The Wether Fells¶
West of the Coldhollow road the walls climb out of the valley and keep going: the Wether Fells, the sheep country that fills the north's wool-rooms and its proverbs. It is a worked landscape - drove road, folds, standing stone, gorse moor - and every part of it is somebody's living, including the parts doing the eating.
The fells are early hunting ground: levels 3-8, one gate off the Coldhollow road.
Getting there¶
From Coldhollow take the Coldhollow Road south past the Long Glaze to the Shelf Edge, and go WEST through the fell gate onto the drove road. The gate's board says SHUT THE GATE, and means it - the top latch too.
There is a back door: the high moor's east scar drops to the boulder field on the Frostspine Climb, the trail up toward the Highreach. Handy going home; a long fall short of handy coming in underleveled.
The drove road & the bield pastures (levels 3-5)¶
The road runs walled and straight, west to its own end. South of it lie the in-bye pastures - the fells' best grass, held these days by the flock that outlived its shepherds:
- Feral hoggets hold the folds in force. A hundredweight of felted wool and grievance, they charge on sight and their unclipped fleeces still sell in Coldhollow, grumbling included.
- Crag kites patrol the walls and ledges - fast, dive-first raptors whose feathers fletchers pay over goose for.
The pastures reward walking the walls: the smit fold, the broken stell, and the far fold - the first ground the flock took for itself - all hold more hoggets than patience.
Wetherstone Rise (levels 5-7)¶
South off the road at the rise turn, the long green hill climbs to the Wetherstone: the standing stone the shepherds kiss, counted first of the flock every spring so that no count on the fells ever starts at nothing.
- Moor harts graze the shoulders and lawns - wary, heavy, and crowned. A moor hart hide is the premium skin of the fells; tanners call it the north's best boot-leather.
- Harts do not start fights. They finish a fair number.
Kiss the stone if you like. Everyone does, and nobody will say why in more than four words.
The Whinny Moor (levels 5-7)¶
West of the rise the gorse takes over - whin in yellow bloom in every month anyone has checked - and the moor belongs to the fell wolves: leaner than timber wolves, quieter than either, hunting the sheep-trods in pairs. Their pelts smell of gorse-bloom and sell accordingly.
Landmarks worth the detour, or the avoiding: the leaning stones, the bone litter (the gorse grows tallest there, and does not get asked why), and the wolf rakes at the moor's south edge, where the den is. Bring a friend to the rakes. The wolves do.
The Redshank Steading (levels 7-8)¶
In the moor's southwest corner a steading that died of the murrain has new tenants: the Redshanks, the sheep-thieves of the fells, squatting the fallen farm and running lifted flocks south by night.
- Redshank scouts watch the moor from the picket thorn and the watch thorn. They carry coin, sometimes a locked box, and a horn whistle it is worth not letting them finish.
- Coll Redshank, the campmaster, keeps the one roofed corner of the fallen hall - an ex-shepherd who prices every fleece on the fells the day before it is stolen. He carries the camp's silver, a better box, and the redshank neckcloth that names the band. Coldhollow taprooms pay well for proof that he stopped needing it.
Bieldstead¶
On a walled lane north of the road, four rooms and a well: Bieldstead, the last working stead on the fells. No shops, no bar, no bank - just Old Grissel, the boy Tam, two dogs with strong opinions, and the standing custom of the hills: travelers get the settle, a bowl, and no questions until the second bowl. The stead and its yard are safe ground, and the only such between the road gate and the high moor.
The high moor¶
North from the road's end a stone-pitched ladder climbs to the tops: peat hags where the wolves run below the wind, the black tarn, the curricks - one stone raised for every flock wintered whole - and the kites' crag with its nine-years-unclaimed brass spoon. Mixed hunting, harts and wolves and kites, and the long view: the whole fells in one eye's corner, the Frostspine in the other.
At the moor's east scar the ground quits west-country manners and drops to the boulder field on the climb toward the Highreach.
The stone¶
Every trade on the fells - wool, mutton, theft - counts before it moves, and every count starts at the Wetherstone: yan, before any ewe. The stone was here before the first flock, wears its polish at lip height, and takes trouble up the kissing path and keeps it. The wind goes around the stone. This is noticed, and not discussed.