“Still,” I ask, as I continue to ponder what I learned a few hours ago, “you’d think the gods would have protected their own.”
“Ha!” Fulco laughs. “The gods of the Britons had grown weak by then. Their time was gone. Even Roman Legions no longer prayed to Mars or Mithras, but to Christ.”
We pass a broken-down cart, abandoned in a ditch, dressed in a gown of dead vine. A fat raven gnaws on something trapped between the half-rotten boards. Fulco picks up a stone and throws it at the bird. It flies away with a human eyeball dangling from its beak.
“I never liked this about these islanders,” Fulco continues, gazing after the raven in disgust. “Clinging to the old ways. Never adapting, never changing, unless somebody forces them to change. If it wasn’t for Rome, they’d still all live in the mud huts. I fear we’re becoming too much like them.”
“You’re still clinging to the old ways,” I note.
He smiles, mischievously. “There are new ways in this land. And before long, they’ll be the current ways. You’ll see.”
We walk faster now, as the road, straight as an arrow in this part of the country, descends ever lower into a deep, damp valley. I lose the track of time as we march on. It could be mid-day, or afternoon, or near evening, I have no way of knowing… For the most part, the forest is an unchanging wall of ancient, gnarled oaks, lofty beeches and sprawling hornbeams. Once in a while it opens up, either onto the copper carpet of a heathland, or on a stinking bog, but soon the forest closes again, darker with each passing hour. The ground grows waterlogged, marshy; murky streams babble in culverts under the road; the flagstones wobble in the mud. We cross a stone bridge, then another. The second one has a massive hole on its left-hand side, leaving only a narrow passage, barely wide enough for a single horse cart. Our steps dislodge a large cobble, which tumbles into the river with a splash. A heron wakes up, blinks at us and moves one step further away from the road.
Beyond the third bridge, the forest grows sparser, pockmarked by clearings. I take them for the spots where woodcutters or charcoal burners do their work, until I notice odd heaps of shiny black gravel, tinted with red, piled high on the grass like giant molehills.
“What’s that?”
“Slag,” replies Fulco. “From the iron works. It’s everywhere around here. We’re not far now.”
Not far from where…? He still hasn’t told me the final destination of our march, or given any clue as to why we set out on this expedition in the first place.
The road takes an unexpected bend, to avoid an outcrop of rock too hard for the Roman pickaxes. For the first time since we marched out in the morning, the rest of the road is concealed from our view. I notice Fulco grow anxious; his hand rests on the head of the throwing axe at his belt. This is a good place for ambush if anyone wished us harm; perhaps the only such place on the entire track. I touch the handle of the long knife in the thigh sheath, the sole weapon I carry. I hope it will be enough for whatever awaits us.
I hear shouting and the noise of clashing arms in the distance. Fulco starts into a run. He cries at me to follow. We emerge from around the bend to see a violent scene. This isn’t an ambush on some hapless travellers, but an assault on a roadside settlement, of the kind I haven’t seen before. It’s a bunch of low huts, their thatch-covered roofs barely rising from the ground, no taller than the slag heaps scattered around them like cow dung on pasture. Only one building stands taller, with smoke rising from a stone chimney protruding from the roof. Four bandits surround that building; a bearded man, standing alone in the doorway, holding a long, leaf-bladed spear, fends them off. Other than the bearded man, the village seems empty, though not abandoned — fowl hangs from the eaves, two terrified goats bleat in a wicker enclosure, an overthrown tar barrel slowly spews its contents onto the ground.
Two more bandits, wielding studded clubs, guard the approach from the road. They’re the first ones to spot us. “Stay back,” Fulco orders. “They’re too much for you.”
He draws both of his throwing axes, whirls them once in his hands and lets them fly at the two guards. They stand no chance: the axes bounce off the dirt, disorientating the men. One lands in the enemy’s chest, the other splits its target’s skull.
