Weeks went by as he drifted in and out of a dream state through which he traversed a wasteland of blackened tree stumps and mountains of ash. A world that had been scorched by some hellish conflagration and left as a warning to mortals of the power of angry gods.  In the constant night sky above him, he could not recognise any of the stars and he howled, lost in the darkness, always with the feeling that something was shadowing his every step. Then he stood before the circle of stones. Vast, towering monoliths of black basalt, their faces marked with symbols he could not read. Runes, like those tattooed on the faces of the Druids. Circles and grids that tugged at his mind seeming to drag his consciousness into them and send it somewhere else until he cringed away from them lest he should lose his sanity. And there, at the centre of the ring, stood the twisted stone with its spirals and whispering menace. Less than half the height of its sisters but dominating them nonetheless, the skull-headed thing in its shadow offering a terrible kiss.

That was when, to the surprise of the healer, he awoke. A strange look in his eye caused all to back away. And then he gave a gurgling laugh.

He left the village that evening. The warriors had been called to skirmish with raiders in the hills to the north. Many of them had died, but perhaps they had been the lucky ones. Those who were left in the village, the old, the young, women, children, the guards on the palisade walls – he left nonalive except a boy who had been scaring birds from the crops and who had hidden in the forest edge when he heard the screams and saw the black smoke rising…

When the remnants of the war party returned, they found the boy sitting on the track leading to the gates. He would not enter the village and screamed when they tried to drag him in. All he could say was that he had seen something that looked like Tal Cádu, a warped, freakish version that shambled from the village covered in gore. Hyerd Cádu took his mighty hammer and went back through the gates, a dark scowl on his heavy brow. His son would pay for the murder of his kith and kin; whether he was ill or cursed, he was a mad dog that needed to be ended.

He found the lad standing on the cliffs by the old quarry, just staring into the drop. The river of stars that they called the Serpent’s Back cut across the black, making an even darker shape of Tal against its glow. Perhaps it would have been better if Hyerd and just planted his big foot in his son’s back and sent him flailing into the void, but he needed to see his face, the eyes of the youth who had slaughtered almost everyone he had ever known.

‘Turn around.’ He tried to growl the words, but they caught in his throat and came out as a rough whisper. He swallowed and tried again. ‘Face me, you little shit! I want to see the eyes of the thing that could do what you have done.’

Tal slowly turned. There was something wrong with his shape, something that moved in a way that was not normal. Hyerd thrust forward the guttering torch he held in his left fist. The flames washed across his son’s features, and he gasped. There was slackness to the features, a blankness to the eyes, but only for a moment. A dark shadow seemed to pass across the face, and the eyes lit with a savage fire that made them glow like coals in the blacksmith’s furnace. Hyerd found himself stepping backwards, backwards from this strip of a lad. Then Tal was on him like the storm winds from the mountains, like death itself. And all the while, he muttered, ‘Don’t wake the god! Don’t wake the god!’ As tears ran down his cheeks and the blood flowed.

But that was eight long summers ago when he was known as Kin Slayer. Eight long summers of killing and war in the service of Erith Mon, a man who had seen the value of a beast such as him.  Erith Mon, who had named him Crow Feeder and raised him up as his champion. Now, he could hear the slow chanting of the Druids as they carried the next draft of poison to him, and after that, they would release the chains that bound him. A sick wave of excitement ran through him for a moment, making his vision blur and his breath rasp. He could make corpses of them. If any had seen the freakish smile that split his entire face like a wolf’s grin, then none would have willingly entered that tent. He strained for a moment against his bonds and then dropped back, a faraway voice talking to him from somewhere deep within.

‘No, not these. Not yet, anyway. Let them free us as always, and they can lead us to greater battles, to a mountain of the dead…’

The thin men in their grey robes gathered around Tal Cádu, the Crow Feeder, and poured bitter herbs between his parched lips. Then they stood and sang their dark, sonorous chants, the overtones buzzing in the air like giant insects. When they were convinced of the efficacy of their art, they summoned the camp smith, who released the great iron clasp that held the chains in place, and with a rattle of heavy links, Tal Cádu worked himself to a sitting position. He glanced around at the pale faces pushed back to the edges of the tent, as far back from him as they could get, and grunted.

‘I could do with some meat and ale.’

The sigh of relief from those around him was loud in the confined space, and his grin at their discomfort was not too pleasant.