The ball bounced and rolled ahead of them. Cullen whooped as he ran, pumping his arms powerfully. He had put on a burst of speed to make sure he was the first to the ball. As ever, it was all for show. As long as the game was still within Murias he wanted to be seen to be winning, especially today. With the Choosing coming up he wanted it fresh in everyone's minds that he was the best of them.
Núada took him down hard before he had covered sixty paces clutching the bladder. It was a crunching tackle. The ball went bouncing away towards the ditch where Niall scooped it up and set off like a startled deer.
Wide Mouth staggered to his feet and cracked a punch off the side of Núada's skull, but Núada laughed and rolled with the blow, coming to his feet five steps out of Cullen's reach. He saluted Wide Mouth and bolted after Niall. Cullen hared off after him.
The morning was fresh and blustery. It wasn't cold but the bite of the air was nothing short of harsh in his lungs as Sláine swallowed breath after deep breath. Sweat rimed his skin. He felt a hot flare of pain run the length of his left leg from ankle to groin, tearing through the muscle, and pulled up short. He hobbled forwards tentatively, each step drawing a fresh needle-sharp stab of pain as he put his foot down.
Grinning like an idiot, Niall hoofed the ball over the fast-flowing River Dôn.
"Oh, you just had to, didn't you?" Dian groaned, throwing himself into the water. The others splashed through the river behind him, fording it at a shallow point. Even so the water splashed up around their chests. The undercurrent was fierce enough to sweep both Cormac and Cullen off their feet and carry them thirty paces down river before they managed to drag themselves out and up the bank on the far side. Niall ran an extra three-quarters of a mile to the rope bridge because he was afraid of being swept away.
Despite the pain, Sláine kept pace with Dian, near the back while the others fought over the ball with kicks and curses and flying fists. An elbow split the skin above Fionn's right eye. Blood made it impossible for him to see properly but that didn't slow him down. Fionn dragged Núada into the dirt, tackling him from behind. He threw himself forwards, wrapping his arms around the smaller boy's waist and dragging him down. Sláine claimed the loose ball, drop-kicking it over two hundred paces further on down the road. He loped on easily even as Wide Mouth dashed passed him. Dian was first to the ball. He put his head down and pumped his arms, running flat out.
Sláine didn't push himself any harder than he had to.
The winner wasn't the one who possessed the ball the longest - it was the one who drove it over the finish line. It was as simple as that. It didn't matter if he didn't touch the ball right up until the foot of Lugh's Spike, just as long as he was the one carrying it over the goal.
His thighs burned as they ploughed through the stubble of the wheat fields. He had to time his final charge just right. The Spike loomed imperiously, less than a quarter of a mile away. He hurdled a fallen log. Pain lanced through his leg as he came down on the hard-packed earth. He ran through it, forcing himself on. With the Spike less than one hundred paces away Sláine gave one final burst, putting everything he had into catching his friend. Even so, he never would have caught him without the intervention of a jag of rock protruding from the dirt floor. Dian's leading foot came down on the splintered stone, turning his ankle viciously. He skidded through and tripped over his own legs as they tangled up around themselves. Dian's mistake came when he threw a hand out to stave off his fall - instinctively, he let the ball go.
Sláine surged forwards and punted the ball with his foot, setting his eyes on the goal, sixty paces away.
He had timed his surge to perfection.
Sláine kicked the ball forwards twice more, chasing it desperately, his focus solely on the pig's bladder as it bounced away in front of him. Forty paces. He ran, chest heaving, head rolling from side to side as he plunged on for the finish. Thirty paces.
He scooped up the ball.
Twenty.
His heart felt as if it was about to burst in his chest.
Ten, nine, eight.
He threw his head back giving every last ounce of his strength to driving himself over the line.
He knew that he had won. He threw his head back, savouring the triumph.
And his legs were cut out from under him by a scything tackle from Wide Mouth, two-footed, hammering in just below the knee. The challenge snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. Sláine went down running, six paces from the line. He tried to haul himself forwards. He couldn't move. The agony was incredible. For one sickening moment he thought his leg was broken. No matter how desperately he willed the rogue limb to move it didn't. He had no control over it.