Fulco reaches for the battle axe on his back. The chief bandit turns towards us now. He notices the two slain and spits with a scowl. He orders three of his men to stop us. I see fear in their eyes as they stare at the massive axe in Fulco’s hands, but they feel safe in numbers. They pay no attention to me, an unarmed boy. They all wield short swords and wear steel helmets; one of them even dons an old mail shirt. But they are no soldiers. Fulco hacks the first one almost in half, from shoulder to bellybutton, then whirls to dodge a blow from the second bandit. A thrusting blade misses his side by an inch. The Frank grabs the second bandit’s sword hand and snaps it at the wrist, then lunges at the third man, head-butts him in the chest, grabs him by the legs and throws him to the ground. The axe head slices the air and lands in the bandit’s neck.
It’s now the turn of the chief. He abandons the attack on the old spearman and turns to face Fulco. He’s as tall and broad-shouldered as the Frank, but instead of the battle axe, he holds a long Roman cavalry sword, a spatha. The two burly giants stare each other down for several long seconds. The chief bandit is the first to charge. He spins the sword over his head like a flail. The blade lands on the shaft of Fulco’s axe, digging deep into the timber. Fulco punches the bandit in the face with the butt of the shaft. They both pull away. Now it’s Fulco’s turn to strike. The axe head grinds against the sword. The two are well-matched in strength at first, neither yielding an inch, but soon the chief bandit begins to waver; his boots slide in the mud under Fulco’s relentless push.
I spot a movement in the grass. It’s the second bandit, the one with a snapped wrist. He holds the short sword in his left hand, and creeps towards the two fighters. I open my mouth to cry a warning, but then I stop myself: if I distract Fulco now, he might lose in the tense clash of muscles. Silently, I draw my knife. I sneak up to the bandit. Up close, he’s terrifyingly large; Fulco dealt with him so fast, I haven’t had a chance to take a good look at him before now. His thighs are as thick as my waist — and he’s hardly even wounded, not counting the broken wrist. Luckily, he still hasn’t seen me, or if he has, he doesn’t treat me as a threat. His entire attention is focused on Fulco’s back.
I glance at the hut, meet the bearded man’s eye and shake my head: leave this to me. Only I am in the position to do anything. The bandit’s muscles tense as he prepares to lunge at Fulco. So do mine. I bite my lips to stop myself from shouting a battle cry as I throw myself onto the bandit and pin him to the ground. My knife seeks out an opening in the mail shirt. We grapple for a few seconds. I bite the bandit’s ear, and he throws me off. In the chaos, I drop the knife, but my enemy, too, has lost his sword. Both weapons lie next to each other in the dust.
We stare at one another like two deer on a rutting ground. The blades are closer to the bandit, but he needs to grab one of them with his left hand: the one he’s now clutching at his side, blood trickling through his fingers. The tip of my knife is painted bright red.
I leap forward. A split second later, so does he, but I’m faster, nimbler — younger. I miss the knife’s hilt and grab it by the blade; it doesn’t matter. I take a swipe from below and feel the knife enter the bandit’s body, just under the hem of his mail shirt. The knife reaches a bone and snaps off; half of it remains in the wound. The bandit squeals like a butchered pig, and just like from a butchered pig, his innards fall out in pale, pulsating coils. In dying fury, he raises the short sword, aiming for my neck, but his arm falters and the blade falls on my shoulder. It slides against the collarbone, too weak to cut through. I push the bandit away and fall on my back. I taste iron on my tongue and wonder whose blood it is that fills my mouth.
CHAPTER VII
THE LAY OF QUINTUS
Fulco helps me sit up. The sleeve of his tuni
c is torn, and the knuckles of his left hand are bruised. These are his only injuries. The chief bandit lies in the grass with his skull cleaved in two.
The bearded man approaches, holding a pitcher of water and a length of white linen and proceeds to clean and bandage the wounds in my hand and on my shoulder.
“Is that the boy?” he asks.
“Yes, that’s Ash,” replies Fulco. “Ash, this is Weland. He’s the man we’ve come all this way to see.”
I eye the bearded man, wondering whether he’s a priest or a seer. I can think of no other reason for us being here.
