Sworn Sword c-1

by James Aitcheson

  ‘Aelfwold,’ I said loudly. ‘Preost.’ It was one of the few English words I knew.

  Osric merely blinked; obviously he hadn’t seen the chaplain either. I frowned. It was Aelfwold who had been most anxious to set off early.

  I left the boy by the hearth as I made for the stairs at the far end of the hall. The chaplain’s door was the first on the landing at the top. I knocked upon it, but there was no answer, and when I pushed, it opened easily, without a sound.

  He was not there. A wooden plate with bread half-eaten stood on the floor beside a cup of wine and small lantern; a woollen coverlet lay crumpled upon the bed. The shutters were open, letting in a chill draught, and I went to close them, my mail hauberk and chausses clinking as I did so. The room faced over the Walebroc, which ran beside the house, though its view was partly blocked by the thick branches of the oak that stood outside the window: the kind of tree that in my youth I had loved to climb, with branches that were evenly spaced, and knots on its bark that made for good handholds.

  ‘Tancred,’ a voice came from behind me.

  I turned with a start. Beatrice was standing in the doorway. I hadn’t even heard her approach.

  ‘My lady,’ I said. ‘You’re risen early.’

  ‘As soon as I heard you all outside I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep any longer,’ she replied.

  ‘We didn’t mean to wake you.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, waving her hand dismissively. ‘You’re looking for Aelfwold, I assume.’

  ‘Have you seen him?’

  ‘He’s in the kitchens, fetching provisions for the road. Robert is with him, I think. He wanted to see you on your way.’

  At least he had not gone far. The days were still short and so we had to make the best use of them. The sooner we left, the better.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, closing over the shutters and making for the door. Beatrice didn’t move, but stood blocking my path.

  ‘I have to go, my lady,’ I said, and tried to edge past her, through the narrow doorway.

  She placed her hand upon the sleeve of my hauberk. ‘Wait,’ she said, and I turned. ‘I never had a chance to thank you properly for the other night. For staying with me. For not leaving, even when I asked you to.’

  I shrugged. ‘I could hardly have left you on your own, in the middle of the woods. I swore to your father that I would protect you, and I intend to honour that pledge.’

  ‘All the same,’ she said, reaching out, touching the back of my hand, intertwining her fingers with my own, ‘you should know that I’m grateful.’

  I looked into her soft, smiling eyes. From down in the hall came Wace and Eudo’s voices — wondering where I was, no doubt. I heard the chaplain greet them, and Robert too.

  ‘They’re waiting for me,’ I said.

  She did not say anything but lifted her other hand to my cheek, gently running her fingers along the cut. The skin was still tender, and I winced inwardly as it stung, but resisted the urge to pull away. Something like a shiver ran through me; I could feel my heart thumping despite myself. I tried not to think what the priest might say if he happened upon us now.

  ‘Be safe,’ she said, and before I could reply she leant towards me, standing up on her toes, pressing her lips to the spot where her hand had just been. It was the lightest of touches, but it lingered there, for how long I could not say, and when she drew back, I could feel the moisture that was left.

  She squeezed my hand. ‘Take care, Tancred.’

  My throat was dry and I swallowed, wondering what had just happened. ‘I will, my lady.’

  My fingers slipped through hers as she let go, and then straightaway I was turning, my cheeks burning as I started down the stairs. After I had descended a few steps I paused to look back over my shoulder, but she had already gone.

  Robert was there to see us leave, just as Beatrice had said. He had on the same black cloak he’d worn yesterday, this time with tunic and braies to match. His scabbard, with its red and gold decoration, was the only mark of colour on his person.

  ‘We hope to return within the week,’ Aelfwold told him.

  Robert nodded as he looked from the chaplain to me, and then to Eudo and Wace, and the rest of his father’s knights. ‘I don’t know how long it will be before the king intends to march, but if I’m gone when you return, ride north on Earninga strAet and look for the black and gold. I have only twenty men with me; I’ll be glad of another six.’

