The winds had died down to a mere whisper around midnight, but the penetrating cold remained and cut deep to the bone. It was the time of the new moon, and the canopy of the heavens was clear, and stars spangled the curtain of darkness with a brilliance that took one’s breath away. The air was full with anticipation and promise.

The initiates stood shivering in their white robes girt with a heavy golden cord, as twenty Priests stood behind them intoning a slow rhythmic chant. The ceremony, in the ways of the Ancients, had begun early that morning with the beginning of a fast. There followed a somber processional leading from the lower plains along a path walked for untold generations by the Ancients, up to the circle of massive stones on the upper plateau.

Then, as the initiates gathered in the inner circle of stones, ringed by the host of Priests, they turned to the west and began a unison chant. What little heat of the day there was had dissipated by this time, even from the massive stone stele, and a cool breeze picked up just before the setting sun arced toward the western touchstone of the circle. To the initiates it seemed to pause there momentarily, then dropped behind the lesser stone and was gone beyond the western horizon. All eyes fixed there, as the red and amber skies gave way to lavender, and then darkness fell all around.

The initiates alternately circled just inside the inner ring of stones, walking slowly in single file, then moving to the outer circle at the point of the prominent eastern stone marker, pausing at the 38 stations around the outer circumference, and completing this double cycle once for each knot on the smoldering hemp rope. They continued this through the long dark night.

Every fourth cycle, they paused, genuflected to the four corners of the heavens, and one of the Priests tossed a fine powdery substance into the air as a rhythmic intoning underscored the moment. The powder was caught by a slight zephyr, and spreading in a feathery plume above the initiates, drifted downwind.

The sheer darkness of the heavens struck Tarbruuk, as did the starry hosts put in place by some ancient hand of light, and he felt the anticipation and mystery of the moment. He had spent his youth in the northern territories as a herder of goats, the eldest of three sons, and the one destined to become a Priest of the Great Stones. His path had been ordained by a power beyond the starry hosts, a knowing his mother held from the time of his very difficult birth.

As an infant, he had been sickly and near death numerous times, yet each time he survived the ravages of fever and convulsions and lived. At the age of eight, he was sent by his father to the hills to shepherd the family’s herd of goats during the early spring, a task he took seriously, and though still sickly, managed well. By the age of ten, he was skilled with his staff and the calls and whistles necessary in directing and keeping his herd together and safe.

His eye was sharp, and he wielded his sling with deadly aim, and animals of prey maintained a safe distance for fear of receiving a thump or welt from an accurately aimed stone. For all his learned skills, Tarbruuk was slight of build, and with all his strength could not hurl a stone with sufficient force to kill an animal threatening his herd, but a well-placed thump on the skull or rump served as well. He kept his herd safe and from harm.

Neveen, Tarbruuk’s mother, was herself a hardy soul, who over the course of four years bore three sons while tending the family’s plot of land near the river, cutting wood for heating and cooking, and helping with the butchering of animals and fowl to feed the family. Lorbruuk, his father, was a shepherd, as was his father before him, who spent months with the herd in the hills overlooking the river valley that was his home. At times he took Tarbruuk with him to teach him the ways of their hard life, and during the long hours as the sun journeyed from horizon to horizon, and sometimes well into the time of mystery after sunset, he instructed Tarbruuk, and passed on the knowledge he had learned from his father on these same hillsides.

So Tarbruuk grew in his knowledge of the bucolic though harsh world of his family, and in the ways of his people. When he approached his twelfth birthday, and his mother told him of a planned visitation by the High Priest of the Ancient Stones, he was pleased, and not a little anxious.

On the day of the eve of the winter solstice, Daevil Jhaesquuat, High Priest of the Ancient Stones, visited the lowly shack built by Lorbruuk. It was humble in nature, simple, made of elements of the earth – stone and wood, mostly, with cracks stuffed with straw and clay. Daevil Jhaesquuat ducked under the low lintel post in the doorway, and stepped into the small room. He was welcomed by Lorbruuk. Neveen stood behind. Tarbruuk stood beside his father, and as Daevil Jhaesquuat approached, offered both hands extended to his side, palms open and facing up, a gesture of greeting and submission. Daevil Jhaesquuat returned the gesture, and nodded his head in respect.

Lorbruuk held the High Priest’s eyes, and nodded in return. Dhumm Tahmass, Trainer of Initiates under the High Priest, entered silently behind Daevil Jhaesquuat, and stood to his left. Then, Jerqell Jihmass, Keeper of Sacred Rituals, followed and took his place to Daevil Jhaesquuat’s right. Such an impressive sight for such a humble family – this tiny room with three holy men filling the major portion of it, the three confronting a tousled-haired youth of twelve. “We have come for your son, Lorbruuk,” said Daevil Jhaesquuat quietly; “It is time.”

Lorbruuk held the eyes of the High Priest with his own. “He is prepared,” said the proud though saddened father. Tarbruuk stepped forward, and bowed. Dhumm Tahmass took Tarbruuk’s left wrist, and placed thereon a leather thong with a clear gemstone of steel-grey hue attached to it. The color matched Tarbruuk’s eyes, and his mother, taking note, smiled.

The three holy men with Tarbruuk following, left the home of Lorbruuk and Neveen, crossed the river at the ford, and followed the river south leading to the pass to the Valley of the Stones beyond. Lorbruuk and Neveen followed at a respectful distance, until they, too, reached the pass. They watched for a long time, as their son walked with the three holy men toward the southern regions. Seeing him disappear over the crest of the far hill, they stood in silence for a time. Then, putting his arm across Neveen’s shoulders, Lorbruuk walked with his wife silently to their home, where they were greeted by their two youngest sons.

