by MD. Lachlan
There was another sound, an exhalation, a deep sigh, more like one of despair than of pain. The monk, noticed the merchant, had blood running from his cheek, then from his forehead, then from his neck and his ears and his lips.
Hugin went back to the confessor and crouched at his ear.
‘Odin, lord, in this offering of pain,
Odin, lord, your servants beseech you,
Odin, lord, who in agony won lore,
Odin, lord, direct us to your enemy.’
The words were a mumble, repeated and repeated.
The monk’s body convulsed, and one or two of the birds took flight, but four remained to tear at his flesh. They seemed almost leisurely in their feeding: pecking, swallowing, turning around, cawing and calling and pecking again.
The berserkers were standing up, some shaking their heads, some turning away and feigning indifference, one watching in fascination. Saerda seemed to be enjoying the spectacle. The merchant saw that Aelis couldn’t look away and was trying to speak, her voice reduced to an appalled stammer by what was happening. In a few seconds, thought Leshii, she was going to betray herself. He put his arm around her as a token of comfort but also as a means of restraint. He knew it must look odd to treat a slave that way but no one was looking at him; all eyes were on the confessor’s suffering. The red sun cast long shadows through the trees like welcoming arms to greet the incoming night. Leshii realised they had been there for hours.
The monk could hardly move but his voice was strong, passionate even. ‘I have come back for her. She is near me.’
The merchant pulled at Aelis. ‘Come away,’ he said. ‘Come away.’
‘She is here!’ screamed the monk. ‘She is here.’
‘Where? Where is she?’ Raven was at his ear, speaking low like a parent coaxing a fretful child to sleep.
‘Here, she is here.’
‘Can you see her? Where is she?’
‘Near me, she was always near me. Lord Jesus, let me resist this. I will not reveal her.’
A raven hopped up onto the monk’s face and took a tentative, inquisitive peck at an eye. Hugin held the monk’s hand and intoned again.
‘Odin, lord, take this agony for your agonies,
Nine days and nights on the storm-racked tree,
Odin, lord, who gave your eye for lore,
Lead us to your enemies.’
‘Aelis! Aelis!’ the monk was screaming. ‘Come to me, come to me. I have looked for you for so long. Aelis. Adisla, do not go from me – it will be my death!’
Adisla? Who was that? wondered Aelis. It sounded like a Norse name. And yet it seemed strangely familiar to her. She was overwhelmed by the urge to help the confessor. She started towards the monk but Leshii stopped her. His solemn faith that this magic would not work had been replaced by an equally solid conviction that it would. In a second, he thought, the monk would identify the lady.
Now the birds fell from the trees like leaves in a black autumn, mobbing the confessor’s body, shrieking and cawing.
Leshii had made up his mind. The silks didn’t matter, nor did the mules. His life and whatever reward he could get for the lady were all he had.
‘Come on,’ he said. ‘We’re going.’
He couldn’t move her. She was rooted where she stood, trembling, her eyes fixed on the confessor.
That terrible woman was singing again over the coaxings of Hugin.
Then the monk gave a scream unlike any other, a sound of torment, a high note in the music of hell. There was confusion and shouting. The Raven was up, shooing the birds away from the monk’s body. He hacked at the rope with his knife and the confessor collapsed like a bag of wet sand. Aelis, unable to stop herself, ran to him, pushing past the berserkers, rushing past Hugin, who had turned away from the confessor with his head in his hands.
Leshii dashed after Aelis and then bent to try to control the weeping girl. ‘Remember,’ he whispered, ‘you are a mute, a mute. Say nothing or join this man in his torments.’
He had been trying not to look at the monk, but as he pulled Aelis away caught sight of him. The confessor’s tongue was lolling from his head. It reminded Leshii of a piece of liver, slick and shiny with blood, and ragged at one edge. The merchant could only marvel at the sort of mind capable of doing what the confessor had done. Jehan would not give them a prophecy, no matter how they enchanted and tormented him, and had done the only thing he could to spite his captors and stop himself from revealing Aelis. He had opened his mouth to let the birds tear out his tongue.
13 The Reward of Honour
A silence fell on the clearing when the Raven cut down the monk.
Ofaeti walked over and looked down at the merchant’s boy, who was cradling the confessor in his arms. ‘Of your religion, I guess, son,’ he said. ‘Well, if that’s the measure of these men then we can all pack up and go home now. That is a man of iron, I’ll give him that. Eh, Raven? He did for you, didn’t he? Crippled, trussed, tied and enchanted, but he beat you at your own game.’ Aelis didn’t understand a word he said but caught the sentiment in his voice.
