I am currently only a small way through this 704 page book, but I’m in love. Take it as a comment on her writing that I, who have never had the least interest in, or intention of reading, any vampire books, am engrossed in this novel. It is partly that it is a fascinating human interest story, combined with history and mystery, delving so far more into the search, the questions, and the hunt for the real story, than in vampires per se.

But it’s also the quality of the writing itself. The more I write, the more I find myself looking at the structure of stories, and, much like The Keep by Jennifer Egan, this one is fascinating.  There are three stories, all masterfully woven together, all pointing back to the story of Vlad himself.   Like a Chinese puzzle box, it draws the reader in, deeper and deeper, farther and farther back in history. 

The book opens with a Note to the Reader,purportedly by the 52 year old historian, and goes from there quickly back to the woman’s days as a 16 year old, traveling Europe with her diplomat father.  As we read her story of the events of 1972, her father gradually reveals to her his story of the events in the 1950’s, which in turn gradually reveals the mysterious events of 1930 which were gradually revealed to him by his mentor and professor who lived them.  And piece by piece, we learn the story of Vlad Tepes himself, prince of Wallachia, better known as Vlad the Impaler or Vlad Dracula, Son of the Dragon.

This is a complex structure, yet Ms. Kostova handles it masterfully.  I find myself flowing from one story to the other seamlessly, always knowing where we are, feeling as if more layers and intricacies and mysteries are constantly being revealed by one or the other.  This may not be to everyone’s taste.  Some may prefer a more straight-forward storyline, but I enjoy it very much.

Also in the quality of writing department, I am savoring Ms. Kostova’s prose.  She has a beautiful way with words, unique turns of phrases, and beautiful imagery.  I find myself wanting to stop and re-read just for the lyrical sound and the images the words evoke.  I find myself wanting to mark certain sentences just so I can find them later and re-read them.  Generally, I charge through books, eager to find out What Happens!  I’d rather spin this book out over days, enjoying every locale and scene she conjures.  Even now, I feel as if I actually experienced the cloistered monastery and enchanting music of the fountain there, high in the Pyrenees-Orientales.  I feel as if I sat on the wall myself, looking down on the waterfall that poured down so far the character could only see mist shimmering back up; I feel as if I watched the eagle circling below.  I do not often have this feeling with books.

The characters are well-drawn, interesting.  They are real and believable, in how their curiosity and disbelief propels them on to look for answers until shocking events create the fear that pulls them back.  Like all of us, they are a mix of qualities, better and worse, one moment vowing with selfless courage to find the killer of dear friends, and at another, vowing to live their lives peacefully after all and hope to be left alone.

I am also enjoying the history of this book, as I learn steadily more about the real Vlad Dracula and his wars with Sultan Mehmed II of the Ottoman Empire.

Will I enjoy the book as much as the book plunges deeper into encounters with the undead?  It’s not my usual fare, but then, I suspect this is not a typical vampire story, either.  I am very much looking forward to the rest of the book.

The basic story of King Herla, told in last week’s post, is of a king who attends a dwarf king’s wedding, in a deep cavern, and emerges after three days of celebration to find that two hundred years have passed in his own world.

Odin's Wild Hunt

In more detailed accounts, we find out that King Herla goes on to be the leader of the Wild Hunt.  The Wild Hunt is only one name for a concept that seems to be found all over Europe and North America.  The Germans speak of the Wilde Jagd (Wild Chase) and the Wildes Heer (Wild Host).  In Old English, there is the Herlaþing (Herla’s Assembly). Oskoreia or Åsgårdsreia is the Norwegian’s Ride of Asgard, and the Mesnée d’Hellequin (Household of Hellequin) was written of in Old French.  The Welsh told tales of  C?n Annwn, the Hounds of Annwn. 

Even in English, the concept is known by various names: Gabriel’s Hounds, Woden’s Hunt, Devil’s Dandy Dogs, Herod’s Hunt, Cain’s Hunt, and the Ghostriders.

