by James Wilde
Who plotted? Who weaved schemes in search of power and gold? Whom could he trust? Not the archbishop, he was increasingly sure, though it pained him deeply to doubt such a great man. Alric watched Ealdred drift along the nave, the candles casting a looming, hook-nosed shadow on the far wall. His ceremonial mitre gave an odd, flat-topped appearance to the shadow’s head, distorting the figure further. Alric shivered, his breath clouding, but the archbishop would be warm in his green and purple woolen chasuble.
Ealdred was a man who understood the world of power as well as the spiritual realm, the monk knew. He had the King’s ear, and he was close to the Godwins, who wielded such great influence across England. Given a choice between the poor ceorls and the wealthy, where would he stand? Alric thought he knew.
Beside the archbishop, the earl’s wife, Judith, listened intently to the advice she was being offered. Her expression was grave, the darkness in her features emphasized by her white headdress. She wrapped herself in her green woolen cloak, the red embroidery around the hem gleaming like blood.
“And what does the church think of these dark prophecies that consume the thoughts of the people?” she was saying in a quiet voice. “They talk of voices whispering in the deep forests and signs in the night sky. Their fears are fueled by those who still pray to the pagan gods, I am sure. Is the world truly coming to an end?”
Ealdred clasped his hands behind his back, raising his face to the altar. “The Revelation of St. John tells us of the End-Times. It is … a difficult work and requires much reflection and study. But the words of our own Archbishop Wulfstan come down to us. His Sermon of the Wolf to the English is much discussed by my fellow churchmen and once was proclaimed from every parish pulpit.” The archbishop pressed two fingers on the bridge of his nose and closed his eyes, remembering. “This world is in haste and is drawing ever closer to its end, and it always happens that the longer it lasts, the worse it becomes. And so it must ever be, for the coming of the Anti-Christ grows ever more evil because of the sins of the people, and then truly it will be grim and terrible widely in the world.” Ealdred opened his eyes and gave a wolfish grin as if he was reveling in the apocalyptic message.
“And the Anti-Christ?” Judith asked. “How shall we know him?”
“We will know him, fear not. Wulfstan thought the Vikings in their dragon-ships were harbingers of the End. But now …” Ealdred shrugged. “The King is fading and with no issue. England faces a time of great upheaval. Perhaps this is the time when the Wolf hunts us all.”
Judith blanched and crossed herself.
“I am sorry. I did not mean to frighten you.” The archbishop pressed his palms together. “We must put our faith in God who will save all good men and women. For now, a strong hand is needed to steady the course of our great ship in these turbulent waters.” He leaned in close and gave a conspiratorial nod. “Now I will leave you to your prayers. Should you require any more guidance, one of the acolytes will fetch me.”
When Ealdred’s echoing footsteps had disappeared into the depths of the church, Judith knelt before the altar and bowed her head. Studying the slump of her shoulders, Alric thought how troubled she looked.
“Why do you spy upon my mistress?”
The monk jumped at the harsh voice. He whirled to see that the third figure had crept up on him. It was a woman with a face like the snow outside and hair the color of ravens’ wings. “I … I …” he stuttered.
“Answer me,” she hissed, leaning in close. Her eyes were like black pebbles.
Alric thought quickly. He couldn’t say that he was spying on any visitor from Tostig’s hall who might reveal the earl’s plans to deal with the simmering conflict across Eoferwic. “I would have news about a … a friend.…” His words tailed away. The woman’s stare was unsettling, and he decided he did not like her.
“What friend?”
“His name is Hereward. We traveled to Eoferwic together—”
“Hereward?” Her eyes flashed in recognition, but she hid the first glimmer of her feelings before he divined them. “What do you know of him?”
“That he is a good man who hides his true nature behind a fierce face.”
Her laughter reminded him of stones falling on a frozen river. “My name is Acha. I will take you to my mistress once she has finished her prayers, and you can ask her all you wish to know.”
