by Justin Hill
Dogs barked.
For a while, before falling silent.
Stillness fell.
The world held its breath.
Brihtric and his men all snored. Fate whispered reassuring nothings into their ears, gave no warning.
Brihtric’s hall was a fine building, with well-tarred timbers and a thatch of reeds that had grown in the river shallows. There was richly carved wainscoting where the men drank, and around the hearth stood gold-worked mead benches and tables for feasting.
‘Burn it,’ a voice said, and a light was unhooded. A stealthy fire started under the eaves, where the timber was driest. The flames quickly caught and leapt up from wall to roof and rafter.
It reflected in the eyes of the waiting men, and they stood with blades drawn and shouldered shields. They waited as a voice inside the hall shouted out in alarm. They gripped their sword hilts tighter. Wet their lips. Waited for the hall doors to open.
The first man out of the doors was a young lad with blond hair and a blue cloak. He did not see the blade that killed him, nor the man who dealt the blow. The second fell almost as quickly, hacked by three blades. The third was a serving man, and he was wiping tears and smoke from his eyes when he saw the attackers; he had barely a moment to shout a warning before a blade shaved off the top of his skull. It flew into the air and landed six feet from where the rest of his body lay. The next was a woman, who screamed as she came.
‘Let her go,’ a voice ordered, and the women and children and old men and thralls were seized and dragged out of the way, while every man and boy of fighting age was struck down, even as they rushed out for air. Some were serving men and some were stable boys. Almost at the last, whimpering, came Brihtric, clinging to his whore.
‘Who are you?’ he pleaded. ‘I will do you great honour!’
But the sword blades struck again and again, cutting Brihtric and whore down together, sending them to the Lord in sin without hope of forgiveness.
The moon set. Godwin tossed and turned in his sleep, found himself lying under a cloak in a windswept autumn field. Many hands were holding him down and a spear was being raised to run him through. The blade glinted in the moonlight and he woke with a start.
The room was silent, the fire low.
He calmed himself, felt his heartbeat slow, but it took a long time for Godwin to get back to sleep. A night terror, that is all. Calm yourself.
Just as he was dropping off there were sounds outside the hall. Nothing, Godwin told himself. Calm yourself. But there it was again! The stamp of a hoof, a horse snorting in the night air.
Godwin stiffened. His ears strained the night. He reached for his sword. There were horses in the yard, he was sure, horses and men’s voices. Horse thieves, Godwin thought at first, thought of Brihtric and his hand scrambled over the sleeping bodies next to him.
‘Get weapons!’ he whispered. ‘Foes are upon us.’ Godwin drew a warped yellow linden shield from the hall wall. ‘Quick!’ Godwin said, and kicked the sleepers. ‘Up!’
Someone tried the latch; under the door jamb he could see the light of flames; there were muffled voices.
‘Who comes to my hall stealthily and at night like outlaws?’ Godwin shouted but then the doors flew open and silhouetted against the setting moon was a crowd of cloaked men, swords shining pale in their hands.
‘It’s him,’ one of the cloaked men said.
‘Come out!’ another ordered.
Godwin’s hand shook. ‘I shall not!’
Godwin spoke with a courage he did not feel. He knew he was cornered. The tale of Wulfnoth’s son was about to end here, in his home.
You should have stayed away, he told himself. Gone to exile in Normandig.
Godwin laughed, but there was no humour. ‘I am Godwin Wulfnothson! This is my hall and I shall kill any man who steps inside or seeks to do me or my people harm!’
There was a moment of silence.
‘Godwin?’
The cloaked men moved towards him. Godwin braced to strike.
‘Godwin, is that you?’
‘Do your worst.’
‘Godwin?’ another voice said. ‘Christ’s bones! Godwin! Is that you?’
‘One more step and I shall cut you down!’
A lantern was unhooded and the pale yellow light blinded Godwin for a moment. ‘Godwin,’ a voice said, ‘it’s me!’
‘Who?’
‘Me!’ the first voice said. The lantern was held up: it lit his face. ‘Caerl.’
‘You betrayed me?’ Godwin said, as if this was a final twist of irony.