  ‘We will, lord,’ I said, but at the same time felt my spirits sink. When I pictured it in my mind, I saw myself leading the charge, as I had at Dunholm and countless times before, but I no longer commanded a conroi of my own, I remembered; the only men under my authority were the five with me now. It was in numbers that the charge found its strength: in the weight of horse and mail it could bring to bear upon the enemy. Which meant that we would have to fight under the banner of Robert Malet — and under his orders rather than my own.

  ‘We’ll be praying for your father’s safety,’ the chaplain said.

  ‘As will I, Aelfwold,’ Robert answered. ‘I wish you a safe journey.’

  We bade him farewell and rode away, up the hill and away from the river. The road widened as we came upon the markets at Ceap, where the traders were setting up their stalls. Baskets lined the side of the street, some full of fish, no doubt fresh from the river; others held crabs, and they were even fresher, for many of them were still alive, clambering over each other in sideways fashion as they tried to escape. Further along, a man lifted wicker cages packed with scrawny chickens down from his cart. Merchants, recognising us for Frenchmen, called to us in our own tongue, trying to sell us rolls of Flemish wool-cloth, or flagons of Rhenish wine.

  We rode on past them, towards the city’s western gates and beyond. The road followed the line of the Temes as it curved around to the south, towards Westmynstre church and the royal palace. A number of boats were moored there, from small barges to great longships. Among the latter I recognised Mora, King Guillaume’s own ship — the very one, indeed, in which he had sailed from Normandy during the invasion. There were few vessels known to be larger; at thirty-three benches she was longer even than Wyvern. Today she was at rest and sat high in the water, empty of all but a few men. Had she been out on the water I knew she would have been more impressive still. I could readily imagine her great sail, decorated in the king’s colours of red and yellow, billowing in the breeze.

  On the higher ground beyond Westmynstre stood hundreds of tents, with banners of every hue flying high above: reds and greens, blues and whites. A wooden stockade had been erected on the slopes beneath the camp, forming an enclosure within which all the horses of the king’s host were gathered. How many men were encamped there, I could not say. Wigod had said that the king had eight hundred with him, and to judge by the number of tents and banners, that seemed about right. But even if all of those were fighting men, which was doubtful, it did not look like an army that could take back Eoferwic.

  I breathed deeply but said nothing, though I glanced at Wace and saw his expression, and knew that he was thinking the same.

  The Temes wound away to the south and we found ourselves amidst recently ploughed fields and rolling hills covered in woodland. The country all about lay silent, save for the calls of birds in the distance, the creaking of branches in the wind, and the crunch of small stones under our horses’ hooves. Every so often we met other travellers: peasants driving their animals to market in Lundene; pedlars and merchants; a group of monks with brown hoods. The further from the city we travelled, however, the less we saw of such people, and the more we were alone.

  My mind kept returning to my conversation with Robert and his mention of the nun, Eadgyth. She was once much more than just a nun, he had said. Did he mean that she and Malet had once been lovers? But even if that were so, why send to her now?

  I was jolted from my thoughts by Eudo and Radulf laughing as they exchanged bawdy jokes. I glanced behind me
, trying to catch Eudo’s eye, but he merely ignored me. He had hardly spoken to me since yesterday; in fact he had spent the rest of that day away from the house, probably across the bridge in Sudwerca, although he never told us. Only as we were breaking our fast did he at last come back. He gave no reason for his absence, and when he looked at me his eyes were hard, his mouth set firm, as if in disgust.

  ‘What’s wrong with Eudo?’ I asked Wace, when we stopped at noon.

  ‘Maybe you should ask him,’ he said.

  I had no wish to start an argument, though. Whatever the reason for Eudo’s foul mood, I knew that it would soon pass: it usually did. And so I ignored him as the seven of us sat beneath the drooping arms of an old oak and ate what food Wigod had provided us with: bread and cheese and salted bacon. Aelfwold made sure we did not linger long, however, reminding us that we still had many miles to make, and so shortly after we had finished we returned to our horses.