The monk told her his name and thanked her, though he would now have to spin his lie further. Acha did not soften, but they exchanged a courteous conversation about the festivities the earl planned for Christmas. His men had already selected the Yule log, which Ealdred himself would bless, and the holly and mistletoe would soon be collected. Allspice, nutmeg, and cinnamon were ready for the baking of the festive cakes.
When Judith had finished her prayers, Acha led Alric over and introduced him. The younger woman stepped back but listened with what the monk thought was keen interest. The countess’s face softened when Alric told her of his mission to take the Word to the villages of Northumbria that did not yet have a church or a priest. The monk had heard that Judith was a pious woman who had made many gifts to the church of St. Cuthbert in Dun Holme. Learned, too: she was said to own many books and illuminated manuscripts. She seemed surprisingly keen when the monk mentioned Hereward’s name and spoke of the warrior with clear warmth.
“You knew him before he came to Eoferwic?” Acha asked her.
The countess smiled at the younger woman’s interest. “Yes, I knew him. At court.”
“Hereward was at court?” Alric, unable to hide the shock in his voice, was filled with a crimson vision of the warrior rising from the pool of blood, eyes glinting with uncivilized fury.
Judith laughed. “He is your friend, and you know nothing about him?”
“I know him better than he knows himself,” the monk asserted, “but of the events of his life I know nothing at all.”
“Tell us,” Acha urged her mistress, unable to hide her curiosity.
“I remember,” Judith said, “a boy of barely twelve summers looking as if a great wind had blown him into the King’s hall, golden hair filled with straw and dirt, and bruises and dried blood smearing his face. He was a fighter even then, and a trouble to his father, Asketil, one of the King’s thegns. Though he had a singing voice that could reduce men to tears and a face of beauty and innocence, there were some who said the Devil lived in his heart.” She looked from Acha to Alric, a shadow crossing her face. “In his Mercian home, he and a band of friends were responsible for such unrest that Asketil feared for his son’s safety. The boys were like wolves, untamed, they say. Stealing. Fighting. Burning barns. Attacking good men and women. Unable to control the boy, Asketil brought him to court, where he hoped his son would learn to be an honorable man. Hereward promptly ran back to Mercia and hid for more than a year in the wilds.”
Acha covered her mouth to hide a laugh. “And his mother? I have never seen a good wife who could not bring a child to heel with the side of her hand or the sharp of her tongue.”
Judith gave a sad smile. “The boy’s mother was taken by God when he was young. Asketil is as unbending as an oak and as cold as the ground outside this church. He played little part in the boy’s upbringing, preferring to devote himself to the King’s business and his own needs. Though he hides a hot temper. I found Hereward once so badly beaten that he could not stand.”
“His father?” Alric asked.
Judith nodded. “Asketil swung between uninterest and dealing out beatings that no just man would inflict on a beast. Yet Hereward wanted for nothing. The monks at Peterborough gave him schooling. He learned to play the harp. On his father’s estates he was trained in fighting with spear, axe, and sword, and he became a fine horseman. He learned the secrets of the watermen of the fens. He hunted boar and waterfowl and he was adept at hawking. And yet, as the years passed, he caused such a tumult in Mercia that it was as if he cared for no man or woman.”
“I cannot believe that,” Alric
put in.
“Nor I,” the countess said with a nod. “He was a lost soul, but inside I saw a spark of goodness, if only someone could fan it into a flame.”
Alric felt his spirit rise. It was almost as if Judith were speaking directly to him.
“Perhaps it is too late,” Acha mused. “Those who saw his treatment of Thangbrand said he was more beast than man. And I would agree.”
“Perhaps.” Judith rubbed her hands together to warm them. “Asketil brought him back to court and kept him there for three summers, and though there were moments of fighting and drunkenness that shamed his father, he did seem to find some peace. When he returned to Mercia on the brink of manhood, I hoped he would escape the devils that haunted him.”
