by Trevor Bloom
‘Stay here,’ Eleri said. ‘I will fetch the queen.’
A moment later he heard the hard rap of heels on the wooden floor, and Basinia entered. She was dressed for travelling. A loose fitting gown in some fine material with an overjacket in the same colour, a dark cap and veil, a waterproof overcape, and fur lined boots. She stood slender and erect. Heavy gold earrings hung almost to her shoulders, and her lips were painted red making her mouth look like an open wound. Perfume, rich and heavy, hung in the air about her. She could have been a girl of twenty-five.
The queen coolly surveyed him and then handed her wrap to Eleri.
‘The Saxons will soon be here,’ she said.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘But you know the Overlord intends to stay in Tornacum.’
He thought he saw a shadow pass across her eyes.
‘My son can be very stupid at times,’ she said. ‘He doesn’t always see the dangers that surround us.’
‘I think he sees them, Lady, but he chooses to ignore them.’
‘Then you know that you are both going to die?’
They stepped back to allow two slaves carrying an oaken chest to pass. The chest was black with age and heavy, and the strain on the mens’ faces was plain. He wondered if Basinia had sent the young Frankish nobleman to Thraelsted as a decoy for him. He would have asked her outright but he had no wish to be in Basinia’s debt.
The queen stared blankly at him. ‘It would be a shame,’ she said, ‘after all you have done for us. You will lose everything you have worked for.’
‘What are you trying to say, Lady?’
She scowled, unwilling to put her thoughts into words. ‘You understand that if my son dies, you will have nothing. You will remain a half-slave for the rest of your life. Of course,’ she added, ‘if you die that will hardly matter.’
He understood well enough, the message plain. If the Overlord died, his promise to free Ascha would die with him. And if Ascha lived, and her son died, Basinia would make sure he suffered.
‘If it is to happen, it will happen,’ he said coldly.
Basinia raised a hand in disgust. ‘Neither of you need die. It’s unnecessary.’ She went to the window and was silent for a long time. Then she turned and said, ‘I want you to go to Radhalla and offer him the town in exchange for my son’s life. And yours too,’ she added as an afterthought.
‘I doubt whether Radhalla will consider it a fair exchange,’ he muttered.
‘Nevertheless, you will go?’
‘No, Lady.’
‘I thought you might say that,’ she said. ‘Is there nothing I can offer you that will change your mind?’
‘I’m not about to barter for my life with Radhalla.’
Basinia seemed to sag a little and then drew herself up and shook her head, her cheeks bloodless. ‘Then it’s goodbye, Saxon. I am leaving for Cambarac and my boat is waiting. I will see you on the other side, if not in this life then most certainly in the next.’
It took him a moment to work through the implication of what she said. Basinia had a boat? By tomorrow Tornacum would be a charnel house, but a boat offered the chance of escape.
He swallowed, knowing there would be a price for what he was about to ask.
‘Would you be willing to take my brother and my friends to Cambarac?’
She looked into his eyes, and then nodded. ‘Bring them and we will take them,’ she said quietly.
Basinia lifted her hand.
Ascha hesitated, then bowed his head and brushed the back of her hand with his lips. The queen looked at Ascha, and her mouth moved jerkily. ‘Take care of my son, Theod. He is all I have. There is a sharp bend on the river just south of the town. I will tell the boat to wait for you. We will wait until mid-morning tomorrow, no later.’
They exchanged glances, and he knew they’d made a deal. She would offer passage to Octha, Hanno and Herrad if he did everything he could to keep Clovis alive.
She swept past him and was gone without another word.
The Antrustion guards and the servants bustled to make ready. He could see slaves and servants loading the wagons outside. Eleri went to go and then paused and looked over her shoulder directly at him.
‘Take care!’ she whispered. ‘Your life is in great danger.’
‘I’m not afraid to die,’ he said casually.
Her mouth twitched. ‘Radhalla is not your only enemy. There are others who want you dead.’
He looked at her. ‘Who wants me dead, Eleri?’
