Bassus swallowed hard. He was sure he heard all the other men do likewise in the silence.
“Do not think I would hesitate in this,” she said, turning back to Beircheart. “Mark my words the next time you have an itch, scratch it with a house thrall, but not with my daughter.”
She spun on her heel then, not waiting for an answer. Bassus let out a slow breath. Indeed, what answer could any of them give? There was nothing more to be said. By the gods, but the woman was spirited.
As she stalked away, making her way back down the hill towards Ubba’s hall, the men began to chatter, jesting and laughing. Renweard slapped Beircheart on the back.
“Looks as though you will not be ploughing that furrow any time soon.”
Laughter rippled through the warriors, the tension of the fight and Rowena’s outburst blowing away like chaff on a stiff breeze.
But Bassus did not join them in their jesting. He stood frowning and scratching his wet beard. He watched the sway of Rowena’s hips as she walked away and did not move until she was lost to sight behind a stand of ash trees that shielded the path.
Chapter 28
Beobrand awoke feeling refreshed despite the ale of the previous night. Alwin and his father yet slept, their snores rumbling in the small house. Andswaru was up with Swithun. She sat in the gloom with the infant content at her breast. Her gaze was upon Beobrand as he rose from the fireside and stretched. Beobrand felt suddenly awkward. Again, he was struck by how familiar the hut was to him. He had known Alwin and Andswaru all his life and yet their paths were so very distant now that they were almost like strangers.
He stooped to pick up his shoes, and then made his way to the stool he had sat on the night before. With a thud, his head connected hard with one of the roof beams.
“Thunor’s balls!” he exclaimed. Gods, he had forgotten how low the roof was. Rubbing his mutilated left hand gingerly over his forehead, he sat and pulled on his shoes. This was no place for him. He wished he had not returned to Hithe. Nothing good would come of it.
“Would you break your fast with us?” Andswaru asked. Then, with a smile, “Or are you content to break your head and our roof?”
Beobrand forced a smile. His head had not hurt these past days, but the crack against the timber had reminded him of the wound he had suffered at the great ditch.
“I am not hungry,” he said. “I thank you for your hospitality, Andswaru.”
“Will you not wait for Alwin to awaken?” she asked, frowning in the darkness.
Beobrand felt a pang of guilt. But he did not wish to tarry any longer in this dark, cramped hut that was full of the shadows of memories from a past he hardly recognised as his.
“No, let him sleep. He drank more than I. I will see him again before I leave Hithe.”
He finished tying his leg bindings and, with a final nod of thanks to Andswaru, he was out into the open air, carefully bending to avoid the door’s low lintel. Dawn had barely caressed the east with light. It was cool, but still. A thin morning mist embraced the trees and buildings. Taking a deep breath of the chill air, he tasted the salt from the sea. He was tempted to walk back down to the strand, but being alone with his thoughts was not what he needed. Instead, he made his way towards Folca’s hall. He would find Acennan there, and then together they would seek out Selwyn.
He knew not what to expect when he found his uncle. Would the old man recognise him? Or had has mind slipped beyond this world, as oftentimes happened to those who reached such a great age? He would know soon enough, though the thought of what he might find unnerved him. He had never thought to return here. He had thought he had buried his memories along with his kin, but now those memories shadowed his mind the way Folca’s hall loomed on the hill in the mist.
There was one thing that Beobrand was certain of. Facing the fears of his past would be easier with a friend at his side.
*
Beobrand found Acennan before he reached the hall. The stocky warrior came down the hill, cloak wrapped about his shoulders against the early-morning cold.
“I wondered where you had gone,” Acennan said. “I thought perhaps you had taken a horse and ridden north. Or boarded a ship and left on the tide to return to Bernicia.”
“I would not do such a thing,” Beobrand said.
“Well, the way you have been these last days, I was not so sure.” Acennan scratched at his beard and gave him a twisted grin. “And truth be told, I do not think I would have missed your company.”
Beobrand nodded, feeling his face grow warm. Acennan was right. He had been poor company indeed.
“I would not leave here without you,” he said.
“I know you would not,” replied Acennan, suddenly serious. “And you must know that I could not leave you to die in that shit-filled ditch.”
“I do know it,” Beobrand raked his hand through his hair, wincing as his fingers brushed the growing lump on his forehead where he had collided with Alwin’s roof timber. It was in just the spot where he had been hit by Wybert’s giant. “I know you did what you thought best.”
Acennan gave a short barking laugh.
“No, Beobrand. I did not do what I thought best. I did what was best.”
“I wish I could be so sure.”
“Well, I am not sure why, given what a poor companion you have been, but I am certain that I would rather you lived than died.”
Beobrand’s face clouded. The thought of those who had fallen against Penda’s force was never far beneath the surface of his thoughts.
“And I know,” Acennan said, clasping Beobrand’s shoulder, “that Attor, Elmer, Ceawlin, Aethelwulf and Dreogan would all agree with me.”
