The Harrowing

by James Aitcheson

  ‘Why?’ asks Beorn. ‘What did you do?’

  Tova meets her lady’s gaze, and she sees the trepidation in her eyes. But it’s too late for Merewyn to have any second thoughts, especially now that she has come so far in her story. What choice does she have now but to tell them how it ends?

  *

  Winter came and went. It wasn’t as harsh as some, not as bitter as this one, but the winds came rushing down from the high moors, and rain battered the hall for days on end. There was a storm one night that screeched and roared and made the whole house creak, waking everyone. In the morning we found that it had torn the thatch from one of the barns, and Skalpi crossed himself and said the old gods, the gods of the Danes, the gods of his father’s father, were stirring from their slumber, beating their war drums as they marched to give battle with the new religion, and that was the surest sign that bad times were to come.

  Then, just as the days were beginning to grow bright again and the first shoots were bursting forth, there came another long spell of rain. The rivers rushed and frothed and swirled and swelled until eventually they overspilled their banks and all the meadows were under water. The timber bridge, which had apparently stood for forty years, was swept away, and the wath was too dangerous to cross for weeks afterwards, so we were cut off for much of that time, and that meant that tidings of goings-on elsewhere were hard to come by. We’d hear things sometimes if we needed to send to manors further up the valley to trade fleeces for flour or salted pork for rolls of linen, but it was only what they’d learned from others, who themselves had heard it in turn from Byrhtred, who’d been told it by Æthelwulf, who had first heard it from Maning, so it was difficult to know how much of what reached our ears was true, if anything.

  Of course it turned out it was all true: the rumours of rebellion which Skalpi had dismissed as mere fancies, everything. Some time before Christmas the ætheling had fled King Wilelm’s court and gone into St Cuthbert’s land, where he’d made common cause with the lord of Bebbanburh and other noble families and had marched south. A great battle had followed at Dunholm, where the Normans had been slaughtered in their thousands, or so it was said, until the streets were choked with their corpses and the river below the town had run red with their blood.

  Not long after, the ætheling had retaken Eoferwic, and the Norman whom the king had made shire reeve was besieged inside his castle, and suddenly men began to think that young Eadgar might be the one to drive the Normans from this land back into the sea. But then, as you know, the king rode north with great haste, gathering his vassals, his foot warriors and his riding men as he went. He came upon the ætheling and his army before dawn one morning, forced his way inside the city and took them by surprise, routing them and causing them to flee back into the north.

  So it was told to us. The great rising against the Normans, over before it had hardly begun.

  When he heard the news, Orm was livid. I was in our chambers with Skalpi eating our midday meal when he burst in uninvited.

  ‘You should have let me go,’ he said without so much as a greeting. He didn’t glance at me; I don’t know that he even realised I was there, so consumed was he with rage. All his attention was on his father. ‘Now the rebellion is over, and instead of marching under Eadgar’s banner all I’ve done is waste my time here.’

  ‘Do you think the rebels failed because they lacked your spear and your shield?’ Skalpi asked him. ‘Do you? Don’t be foolish. If you’d gone, you’d most likely have got yourself killed.’

  Orm stood across the table from his father. ‘At least I have the courage to fight for my land and my people, something you would never do!’

  Red-faced, Skalpi rose. ‘Apologise,’ he said.

  ‘Why should I apologise?’ Orm retorted. ‘Why should I say sorry for speaking the truth?’

  And Skalpi struck him.

  I’d never seen my husband take his hand to anyone, not even a slave, and certainly not his own son. As long as I’d known him, he’d always been among the most mild-mannered of men. I’d heard that in his time he’d fought in wars and had killed men, run them through with spear and sword. That was not the Skalpi I knew, but in that moment there was such a wildness in his eyes. As if something inside him had broken, I thought, as if the Devil had somehow taken hold of him. His mouth was twisted into an expression I’d never seen before, an expression I’ll never forget as long as I live. His teeth bared. Breathing hard. Like a hound gone mad. And I was afraid of him suddenly, as I’d never been afraid before.

