folk glad of the company of another strong man to protect them from roving packs of landless britons and saxons. I avoided questions as usual and most assumed I was a foreigner going to the monastery and I did not know the way. I walked hooded and robed for many days until we reached a wide lake, surrounded by grass and trees. It was bright day and the sun sparkled off the waters. The sound of church bells echoed across the lake and nuns filed past me. I remember thinking that this was the last place I wished to be as I waited for the boats to come.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw a figure dressed in bright robin-red robes among the trees by the lake. I turned and it was gone. Then it appeared again. I looked around to make certain all were busy and then slipped off towards the trees. I saw no-one, but by the waters edge a coracle awaited me. Intrigued, I stepped into it and it began to float away from the bank. There was no oar, so I sat and waited as I drifted out into the lake, thinking I should paddle with my hands if it came to it. Away to my right, the Isle of Glastonbury loomed over the sparkling lake and tiny boats moved away from it. My little boat floated away from the Isle across the lake and slowly out of sight of land. I could see nothing around me but waters, until a sunbeam hit me midgaze and I closed my watering eyes. And when I opened them again, suddenly the Isle was before me. It had appeared during the few seconds my eyes had been closed and now it was glistening, a great emerald, in the midday sun.

As the boat floated in, the figure in scarlet stood upon a jutting out of rock that made a quay at the side of the water. I could not tell if it was carved by the hand of man or was an outgrowing from the living rock itself. As I drew closer I saw the immortal face of the Lady of the Lake, dark elflocks and a hard face crowned with ice-blue eyes. I stood in my boat as it touched the side and bowed low before her. She extended a hand, accepting the courtesy.

‘Know now, Fendegist King that thou art the first and the last saxon who will ever set foot on this Blessed Isle.’ She said as she guided me onto the rock. Her voice was like ice melting in the spring thaw and made me think of my homeland.

In all my years I had seen none before as beautiful as the Lady of the Lake and none since save for my sweet lady Macha. She was like the full moon in summer, her dark and soulful radiance warmed me to the bone and yet the ice dagger of her gaze stripped my mind bare.

When I could finally speak again, I said ‘Surely, I have come at last to the place I seek.’

The lady shook her head. ‘No. I foresaw your coming but a day or so ago. I was not expecting you. If you were to remain here I would have seen more. You are as much a surprise guest as anyone ever is in Avalon. You may remain here for rest and succour, but you must go on until you finally come to the place where you will keep the old ways forever.’

‘I cannot do that here?’ I must have sounded like a spoiled child, compared to her.

The Lady smiled. ‘Your old ways are not our old ways. We hold in common that they are to be changed and hidden by the christians, but that is all. Ours is the way of peace and healing and the goddess, your way is that of the sky father and the cold lands, the way of noble war and a great death. You are day, we are night. Do you understand this? You cannot remain here for you would wither away and die like the tree that is deprived of sunlight. For the sake of the truth we both serve, I will look into my mirror and seek for you your path from here, but you cannot stay.’

I understood her words and was saddened by them, but glad I would find respite here. It was hard not to be glad in such a place. She led me to her mirror, which was the sacred well in the stone circle. I saw beside and within it the shadow of another well, the well on the Isle of Glastonbury and knew that the two were one, the undine within was of both and they were images of each other. She looked into the mirror and her eyes did not move for a while. The she looked up and at me.

‘You must continue as you have done so far.’ She said. ‘West, ever west. But you shall not travel blind. I will tell you what is there, it is the green land of the goddesses Eire, Fodhla and Banba. This is as far as a mortal can travel west for after this comes the great ocean from which none has ever returned. There are still kingdoms in this land that have never seen the coming of a christian priest. But they will, and so this is not the end of your journey, though you shall remain there a long while. Your way is across the ocean by the lost paths that lead to the Isle of the Blessed where the People of Dana went long ago by roads across the sea and under the earth. It is only beyond the ninth wave, this place and there you will keep your way until the Ragnarok comes and the world ends and begins again, or until the time comes for your gods to return. I have spoken.’

It brought gladness to my heart to have things made clear to me and that my wyrd at last should be unwound before me. I did not know how I should pass beyond the ninth wave, but I knew I would die trying if need be, as it has always been so with me.

