Holding the hilt carefully in both hands, she turns it over, admiring the way the edge catches the light. The balance is different with a longer blade, compared with the knife she’s been practising with. Along one face, she notices, are inscribed some letters that she can’t read.
She points to them. ‘What does that say?’
‘It says, “Cynehelm had me made.” Since Cynehelm is no more, there’s no point me holding on to it any longer.’
‘Don’t you need it?’
He rises, grimacing a little as he does so, and makes towards the door. ‘I have my bow. My axe. They’ve always been enough.’
‘Where are you going?’
‘I’ve made a decision. It can’t be far to Hagustaldesham. Half a day on foot through the snow. Maybe a bit more. If I go now, I can probably get there before dark.’
‘You’re leaving?’
‘I’m going to get help.’
‘But what about us?’
‘Your lady won’t be going anywhere quickly. Someone needs to stay with her and take care of her.’
‘You can’t just leave.’
‘Either I go now, before it gets any later, and try to reach there by nightfall, or we wait as the snow comes down, and we freeze or we starve, whichever comes first.’
Tova shakes her head. ‘You can’t.’
‘Would you rather go yourself?’ He rests a hand on her shoulder. ‘There’s no other way. If there was, if I could think of one, I wouldn’t be doing this. But there isn’t, so I have to.’
‘No. We need you.’
‘I’ll bring help, and we’ll make it through this. All of us. You’ll see. But you have to trust me.’
Trust me, he says. This man whom she still hardly knows. Their lives in his hands. Again. Without him they’d never have made it this far. Without him they’d be dead several times over.
He clasps her hands in his. His palms are rough and marked with a hundred cuts and scabs.
‘Whatever you do,’ he says, ‘whatever happens, you have to keep the fire burning.’
She nods. ‘Of course.’
He taps his chest, where his heart is. ‘I mean the fire in here. Don’t let it go out. Ever. If you do, that means they’ve won. What you said earlier, you were right. Whatever happens, you mustn’t give up, you have to keep on going. For you and your lady. For the priest. For me.’
She has never heard him talk like this before, and it unnerves her. Her skin crawls. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘You aren’t like the rest of us. You don’t have to carry the burdens we do. You’re a good person.’
‘Don’t say that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because it isn’t true.’
Murderer. Isn’t that what she is now? She’s a killer too. Like him. Like Merewyn. They made that choice together, the three of them. How can he possibly say she’s a good person after that?
And then there are the things he doesn’t know about. The things she hasn’t told anyone.
‘You’re loyal,’ he says. ‘Forgiving. Honest. A better person than the rest of us. When times grew hard, we were weak. We gave in to greed, to anger, to fear. But you won’t. I know you won’t. You’re strong. Stronger than most warriors I’ve known. You have the fire within you. As long as you keep it burning, there’s still hope.’
He’s beginning to frighten her now. All this talk only sounds to her like farewell. Why else would he be saying these things?
‘Don’t,’ she says. ‘Please.’
‘Believe me. Everything will be all right.’
He tries to let go of her hands, but she won’t let him. ‘You’re hurt. You’ll never make it in this weather. What if you get lost? What if the Normans find you?’
‘I can take care of myself. And I’ll be coming back.’
‘When?’
‘Tomorrow. I promise. You know I don’t make oaths lightly.’
‘Beorn.’
‘What?’
She allows his fingers to slip through her grasp. A part of her wants to throw her arms around him and thank him for everything he’s done, but that would seem too final. Besides, he knows it already.
Instead she says, ‘Be safe.’
‘I will.’
He grabs the handle and jerks once, hard. The door creaks open and the snow bursts in. It eddies around his feet. A blast of chill air greets her. Outside the flakes fall thickly in waves and spirals that make her dizzy. There’s so much of it. How is he going to find his way?
But she says nothing and keeps those worries to herself. He knows what he’s doing, she tells herself. He’s managed to endure this long, after all.
He ventures out into the storm. Takes one step, then another, then another, fighting against the wind. He doesn’t look back; she doesn’t expect him to. But just in case he does, she stands by the doorway, watching as he trudges on through the snow. The flurries envelop him, until all she can see of him is the outline of a figure, growing steadily fainter with each passing moment.
But still she watches, until, all too soon, he vanishes into the whiteness.
He’s gone.
*
Less than a day away. That’s how close they came.
Unless, if Oslac was right, they were never really close at all, and they’ve been chasing a dream.
They’ll know soon. When Beorn comes back. If he finds help, or if he doesn’t.
Either way, they’ll know.
*
It’s nearly dark by the time Merewyn wakes again. Tova hasn’t ventured outside since Beorn left. For the last hour she’s been watching the sliver of daylight around the door turn steadily dimmer and dimmer. Now it’s nearly gone. She doesn’t know if it’s still snowing. The wind hasn’t ceased; she can hear it screeching through the trees outside. She has dragged the altar across in front of the door to barricade it and stop it from blowing open, but it still rattles.
They sit close together, sharing in one another’s warmth. Tova’s legs ache with the cold. She has never seen her lady so pale, so stiff, so fragile. Merewyn’s dress is still drying on the makeshift frame beside the fire.
