Find your inner wolf

A thrutopian resolution

I resolved years ago only to work or socialise with nice people.

Not easy when you’re in a job or an environment where you must depend on others, because there are so many nasty people around.

They have a tendency to breed.

My original resolution forgotten – or set aside in the noble cause of journalism – and it’s no surprise that those nasty people managed to steal my peace.

So I’ve made the requisite adjustments and now I can reactivate the original resolution for 2025. However, I’m not quite a full-time author because I love editing New Natural Business which, incidentally, is run by nice people.

Obviously, the bad guys are vastly outnumbered by the good but it’s the scum that sticks to the sides when you’ve drained the sink. Or tries to.

Although I write historical fiction set in eras where dictators, bullies and misogynists are rife, I don’t let them win. I’m determined to be ever more thrutopian (thanks for the word, Manda Scott) in my writing.

Easy for me at my age to make the necessary adjustment to do what I love, namely to write fiction with a message for the ages and shut the door on the peace-stealers. My wife told me to do this years ago. Sometimes I’m a bit slow.

A friend immediately sent this quote from T.S. Eliot.

Now all I need to do is to sniff out the motivation of those I meet and use what little instinct remains to me in this crazy world. Instinct that invariably depends on trustworthy help from those I love/like/admire.

Just like this character from a scene I’ve just written. We’re talking about a small Celtic island community in 55BCE, a stone’s throw from Caesar’s murderous campaign in Gaul. It’s in its raw state at the moment, but here goes…

--

The wolf sniffed salty air and tensed.

‘What is it, Brother?’ asked the man who watched with him. He had also seen the distant ship heeling in the teeth of a cold northerly, but of late many vessels had passed by their island, mostly traders and some Roman warships, none interested in this island lost in a grey ocean.

The wolf whined. Not his usual warning of danger. He had an old wound on his flank stretching from shoulder to rump, visible because new fur had refused to cover the ugly scar. He knew his recovery was down to human care and he was grateful. And he had a new family to take his mind off any residual aches and pains; wolf cubs are as unruly as human children.

The man standing next to him had suffered a similar wound when a Roman blade thrust between ribs had almost ended his life. But the bond between man and animal was far deeper than livid scars and months of willing each other to deny death. Their debt to each other was that the wolf owed his life to the man who had rescued a terrified cub from Roman hunters, and the man owed his spiritual awakening to the creature he now called Brother.

Bratir, in the old old tongue.

And now, from a cliff top as slight drizzle dampened both, they watched the ship beat a new course towards their island. The man could see it was not Roman; those relied on many oars. This was a solid, twin-sailed ship that, just for a moment, sparked memories for both of them. She tacked again and when they saw her graceful lines, they knew this was the same ship that had borne both man and beast to the Isle of the Dead many months ago. Then, there had been Romans here. Now there were none.

--

Surely no threat? The wolf knows better…

--

Fighting for respite in the island’s lee, the ship closed. Gulls screamed their incessant warning, as ever arguing over something and nothing. Bratir sniffed the air again. Even at this distance he could not only smell the sweat of human endeavour and the foulness of hide sails, he could also distinguish between good and evil. His was the power of perception through smell. The man had only his eyesight to rely upon. Together they concurred. This was a safe visitor, even though the wolf knew there was a Roman aboard.

The man took a deep breath. This was the ship that had borne him and the wolf away from a simple life as an educated Gaul and a fixer for his friend Commius the Atrabatian. Spirited him away at the behest of the Roman conqueror, Caesar, into intrigue and danger. To the very edge of the abyss. And now that same ship was back: where to this time? The thought lingered in the mind of the man who was named for the god of wild things, Cernunnos, the antithesis of what the Romans called civilisation.

He touched the birthmark on his forehead, a livid antler-shaped starburst that gave him his mysterious birthright, and wished it wasn’t there. It set him apart, and the wild god would come back for him time and again. Resentment was a temptation he had always resisted, but now there it was again, rising like a remorseless tide that he could barely resist. That tide had receded and given him a family and healing on this island, and now it was flooding again.

The ship had found calmer water beneath the cliff and was making for the sheltered bay that served as the island’s harbour. Around this was arrayed a small Roman settlement, now reclaimed by Gaul and settled by refugees fleeing the conqueror’s cruelty, mothered by the goddess Ritona and her farseeing priestesses. A safe haven. Or was it?

The wolf whined again, as yet uncertain.

‘Come,’ said Cerno. ‘We have guests.’

--

All seems well. But wait, what’s this?

--

But Bratir hesitated. He raised his head and sniffed the air again. There it was, a fleeting sense of danger nagging like sudden movement in the shadows that vanishes when you look for it. Not this ship, something further off. He swept the horizon and saw nothing. Mistaken perhaps.

‘What is it, Brother?’ Cerno had moved several paces and turned, one eyebrow raised. He trusted the wolf.

Bratir shook himself as if to be rid of worrying thoughts, silver droplets arcing in all directions, and trotted after Cerno.

But the man had seen a familiar look in the wolf’s yellow eyes that only a fool would dismiss. Perhaps the gulls knew it too.

--

So, trust your inner wolf. I’m going to give it my best shot. Remember, if someone smiles at you while holding a (metaphorical) knife behind their back, they couldn’t give a ha’penny for your wellbeing. They are only interested in their own self-aggrandisement.

NOTE: The excerpt above is from the second book in a series to be launched by Sapere Books in 2025. Watch this space, and while you’re here, have a look at my earlier novels, all of them published during 2024.

This might just help save me from fulfilling another TS Eliot comment: “Some editors are failed writers, but so are most writers.”