Cry for the Wolf, Chapter 9. by Richard Walker

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A year shy of sixty years now, the abbot resented the creeping debilities of old age and the fact that they interfered with that one great passion of his. He still had his high color. He had always been florid of face and hand and age had not been able to wring him out and cool his blood. He had always been a tallish man, in his own estimation, well made if a little rangy. Now, however, he feared he was becoming simply boney, even though he didn't feel any diminishment of his strength, and he even seemed to be losing some of his height. 'Just a little settling of the bones,' the physickers had said. 'It is to be expected of a man your age,' they said, puzzled at his attitude. Withered old stiffs! They were nothing but glorified clerks who would drop dead of fright if they ever felt their blood race as his did when he raced through the fields on his fine courser. They knew nothing of what it meant to be a man of action. It had been more than a couple years since he had been forced to
give up the chase and the hunt, except for the falcons which he still enjoyed, but his riding he clung to tenaciously. No matter how it pained him, he would still ride everywhere in his travels on abbey business, even in favor of sending a note when he wished to converse with neighbors and allies not too distant. He knew he should have been thankful that he remained strong and active several years longer than most men of his years, few men lived much longer than the years he had achieved, but it only made him feel the loss more keenly. His health was still sound. He knew he had more than a few good years left in him yet, Light willing.
He wondered what it felt like to be one of the dunladdin, to live twice the span of years granted humankind, or a dwarf, living perhaps more than four times humankind's span of years. What wisdom could be garnered! What secrets could not be ferreted out in that time? Such a legacy could be built to hand down to ... whom? He sighed. It was work enough just keeping things together for his own lifetime. No doubt any legacy he left the .. kingdom in his wake would be squandered all too soon by the younger men who followed in his footsteps.
Thinking to take his ease, maybe lie down a moment and then fresh up before the waterhorn called him to sup, Sagacious decided to go straight up the newel stairs at the end of the screens passage of the ,Friar General's hall to the oriel chamber above that adjoined his suite. Handing his horse over to the stable-hind, he headed across the court to the hall he 'sought, where the back door to the screens passage stood open, as usual. Unfortunately, once he passed through the back door into the passage, a young postulant he didn't recognize spotted him through the open doorway to the hall just as he headed for the stairs and hailed him.
"Your Grace! In the Friar General's name, a moment, an it please you!" The old abbot blew a heartfelt sigh and stopped by the door that let onto the vice he sought granting access to the oriel chamber and upper gallery and waited for the young man to catch up.