“And now he is in Eoferwic.” Acha stroked the tip of her index finger along her full lips. “And no one knows why, for he refuses to tell a soul of his true reasons for being here.”
“His sword-arm is a valuable addition to the huscarls in these turbulent times,” Judith said. “He is the best warrior here. At court, the men said he was unbeatable in battle because he has no fear.”
Because he cares for nothing, not even himself, the monk thought. He watched the raven-haired woman from the corner of his eye. Her expression was thoughtful, and he wondered what was passing through her head.
Judith continued: “Mercia’s loss is Northumbria’s gain. Hereward will serve us well here, I think. Now, this cold reaches deep into my bones and I would spend some time by my hearth.” She was about to walk away along the nave when she added, “Would you like me to remember you to your friend?”
“Thank you, Countess, but that is not necessary,” Alric replied with a polite smile. “I will see him again soon enough.”
The tap-tap-tap of the two women’s leather soles faded into the gloom. Just before the shadows folded around her, Acha glanced back and the monk thought he glimpsed something fierce in her face, a desire, perhaps, to seize an opportunity with both hands and never let it go.
Alone in the nave, Alric wondered what to do now. There was enough work in the church to keep him occupied until long after sunset, but then Wulfhere and some of the other men were meeting in secret to discuss their next move. The monk hoped to persuade the rebellious group to concentrate their efforts on urging the thegns to change the earl’s mind, perhaps after Twelfth Night when Tostig would be replete and rested, without bloodshed or further burning.
Walking slowly toward the altar, he was distracted by the sound of approaching footsteps. Ealdred appeared, but Alric’s smile of greeting froze on his face when he saw that the archbishop was not alone. Four men stood in the shadows behind the churchman, but the monk was rooted to the spot by the sight of the red-bearded Viking at Ealdred’s side.
Harald Redteeth grinned, raising one muscular arm to point at Alric. “That one,” he said. “His hands are red with a woman’s blood. He is a murderer who attempted to flee the punishment for his crime. Now he must pay the price for his sin.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
ON THE SNOW-COVERED BANK OF THE GRAY RIVER, IN THE TEETH of a bitter wind, Hereward watched the sailors tie up a ship laden with lapis lazuli, amethyst pendants, and silk brought from the lands beyond the whale-road. It would be the last vessel to visit Eoferwic before the port closed for Christmas, for no one worked during the Twelve Days. The seamen’s skin was lashed red by the wind and the icy sea spray, and it was a struggle to work their frozen fingers even with the thick furs and leather they wore against the cold.
“News from the south?” the warrior asked a weary Saxon fumbling a knot on the rope looped round the wooden post next to the jetty. Hereward had hoped the messenger Tostig had sent to warn the King would have returned by now to report that Edwin of Mercia had been imprisoned.
“It’s cold,” the sailor grunted without raising his eyes.
“Is your blood as cold as the fish that swim in the river?” The voice at Hereward’s back was laced with mockery. He turned to see Acha, her pale face peering from the depths of a hood, a wry smile playing on her lips. “I cannot think of another reason why you would shun the fire on this icy day.”
“You follow me out into the winter gale to torment me now?”
“Torment? You are too sensitive. When I first saw you, I thought you a man who liked to play rough-and-tumble.”
At the clear tease in her voice, Hereward looked at her sharply, trying to guess what game she was playing. His instinct told him she was trying to keep him off-kilter. He felt sure that she was used to making men run like dogs. “Leave me be. I have no time for your diversions.”
He was surprised when she did not take offense and instead slipped her arm through his. She leaned in close to breathe in his ear: “Come. There is someone you should meet. And later, more comfort than you will ever find on these frozen banks.”