She takes out the book again, searching through the pages for more pictures of stories that she recognises. Before long she comes across one of a great, brightly coloured ship with golden dragon heads at each end, afloat upon the dark and turbulent seas and laden with livestock: with pigs and goats and horses and hounds and ducks, and again those strange humped animals that Merewyn said were called camels. Two of each creature, their heads peering over the sides.
A man, leaning from a window on the ship’s upper deck, reaches his hand towards a dove. An olive branch in its beak.
You relented, Lord, she thinks, that time long ago. Please, have mercy upon us this time too.
*
‘There’s something I need to tell you,’ Tova says. ‘Something I’ve been keeping secret. Something I’m ashamed of.’
Beside her Merewyn stirs. ‘What is it?’
‘I’ve wanted to say for so long, but it was never the right time.’
‘You can tell me, whatever it is.’
Tova takes a deep breath and then says, ‘Do you remember the harvest before last, when the silver went missing from Skalpi’s strongbox?’
‘You know I do. Why?’
‘It was me.’
‘You?’
‘It wasn’t Gunnhild who took it. It was me. I meant to run away.’
‘Run away?’
Tova swallows. ‘We were always talking in the dairy about what we might do if we ever earned our freedom. If we ever managed to escape. We’d all heard stories of slaves who’d done that, but always they ended up getting caught again. They were never able to hide for long; after a while they had to make themselves known somewhere if t
hey didn’t want to starve, and people were always on the lookout for runaways, eager to claim a reward. I thought that if I had money, I might be able to pay my way – maybe I’d flee to the sea and buy passage somewhere. I don’t know that I ever truly had a plan, but that’s why I did it. It was only a few pennies. I didn’t think anyone would miss them.’
‘You hated it that much?’
‘Of course I hated it. We all did. You would too. All day you work hard for no reward, and the next and the next and the next, and all the time you’re told that it’s not enough. Every night you bed down on damp rushes or flat straw because no one ever bothers to give you fresh bedding. You’re always last to eat, and if there’s nothing left for you after all the servants have had theirs then you go hungry. You never have your own clothes, only what others give you, and often they’re full of holes or wearing out and you have to mend them as best you can. No one cares for you or thinks about you at all, except when they need something done.’
‘Oh Tova,’ Merewyn says. ‘I never knew.’
‘It’s all right. There’s no reason you should have. Anyway, you did the best thing anyone ever could for me. You gave me my freedom. It wasn’t you. Ælfric was the one who was supposed to look after us and make sure we were properly fed and clothed. He was always looking for more from us, and we had no choice but to give it. If you disobeyed or refused to work you were beaten, and at the same time you were supposed to be grateful for whatever you were given, however little it was.’
‘But once you had the money, why didn’t you flee?’
‘I don’t know. Until I had the coins in my hand I never had any doubts, but as soon as I did, I began asking myself how far I expected to get before they caught me or some other fate befell me. I wondered how I’d manage to survive on my own, and what kind of life that would be. And, on top of everything else, I didn’t know where to go. In the end, I was too frightened to do anything.’
‘So you changed your mind, but you still kept the silver.’
‘I meant to return it, really I did. I knew that someone would notice it was missing sooner or later. But there was never a good time. I kept it hidden inside a small cloth pouch that I stuffed inside my mattress. I thought no one would find it there, but before I could take it back they searched our quarters.’
‘How did it find its way under Gunnhild’s bed, then?’
‘That was Orm’s doing.’
‘Orm?’
‘They tore our room apart. Him and Ælfric, I mean. He found the pouch, but he didn’t say anything until they came to Gunnhild’s bed. Only then did he pretend to find it. That’s why she didn’t know anything about it.’
‘How do you know this?’
‘Because he told me afterwards. A few days later.’
‘Why would Orm do anything to help you?’
‘Why do you think? Because he wanted something.’
‘Oh Tova.’
‘I’d noticed the way he looked at me, but then I thought he looked at all the girls that way. For a long time I didn’t think anything of it. I didn’t think he’d ever do anything, if only out of fear of his father. After his mother was driven out, though, he changed, became more withdrawn. Some of the ceorls didn’t like the looks he gave their daughters, the way he’d watch them when they were at work in the fields. They went to Skalpi to protest, and he managed to put a stop it for a while, but only for a while.
‘Anyway, I was as confused as Gunnhild was when they accused her. I’d been fearing the worst. I knew it was a mistake, but I had no idea how it had happened. Not until a couple of days later, in the kitchen, when Orm told me what he’d done. That he’d lied for me and that he’d done it to protect me. He told me I ought to thank him, and that if I didn’t do the things he wanted then he’d tell everyone the truth. When I still refused, he hit me and told me that I was worthless and no better than a slug. He said that if he liked he could kill me and nobody would care because I was only a slave. That’s when you came in. After that I kept expecting him to carry out his threat.’
‘But he never did.’
‘No, he didn’t.’
‘You should have said something.’
‘I was too afraid.’