  He struck his son across the side of his head, hard enough to send him reeling, stumbling sideways so that he almost fell over a stool. How Orm managed to stay on his feet, I don’t know, but he did. His ear was bleeding where I guessed Skalpi’s ring had cut him, blood streaming down his face, dripping on to the rushes and the straw. He put a hand to his cheek, and his fingers and palm came away smeared red, and he just looked at them, bewildered, his mouth hanging dumbly open like he didn’t understand what had happened, like he couldn’t believe what his father had done.

  ‘You dare disrespect me?’ Skalpi roared. ‘You don’t know what I’ve given for this kingdom, for my people. I’ve marched until my feet were raw and bloody. I’ve stood in the shield wall with Earl Siward against the Scots, in fog and hail, wind and snow, my fingers so stiff with cold that afterwards I couldn’t make them let go of my spear haft. I’ve killed more men than you’ve winters to your name. I’ve done things I hoped I’d never have to do, seen horrors you wouldn’t believe if I told you. I’ve done more than you ever will, and I did it all to defend these lands, you ingrate. These lands, which our family has held by charter right since the days of my father and his father, so that you and your brother might in turn inherit them from me some day. Do you hear me?’

  That’s what he said, more or less, while Orm simply stared at him. For once he had nothing to say.

  ‘Next time you think about accusing me of faint-heartedness, remember that,’ said Skalpi, then went out, without finishing his meal, without as much as another word either to Orm or to me, as if in his anger he’d forgotten I was there as well.

  Maybe part of the reason he was angry was that he believed Orm was right, even if he didn’t want to admit it. He might have been nearing fifty and as far as I knew hadn’t lifted a blade or donned byrnie or helmet in years. He certainly hadn’t in the months I’d known him. In spite of that, I think he felt he should have been there, riding with Eadgar, fighting against the foreigners, doing what he could to defend the land he loved, the land in which he had grown up. The one thing that gave him hope was that the ætheling had escaped the battle and probably still lived. As long as he did, the remaining rebels, the ones who’d survived Eoferwic, had someone to rally around.

  Those were strange times. All that anyone talked about, in the fields or the hall or the yard or the pigpens, was the war against the foreigners. Whenever more news came our way, Skalpi would summon Ælfric to consult with him as to what he should do. There was great excitement but at the same time great uncertainty, because no one knew what the Normans would do next. King Wilelm himself had gone back south to put down risings elsewhere, but he’d left behind even more men to occupy Eoferwic and the surrounding country. They were seizing manors close to the city in reprisal for the rebellion, and we heard of scouting parties riding north into St Cuthbert’s land to try to root Eadgar out. We knew they hadn’t succeeded, though, because just after midsummer a man arrived at Heldeby, sent by the ætheling himself.

  He came alone, arriving one bright morning. He rode a white horse, and not some old nag but a stallion, well bred and spirited. Weeks of dust and dirt caked his shoes and his cloak and his trews, which were full of holes, some of them stitched back up and others not. By the state of him he looked poor, but his clothing was fine, or at least it had been at one time. I remember thinking that his tunic must once have been reddish in colour, alth
ough it had faded to a sort of mud-brown, and it was embroidered at the cuffs and the neck and hem and along the sleeves, but all the threads were coming loose. He was about the same age as you, Beorn, or maybe a bit older. It was hard to tell; his face was drawn and he had dark pouches under his eyes, as if he hadn’t slept properly in several days.

  The stranger drew to a halt in the yard, surrounded by a cloud of dust that his mount had kicked up, and demanded that the lord or steward or whoever held this manor come out to greet him, for he had been sent by Eadgar himself. As soon as he said that, there was a great commotion. Word was passed around, and everyone set down their tools and whatever it was they were supposed to be doing, and flocked to see this man and hear what he had come to say. Skalpi was out with Orm and Ælfric riding Heldeby’s bounds, as they did every week, examining fences and hedges that might need repairing, drove roads and tracks that needed to be cleared of brambles and nettles, which were always encroaching and making passage difficult for travellers. I sent someone out to look for them and bring them back while I stepped forward and told him plainly that in the meantime the stranger should address himself to me, the Lady Merewyn, Skalpi’s wife and head of his household.