“And you’ve arrived not a moment too soon,” says Weland. He leans back to assess the bandages. Satisfied with his handiwork, he stands up, puts his hands to his mouth and shouts: “it’s alright, you can all go out now!”
The doors of the low huts all around us are thrown open. The villagers emerge into the light, blinking; most are women and children, I see only two men of fighting age. To my surprise, the inhabitants of the village look just like the people of Saffron Valley: dark of eye and hair, and dressed in the same sort of drab gowns and tunics as up north. The only difference I notice is that their cloaks — on those who have them — are clasped on their left shoulders, rather than on the right.
“Why are you so shocked?” asks Fulco. “Is something the matter?”
“I… I thought this was a Regins village.”
“And so it is. The Regins are just the same as Cadwallons, or Trinowaunts. All are Britons.”
“Then the border…”
“A long time ago, they may have been as different from each other as Franks are from Saxons,” explains Fulco. “When the Romans came, they took those boundaries and made them their own, but let the people cross as they wished. Nowadays, a Regin is simply someone who lives south of the border and pays taxes to the Comes in New Port. Any differences there may have been in blood, customs or tongue are long gone.”
“Except the Southerners mix more with those from across the sea,” adds Weland with a snicker. Fulco nods in agreement.
“But then, why do they live like this? What kind of houses are these, with just roofs sticking out of the ground? I’ve never seen them north of the border.”
“Those are Saxon houses, boy,” answers Weland. “I taught them how to build like this.”
Only now I notice his blue eyes — his hair and beard are both silver, so I couldn’t tell before. I jump to my feet. “You’re a Saxon!”
“Am I the first one you see?” Weland’s eyes narrow in amusement.
“The first one I can talk to!” I look to Fulco. “So he’s a Saxon priest? Is there another ritual to go through?”
“He’s not a priest.” Fulco grins. “Far from it.”
“I’ll have you know, my profession commanded more respect than any priest, back in the Old Country,” says Weland. “Besides, there is a ritual involved, of sorts.” He looks at the bodies on the ground. “I wasn’t going to sell it to you cheaply,” he adds. “But, seeing as you’ve saved us all a lot of trouble… These robbers were becoming a real nuisance.”
Fulco rolls over the bandit chief with his boot. “Who are they? This one looks like a legionnaire.”
“He was.” Weland nods. “A number of them arrived from Armorica in recent months. There’s a new rebellion there, and with it, a new crop of deserters.”
“A rebellion, again? It just never ends over there,” says Fulco, frowning. “I’m surprised Rome even bothers still sending soldiers this far.” He picks up the sword. A chip the size of a man’s thumb spoils the blade’s edge, about two thirds from the hilt. “This is a good weapon. Do you reckon you can fix it?”
Weland scoffs. “Don’t insult me. If you wait until tomorrow, I’ll throw it in for free. Now please,” he says, gesturing towards his home, “make yourself comfortable, though I don’t have much in the way of comfort — certainly not the kind you two are used to. Still, I have some good grouse left, if you fancy…”
Weland’s house is more spacious inside than it appears from the outside. Its floor is the bottom of a dug-out pit, almost three feet below the level of the threshold. A platform raised on timber pillars serves for a bed, leaving plenty of room underneath for piles of charcoal and other supplies. A great stone forge, larger even than the one I’ve seen at Eadgith’s house, and square in shape rather than round, takes up the entire far end of the house. The coals on the hearth are still smouldering. Weland gives them a couple of blows from leather bellows, and the bright yellow flame returns in a shower of sparks. He roots about in the storage, pulls out a long-necked flagon and slams it on the bench where Fulco and I are sitting.
“The last of the summer mel,” he says, pouring the golden liquid into our cups.
Fulco raises the cup in a toast. “Was hael!”
I join in, hesitantly. Weland takes a gulp straight from the flagon, and wipes his mouth. His hands are rough, red, covered in callouses and old scars. He’s missing a few fingernails.