The sun set over the river valley, and Neveen cried herself to sleep. Lorbruuk chopped up a felled tree he had meant to cut up months ago, and then climbing to a hilltop near his home, pondered the stars in their paths in the heavens above until well after midnight.

Tarbruuk focused on the three stars of the belt of the Wandering Shepherd in the dark heavens above. A cluster of minor stars outlined a sling attached to his belt, a weapon used to fend off those that preyed on his herd. Tarbruuk fancied he was like that Wandering Shepherd – keen of eye, with a sharp sense for the ways of predators in his familiar hillsides, and a clear grasp of the times of the rising and setting of the sun throughout the full cycle of the sun’s travels above – all important in securing one’s herd.

He was suddenly reminded of the penetrating cold, and he pulled his robe tighter around his body. The chanting continued. Tarbruuk knew it was almost time – he sensed it well before the others, and felt a sense of relief mixed with anticipation. This was what he had prepared for all his life. It was what his parents had prepared him for all their lives. Now, the time was upon him.

The circle of Priests continued their rhythmic chanting, swaying back and forth in the growing light of morn. The initiates stood in a cluster, facing the prime marker stone on the eastern quadrant of the circle of massive stones. The sky at the horizon was the color of deep indigo, and as the sun approached the crest of the eastern horizon from beyond the nether worlds, the skies shifted to blue-grey, lavender, and then into amber and silver.

The slight wind died to but a whisper, and the quiet of morn subdued everything. Tarbruuk looked to the High Priest, who stepped forward and raised his hands above his head, his eyes closed, his lips reciting an invocation to the ancient celestial hosts. The initiates knelt, their arms out to their sides, their hands open and facing upward in supplication and submission. Three Priests thrust crystal vials into the air releasing a powdery substance, and catching the slight whisper of a wind, it floated gently toward the north. A ram’s horn sounded in the distance, just as the sun crested the eastern rim of the world, just above the prime marker stone.

That afternoon, Tarbruuk and the other initiates entered the formal training period of 20 cycles of the moon. They fasted, and meditated on ancient signs in the heavens; they worked the gardens with their hands, and shepherded the flocks of their order; they hiked the mountains to the south, and slept under the starry skies; they dug the earth with sharpened tools and cleared with hemp whisks, seeking that left by their ancestors and ancient travelers through their land; they burned the dried powders of aromatic plants, and studied the healing properties of their leaves and roots; they learned the music of their grandfathers, and gained skills in applying pigment to the walls of their closed ceremonial caves. It was a new life, and hard, but one Tarbruuk took to with vigor and anticipation and growing skill.

At the beginning of the fourth cycle of the moon, Dhumm Tahmass, Trainer of Initiates under the High Priest, called Tarbruuk before him. As Tarbruuk entered the low-ceilinged room, he observed Jerqell Jihmass, Keeper of Sacred Rituals, standing to the side. The two men questioned Tarbruuk about his perceived self-important thoughts, his sowing of dissension amongst his fellow-initiates, his studying of disallowed ancient rituals.

Tarbruuk denied favoring or putting himself forward, or of causing a stir amongst his fellow-initiates; he merely raised questions when instruction wasn’t clear. He spoke of ancient rituals which he’d come by through his grandmother, though they were not at odds with his training around the ways of the stones, but were of a piece and the same.

“Silence!” roared Dhumm Tahmass through clenched teeth, his eyes afire, his jaw set. “I knew from the beginning you were not fit for this training! You are an independent spirit, filled with rage to change things, and taken with ideas that pollute, thoughts that poison, and visions that corrupt.” Dhumm Tahmass folded his arms across his breast, and looking down his long aquiline nose, added, “And, for your troubles your fellow-initiates hold you and your ways suspect.”

“You are a trouble-maker, Northerner!” hissed Jerqell Jihmass, and his eyes narrowed. “They speak truth, Tarbruuk,” said Daevil Jhaesquuat quietly, “I am sorry.” The High Priest of the Ancient Stones stood in the doorway, crowding the tiny room. “Your mother and father have taught you well, Tarbruuk – but your thoughts are poison and opposed to the ways of our calling,” said the High Priest. Then, he too folded his arms across his breast.

“My thoughts are mine, but are of the same that was of the Ancients and their ways. They are thus not mine, but of old.” Tarbruuk’s eyes locked on those of the High Priest. Unblinking, Daevil Jhaesquuat nodded, and motioned with his fingers. Dhumm Tahmass stepped forward, and took from his inner pocket a small crystal container with a lid of lead, and removing the lid, touched his fingertip to the dark substance therein, and reached over and placed a black smudge on Tarbruuk’s forehead. This done, he stepped back. Jerqell Jihmass then took a scroll from within his outer robe and opened it. He intoned a soft-spoken phrase, then a second, then a third.

The accusations were now formal, the decision made. Jerqell Jihmass closed the scroll, and slipped it back into the folds of his robe, and he, too, stepped back. The three men exited the small room, leaving the young Tarbruuk standing alone with his thoughts, he knew not for how long. Then, turning, he himself exited the room.

Tarbruuk was saddened by the closed thinking on the part of his Elders, and by their cold and belittling manner of deliberations. He felt secure in the lore and training in the ways of the Ancients taught by his grandmother, and that continued by his mother.

The ceremonies of the lights of the night sky were ingrained in the body of his early teachings, and were now comfortably deep within his soul and in his mind’s eye. He felt a closeness because of it with the night sky, and with the earth that was his shelter and his home. His eyes beheld wonder in the skies of the night, and it filled him with vision and hope for his family and his people. It was preferred to the darkness of the night skies of the High Priest and his initiates.

Tarbruuk packed his few simple belongings, and carrying them in a square piece of homespun tied in a bundle, left his home at the place of training for the pass leading to the Valleys of the Northern Reaches…