And so I spent but a few days on the Isle of Avalon before I was returned to the shore and sound of monastery bells and walked again upon the path of my wyrd, ever westward.

I crossed the wide lands that lead to Cornwall and sunken Lyonesse and at last reached the sea again. The snow swathed mountains of Cymru stood to the north of me and across the waters Eire awaited me. Once again I was made to seek the help of fishermen and traders to cross them. The White Veiled sisters of Sinadon bid me farewell as they vanished into the sea mists, and I left at last the Island of the Mighty.

When we landed on the green isle and I had finished emptying the contents of my stomach onto the solid ground, I looked upon this new place and drank in its scent. It was fresh and new, as if I had sailed into the childhood of the world. And so I set off again towards the sinking sun. I came across many christians, but they were different from the ones I knew. They did not call me heathen or blasphemer, nor did they forbid the worship of all gods but theirs, seeking only to emulate the life of Ieshua and live as he did for love and wisdom. I saw at last christianity as it could have been without men like Augustine and the legendary Bishop Patricius, but I knew that it could not remain like this, for it is the fools that have the loudest voices. I arrived at the shores of the great ocean and knew I could go no further. No-one knew of any land beyond this furthest west save Tir na Nogh, the Isle of the Blessed. So I turned north for I found it very uncomfortably warm this far south and the summer was coming. I passed through Tara and into Ulster where I came at last into a lush forest.

In the distance I heard the sounds of battle. The very noise of swords clashing has always been enough to stir my blood, but I had gone as a pilgrim without weapon for a long time now, and there was only my claws and my fangs.

And so, I ran on four feet into the battle and saw a proud and tall woman laying about some ruffians with a great sword half her size. One against five is never fair, so I decided both honour and amusement indicated taking the woman’s side. I dived into the fray and tore out three throats before they knew what had befallen them. The woman slew the other two and stood there panting in her fine robes, her sword drenched in their blood. She regarded me slowly, watching to see if I would attack and I had a good view of what was perhaps the most beautiful creature in the world. Her crimson curls fell to her waist, escaping from the finely carved bone hair-comb. Her eyes were the green of the trees and the grass of Eire and her face was fine-boned with high cheeks and a noble nose. She was not fat, nor was she thin but all shapely curves and lean muscle moving beneath the robes. As I gazed upon her, I longed to strip off those royal clothes and take her to myself. She was a woman in the prime of life, and she smelt of sweat and costly perfumes, a Queen or some high-born lady I was sure. When she spoke, it was in a language I did not know, for it was gaelic. She strode over to me and inspected me, then smiled and patted my head, thinking me someone’s dog. She looked around for my owner and when none came, she turned on her heel and began to walk away. I changed back into the shape of a man and quickly stole the cloak from the back of a dead man and covered myself so as not to alarm her. Then I cleared my throat. She turned around and looked upon me in shock, for I was wild and my beard grown long with years of wandering. She was not shocked for long though, as she broke into smiles and spoke a word which I now know was ‘Sidhe’. She took me for a fairy.

‘Forgive me lady.’ Said I. ‘I do not understand.’

‘Th’are a saxon sidhe?’ She said in my tongue, though heavy with a gaelic accent and laughed. ‘That is new to me. Are their aelfs coming now across the seas too?’

‘I am no alfar, lady.’

‘A sorceror then.’ She smiled and lit my world with her bright lips. ‘I needed no help from thee sorceror, but I thank tha all the same. Wilt tha come with me to my home and rest awhile. Perhaps we shall find thee some more clothes?’ She laughed. ‘Unless th’wilt come as a wolf.’

I lowered my head in shame and then lifted it and smiled at the wild celt woman as I had not for a long time.

‘That is well with me, lady.’

‘I am Macha, Queen of Ulster, the last to bear that name. What are you?’ She returned my smile again and laughed at her own rudeness.

‘I am called Fendegist. Once I was king of the Orlfrlingas, but that was in the past and another country.’ Said I.

And the rest, my children you know. Now at last the tale shall end, for I am too old for any wandering except the last one. I go into the west beyond the ninth wave as the allfather and the lady of avalon foresaw, and what I will find there I do not know, but know that I will always be close, you have but to call on me for in the end of every tale is the beginning of a new one.

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