She looked down at the monk. His blood was black and shiny in the moonlight, one eye swollen and raw. The bird had virtually removed the eyelid, though the eye itself looked intact. His face and ears were a mass of cuts, the white nub of a cheek bone showing through and a hole in his cheek exposing a tooth. She removed the remains of the horrible hand at his neck and threw it away. No one tried to stop her.
‘He won’t recover from this,’ said Leshii. ‘The wounds won’t kill him but they’ll turn bad. I’ve seen it before.’
‘How much are god bones, by weight?’ It was the voice of Saerda. He gave a short laugh and prodded his boot at the monk’s side.
Aelis was on her feet in a second. Without thinking what she was doing, she had pushed Saerda in the middle of the chest. He was taken by surprise and fell back over a tree root. He didn’t take long to recover, though, drawing his knife even as he tripped, regaining his balance before he hit the ground and springing to stab at Aelis. It was four strides between Saerda and the lady. He took two before Ofaeti, with surprising quickness, stepped across and dropped his shoulder into the thin man’s side, battering him into a tree. All the wind went out of him as he hit the trunk. He slumped to the floor and lay there panting.
Ofaeti pointed at the monk and spoke: ‘This man has earned my respect for tonight. Let the boy care for him, if it suits his temper. If it’s a fight you’re after, Saerda, you needn’t be disappointed. I stand ready to oblige.’ Again, Aelis couldn’t grasp exactly what he was saying but the meaning of his words was clear enough to anyone.
Saerda stood and dusted himself down, still trying to recover his breath. Then he gave Aelis a look that needed no interpretation at all, smiled and backed off towards the camp.
It was night now and the big moon turned the clearing into a silver circle. Hugin said something in Norse to the merchant.
Leshii shook his head. ‘I don’t think he knows we are here.’
For the first time, the Raven fixed his eyes on Aelis. ‘Keep him warm for the night and give him water if he calls for it. He won’t die before tomorrow.’ He turned to Leshii again and said, ‘Tell the king what he said and that, one way or another, the monk will have given us all he has to give us by this time tomorrow. Now I need to think.’
He walked back across the clearing, taking his sister by the arm and escorting her into the trees
It was quickly obvious that Jehan was going to die. He was very cold and he shook. His wounds were awful, oozing stab marks across every inch of exposed flesh. Strangely, the birds had not pecked through his clothes. The habit and undershirt had put them off and they had gone only for the skin they could see.
Jehan was delirious, clinging to Aelis’s hand, gargling and babbling. His tongue was terribly swollen like a fat blood sausage and he could hardly close his mouth. Aelis tended to him, dabbing his mouth with a damp cloth to keep it moist, squeezing
in a little water. From away in the trees, from the direction of the Raven’s shelter, chanting came, low and indistinct, a smoke of words, just a tinge of them on the breeze.
Leshii sat with her. He was a hard man who saw the world in terms of profit and loss, but even he had been shaken by the monk’s ordeal, she could see. A boy came running into the clearing and spoke to the Vikings. She saw the one called Fastarr nod and point towards her. The big fat Norseman came up and said something to the merchant. Leshii replied and the man went away.
Leshii said, ‘I have to go to report to the king. He has sent for me.’
‘On what?’ She spoke low, careful to see if she was observed.
‘What the monk said under torture.’ Leshii did not dignify what he had seen with the name of magic. The man had been half killed and had nearly revealed what he had guessed – that the lady was near him. No prophecy to that, he thought. ‘You have to come as well. They were insistent. Seems like you might have more slave work to do down there.’
She touched him on the arm. ‘The confessor is dying,’ she said.
‘Yes.’
‘I need to stay here with him. Let me stay here.’
Leshii shrugged and turned to the Norsemen and shouted something at them that Aelis didn’t understand. The fat one replied, shaking his head.
‘No, you have to come,’ said Leshii.
‘I will not leave him,’ said Aelis, averting her face.
The merchant spoke to the berserkers again. There was a brief discussion between them. Then the fat one shook his head and made an odd gesture. She heard the king’s name mentioned.
Leshii turned to Aelis. ‘Ofaeti says Sigfrid can fetch and carry for himself for one night. The priest has earned some comfort. The berserker will do your work for you if the king demands it. You look after the monk. If you can move him then go down the river to the woods by the ford. I will meet you there and I swear I will reunite you with your people.’ Leshii made to stand. ‘You have a friend there in the fat Viking, it seems, but I must be gone.’