  I was placing my flask in my saddlebag while beside me the chaplain mounted up, when I saw something drop from his cloak pocket. He did not seem to notice as he began slowly to make his way back towards the path, following the others who were laughing between themselves.

  ‘Aelfwold,’ I called, raising my hand to catch his attention.

  It was a parchment scroll, about the same length as the distance from my elbow to my wrist, tightly bound with a simple leather thong. I crouched down and picked it up from where it lay on the grass. It felt crisp and new, although the parchment was not the best: the surface was not even but grainy, while the sides were rough where the sheet had been cut from the edge of the animal’s skin.

  The chaplain turned the mare about and rode back over towards me, a frown upon his face all of a sudden. ‘Give that to me,’ he said.

  I held the scroll out to him; he reached down and took it carefully, watching me all the time as he replaced it inside his cloak.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked him.

  ‘Nothing,’ he said. ‘Nothing important, at least.’ He gave a smile, though I could not detect any humour behind it. ‘Thank you, Tancred.’

  He turned and started to ride away. I stood there for a moment, puzzled by the change in his manner.

  ‘Are you coming?’ Wace called from the road.

  I looked up, blinking as the glare of the sun struck my eyes. There was something important about that scroll: that much was clear, at least. And I couldn’t help but connect it with this mission of his, this journey to Wiltune and Eadgyth. But what reason would Malet have for sending to a nun in any case, and to an English nun at that?

  ‘I’m coming,’ I muttered, mounting up at last.

  Like Earninga strAet, this was one of the ancient roads, and made for easy riding, which meant that we covered many miles that day. Nevertheless, the sun was growing low and bright in the sky ahead of us by the time we arrived at the Temes again. The river was narrower here than when we had last seen it back near Lundene, but the waters were high and the current fast, swelled by the snowmelt running down from the hills. A stone bridge traversed it; on the other side a scattering of houses nestled beside a small timber church, while amidst the reeds at the water’s edge a number of small rowing boats had been drawn up on to the shore.

  ‘Stanes,’ Aelfwold said, when I asked him the name of the place. ‘Over on the other side lies Wessex, the ancient heartland of the English kings.’

  ‘Wessex,’ I murmured to myself. How far we had come, I thought: from Northumbria to here, the southernmost province which made up the kingdom of England. It had belonged once to the usurper Harold, before he had seized the crown. Now it lay under the charge of Guillaume fitz Osbern, who was one of the realm’s leading noblemen, alongside Malet — and Robert de Commines, I thought, before I remembered.

  We had come upon many other villages that day. Some were larger, some were smaller, but all were alike in character, inhabited by gaunt and sullen peasants who spat on the ground as we passed by. I wondered whether they had heard of events in the north, and what that might mean to them. Of course it might not concern them at all; Eoferwic was two hundred miles and more from here. In any case, they could spit and stare as much as they wanted. I knew they would not harm us, for we had horses and mail and swords, and they did not.

  That night we spent in our tents, a short way off the road. It was a fitful sleep, though, for I dreamt again of Oswynn, except that her face was shrouded in darkness, and every time I tried to come near her, she melted away into nothing. More than once I woke to find myself breathing hard, sweat running from my forehead, and though I managed to return to sleep each time, it was always to the same dream. When morning came I felt as if I had hardly rested.

  The hills lay thick with the night’s frost, and for some time after we resumed our journey we travelled through a landscape glistening white as the fields of heaven. Soon, however, the rime began to melt, the clouds passed in front of the sun, and as the horses settled into their rhythm, so the day wore on. Hour after hour we passed fields and farms nestled amidst gently sloping hills, and it struck me that the country here was not so different from that in Normandy or Flanders. More than once I found myself gazing out across a certain valley or forest, only to be reminded of somewhere I had known in my youth, and for a moment I could imagine myself there once again. But of course it was never quite the same; most times we only had to go on over the next rise or merely beyond the next tree before its appearance suddenly changed and the feeling faded.

