The Charcoal Burner's Apprentice

Hi, below is an older piece of writing that I did, and would really welcome any comments or criticisms that anyone has. It would be aimed at older children I think. Thanks!

A thin blue trail of smoke rose slowly, vertically up into the darkening sky. The old charcoal burner, huddled in the opening of his shelter, drew deep on his clay pipe, the red glow illuminating his amber eyes. The snow fell softly through the still air and the old man looked through it, deep into the dark forest. Somewhere far off a bough, heavy with ice and snow, heavy with the weight of too many summers passed, cracked sharply and fell, sending a rush of birds into the frozen winter air.

The collier, for that is the name given to those who burn wood to make charcoal, drew again on his pipe. Unlike the birds, he had not been startled, having passed all his life in the forest and knowing its sounds as he knew the beating of his own heart.

By and by the snow stopped falling and the clouds parted, revealing a million diamond like glints of light, made bright by the full moon, fully risen. Inside the small shelter the collier, wrapped in animal skins, slept soundlessly. Curled next to him, as quiet as he, were his companions, a golden haired she-goat named Madriel and a he-wolf called Dalenbane. Despite the natural order that should have set them apart, they were peaceable enough together. More, they were family. Madriel had been mother to Dalenbane since John Collier (for that is the old man's name) had found him not six months old, alone and starving in the forest a year before. The three slumbered on, their warm dreams drifting away to turn to frost and fall glittering from the night.

As the moon reached its zenith Dalenbane opened his eyes at the sound of one of his past brothers, unknown family from a future unexplored, howling his mournful song from a far dark corner of the forest. "Easy, wolf brother", murmured John from the darkness and Dalenbane, distracted, beat his tail gratefully once against the floor then re-curled himself for the return to sleep and then whipped his head up once more as the first cry sounded. It was not very loud, nor very far away, but in that cry there seemed to be all the world's sadness. John recognised a little of that sadness and, though he feared it, this was his forest and he hastened to offer what aid he could to it's bearer.

Pushing aside the bundled reeds covering the entrance of the shelter he stepped through and stood stiffly upright. "Come, Dalenbane" he said to the wolf who stood alongside him and strode purposefully into the trees, below the canopy of snow and darkness. After they had gone a little way, John stopped and listened again for the crying which seemed now to be a little to the right of where they were heading. Dalenbane loped off in its direction and John called after him, but he was gone, following a scent and a sadness.

When John entered the clearing, he found Dalenbane standing over the figure of a young woman. Her sadness was now mixed with terror as the wolf, not being aware of his fearsome appearance, stood regarding her silently with his yellow eyes. The girl whimpered at the sight of this man, a devil to her eyes, streaked grey and black with the soot and ash of his profession.

John spoke quiet words of comfort to her and she relaxed a little before uttering such a cry that the wood had never heard, and then fainting clean away. John lifted her easily in his strong arms and turned towards the camp. Dalenbane paused to sniff at the patch of blood that the girl had left behind, unseen by the charcoal burner, but unmissable to the furious senses of the wolf.

John strode confidently through the wood. Ash, elm, beech and oak, he knew every one, and every one led him back to where his earthen kiln performed it's inexorable, filthy alchemy. John laid the girl in the shelter then took his precious copper kettle and, tearing aside a small section of the kiln, took out a little of the smouldering wood to fill it. He took it back into the shelter to provide a little warmth for the girl then covered her with the animal pelts. He lit a tallow candle and looked at her face, now peaceful. She was beautiful and had seen no more than seventeen or eighteen summers.

The snow had begun to fall again and John replaced the reeds over the doorway and the candle that had been guttering a little, leapt back to full life casting its yellow light throughout the small space. The girl had started to moan again, and the moaning turned now into a loud keening sound and the collier, though not very worldly, knew what the spreading darkness on her skirts meant, and what he must do. The girl was with child, and the child was coming. What she was doing in the middle of the forest, in the snow, John couldn't imagine and she hadn't spoken, but she was very frightened, and not just by the pain of childbirth.

He had never delivered a human child before but he had been around beasts of many types all his long life, and he was not daunted by the task that had fallen to him this night.

The girl cried aloud again, making Dalenbane whine nervously, and again she cried, and again. She sweated and cursed the heavens and moaned and cried again, and little by little the babe emerged until all in a rush he, for it was a he, was out. The girl, immune to any stimulus before, smiled exhaustedly at the plaintive cries of the infant and, with him clasped to her breast, fell into a deep slumber. John took his iron knife and heated it the fire until it grew a dull red then plunged it into the snow to cool it once more. Taking a plaited length of birch bark, he tied it around the tube joining mother and child, which he then cut above the knot with the knife.

Colour was now coming to the child but it was leaving the mother. She grew paler by the minute and John knew why, and also knew there was nothing to be done. The blood that should have stopped a little after the birth continued to flow. Even worse, it was no longer thin and watery but was rich and the deep colour of rubies.

The mother awoke once more, looked at the child once more, smiled once more and spoke her first and final words to John, "Please", she closed her eyes and swallowed before looking back at the collier, "Please, keep him safe." And with that her voice drifted away and the light from her eyes faded and she was no more, leaving John and the infant alone together.

John, carefully cradling the tiny thing in his arms, stepped from the shelter into the cold clear day coming fast from the lightening Eastern sky.

"Welcome", he said to the quiet infant.