“Is that the spear?” Fulco asks, looking at the weapon the blacksmith used to defend his smithy. It hangs over the door frame now: a thick shaft of ash, and a slender, leaf-shaped blade, almost a foot long.
“No,” replies Weland. “This one’s mine, an old thing I brought with me from home. I haven’t riveted yours yet.”
“If you need any help…” I volunteer, remembering how Eadgith’s father always needed several hands around the forge.
Weland waves his hand. “I have all the help I need. I sent my boy to the woods when I saw the bandits coming. He should be back soon. Ah, this must be him.”
The door creaks open, but instead of a boy, a woman enters the house, carrying a large loaf of black bread and a link of smoked sausage. She leaves it on the bench, casts a frightened look at me and Fulco, bows and leaves, all without saying a word.
“You still seem surprised they look like other Britons,” notes Fulco.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. It’s just all of this —” I say, and wave my hands around the house, “— looks so much different to what I’m used to. What’s wrong with the way we build up north?”
“Nothing’s wrong with it,” replies Weland. “But a home needs to suit the needs of the people living in it.” He taps the earthen wall, shored up with timber. “This is cheap and quick to build, cheap to heat. When the bandits come, they only burn the roof, instead of the whole house, and you can rebuild it in a day.”
“People feel safe in a place like Saffron Valley,” adds Fulco. “They build to last, to leave something to their children. Here in Andreda, they have no guards to protect them, or an earthen wall to hide behind, so they build simple and fast.”
“Can’t Dux Wortigern send his troops to bring peace to this place? What about those Saxon mercenaries I keep hearing about?”
They both chuckle. “Wortigern can’t even keep peace in Londin,” says Fulco. This is news to me. “And the mercenaries protect only the rich traders and their goods. Simple folk need to take care of themselves around here.”
The door opens again, and this time it is the boy Weland mentioned earlier. He has unruly, mousy hair, like Lady Adelheid, and green eyes, darting from me to Fulco and back again. He speaks, but in a language I don’t understand… though I remember its sound. Weland replies in the same tongue, and the boy rushes outside.
“You haven’t taught him the Vulgar Tongue?” asks Fulco.
“What for? Everyone here speaks a bit of Saxon anyway, and I don’t need him talking to strangers. They might give him some strange ideas.” He winks and laughs.
The boy returns, holding a shaft of ash wood and a freshly forged steel blade. He hands the blade to Fulco for inspection.
“What do you think?” asks Weland. “Will this do?”
The blade is slimmer than that of the spear above the door, shaped into a thin wedge, with barbed points at each side and a further foot of steel between the tip and the socket. It looks like a cross between a heav
y infantry spear and a javelin.
“Of course it will,” replies Fulco. “You’re the best blacksmith I know.”
“Still, you’ve given me quite a challenge. Where did you find this design?”
“I modified an Anglian pattern I spotted at Rath.”
“I thought it seemed familiar.” Weland nods. “The Anglian craftsmen always surpassed the Saxons back in the Old Country.” He rises heavily from his stool. “Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to finish this. Won’t take long. Cume!” he orders the boy, and the two wander off to the forge. The steady sound of a hammer soon rings out from the anvil.
“How have you two met?” I ask Fulco, biting into the sausage. “The war?”
“Later, much later. He arrived in the pagus of the Cants with some of the Iute refugees, twelve years ago. Wandered around all over the place, then came to settle here, among the slag heaps. He found an untapped vein of ore, opened a smithy for travellers, and then others just started settling around his house.”
“You said he was the best blacksmith. Why won’t he join the mercenaries? I’m sure they’d pay well for his services. Wouldn’t he rather live among other Saxons?”
“Not all fair-hairs are the same, boy. That’s another thing you need to learn. The Iutes come from another part of the Continent than the Saxons in New Port. They’re more like Franks in customs and laws. That’s why Weland and I struck such good friendship.”
“Hey,” Weland calls from the forge, “I’ll have you know I’m very friendly with everyone!” He strikes one last blow with the hammer. “It’s done.”
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