She closed her eyes, shook her head and turned to leave. Ascha grabbed her wrist, pulled her away from the door and closed it with his foot. Outside he could hear the queen shouting at the slaves and servants. There was the sound of a slap and a high pitched wail.
‘What’s going on, Eleri?’
‘Nothing! Is this the thanks I get for trying to help you?’
‘What do you know?’
‘I cannot tell you. Let me be!’ She struggled and tried to pull her arm away.
He stared at her, working it through. ‘The morning after I spent the night with you I was attacked by the Alani. And a year ago I was followed on the road to Colonia by men who already knew that Clovis had sent a spy to the north. You served us, Eleri. You heard us talking. You knew where I was going. You told them.’
‘Let me go, you’re hurting me.’
‘It had to be you. Who are you working for, Eleri?’
She threw a cape over her shoulders, looked at him and shook her head. ‘I cannot. He would kill me.’
‘Who will kill you?’
She said nothing, her thin lips pressed tight.
He thought for a moment. ‘Was it Fara? Ragnachar’s man?’
There was a pause and then a reluctant nod.
‘You said you were a gift. Who gave you, Eleri? Who gave you to the Overlord?’
She turned away and then looked back. ‘Ragnachar gave me to Clovis, and he passed me on to his mother. The Overlord has little interest in women,’ she added with a brittle smile.
‘And the queen used you, didn’t she? Set you up as a royal whore. You slept with royal guests and whatever you learnt, you told Basinia?’
He remembered the night he had spent with Eleri, lying beside her, kissing her eyes, her throat. He put a hand to the side of his face. ‘Sweet Tiw! You’re working both sides. You’ve been passing information to Basinia and to Fara.’
‘I had no choice. Fara said if I refused he would cut me,’ she said with a shudder.
‘Does the queen know?’
Eleri gasped and shook her head. ‘No, and you must never tell her. If she discovers I have been disloyal she will punish me. She thinks I work for her and her alone.’
‘And Fara?’
‘You have no idea what you are getting into here. You have become a thorn in Ragnachar’s side. Fara is a very dangerous man. If he finds you, he will kill you.’
‘Does he know I’m here?’
‘Yes, he knows.’
‘Who told him, Eleri?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘You don’t know?’
‘Fara has spies everywhere,’ she said, pleading. ‘There is nothing Clovis does that Ragnachar doesn’t know about. Anyone could have told him.’
‘Who then?’
She thought for a moment. ‘Maybe Flavinius?’
Flavinius? He felt his jaw drop. Flavinius had said he should not tell Clovis he had seen Fara with Radhalla. But Octha had also told him to say nothing. Was there no-one he could trust?
There was the crack of a whip outside, the clop of hooves and with a groan of timber, he heard the wagons move off. He stepped in close. ‘Eleri, I need to know. Will Fara harm Clovis?’
Eleri shook her head. ‘No, he will leave that to Radhalla. But you are a threat, and he will hurt you as easily as breathing.’
‘Eleri!’
The girl jumped like a scalded cat. They both turned. The queen stood in the doorway with her hands clasped before her an
d her face cold and wintry. She gave them a bleak smile. ‘When you two are quite finished?’ she said, a rasp in her voice like a stick through gravel.
Eleri bent her head and moved away. She stopped in the doorway, turned, ran back and kissed him hard on the mouth and then she was gone.
He went over in his mind what Eleri had said and tried to imagine what Fara would do. The house was quiet. The wind must have picked up because somewhere a door was banging and the shutters began to swing, squeaking on iron pins. He was sure he was being watched, he felt the eyes boring into the back of his head, but he saw no-one. He heard a sound behind him and turned with a start but it was only a rat scuttling along the foot of the wall. He thought of the girl, and Octha waiting at the mansio. They were safe for the moment. And then the fear hit him, his blood ran cold, and he had a sense that something was terribly wrong. He will hurt you, Eleri had said. No pleasure in killing his enemies when he could make them suffer.
He turned and ran.
Pricked by a gathering urgency, he cut down a narrow gravel alley and ran past the waterfront shacks of the rivermen. He stopped to listen, heart yammering and then he was off again. Somewhere on the river road he could hear horses clopping. He came to Flavinius’s house and stopped and listened. Cats yowled in the night. He could see the door was open. He looked both ways up the dirt street.