‘But we sent Gunnhild away. Her daughter as well. We sold them to a trader who was going to take them across the sea.’
‘I know,’ Tova says, feeling very small. She wonders what has happened to them and where they are now. Are they even still alive? If only she could say sorry, but she can’t.
Forgive me, Ase, Gunnhild, both of you, she pleads silently. Wherever you are, forgive me.
‘You let us think it was her,’ Merewyn says. ‘You knew it was wrong and yet you said nothing.’
‘I was frightened!’
Merewyn shakes her head as if she cannot quite bring herself to believe it. ‘I begged Skalpi to be merciful, begged him not to be too hard on her. God be thanked he listened to me, but he didn’t have to. If he’d wanted he could have had Gunnhild hanged. Would you have kept silent then, knowing she was paying with her life for something you’d done?’
‘I–I don’t know,’ Tova says. She really doesn’t. She thinks she would, but she isn’t sure.
‘Why are you telling me this now, anyway?’
‘Because . . .’ says Tova, but the rest of the words stick in her throat and she can’t get them out. She can’t make herself say it.
Remember what Beorn promised, she thinks. He hasn’t let you down yet and he won’t let you down now. She must believe it. She must.
‘Because it might be the last chance I get,’ she says. ‘If I didn’t tell you now, it might be too late. And I didn’t want to die without telling someone.’
‘Don’t talk like that,’ Merewyn snaps, but Tova notices the tremor in her voice as she says it.
‘There’s another reason. Before he went, Beorn said these things to me. He told me to keep the fire burning and that I should never give up hope, no matter what happened. He kept saying it, and then he told me I was a good person. That’s what he believed. But it isn’t true. It isn’t true at all. I’m a thief and a liar, just like Guthred. I’m no better than anyone else.’
It’s a long time before Merewyn says anything. ‘What you did, you did out of desperation. There’s no shame in that.’
‘But Gunnhild, she was like a mother to me. And Ase, she was my best friend.’
‘Did they hate it as much as you did?’
Tova nods.
‘Maybe, then, it was a good thing you did for them.’
‘How could it be a good thing?’
‘Well, they could have ended up somewhere better than Heldeby. Somewhere without an Ælfric always watching them. Somewhere with fresh straw and blankets to sleep on, and clothes that weren’t falling apart. Somewhere safe from the Normans. From all this. Who knows? They might even have earned their freedom by now.’
She’s trying to make Tova feel better, but it’s not working. ‘You don’t know that.’
‘It’s possible, though, isn’t it?’
‘I suppose.’
‘We can’t change the things we’ve done. We can’t make them right, not completely. But you’ll get the chance to see Ase and Gunnhild again. Perhaps not in this life, that’s all. In the next. You’ll be able to tell them then. You’ll be able to say sorry for everything. And they’ll understand.’
‘Do you really believe that?’
Merewyn hesitates before, in a small voice, she says, ‘I have to. The thought that this world is all there is . . . Well, there has to be something more, hasn’t there? A place where there’s no pain, no hunger, no bloodshed. A place without evil.’
Tova has seen and heard enough evil, enough pain, in this past week to last her the rest of her life, even if she were to live to Thorvald’s age. No matter what happens after this is over, she
thinks, it’ll seem like paradise.
Her lady is shivering again as she leans towards Tova. ‘I hope Beorn comes back soon.’
‘So do I,’ Tova says, but she cannot keep the doubt from her mind. It throbs away inside her. Like a headache she can’t ignore.
What if the flurries turn heavier and he loses his way in the storm and cannot find his way? What if, in the gloom, he falls down a ravine that he doesn’t see until it’s too late? What if he can’t find help and keeps on wandering, more and more desperate, until the freezing night or hunger or his injured leg brings him down? What if he runs into another band of Normans? How well will he be able to fight? How well will he be able to run?
What if he’s already dead?
They would never know.
They could be sitting here, waiting for days, and not have any idea. At some point they’d have to accept he wasn’t coming back, but when? How long can they make the firewood last? How long before the snow relents?
She asks, ‘What if he doesn’t?’
Merewyn’s reply, when it comes, is drowsy. ‘Doesn’t what?’
‘Come back.’
‘He said he would, didn’t he? And so he will. He hasn’t broken a promise to us yet. He won’t now.’
‘But if he doesn’t?’
The question hangs between them, unanswered.
She supposes that Beorn, better than anyone, knows how to survive. That’s what he does. It’s what he’s good at.
Tova slides deeper under the folded wall hanging that serves her as a blanket, like a badger burrowing down into the earth, where she can hide, safe and snug, until winter has passed. The floor is hard, and she shifts, trying to find a more comfortable position, but there is none, and so she concentrates instead on staying as still as she can, curled as tightly as possible, her knees drawn up in front of her chest, her arms folded and her gloved hands tucked into her armpits, but nothing she does seems to work.
Outside the wind keens, rising to a screech before stuttering and breaking down into a weary moan. A death song. A lament for the fallen. No light now save the glow of the fire, which has dwindled to almost nothing.
Keep it burning, she thinks. Don’t let it go out.
The Harrowing Page 37