Beobrand wished to speak more of the hollow he felt within him. How he felt as though he had betrayed his gesithas, as though he had slain them as surely as if he had plunged Hrunting’s blade into them himself. But he could not talk of such things. He held Acennan’s gaze for a long while before reaching out and clasping his friends forearm.
“I am sorry,” he said at last.
“I know you are,” said Acennan, and Beobrand felt a weight lifted from him, as if he had shrugged off an iron byrnie. “Now,” Acennan continued, “if we are friends once more, let us do what we came here for. I would return to Northumbria as quickly as we are able. Much as I enjoy your cheery company, it is the promise of taking Eadgyth the tidings of our betrothal that sustains me.”
“Very well,” said Beobrand, “let us find my uncle. I would see him one last time and ensure that he is cared for. He has no kin here to tend to his needs.”
“And then we head for Eoferwic?”
“Eventually, yes,” said Beobrand, flashing a grin at Acennan. His head throbbed from the fresh blow, but his spirit was lighter than it had been for many days. He led the way through the settlement with a determined stride. Acennan jogged to keep up.
“Eventually?” asked Acennan.
“Yes. Before we return home, there is something I must do.”
“What?”
“As Bassus would say, someone needs killing.”
*
The sun had risen well beyond the trees to the east by the time they reached their destination. Around them, Hithe was now fully awake. They had passed men digging drainage ditches, already mud-caked and sweating. A broad-hipped woman had waddled past, straining under the weight of buckets full of fresh, warm milk. A thickset man with a grey beard had called out to them, raising his hand. Beobrand recognised him. It was Immin, one of the men who had been aboard the ship that had taken him to Bebbanburg after his father’s death. Beobrand lifted his hand in greeting, but did not stop. Immin had been good to him, even giving him the small bone-handled knife he still used for eating. The sailor deserved more. Beobrand knew he should pause and talk to the man for a moment, but he did not wish to delay. His mind was set now. He pressed on, leaving Immin staring after him with a disgruntled expression. Beobrand recalled the faces and names of many of those they passed, but he d
id not speak with any of them.
As the sun climbed into the sky and painted the land with golden light, Beobrand felt as though he walked in a dream. He had helped his father and brother to pollard those ash trees on the hill. He remembered cutting the timber for those fence posts. The rows of peas already sprouting in that field, grew in rich earth he had ploughed many times. He was from this land; had grown into the man he now was in this place. He gripped his half-hand into a fist, then, reaching up, he traced the scar on his face.
No, he had been a frightened boy when he left here.
As they rounded the bend in the path, past the pollarded ash trees, Beobrand for a moment imagined it had all been a dream, that his mother and sisters yet lived and would come to greet him from the house. But if they had not died, it would mean that neither had his father. His skin prickled at the memory of the last time he had seen Grimgundi. He could almost smell the smoke from the blazing house.
His nostrils were full of woodsmoke, but it did not billow from the inferno of his burning home. It wafted on the breeze from an earthen bread oven that a woman tended.
Beobrand had not known what to expect. Had he thought the blackened timbers of his father’s house would yet jut from the earth like accusing fingers? Had he imagined that Grimgundi’s bones would lie in the rubble, charred and cracked by the intense heat that had consumed the house?
What he found was a well-proportioned house, built on the site of his old home. It was larger than Grimgundi’s house had been, with fresh thatch on the roof and whitewashed walls of daub.
The woman who fussed over the bread oven, looked up as Acennan and Beobrand walked along the path towards her. She squinted into the rising sun. She wiped tears from her face where the smoke had stung her eyes and peered at the two men as they drew nearer. She was a plump woman, with good broad hips and meaty breasts. Her face, though partly in shadow, was pink and round. She was young and not unattractive. A memory of her face tugged at Beobrand’s mind. Who was this woman?
With a sudden squeal the woman clapped her hands to her face, her mouth round with astonishment.
“Beobrand?” she said. “Is that really you?”
Instantly, Beobrand remembered her name, though he could not comprehend why she was here.
“Udela,” he said. “Well met.”
Udela nervously wiped her hands on her apron. She opened her mouth, and then she snapped it shut again. Now they were closer, Beobrand saw that what he had thought was a shadow was in fact a large bruise around her eye and cheek. She must have noticed his gaze, or perhaps she just remembered the black eye, for her hand fluttered up to her face. After a moment, she let it fall back again to wipe on her apron. There was no hiding those bruises now.
“Should I bring the dough, mother? I can carry it.”
They all turned towards the door of the hut, out of which tottered a small girl of three or four years. In her tiny hands she grasped a wooden board on which lay a round loaf ready for the oven. The board and the bread were much too large and heavy for such a small child to carry, but the fair-haired girl bit her lip with great determination.
Udela seemed to awaken from a daze. She rushed to the girl and snatched the board from her.
“I have told you before, Ardith. You are to wait for me. What would father say if you dropped the bread in the mud?”
The girl frowned and her lower lip trembled at her mother’s harsh words. Her eyes glistened, but she did not cry.