  He looked at me down his nose, from atop his white horse. I guessed he was unmarried since he was clearly not used to being spoken to in that way by a woman or to showing her any courtesy. But everyone was clamouring for him to speak, pressing close on every side, and so, puffed up with his own self-importance, he gave in. He called himself Ascytel and said that he was a staller in King Eadgar’s service. Not ætheling but king. That was the first time I’d ever heard him called by that title, his real title, and it sounded strange, although it probably shouldn’t have, given that many people say that it was his right by birth. Ascytel said that he had travelled across field and fell, brook and marsh and moor, that he had come from beyond the old wall in the far north, where a host was gathering. Gathering, he said, for another campaign. Another attempt to take back the kingdom from the invaders who sullied the earth with our blood. Many had died at Eoferwic, but many more still lived, he said, and they were determined that one defeat should not be the end of their ambitions. King Eadgar was sending word throughout the land, sending men like him, like Ascytel, into each shire, each wapentake, each manor, to rally support among the English. Sending the message that we were not defeated, that the rebels’ fire was undimmed, and that despite all the hardships they had suffered, the struggle still went on.

  We could yet wrest the crown from the usurper’s brow, he said. We could yet strike him down and drive the Normans from these shores. To do that, though, Eadgar needed our help. He needed the help of every able-bodied man in England. Every man who already possessed a shield or helmet, his own shirt of leather or of mail, and even those who were lacking. If he knew how to wield an axe or sword or seax, if he knew how to thrust and trap and cut, if he had fought before, then so much the better, but if he did not and had not, it didn’t matter. As long as he had hands with which to hold spear or spade or hoe, and feet with which he was willing to march for victory and in the name of the kingdom, in the name of the English people, that proud and ancient race, that was what counted.

  Even then I remember thinking it was madness. A man from every carucate of land – that was what was required by kings in times of war, according to both the law and ancient custom. Heldeby was ten carucates in size, and we could manage without that many men if they went away to fight. Not easily, because the others would have to take on their work, but it could be done. If we willingly gave up every able-bodied man, though, or half or even one third of them, what were we to do if they still had not returned by harvest-time? How did Ascytel expect us to keep up the manor? To feed ourselves? Surely he didn’t expect us to starve for the rebellion’s sake?

  But when I asked him he only shrugged. ‘This is what I’ve been told to tell you,’ he said, and that was all he would say to me, insisting that the rest he must discuss with my husband and my husband alone.

  Skalpi returned soon after that, and they went to his chamber, where they had long discussions which I was not invited to attend. These were matters of war, Skalpi said, and should be talked over between men. And they did talk. For over an hour they talked, before finally they emerged and Ascytel mounted his stallion and rode off to the next manor and the one beyond that and the one beyond that, with the same message for all of them.

  ‘What did you say to him?’ I asked Skalpi when our visitor was no more than a white dot disappearing over the brow of the hill.

  ‘I said what I had to,’ he said, tight-lipped. He clearly didn’t want to speak any further, but he was mistaken if he thought I was going to leave it at that.

  There was a stiffness to his bearing that I didn’t like as he went back inside the hall.

  ‘And what was that?’ I asked.

  ‘I promised ten men, because that’s what I owe. The strongest and the fittest because they’re the ones most likely to make it back.’

  ‘No more than ten?’

  ‘That’s what I promised,’ he said and then hesitated, but when I pressed him he went on: ‘I’m not going to force any man to go who doesn’t want to, but at the same time I won’t deny anyone who’s able and willing the chance to take up arms and join us. Ascytel was right about that much. We need every spear we can muster, if we’re to have any chance of defeating the foreigners.’