The story, of course, is fairly obvious from the name.  A group of ghostly huntsmen rides forever.  While various tales say they are fairies, the ghosts of the dead, the hounds of hell chasing sinners to the underworld, lost souls, or various historical and mythical figures, seeing them, whoever they are, usually means disaster is on its way, in the form of plaque, famine, war, or the death of the unlucky observer.  If you hear them storming down your suburban street tonight (or any night for that matter), follow the advice in one tale: put your apron over your head and do not look! 

Of course, that’s the usual early medieval interpretation.  Later medieval interpretations tend toward the more romantic view of the night riders (not to be confused with my own Night Writers, please) as fairies.  Still, I don’t necessarily recommend looking closely enough to determine whether the Wild Hunt coming down your street appears to be early or late medieval.

As to who is credited as leader of the wild hunt, there are as many leaders as names for the group itself.  In Scotland, the people of the Blue Bells Trilogywould have known it as King Herla, king of the Britons.  The story dates back at least to Walter Map’s telling of the story in De Nugis Curialumin the late 1100’s.  Other stories, however, tell of the huntsmen being led by Odin in Sweden; Fionn mac Cumhaill in Ireland; Knecht Ruprecht, Perchta or Berchtold in 16th Century Germany, or Frau Holda; in England, St. Guthlac,  Hereward the Wake,  and Woden (he’s a story in himself, being regarded as everything from a god of Anglo-Saxon paganism to a historical king to the prototype of Father Christmas, but that will have to wait).  The most familiar names on this list to modern readers would be King Arthur and the devil, also at variously times named as the leaders of the pack. 

 This is only a partial list.  The full one is quite long.  What I found interesting in researching was that one of the leaders are the ultimate evil (the devil) while several others are associated with Christmas.  Knecht Ruprecht, for example, was said to be the helper of St. Nicholas.  Perchtaroamed the country in winter and during the twelve days of Christmas would enter homes to leave a small silver coin in the shoes of children or servants who had been good.  (Unlike the St. Nicholas who she sounds so very much like, however, if the children or servants were bad, she would slit their bellies, remove their guts, and fill them instead with straw and pebbles.  That’s the Christmas spirit!  (Actually, Perchta herself ranges from benevolent to malevolent in various incarnations of her story.)  As mentioned earlier, Woden is considered by some to be an early forerunner of Father Christmas.

On an interesting sidenote, while Hereward the Wake makes no such claims to Santa Claus-hood, some do argue that his parents were the infamous Leofric of Mercia and his better known wife, Lady Godiva.  In addition with being credited as the leader of the Wild Hunt, some of the legends that grew up around him have also gone on to be retold as adventures in Sherwood, thus making him a bit of a prototype for Robin Hood.

Of great interest to me in studying King Herlawas how many of the stories are very specific withdates, locations, and names.  Although I’m no scholar of legends, I am not familiar with myths and legends typically being so specific, especially in regards to dates.

The story of Herla himself, for instance, is very precise in the shepherd’s dates.  He tells Herla there is a story of a king of the Britons, but the Saxons (of which the shepherd is one) have ruled the land for two hundred years.  It is even more specific in when and where Herla and his wild huntsmen were last seen (or scene, if we want to make a movie of it).  They largely disappeared from England in ‘the first year of the coronation of our King Henry’ (that’s the II), moving on to Wales, and soon after were seen by many witnesses to sink into the River Wye, at Hereford in the year 1133.

Herne the Hunter, another leader, is stated specifically to be a huntsman of King Richard II in the last quarter of the 14thCentury.  He is said to roam Windsor Forest, and very specifically, the Great Park within it.  Ordnance maps have placed the location of the tree from which he was hanged after falling out of favor with King Richard.  Herne makes his first appearance in Shakespeare’s Merry Wives of Windsor and much later, interestingly, also shows up in the 1984 series Robin of Sherwood.  It is fair to say here, of course, that whether he was an actual historical figure is debatable.  The story places him very specifically in history, and yet goes on to tell stories which could hardly be true, of his revival from fatal goring being accomplished by a wizard attaching stag horns to his head.  You can find more details here. 