He rolled over onto his back only to see Wide Mouth's ruined face leering down at him. The pain was excruciating and made so much worse by the humiliation of Cullen wrestling the ball from his grasp. He was helpless to do anything but watch as Wide Mouth walked the last few steps to victory and slammed the ball down in triumph.
Sláine was forced to lean on Fionn's shoulder as they walked into the town square for the Choosing.
His leg wasn't broken. Indeed the only casualty of the game was his pride.
Together the pair moved awkwardly over to join the line of boys and girls. Sláine looked up and down the line at the faces of his friends. Their lives would be shaped for better or worse over the next hour.
Murias came out in force to witness the Choosing. The candidates' parents lined the square, anxiously waiting their children's fate. The Choosing reflected on them almost as much as it did on the youngsters. They would, after all, take immense pride in welcoming a new warrior of the Red Branch into their family. Other trades, although less coveted, were no less important to the survival of the tribe. For the want of a nail the kingdom was lost, that was the adage. There was sense to it. An army needed food as much as it needed steel. It needed fur and wool, and leather and grain. It marched on its stomach and on its feet. What good was an army that hadn't eaten? An army that's feet were blistered and chaffed raw by poor boots?
One by one the masters came into the square and walked the line, examining the lads and lasses as if they were sides of meat waiting to be dressed.
Few words were exchanged.
Sláine had long suspected that the decisions were actually made long in advance of the actual ceremony and this torture was little more than a relic hung over from centuries of ritual.
That was why the Choosing was so vital.
It was a way to assure that the lifeblood of the tribe was replenished: the butchers, the bakers, the chandlers, the farmers, tanners, and every other trade under the sun. They were all in their own way as important as the warriors. Of course, the warriors themselves would never have admitted that.
The masters almost certainly met in private to decide what trades were under-represented and needed fresh blood - they would have been fools not to - and while they were at it, decide who amongst the youngsters were best suited to the various trades.
The only question was who they had chosen for what purpose. That was what the ceremony was all about. It gave ritual to nothing more mystical than a calculated decision process.
Fionn was taken early, chosen by Tall Iesin, to the delight his family. Whispers ran along the line. No one knew if the bard had the right to claim an apprentice. They weren't even certain he was Sessair. He came and went as he pleased, trading news for food, song for drink and stories for a place to lay his head come night. He had been alone for as long as any of the boys had known him, and now he had chosen Fionn.
That he had selected Fionn out of all the boys set the wolf amongst the proverbial crows. What did he see in the boy that he had never seen in a candidate before? What made Fionn worthy?
They had no answers because there were no answers.
The honour of being chosen as apprentice to the great storyteller was second only to being called to take the Red Branch. And some would have argued the reverse: that the Red Branch was second only to the bard. Fionn was beaming as he left his friend to await his fate.
Núada found himself pressed into service with Rioch, the tavern keeper. This was something of a surprise choice, but reasoned out it made sense. Núada was quick of thought and good with numbers. He would be able to help Rioch with the brewing and the stables, as well as the tabs run up by drinkers, and because he was a brawler at heart, he'd be useful when it came time to collect those tabs when the drinker's credit ran dry. He didn't seem unhappy with the choice, although he had harboured hopes of being apprenticed to Grudnew's personal bodyguard.
Bluth the Blacksmith's strong hand came down on Niall's shoulder. It was an obvious match that met with the approval of Niall's parents in the crowd. They swarmed around their son delightedly as he walked alongside his new master on the way to the smithy. Grinning, Bluth had to send them on their way so that he might have a few moments alone with his new apprentice - he appeased them with promises of shared ale at the Feis Samain later that night.
A few moments later, the cordwainer, Milo, claimed Cormac.
Cullen, Dian and Sláine stood alone in the square. There were no more masters to come. They had been judged and found unworthy. The thought sank like a smooth sided stone to the pit of the young Celt's gut. Roth wore a face like thunder whereas Macha just looked distraught. The boys didn't move. The ritual of the Choosing demanded that they stay there until sundown on the final day of trinox Samoni. They promised to be three lonely nights while the others celebrated their indentures.