Nothing.
He drew his seaxe and stepped inside. Mouth drying, he scanned the room. A body was slumped in a corner. He bent and lifted the man by the shoulder. It was the servant of Flavinius, dead. Ascha let the body fall. He listened and then went on. In the next room, propped up against a wall, he found Flavinius. No sign of Hanno. Ascha looked out of the window at the street and listened. When he was sure it was clear, he squatted down beside Flavinius. The Roman was still alive; his eyelids fluttered open and he looked up at Ascha with dark and mournful eyes. Ascha saw that his fingers were interlocked and bloody. Gently, he lifted his wrists. Two deep cuts had laid the belly open from ribcage to groin. Flavinius sat in a pool of his own gore, cradling his guts in his lap.
A cold chill crept through Ascha’s bones and froze his heart. He wiped his mouth with a sleeve and tightened his lip.
Flavinius had not betrayed him.
‘Flavinius,’ he said urgently. ‘Can you hear me?’
The Roman looked up at Ascha and tried to speak. ‘They took Hanno.’
‘And Lucullus?’
Flavinius shook his head. ‘He never came back.’
His voice faded to a whisper and his head slumped to one side.
Ascha ran his palm over the Roman’s face, closing his eyes. He said, ‘I’m sorry I ever doubted you,’ and then he shoved the seaxe in his belt and ran out into the street.
He ran at a steady lope through reeking alleys. It was dusk, and the rain had stopped. He turned a corner and saw the old bridge ahead. Across the river he could hear the sounds of drunken revelry. A chill wind blew in from the west, and the sun was dropping like a stone.
As he crossed the bridge four horsemen came out from behind a house on the far side. He stopped and looked back over his shoulder and then drew his franciska. The riders sat silently watching him. One of them carried a long and heavy bundle across his horse’s neck. Like a sack of grain.
‘Where are you going, Saxon?’ they said.
He stood, watching them for some time with his feet slightly apart and the franciska held lightly by his side. Then the rider with the bundle detached himself and rode forward, hooves echoing on the wooden decking. He rode up to Ascha and halted the horse almost within spear-reach. It was Fara. Hanno was slumped head down across the horse’s neck. His wrists and ankles were bound, and Ascha could see there was blood on his shirt and face. He could not tell whether he was alive or dead. Fara sat upright in the saddle and looked down at him, the moonlight gleaming on Ragnachar’s seal around his neck. The horse pawed the timber decking and shifted its feet and sighed.
‘You don’t give up do you?’ Fara said.
Ascha didn’t answer.
‘You have caused us many problems.’
‘I know.’
‘You believe you have the right to destroy what has been planned for years and then just walk away?’
‘The right, no.’
‘Then why?’
‘It was what I had to do.’
‘What you had to do?’ Fara looked back at the others and laughed without humour. ‘For a half-slave, you have big ideas, do you not?’
He said nothing. He looked behind him and moved to the edge of the bridge so the Franks could not surround him. He glanced over the parapet at the river darkly streaming down below and eyed the ground that separated them. Pointless, and they both knew it.
‘You came here to kill me?’ Fara said.
‘I came here to kill Radhalla. I had no thought of killing you.’
‘But you are here now?’
‘Yes.’
‘What is it you want from me?’
‘I want my brother,’ he whispered.
‘He wants his brother,’ Fara smiled. He slapped Hanno on the back. There was a faint groan. ‘You want him alive or dead?’
‘Go screw yourself.’
Fara almost smiled. He said, ‘What will you give me to get him back alive.’
Ascha did not speak.
‘Will you give me your solemn word as the son of a slave-whore that you will leave this city and never return?’ Fara said.
‘Go fuck yourself,’ Ascha snarled. He made a sudden grab for the bridle reins but Fara knew what he would do and pulled the horse back. It reared. Ascha ducked the flailing hooves and sidestepped, but Fara turned the horse easily and rode back a little way and then turned again to face him. Ascha stood in the middle of the bridge, his eyes flickering and his chest heaving, judging the distance between them.