The Peterborough Chroniclegives a very specific report of a sighting of the Wild Hunt.  For this to have any meaning, it is important to know that the Peterborough Chronicle is one of 9 surviving documents that make up the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which is regarded as ‘the single most important historical source of its era.  The Peterborough Chronicle reports:

 …many men both saw and heard a great number of huntsmen hunting. The huntsmen were black, huge, and hideous, and rode on black horses and on black he-goats, and their hounds were jet black, with eyes like saucers, and horrible. This was seen in the very deer park of the town of Peterborough, and in all the woods that stretch from that same town to Stamford, and in the night the monks heard them sounding and winding their horns…

A collection of very brief re-tellings of many Wild Hunt stories can be found here.  Happy reading, and keep that apron handy to pull over your face in case you hear any of the many Wild Hunts with any of their many leaders!

Many thanks to all who are stopping by!

Like all enduring myths and legends, there are variations on the story of King Herla, but the gist of it is this:

 Herla was the king of the Britons more than a thousand years ago.  One day, while hunting in an ancient forest with his men, he met a dwarf with a great red beard, and cloven hooves, riding a huge goat.  “I am a king of many kings and chiefs,” the dwarf told Herla and his men.  “But I have heard of your fame and great deeds, even in my world.  You are worthy to attend my wedding.  We’ll make a compact: even now, the ambassadors of France are arriving at your palace to arrange your marriage to their princess.  I’ll attend your wedding, and a year to the day later, you’ll attend mine.”

It was as the dwarf king had said.  Herla and his men arrived back at his palace to see the ambassadors awaiting him.  The wedding was arranged, and in the midst of the celebrations and feasting, the dwarf king and his people arrived, great crowds of them.  They provided food and drink in vessels of gold and crystal in such abundance that King Herla’s provisions went untouched.  At cock-crow the next morning, he and his people disappeared back to their own world.

A year to the day later, the dwarf king appeared to remind Herla of their pact.  Being a man of honor, Herla and his men selected gifts worthy of a fellow monarch and rode into the ancient forest.  There, a cliff opened before them.  They traveled into a dark tunnel, but soon enough, it opened up into a great cavern of light, seemingly lit by thousands of lamps.  There, Herla and his men celebrated for three days with the dwarf king and his people.

Finally, on preparing to leave, the dwarf showered them with gifts of horses, dogs, and hawks.  In particular, the dwarf lifted up a small hound to ride with Herla on his horse.  “Do not get down from your horses until this dog jumps down,” the dwarf warned.  “Only then will it be safe for you to dismount.”

Herla and his men rode back out of the dwarf’s realm.  Coming out into the forest, they found their world did not look quite as they’d left it three days before.  Disturbed, they rode on, till they found an old shepherd.  “Tell me news of my queen, wife of Herla,” Herla demanded.

The old man looked at him strangely, and finally said, “I scarce understand you, for you are a Briton, and I am a Saxon.”  After some thought, he added, “I have heard such a name.  But it is a very old story, of the wife of Herla.  Her husband rode into the forest to celebrate the marriage of a dwarf king, and was never seen again.  She died of a broken heart.  But that was in the days of the Britons, and the Saxons have ruled England for two hundred years now.”

One of Herla’s men, upset, leapt from his saddle.  He instantly turned to dust, and Herla understood that what the shepherd said was true.  He ordered his men to stay on their horses.  And so they were doomed to ride endlessly, and became the Wild Hunt, roaming the earth forever in their saddles without rest.

Until the first year of King Henry, in 1133, men reported sightings of the Wild Hunt.  In that year, the sightings occured in Wales, until shortly after, many Welsh reported seeing King Herla’s men sinking into the River Wye.  From then, they were never seen again.

The story of King Herla warns us against the trickery of the elder races, such as the dwarves, and the dangers their kingdoms hold even for the greatest among us.

In short, do not go to a dwarf king’s wedding, no matter how much food and drink he brings to yours.

Hush ye, hush ye, little pet ye,

Hush ye, hush ye, do not fret ye,

The Black Douglas shall not get ye.