That wasn't the worst of it though. Without a trade they were outside the tribe. They would be forced out of Murias to become exiles. No man of the Sessair was allowed to beg and without a trade that is exactly what they would be reduced to doing. Travelling from homestead to homestead begging for work and a roof for the night.
Sláine turned slightly and saw Cullen staring at him, hatred blazing in his eyes. It was obvious that Wide Mouth blamed him for their fall from grace. Their public feud had undone their ambitions. The stupidity of it galled him. Wide Mouth had come marching into the roundhouse demanding justice - well he had it now. They both did.
But Dian being out here didn't make sense. He had nothing to do with their fight. Indeed, Grudnew himself had praised the youngster for standing between his two friends when both Sláine and Wide Mouth had lost their heads. That deserved a reward surely, not exile?
Whispers began after another spell. Sláine knew that they were talking about him. Their words didn't carry. They didn't need to. He saw their meaning in the eyes of the speakers: pity.
He wouldn't be the object of anyone's pity.
He held himself taller, drew his back straighter, and kept his eyes fixed firmly on an invisible spot in the middle distance where nothing existed. They could keep their pity. He was Sláine Mac Roth. He had no need for it.
Cathbad, the druid, shuffled into the square, his twisted frame bent almost double as he moved towards the boys.
Sláine didn't know what to think. Life as a druid was not the life he would have chosen for himself even an hour ago, but now Cathbad's arrival offered a slim hope of salvation. He could give himself to the service of the Goddess. He even started to believe that he had always dreamed of that oneness with the earth, that that was reason for the sensation of raw power he felt surging through his body when he lost his temper. So it was doubly hard when the old druid walked up to Dian, wrapped him on the knuckles with his rowan staff, said, "Follow me, boy", and turned his back.
There was to be no last minute reprieve for either him or Cullen of the Wide Mouth.
As the afternoon wore on into dusk all hope left him.
The last thing he wanted to do was cry but it was impossible not to. He bit down on his lips and focused on that nowhere right in front of his eyes as the tears streamed down his face.
No one laughed at him.
They shared his grief because they knew no one was going to come.
The crowd had thinned down to nothing as the first hour stretched into a second and then a third without anyone coming to claim the boys.
Sláine had cried himself out, mastering the weakness that was emotion. He didn't sniff, didn't moan. He just stared into space. Wide Mouth was devastated and made no effort to hide it. He no longer stood. He waited out the final hour of sunlight on his knees, beseeching Danu to forgive him and find a place for him in her heart. It was pitiful to see the proud boy reduced so easily to a wreck of a man.
A man.
They would be men when the sun sank below the horizon - no longer boys. And as men they had no place in the tribe.
Cullen looked up with red-rimmed eyes.
"It's all your fault," he spat accusingly at Sláine. He kept his voice low, harsh, so that it wouldn't carry any further than it had to.
Sláine didn't bite. He knew what Wide Mouth was doing. He hoped to provoke Sláine into a fight and by doing so show the few remaining watchers that Sláine was the canker that needed to be cut out of the Sessair. It was a pitiful attempt to make him look like the innocent victim in all of this, but there was no innocent victim. Both were party to their own downfall and both of them knew it.
Still there was a vindictiveness about Cullen of the Wide Mouth that defied reasoning. It wasn't just spite. It went beyond that. Wide Mouth derived glee from his own malice. He revelled in it. His behaviour now was only a hint of the man he would become. It made sense that Grudnew would not want him as part of the tribe. Who wanted a vicious moron in the heart of their family? Sláine was being punished for goading Wide Mouth when he had beaten him. What was it the king had said, "a warrior needed to learn humility"? What was more humbling than exile from his people?
"Look!" someone said.
Sláine didn't.
He didn't want to know what was happening. He wanted Danu to open the ground up around him and swallow him whole, ending his humiliation.