“Sorry, mother,” she said. She brightened then and turned to Beobrand and Acennan. “Who are you?”
“My name is Beobrand, and this is Acennan.”
“You’re very tall,” Ardith said, gazing up at him.
“Hush now,” Udela said, placing a hand on her daughter’s shoulder. “Go inside and prepare a cup of ale for our guests.” Ardith puffed out her chest, clearly pleased to have been given such an important task. She ran back into the house.
“What brings you back here?” Udela asked. “It has been a long time since you went away.”
“I might ask the same of you,” Beobrand replied. “How do you come to be living in a house on my father’s land?”
Udela’s jaw clenched and for a moment her eyes blazed, but then she dropped her gaze.
“You will have to speak to my husband about that, Beobrand.” She looked back at him then, her eyes imploring. “But he is away at Teothic’s farm. My husband is the reeve here and there is a dispute about Teothic’s pigs. Lilla says they’ve been foraging for mast on his land.” Beobrand said nothing. So, Udela had married the reeve. Surely she could not mean old Cyneheard. There was something amiss here. Beobrand’s father had been a freeman and his land should have gone to his remaining kin. His uncle, Selwyn, had not been a wealthy man, and Beobrand had thought to find him here.
“Where is my uncle?” he asked, an edge of ice entering his tone. He did not think of this place as home; had not done so for many years. But to see it in someone else’s possession rankled.
“He is in a house at the end of the path, by the meadow. My husband built it for him there. Selwyn said he would prefer to live alone.” Beobrand stared at her, his eyes the colour of sea-ice. “But I care for him,” Udela continued in a rush, “as if he were my own kin. I prepare him food and drink and wash his clothes.” A sudden anger flared in her face. “It was not I who abandoned him and everybody he knew, Beobrand, son of Grimgundi,” she snapped.
Beobrand sighed. She spoke the truth.
Ardith came slowly out of the house, stepping carefully to avoid tripping, her brow wrinkled in concentration. She held a large cup of ale in both her tiny hands before her. She proffered the cup to Beobrand.
“I bid you well come to our home,” she said, as formally as a princess in a great hall.
Beobrand could not help smiling.
“I thank you, young mistress Ardith,” he replied, taking the vessel and drinking deeply of the contents.
Ardith beamed. Udela smiled too, her sudden outburst forgotten, it seemed.
Beobrand passed the cup to Acennan, who inclined his head solemnly and drained the rest of the ale. He handed the cup back to the girl.
“That is the finest ale I have drunk in a long while,” he said. “Is it brewed by the gods themselves?” Ardith looked up at him with wide eyes.
“No,” she said, “mother makes it.”
Acennan laughed.
“Well, it tasted good enough for the gods.”
Beobrand was done with pleasantries.
“I would see my uncle now, Udela,” he said. “How is he?”
Udela had placed the board with the unbaked loaf on a block of wood by the oven. Smoke was roiling from the oven’s mouth. No bread could bake in there until the fire had died back. She smoothed her apron over her thighs.
“He is old, Beobrand,” she said, her voice tender. “He drifts… Like flotsam on the sea… If it is a good day, he will be pleased to see you.” Beobrand did not ask what would happen if it were a bad day.
“Thank you for your care of him,” he said, but it didn’t seem enough. She was right to be angry with him. He had fled from the horror of the pestilence, from the death of his loved ones and the memories of his father’s spite. He had run without a thought for those he left behind. She was staring at him now with an expression he could not fathom. The bruise on her face was dark and brooding.
He set off down the track towards the meadow. Acennan ruffled Ardith’s hair and fell into step beside Beobrand.
They had only gone a few paces when Beobrand halted.
“When we return, we will talk of how your husband came to own my father’s land.” Her face paled under the bruises. “Who is your husband?” Beobrand asked. “Do I know him?”
“Aye, you know him,” she replied, absently pulling Ardith close to her. “My husband is Scrydan.”
*
Beobrand and Acennan left Udela and Ardith at the house and walked along the path that led to the meadow. A hor
se in a fenced-off enclosure stopped cropping grass and raised its large head to gaze at them quizzically as they passed. Suddenly Beobrand was overcome with a wave of sorrow at the loss of Sceadugenga. It was stupid to think that way. It was only an animal. And yet the pain was real. He paused, stepping off the bare earth track to lean on the fence. The wood was freshly cut and yet to be aged by rain and the harsh winter frosts. The horse was curious, and trotted over to where Beobrand stood. It was a fine beast, strong-backed with long legs that would carry it fast over the land. It was a horse for riding, not for work in the fields. Oxen or mules were better suited to the work of pulling the plough. Beobrand reached out and stroked the horse’s soft nose. It snorted and shook its head.
In the far field, down by the wood that marked the edge of his father’s land, Beobrand saw a man ploughing with two oxen. A thrall, he supposed. Scrydan was doing well for himself. Better than his father had, that was for certain. But perhaps Scrydan was sober most of the time. Perhaps he worked hard.
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