One famous story tells of a mother consoling her child with the rhyme above.  At the final words, a voice behind her said, “At least not tonight.”  The Black Douglas had stood behind her in silence, listening to her sing.  (To the best of my knowledge, Douglas did neither her nor her child any harm.)

It is hard to imagine that a child’s hobby horse could have any relation to medieval warfare, or a man of such fierce reputation.  And yet, it is from the horses ridden by Robert Bruce and the Black Douglas and their men that we get the name hobby horse.

The Irish Hobby is the official name of the breed, developed before the 13th century, and now extinct, though it was used to develop many current breeds, including the Connemara and the Irish Draught.  They were smaller horses, sometimes described as more like ponies, whose strength was in being light, agile, and swift.   The name, in fact, is believed to come from the French hobin, which is said to come in turn from the Gaelic obann, meaning swift. 

The hobbin’s speed came, in part, from being well suited to the bogs, forests, and hills of Ireland and Scotland.  Being light and agile allowed it to move easily through such places, where the large English warhorse was at a disadvantage.  Even in such rough conditions, hobelars–the men who rode the hobbins–could cover an astonishing 60 to 70 miles a day, allowing them to make the lightning strike-and-retreat raids across the English border for which James Douglas was especially famed.

Unlike the warhorse, trained for battle, the hobbin was essentially a mode of transport.  The Scots typically rode in fast, dismounted to fight on foot, and rode out again.  The humble hobbin, however, might claim some credit for the Scots frequent ability to outfight much larger armies.  Imagine how it might have been:

The Connemara Pony, a breed believed to be similar to the hobbins ridden by James Douglas and his men.

None of it is quite what we think of today when we see children skipping with their hobby horses to the jovial strains of the William Tell Overture.

John Balliol’s kingship came via several avenues.  The first was the luck of the draw: he just so happened to be born a great-great-great grandson of David I of Scotland.  I’m guessing most of us don’t even know the names of our great-great-great grandfathers, but in his case, such a name was vitally important to an entire nation; in fact, to two, as we’ll see.

The second factor in John Balliol’s kingship was a series of unfortunate deaths.  He would have lived part of his life under the rule of Alexander III of Scotland.  Alexander had three children, all of whom preceded him in death: David, the younger son, in 1281, Margaret, Queen of Norway, in childbirth 1283; and the elder brother, Prince Alexander, in 1284.  This left Alexander’s young granddaughter, Margaret, known as The Maid of Norway, as his sole heir.  With Alexander’s wife and three children all dead, and a country in need of an heir, Alexander re-married.  His race home to his new bride, despite adverse weather, ironically, led to his death when his horse fell over a cliff in the dark, and exactly the situation a new wife was supposed to prevent. 

Alexander’s young granddaughter, three or four years of age when Alexander died, was sent from Norway, in 1290, to take the throne of Scotland.  Not only did she become ill on the voyage, but a storm blew her ship off course.  She died on September 26, 1290 on Orkney Island, at the age of 7.

This left a country that had, just a few short years before, had a monarch and four clear heirs, with no obvious successor to the throne.

Into this void stepped thirteen men, all claiming the right of succession.  Maybe six of these had strong claims, with Robert Bruce, “the Competitor,” grandfather of the better known Robert the Bruce, Robert I of Scotland, and John Balliol having the strongest.  John Balliol and his three older brothers–all of whom had predeceased him, leaving him as the possible heir–were descended from an elder daughter of the line of King David, while Bruce was descended from a second daughter, but a generation closer to David I.

Still, civil war threatened to break out.  The Scots invited Edward I, Edward Longshanks, King of England, to settle the matter.  Edward chose John Balliol, viewing him as the weaker and more easily controlled man.  So on the 17th of November, 1292, Balliol became king of Scotland. 

His reign was short-lived.