‘No,’ Caerl laughed. ‘We’ve come back! Put away your spears – it’s Godwin!’
Godwin didn’t believe him until he had lifted the lantern and touched Caerl’s face. ‘It is you.’
‘Of course!’
Beorn stepped forward and embraced Godwin. ‘Why it’s him!’ he said. ‘We’ve been looking for you in every damned port between here and Dovere, and where do we find you but snug as a bug at home!’
Godwin was shocked and confused and amazed to see his father’s men standing before him with grey in their hair and lines on their salt-tanned faces.
‘We’ve found you,’ Caerl said.
‘He’s grown!’ Beorn said. The men laughed. They spoke about him with an authority they did not have. Their manner pricked Godwin’s irritation.
‘So this is a fine way for you to return,’ Godwin said. ‘Creeping at night. Do not come here demanding a hall. Last time I saw you all, you left me a boy in Ethelred’s care.’
There was an embarrassed silence. The silence was as annoying as the laughter.
‘Tell me, why should I welcome you?’
‘We have come to help,’ one man said.
‘I do not need the help of turncoats and cowards.’
The night chill flooded in through the open hall doors.
‘We swore to protect you.’
‘I am no milk sop. I need no wet nurse. You were not here when I killed Ulf in battle.’
The men said nothing. They hadn’t expected this.
Beorn stepped forward. ‘We are glad to see you hale and hearty. If you want us to leave, we shall. But we have gifts and tokens to give you first. From your father.’
‘We have news,’ Caerl said, and the men about him lowered their hoods. ‘He has passed into Christ’s care. We buried him five weeks before, on a headland above the city of Dyflin, under an ancient yew tree. We piled stones over his grave so that the dogs might not trouble his bones and so that he might look back towards the land of his birth.’
‘Your news is no news,’ Godwin said. ‘I heard it three weeks past, born on the back of the seas. Show me the gifts.’
They brought forward a number of objects that his father had carried, and a chest of silver pennies that made Godwin rich.
‘More than a thegn’s weregeld,’ Caerl said.
Godwin did not smile. ‘Am I only worth a thegn’s price?’ But men saw that his mood had mellowed. Nevertheless he still felt uneasy at the manner of their return. ‘How is it that you come to this manor with weapons, and in the dark, like murderers?’
‘That is because we have murdered,’ Beorn said. He smiled. His teeth were as crooked as ever.
‘And who have you murdered?’
‘Ask Brihtric.’
Godwin was angry. ‘Enough of the play. Tell me plainly what crime you have upon you.’
‘We have avenged your father. Brihtric is dead. His men are slain. His hall now burns.’
Godwin’s face grew darker. ‘I swore to kill him,’ he said. ‘Killing after dark is murder, and I do not condone murder. This is not a good deed. You did not tell me that you came with blood on your hands!’
He fell suddenly silent. He had accepted their gifts. If he sheltered them, he would bring their crime upon his own head. If he sent them away, men would talk badly of him. He was tired and confused and paused before he spoke.
A girl stepped forward. ‘If W
ulfnoth was here today, he would kneel before you and beg your forgiveness. He cannot, so I beg for him, and for these men who cared and protected and loved him.’
‘You come to my hall with too much confidence, too much pride and too much gold upon your arms,’ Godwin said.
‘It is true,’ Caerl said, ‘that we have prospered in exile. But from what we have heard about Godwin Wulfnothson, you – through honesty and loyalty – have prospered too.’
‘Do not lecture me,’ Godwin said.
Caerl spoke gently. ‘I do not mean to lecture you. But Kendra is right. If Wulfnoth was here, he would kneel before you and ask for forgiveness. And even though we followed our oaths when we went with your father, it was not right that he fled and left you in Ethelred’s care.’
Caerl knelt before Godwin. One by one those who had murdered Brihtric and his men bent at the knee. Only Beorn stood.
Godwin looked at him. ‘I remember you, Beorn. You were kind to me when I was a boy. But are you my man or Wulfnoth’s?’