At the end of the bridge, the three Alani sat on their horses and watched in silence.
‘I warned you,’ Fara said.
‘People have been warning me all my life.’
‘You want your brother?’
‘Yes.’
There was the flash of a long knife in the moonlight.
‘Then take him.’
‘No!’ Ascha yelled.
Fara looked at Ascha, and a smile twisted across his face. He bent low over the horse’s neck and then he made a single long pass with his knife, opening Hanno’s throat from ear to ear. In one easy movement he scooped up Hanno’s feet with the crook of his arm and flicked his body off the horse. Ascha heard his brother’s skull crack against the parapet of the bridge and then with a deep splash Hanno fell into the river.
Fara turned his horse and rode back across the bridge to where the others were waiting. He said something which made them laugh, and they turned and rode off towards the north. Ascha sucked air into his lungs, ran to the edge of the bridge and peered into the depths. He leaned over the parapet and looked down, searching for his brother. The water was black and moved darkly, ripples glistening in the half light. He could see nothing of Hanno. Across the river he could hear horses trotting away.
Ascha leaned against the bridge and wrapped his arms across his chest and screwed his eyes tight shut. Some day, he would mourn his brother Hanno but right now he felt empty, drained of all feeling.
So numb he couldn’t feel the sadness.
Half a lifetime ago, Ascha and his mother are sitting on the mossy door step of the long hut watching the cows being driven back for milking. The cows move lazily, their big bellies swaying from side to side, neck bells tinkling. Small boys walk beside them pushing the cows’ flanks. The boys are barefoot and stripped to the waist, their skin the colour of mud.
‘So you’re going?’ his mother says, her face tight.
‘Yes,’ he says, unable to hide his joy. With Hanno’s encouragement, he has done a deal. He will carve the SeaWulf’s new prow monster if Aelfric will let him go on the raid.
His mother picks at the stuff of h
er skirt. She looks up at him and then looks away. Lately he has noticed her spending more time in his company. He has caught her gazing at him, touching him, reaching across to brush the hair back from his brow. Her eyes are red-rimmed and swollen, and he wonders if she is suffering from the grass fever.
‘When do you sail?’
‘In three days,’ he grins, unable to hide his joy.
‘Your father has let you go?’
‘He says I can go as an oarsman, unweaponed.’
‘Good,’ she says.
He gives her a keen look, ‘You want me to go?’
‘No, but I think you should.’ She lays her hand along the side of his face. ‘It’s time.’
‘Time?’
‘You must travel. See the world. There is nothing for you in this wilderness.’ She waves towards the green marshes, the water sparkling in the sun, the reeds lush, pricked with blue and yellow irises. ‘Get away. Learn. It’s your only chance to make something of yourself.’
The cows are almost past, the boys thwacking sticks on their rumps, shouting Hup! Hup!
‘I can do it,’ he says.
She gives him a sad look. ‘I know, but you are still young. I worry.’
‘I’m old enough.’
‘Fourteen,’ she says, miserable. ‘And you think you’re a man!’
‘Hanno will look after me.’
‘But will Hanno care for you as I do?’ she says bitterly.
He notices for the first time that there are strands of grey in her hair.
‘We’ll be back by the autumn,’ he says and flashes her a wicked grin. ‘With more loot than you can shake a stick at!’
‘There’ll not be a day goes by that I’ll not be thinking of you,’ she says.
He nods, knowing it’s true.
The breeze shifts, gusting the smell of ship’s caulk and raw sewage towards them. He sees his mother’s nose wrinkle and smiles.
He touches her arm. ‘I must get back,’ he says gently. ‘They’ll be wondering where I am.’
Ascha sat on his heels outside the mansio and waited. He sat there for a long time, watching as the lamps went out one by one. Finally, when the inn was dark, he crossed the yard and tapped lightly on the door with the back of his hand. The door opened and a slim shape appeared. Herrad took his arm in both of hers without a word and they walked toward the town, her shoulder pressed against his. It was warmer but not much, and the sky had cleared. Across the fields he could see the dark and brooding shape of the Basilica.