The promise hung in the icy air for a moment, then Hereward allowed himself to be led back into the filthy streets of Eoferwic. Under the pall of woodsmoke, the people were eagerly anticipating the coming feast and relief from daily toil, if only for a while. Faces were flushed and eyes gleamed. Freshly cut holly twisted around doorways, and sweating men dragged Yule logs across the frozen mud to their hearths. Under twirls of milky-berried mistletoe, men stole kisses from young women as they had done since the days of their most distant ancestors. Over the rooftops rang the squeals of the pigs and the honking of the geese facing slaughter.
“You are allowed greater freedom than many slaves,” Hereward said as Acha picked a narrow path into one of the oldest, dirtiest parts of the town.
“My reward for serving my mistress well.”
“I have watched you. You are filled with fire, and your tongue is as sharp as a knife, but you bite it whenever the earl or his wife is around.”
“We all do what we do to survive.” She skirted a spoil-heap where two hollow-stomached dogs fought over a cow bone, snapping and snarling.
“But you are not at ease with your lot.”
“You see that, do you?” Her eyes flashed.
Hereward saw more than she realized. Her flinty exterior hid a deep, unfocused yearning, much like the one he felt himself. He had never known peace, and Acha, too, was filled with unease, he was sure. The warrior knew that she thought escaping back to her homeland of mountains and forests would still the incessant drone in her head, but he guessed that the source of her troubles lay deeper than that. Perhaps it was the curse of all men and women that no one could see the road that would take them safely through the wilderness.
“Your king, Gruffydd ap Llywelyn, is raiding England once again. You know King Edward will not allow that to continue. Your people will face a bloody response.”
“Do not treat me like a girl,” she snapped. “I know many things, and more than you. I know Edward is to discuss the English response at his Christmas court at Gloucester, the court Earl Tostig cannot attend because of the troubles here in Eoferwic. But he will be asked to invade Gwynedd and Powis to drive Gruffydd ap Llywelyn back, there is no doubt of that.”
“You keep your eyes and ears open in your mistress’s presence, I see,” Hereward responded. “Do you hope that your knowledge of your homeland might be of use to Earl Tostig should such an invasion arise? Perhaps that he might take you back to the Cymri? And then what? An escape? The information you have gathered on the earl would be of great value to your king.”
“Never. I am loyal to my mistress,” she replied, the lie apparent.
“You scheme and plot and twist men and women to your advantage more skillfully than anyone I know. I should watch you,” he said as they came to a halt outside a small, filthy hovel.
She gave him an enigmatic smile. “If you are aware of my games, you are protected from them.”
Ducking down, she eased through the doorway. Hereward followed and found himself in a smoky space lit by the glow from the embers in the hearth. Unfamiliar plants smoldered in the fire, filling the air with an odd scent that was at
first sickly-sweet but carried bitter undertones. The skulls of birds and small woodland animals hung from the roof in strings that rattled as he pushed his way through them. He was reminded of the house where the wicce had given them shelter after the escape from Gedley. By the fire sat a gray-haired woman with rheumy eyes, beating out a steady rhythm with a hollow wooden pipe. Her forearms were covered with faded blue-black etchings, and her cheeks too.
“Britheva, I have brought the one I told you about,” Acha whispered, crouching next to the elderly woman.
“He is welcome.” The woman’s throaty voice held an accent that Hereward didn’t recognize. He squatted on her other side.
“You are a wise woman,” he said. “I thought the church had driven you out of all the towns.”
“The tide comes in, the tide goes out. The rocks remain.” Peering deep into her guest’s face, Britheva held out a hand, snapping her fingers with irritation until Hereward offered his own. The woman grabbed his wrist and flipped it back and forth a few times, examining his skin. She nodded. “Feeder of Ravens.”
The warrior flinched inwardly. The familiar vision of the black birds rising up from the lightning-split oak loomed large in his mind.
“What do you see?” Acha asked in a deferential whisper.
After a moment’s silence in which there was only the wind whistling in the shadowy roof space and the crackle of the fire, Britheva closed her eyes and let her head fall back. “These are the days we feared,” she croaked.