  Close to midday the road climbed a steep hill, at the top of which we came upon crumbling stone walls and what looked as if it had once been a gatehouse. Its arch had long since collapsed; great blocks of lichen-covered stone, dressed and evenly shaped, littered the side of the way. As we passed within the gates I saw the remains where more buildings had once stood: neat rectangles and half-circles of stone foundations, many with trees and bushes growing in their midst. The air was almost still, the skies filled with shadows as rainclouds loomed overhead. Aside from the seven of us, there was no one.

  ‘Ythde swa thisne eardgeard,’ Aelfwold intoned as he looked about, ‘Aelda scyppend, oththAet burgwara breahtma lease, eald enta geweorc idlu stodon.’

  ‘Thus He, the creator of men, destroyed this city,’ said Eudo, ‘until, deprived of the sound of its inhabitants, the ancient work of giants stood empty.’

  I stared at him in surprise, not just since it was the most I had heard him say in a good many hours, but also because I hadn’t known he could translate English so readily.

  Aelfwold nodded solemnly. ‘You are near enough. It is from a poem,’ he explained to us. ‘A poem of great sadness and loss, about things which were, but are no more.’

  I dismounted, leaving my horse while I walked between the ruins of what must at one time have been houses. Not that there was any sign of those who had lived here; it was probably centuries since they had done so, and all their possessions would have long ago turned to dust.

  Shards of slate were strewn across the grass, grey against green, but nestled among them I caught the tiniest glimpse of dull red. I crouched down to get a closer look. It was a stone, cut into a rough cube not much wider than my thumbnail: much like the dice that Radulf owned. I prised it out from the mud and turned its rounded edges between my forefinger and thumb, wiping the dirt from its surface, searching for any hint of markings, though I could see none. One face was smooth, but the rest were rough, encrusted with flakes of something like mortar, which crumbled away at my touch.

  Another of the stones caught my eye, less than an arm’s length away from where the first had lain, and I picked it up. It was identical both in size and in shape, although this one was black rather than red. I turned the two of them carefully in my fingers, wondering what they could have been used for.

  ‘This place, I believe, is what we know in the English tongue as Silcestre, but which the Romans used to call Calleva,’ Aelfwold said. ‘In its time it was a great city; since its fall, however, none have dared
live here nor attempt to rebuild it.’

  I tossed the two stones back on to the ground and stood back up. ‘Why would God punish them?’ I asked. ‘I thought the Romans were a Christian people.’ Though it was a long time since I had been at my studies, I was certain of that much.

  ‘They were,’ said Aelfwold, unblinking and unsmiling. ‘But they were also a sinful race, proud and weak in morals, who spent more of their time in pleasure than they did pursuing God’s work. Too concerned with preserving their worldly wealth, they cared little for the future of their souls.’ He gestured all around him at the shattered stones, the broken tiles, the empty town. ‘What you see is the result of His retribution: a warning to all men not to follow the same example.’

  For a while no one said anything. The wind began to gust and I felt a drop of water strike the back of my neck, trickling down my spine and causing me to shiver. Overhead, the skies were darkening still further; around us the ground pattered as the rain began to fall.

  ‘We should find shelter,’ Wace said.

  ‘A good idea,’ I replied.

  The most substantial remains were of a larger building a little to the south, and it was there that we led our animals. There was nothing to which we could tether them, but they were unlikely to roam far, so we left them to graze upon the grass. We huddled down within the walls, which rose here as far as waist-height, offering some protection at least from the chill of the wind at it swept amidst the shattered stonework. There was no roof to keep out the rain, however; instead we sat with the hoods of our cloaks up, eating in silence.

  We could have set up our tents, but it would have taken some while, and I did not want us to tarry here any longer than we had to. At one point I imagined I heard a whisper — some words spoken, though I could not make them out — and thought that the ghosts of those who had lived here were trying to speak to us, before dismissing the idea. Such things existed only in the minds of children and the mad, and I was neither of those.