Beorn wavered. He briefly grinned. Godwin was no longer the snotty-nosed boy he had known. It was hard accepting such a young man as lord, but he looked at Godwin, stern and hard and decided. His smile flashed briefly. ‘If all of you kneel, then how can I stand alone?’
As Beorn fell to his knees, Godwin looked at the men before him. ‘I will be a lord worthy of you all.’ He pulled Caerl and Beorn to their feet. ‘But I spoke in anger. I will take you all into my care and defend you at court or at battle. For it was not your choice to leave me in the bonds of a hostage. And you have been loyal. Stand! Stand, all of you. Contone is your home as well as mine and you should be welcome. No man shall say that Godwin Wulfnothson was not a generous lord.’
They ate and drank a simple but hearty meal of bread and ale. At the end Caerl brought in a bundle of tightly bound sheepskins and set them upon the top table. He drew his table knife and cut the thongs and the stiff petals of sheepskin fell open. Inside was a fine red cloak edged with silver embroidery and a brooch with three dogs with eyes of blue jewels. Godwin remembered the brooch clearly, but one of the eye-settings was empty. He put it aside. The dark eye socket watched as Caerl shook the folds of the cloak, as if he could shake the memories out, and threw it over Godwin’s shoulders. It smelt of the sea and old peat smoke. Round his waist he tied Wulfnoth’s belt of silver links, and at the end he took out Wulfnoth’s sword and presented it to Godwin.
Godwin looked at the hilt and thought of all the great moments in tales when heroes took swords. It was the sight of his father’s sword that stung one of the Heathobards to vengeance, when he saw it dangling from the belt of his erstwhile enemy at the bridal feast. One of the old veterans saw it and remembered the day the Shieldings defeated them. He cursed the young warriors till he was barbed to action, and blood flowed again and the feud rekindled. Beowulf’s sword Næling broke in the dragon-slaying and brought his death. Sigmund was the only man strong enough to pull his sword from the tree in which it was embedded. It was a magic blade that broke all before him, but Wodin shattered Sigmund’s sword and the great hero died. The shards were handed to Sigmund’s son Sigurd and, reforged, they slew the dragon Fafnir.
Heirloom swords were a mixed blessing. Godwin looked at it. There was a long silence. Fate hung, taut as a harp string. The fire crackled and over them the hall hunched dark and eager. Godwin felt the hairs on his nape rise, as if the Three Wyrd Sisters had set their spindle and shears.
Godwin reached out and grasped the sword hilt – as Sigmund grasped the blade that no other man could pull – and the blade slid free of the scabbard. The war-thirsty blade glimmered as if in recognition. Ruddy firelight played along its surface and Godwin felt a shiver run down his spine, a shiver not of cold but of power, as a man might feel when he beds his first girl, or kills his first enemy.
‘Too long have we cowered,’ Godwin said. ‘Too long have we bowed to unjust rulers.’ His eyes gleamed as he lifted the blade and laughed. That laughter came from long ago and it brought back a lightness and a joy that he had not felt for many winters. He spoke loud enough for the Wyrd Sisters to hear. ‘Næling!’ He called the sword by name and the blade answered with a sudden gleam of reflected flames, as if filled with the strange spells of the smith. ‘Hear me and bear witness!’ His voice filled the hall-shadows. ‘You are Godwin’s sword now and we have many wrongs to right!’
One of Wulfnoth’s men had been killed at the burning of Brihtric’s hall. Another had been fatally wounded. Brand was his name. He cried over and over, and when the end came, the silence was a relief. Wulfnoth’s men were already digging the graves, and Godwin stood outside the hall, a lone figure with his father’s sword heavy on his belt.
Kendra came out of the hall, blood on her apron, and walked some way away, kept her back to the hall.
‘He is dead?’
She nodded.
‘Then he will be at peace.’
Kendra used her forearm to wipe the hair from her face. She looked out from the high vantage point, over a winter landscape, and wondered what this year would bring.
‘You’re not English,’ Godwin said after a long silence.
‘Is that a question?’
‘Yes,’ he said.
‘No. Your father bought me in Dyflin. He bought Brunstan too. There were a few others as well, before my time. He often bought people who were from his county.’