  I remember the feeling in my stomach at that moment. ‘“We”?’ I echoed, my voice small.

  He placed his hands upon my shoulders and looked straight at me. ‘If we lose this war, we will lose everything else as well. I can’t stand aside while others risk their lives on my behalf. I might be old but I can still ride and I can still lead men. I know what it means to fight in the shield wall. So you must see that if Eadgar is marching, then I must march too.’

  But I didn’t see. ‘You can’t.’

  ‘I have to,’ he replied and turned away. He’d made up his mind, he said, given his word to Ascytel to give on his behalf to Eadgar himself.

  I clutched at his arm and tried to persuade him to send someone else in his place. He didn’t have to go himself. I tried to hold back my tears. I didn’t want him to dismiss my pleas as those of a desperate and foolish woman. He listened patiently, as he always did. Although I didn’t love him as he had hoped I would, I’d grown fond of him. And I was worried for him. He had the resolve and he was afraid of nothing. That he was strong enough in that sense, I had no doubt. And it was true that he didn’t toil for breath or walk with a limp or talk about his creaking bones, as did many men his age. He wasn’t in ill health, but he wasn’t battle-fit, and surely he knew that.

  I asked him when was the last time he’d drawn his sword from its scabbard, or even when he’d last lifted it from the kist beneath his bed.

  He didn’t answer. He had none to give.

  I couldn’t help thinking that if Eadgar’s first rebellion had failed, why should it be different this time? How many more would die?

  And I confess I was worried for myself as well, although I would never tell him so. Why not? Because it would sound as though I had no confidence in him, and also because I feared it would sound selfish. And it was selfish, I suppose. For I was asking myself, if he didn’t survive, what would happen to me? As his wife I commanded some respect, modest though it was, and had protection in law. As his widow I’d have hardly any of that. I’d either have to take another husband, go back to my brother’s house or else go into the cloister, and the thought of any of those things made me despair. For while life at Heldeby was not always easy, the truth was that I’d grown comfortable there. Like the sapling, I was at last beginning to flourish, and I didn’t want things to change.

  But I said none of this. He sat upon a stool on the dais while I paced around and around.

  ‘I am a warrior,’ Skalpi said eventually. He spoke quietly, but his wor
ds filled the hall. ‘My father was a warrior, and his father too. Both of them strove hard to defend these lands of ours. And I must do the same.’

  I didn’t try to argue with him. Not when he said that. I’d done all I could and knew if I said anything more it was likely only to strengthen his determination. He was like that.

  The next few days swept by in a haze. For so long things had been quiet; from where we were, in the hill country on the edge of the high moors, the wars against the Normans had seemed a world away. But suddenly everything had changed.

  Preparations began that very evening. Skalpi called a muster at the ancient stone that stood in the meadow not far from the crossroads, to which he invited every man and boy over the age of eleven, which included Orm but not Ketil. As the sun grew low, two dozen came, of whom he sent away four because they were too young, another because he could only walk with the aid of a crutch and was nearly sixty besides, and lastly Wulfrun, the smith’s wife, because she was a woman, though she protested she was as strong as any man, and proved it too by clouting around the ear one of the younger men who laughed.

  That left eighteen, whom Skalpi watched over the coming days as Ælfric sparred with them in the training yard, using poles and wicker shields in place of the real things. He watched as they were formed into groups and made to practise the shield wall, and he watched as they were each handed a spear and, one by one, took it in turns to run at a scarecrow and impale it. He watched as they hurled javelins at targets in the fallow field beside the coppice, and gave advice to each man on how to hold the shaft and how to plant his feet, and where his head should be as he aimed and then loosed it. At all of this there were some who were better than others, and equally there were some who clearly had no skill and would not survive long. He dismissed these, saying the last thing anyone in battle wanted was someone on his flank he couldn’t trust to hold his own, because when the lines clash each man relies on his friends to help keep him alive. If the shield wall breaks through ineptitude or cowardice, then everyone dies. He had seen it happen, time after time. So he would take only the best.