Fortunately for Scotland, perhaps unfortunately for John himself, neither he nor Scotland was quite as weak as Longshanks expected.  At first, homage to Edward I, as the self-declared Lord Paramount of Scotland, was forced from the Scottish nobility.  (Does anyone besides me sense a medieval Death Star hovering at the border?  Actually, it was called a trebuchet in those times.)  Edward did his best to undermine John’s authority and humiliate him, demanding and receiving legal authority, money, and troops.

In 1294, Edward demanded Scottish troops for his war against France, setting a deadline of September 1. Scotland’s response was to immediately enter their own negotiations both with France and Norway.  In October of 1294, John Balliol openly defied Edward.  By the summer of 1295, Edward became aware of Scotland’s negotiations with France, and, being a medieval king, did what medieval kings (usually) did best: he gathered his troops to wage war. 

1296 saw the outbreak of hostilities, as Edward Longshanks, in a brief respite from his war against France, drove his army north to conquer the Scots.

John Balliol was known in his own lifetime by, and has come down through history with, the moniker Toom Tabard, meaning empty coat.  It stems from the incident at his capture and forced abdication on July 10, 1296, in which Edward Longshanks, ever on the lookout for a good chance to humiliate a man, ripped the heraldic insignia from Balliol’s tabard, or tunic.

Balliol’s brief kingship ended with capture of himself and his son by Longshanks, and his forced abdication on July 10, 1296.  He was imprisoned  in England’s Tower of London, released in 1299 briefly into the custody of the Pope, and in 1301, allowed to go to his estates in France, where he lived out the rest of his life in exile.

Take the name John Comyn.  In the time of Robert Bruce, alone, there are several of them important enough to have come down in history.  The best known is the John Comyn, Guardian of Scotland, slain by Bruce before the altar of Greyfriars Kirk.  That John Comyn is also known as John III Comyn, Lord of Badenoch, and the Red Comyn. 

His father, John II Comyn, also Lord of Badenoch, also a Guardian of Scotland at one stage, was the Black Comyn,  and, like his son, fought for the crown of Scotland with a Robert Bruce–although with Robert Bruce’s grandfather,also Robert Bruce,  known as “The Competitor,” in the late 1200’s, whereas John III, the Red Comyn, fought with the younger Robert Bruce, of Braveheart and Bannockburn fame.

Home of the Comyn Family

Current with this John Comyn was his cousin, John Comyn, differentiated by  the title Earl of Buchan.  In an interesting, perhaps sad, twist, this John Comyn, Earl of Buchan, though a great supporter of John Baliol and enemy of Robert Bruce, was also the husband of the remarkable Isobel MacDuff, Countess of Buchan, who left her husband to ride north and claim the MacDuff family’s traditional role of crowning the Kings of Scotland, by placing the crown on Robert Bruce’s head, shortly after he murdered her husband’s cousin, John Comyn, at Greyfriars Kirk.

Confused yet?

Actually, writing it all out has made it all much clearer.  Now for my second act… on to the Alexander Comyns and Alexander MacDougalls!

Whether Bruce went with the intention of killing Comyn, or whether the crime was committed in the heat of an argument is unknown, but the end result is remembered 700 years later: Robert the Bruce, Scotland’s greatest king, killed a man in front of an altar on holy ground.  The deed launched him on a more abrupt road to kingship and war with England than he most likely intended.

Killing was not an unusual matter in medieval life.  Killing a man on holy ground, however, was a serious matter.  Bruce knew that he would be ex-communicated for it, and, more importantly, that an ex-communicated man cannot be crowned king.  His answer was the race to Scone, where he was crowned before the Pope could get the news and proceed with the ex-communication.

The killing at Greyfriars also cemented some of the great families of Scotland against Bruce as king, and leading them to side with England in the years leading up to Bannockburn.  Who’s to say what would have happened, had tempers stayed cool at Greyfriars that day.  Would Scotland have had an easier time, had the Comyns and their kin not turned against Bruce?  Or would Scotland have had a harder time, with continued infighting amongst the clans?  Regardless, the incident stands out as a major event in the life of Robert Bruce and the history of Scotland.

More on John Comyn tomorrow.

