Skye by Kevin Grote

Author:Kevin Grote [Grote, Kevin]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Published: 2011-06-23T04:30:00+00:00

Chapter 4

August 19th, 1735

Scene I – Fields and woods near MacEwan Farm

The steady Atlantic wind spins the dangling corpse and makes the rusty chains rattle. The skull’s eyeless sockets evoke horror and terror to the very youngest of children and the most hardened of adults.

Even in these modern times, it is not an uncommon sight for the remains of criminals and traitors to be exhibited until they rot away. The most dastardly villains and traitors have their heads lopped off and put on spikes at the town and city gates. The rest of the pirates, thieves, robbers, counterfeiters, and poachers end up like this poor soul, dangling at the end of a noose, and exposed to the elements.

It has been there at the crossroads for so long, that it is now only bones clad in rags. The metal bars and chains give the tortured remains a human shape. This gruesome exhibit is a lesson to would-be cattle-thieves, and the bones of Randall ‘Red Randy’ MacBaine have rattled on the gibbet on the Stonefield Road, on the way east to Kilbeg, for nigh onto three years. Red Randy had added murder to his other crimes, and so, was tarred and hung in chains after being strung up.

But no one is heeding his grim warning today.

Or, what remains of him.

To the older boys, they laugh and throw rocks and pebbles on old ‘Red Randy’ as they scamper by. They have much more important things on their minds this morning, then gazing with fright upon the slack jaw, and wisps of red hair clinging to the skull. They ignore the bony left hand which has finally lost the grip of the tendons, and fallen, more or less, intact onto the road.

It is a clan wedding day, and for once the children are not busy doing their chores but allowed a few hours at play. En masse the boys and girls traipse off and assemble in woods and pastures to the west of Stonefield, this sunny morning in early August.

It is a day for play, and they have a football with them. As well as their toy weaponry of wooden swords, leather helmets, shields, and pole-arms. The girls come singing and skipping with the boys, both to watch and hopefully to play.

Some of the girls really want to play and look on the carryings-on with envy.

First of the entertainment will be a game of football.

The twenty odd boys pair off in two teams, chosen by the two captains, Hugh MacKellan and Lachlann MacEwan. Hugh is the oldest son of the Laird, and Lachlann, his good friend, is the oldest son of the Lairds tacksman, Hamish MacEwan.

There will be no friendship today. Everyone plays to win.

One goal is set across the field, utilizing a convenient sapling on one side, and a shepherd’s crook jammed into the ground for the other. The gibbet will be the other goal, ‘Red Randy’ on one side, and the nearby mile post to town, the other.

There is no ‘referee,’ and the child’s game becomes a little rough and tumble.

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