There was a lightness about her that Godwin liked. She had been a hostage to Fate as well. ‘What’s your name?’ he said.
‘Kendra.’
‘No, your real name.’
‘Gruoch.’
‘Kendra sounds better.’
‘It does,’ she said.
Far below, they could see a boy on an empty haywain driving the oxen up the slope. His shouts and whistles came faint over the distance as the four oxen tugged and laboured.
‘So where are you from?’
‘The north,’ she said. ‘An island that we called Ila, but I do not know what you would call it in your tongue. It means the Isle of Yula. But who Yula was, I don’t know.’ She went quiet for a moment. The past suppressed unimportant details. Yes, I lived in the northern sea, she thought, on a rocky island above a sheer black cliff in a beehive hut. Until the Norsemen came.
Godwin followed her gaze out and away from where they stood. After a while he tossed a stone towards the field edge. ‘We’ve a lot in common, you and I.’
‘Do we?’
‘Of course.’
She laughed at him.
Godwin felt awkward. ‘Yesterday morning I dreamt of my father. It was at the forging of my brother’s sword. His name was Leofwine. He was very tall and strong and handsome. My father loved him dearly. He was the first-born. I was eight or nine.’
‘How old are you now?’
‘Fifteen,’ Godwin said. ‘You?’
‘Not sure,’ Kendra said. ‘Fourteen?’
Kendra took out a fine horn comb. She stood behind him and took a lock of his hair in her hands. ‘Your hair’s as knotted as brambles. Head back!’ she said, and began to tease out the knots and snags. She fetched a bowl of water, and after each stroke she rinsed the comb in the bowl and left a wriggling scum of lice squirming on the surface.
‘I did this for your father,’ she said. It struck her then that the last time she had used the comb was on Wulfnoth’s head, as she prepared him for the grave.
Godwin felt her falter and opened one eye. ‘What is it?’
‘Nothing,’ she said and coughed to clear her throat, as if that was what had diverted her, kept combing.
Kendra felt an urge to put her arms around Godwin and hold him safe. She rinsed his hair and he let it hang down and drip between his legs; handed him a cloth to wrap his hair in. It was good to see Godwin at home. Home, Kendra thought, and savoured the word: a bitter flavour. Her keenest regret was her mother’s face as her daughters were loaded into the Norsemen’s ship. The warriors waded through the surf as t
hey pushed their craft back into the waters. Her mother had been left behind with twenty other folk too old or weak or ugly to be of use. Kendra and her sisters had formed one cold and shivering bundle at the longship’s gunwales, noses dripping and white frightened faces peering over the side of the boat as their mother splashed into the waves, her arms outstretched, her face was distorted, her voice incoherent with grief. That moment came back so vividly that a shiver ran through Kendra. But when she closed her eyes, all she saw was her mother’s strangely shaped mouth; all she heard was the call of gulls.
Kendra was silent for a long time. A skylark sang. Her fingers worked his scalp through the cloth, then vigorously rubbed his head, and left his hair sticking up with damp. ‘Your hair is paler than your father’s.’
There was a long pause before Godwin spoke.
‘My mother was blond.’
They looked back to the land and spotted the hunched figures of Wulfnoth’s crew climbing up the slope, hogsheads on their shoulders.
Godwin watched them come almost within a bowshot. ‘Tell me,’ he said quite suddenly, ‘were you my father’s girl?’
Kendra blushed despite herself. ‘Yes, I was,’ she said.
‘Did you give him children?’
‘None.’
Godwin didn’t look at her, and she felt she ought to say something more, but the men were almost upon them and he stood up and went out to greet them.
The men who had been killed at the fight at Brihtric’s hall were wrapped in plain woollen shrouds, the ends tied up with leather thongs: giant knotted socks loaded on to the back of an ox-drawn cart. The cart was driven by a short blond lad who switched his team so abruptly forward that a body half slid off the cart.
Caerl knocked the lad’s leather cap off his head. ‘Show some respect!’ he said.
The procession made a strange silhouette against the dull, cloudy skyline: four men and two bodies, like the eight-legged horse of Odin who carried souls to Valhalla.