 Urquhart dates from medieval days, or earlier.  Adomnan’s Life of Columba tells us that a structure of some sort stood on the same site as early as the 6th Century, most likely the home of an elderly Pict noble, Emchath, whom St. Columba converted, on his way to visit King Brude.  As an interesting side note, other sources say it was on his trip to visit Brude that St. Columba became the first recorded observer of the Loch Ness monster.  He saw a sea creature attacking a man, and drove it off by making the sign of the cross and ordering it to leave.  As a second interesting sidenote, reports say that most Nessie sightings do occur near Urquhart.  I guess it’s as popular among behemoth semi-mythical sea creatures as among humans!

Despite evidence of some structure on the site that early, there are no actual records of Urquhart Castle until the 1200’s.  The land on which it is built was once the home of the Durward family, leading many to believe they built the castle.  In 1250, Alan Durward, a powerful Scottish noble and brother-in-law of King Alexander III, held Urquhart.  When Durward died in 1268, the castle went to the powerful Comyn family, Lords of Badenoch, who in later years became enemies of the Bruce family.

Through the years, however, Urquhart has gone through many hands.  In 1296, Edward I (Longshanks) of England,  threw the might of his trebuchet against Urquhart, tearing down its walls and taking it.  2 years later, the Scots regained it.  In 1303, Longshanks took it again, only to have it re-captured in 1308 by Robert the Bruce, who gave it to his nephew, Sir Thomas Randolph, future Earl of Moray.

From the 1500’s until 1912, it remained mostly in the hands of the Grants, although it was frequently attacked, and on occasion captured by, the MacDonalds in the 1500’s, and by the Covenanters in 1644.  1689 saw the last government troops living in Urquhart, and in 1691 or ‘92, depending on the source, Williamite forces blew up the castle to prevent it being used as a Jacobite stronghold.  For part of its history, in the 1700’s, it lived the ignominous life of a stone quarry, but today is the third busiest of Historic Scotland’s sites.

Choose your words wisely, pick words that say a lot in the shortest possible space.  Think about what words really convey full, vivid meanings.   Give a few details.  For instance, does the house in your story merely have white walls?  Or are they antiseptic white, off-white or cream?  Are they freshly scrubbed, has someone put hand-down motifs across the top, or do they sport a host of fingerprints at waist level?  More interesting yet, does your character glance up and see large footprints on the walls two feet above her head?  Honing in on even a detail or two brings an added depth to your setting, in addition to telling something about your characters.

Use all 5 senses.  If at all possible, experience your setting first hand, and if not, use the internet to find pictures and research.  Use forums (nanowrimo is a great one) to ask questions of people who have experienced it.  Travel forums, such as Travelpod are also great tools, where people blog about their travel experiences, in addition to posting pictures.

Writing about Shawn and Allene hiking the Highlands was one thing; being there myself and recording every detail was another altogether.  After being there, I knew the sights of oak trees, sunlight glinting off veins of stones lying on the bottom of a stream, lichen-covered boulders, scrubby grass, shaggy Highland cattle with huge horns, and just how dark it is at night with no street or city lights; the sounds of sheep bleating nearby and the lowing of cattle carrying up the hill from a mile away; the smells of cow dung in the fields and coffee shops and fish and chips in the village below; and the metallic taste of the water from the streams and hot coffee and bridies after a long hike. 

I learned what it was like to hike through heather and moorland, with my feet sometimes sinking down farther than I expected and clumps of heather at times reaching past my knees.  It was not the flat and easy walk it appeared in pictures!  I gained an appreciation for just how cold 60 degrees can be at the top of a Scottish monroe with a stiff wind blowing the whole time, what it’s like to climb in medieval boots, and just how much and for how long muscles ache when not accustomed to such activity!

When creating your own settings, list the five senses–sight, sound, smell, touch, and taste–and spend some time listing as many items in each category as you can, for each scene in your story.  Don’t forget to write down what emotions the setting might provoke.  Research what you don’t know personally.  You don’t necessarily need to use everything you list, but it will help bring the places to life in your own head, which will bring it to life on the page for your readers.

Happy writing!