Aelis stood and nodded to Ofaeti. She was afraid, but inside her a certainty was growing. God had put her together with the confessor. And God, she thought, knew well his friends from his enemies. If anyone should be scared, it was the sorcerer and his horrible servants.
14 A Discovery
Leshii and the berserks made their way back down into the camp, towards the house Sigfrid was using as his headquarters. The assault had been a substantial one that day and the Norsemen had taken many casualties. Fires blazed in the night, and the sound of rough music, pipe and drum, was cut through with groans and screams. Faces, pale and thin, loomed from the darkness. This, thought, Leshii, was what the land of the dead would be like.
The house was visible from a way away under the bright moon, its checked roof gleaming in the silver light. Leshii was tired and looking forward to the hospitality of the king. The advantage of dealing with monarchs was that – even in times of hardship – there was good wine to drink and good food to eat. He went in to find the king sitting on a chair in the centre of the room. It was no throne but had been put in such a position that it was clear it was intended to stand in for one. Leshii wondered if some formal court was taking place. In all his other dealings with the Norsemen they had rarely stood on ceremony, particularly in times of war.
The king gave Leshii a curt smile and held out his cup to be filled. Leshii noted that the man who did so was not Sigfrid’s normal servant but the skinny berserk Saerda. So this was where he’d gone when he left the camp.
‘You haven’t brought your boy with you, merchant.’
‘He is tending to the monk. The Frank has had a rough time of it today,’ said Ofaeti.
‘I said he was to be brought here.’ Sigfrid was pale and clamped his jaw tight, as if trying to bite down the anger that was rising inside him.
‘One servant’s like another,’ said Ofaeti. ‘I’ll stand the boy’s place, if I have to.’
‘I said the boy was to be brought, now bring the boy, fat man.’
‘It’s an hour up the hill,’ said Ofaeti. Then he looked at the simmering king and said, ‘I’ll go, I’ll go.’
‘Good. Bring him and make no fuss about it. Do not alert the Raven.’
‘You’re the boss,’ said Ofaeti. He turned and went out of the hall, gesturing at Fastarr to come with him.
The king took up his wine and swallowed down his temper. Then he spoke to Leshii in a more even voice. ‘So what did he say, the saint? What revelations did he bring forth?’
Leshii glanced about him. The warriors in the king’s house seemed almost to crackle with excitement. All eyes were on him and Leshii had been in enough losing deals to know when it was time to call it quits and get out. This was one of those moments. However, while the king was there, there was no question of that.
‘Come on, merchant, what did he say?’
Leshii wondered if he should lie but thought better of it. Latin was spoken widely enough for the king to have heard from elsewhere. The truth was the only safe course.
‘He said she was here,’ he said.
‘Really?’ Leshii could see that behind the king’s light manner was a boiling rage. ‘Why do you think that was?’
‘I am not a magician, lord.’
The king stood, so quickly that Leshii almost leaped backwards. Sigfrid was clearly only just managing to keep a hold on his fury.
‘Oh, but you are, merchant, you are. I have heard that I knew you as a child – my men here tell me. But I have no memory of you. Have you wiped it away?’
Leshii was relieved. If that was all this was, he could talk his way out of it.
‘I merely said that your renown was so great that I knew of you and your father as a child, even in my home beyond the Eastern Lake. They sing of your deeds there. Perhaps your warriors misunderstood me. My command of your language is not so sure.’
‘It is good enough to lie in,’ said Sigfrid.
Leshii said nothing, as he guessed whatever he said would not do him much good.
The king clapped his hands together. ‘Good Saerda,’ he said, ‘show our esteemed guest what you found in his packs.’
‘You gave your oath not to touch them!’
‘Nor did I. Saerda caught a boy trying to steal from them,’ said Sigfrid. ‘A thief opened your packs, merchant, not one of my warriors. And why are you so keen that no one should see your wares? It’s an unusual merchant who doesn’t display his goods.’
‘I prefer to be there when they are displayed, my lord, or I find I get a rather poor price for them, nothing being the poorest price I know.’
‘There are worse payments than nothing at all,’ said Sigfrid, tapping at the hilt of the sword on his belt.
Saerda shot a brief smile towards Leshii and dragged one of the packs forward. It had been opened. Leshii felt his heart beginning to race as the berserk reached within and pulled something out. There was a flash of pale gold in the candlelight. Aelis’s hair.
‘What’s this, merchant?’ The king’s voice cracked in his anger.
Leshii breathed out slowly and spread his arms wide. He needed to calm himself.
‘I bought it from a peasant woman on the way here. It will make a fine wig; any of your warriors would be proud to take it to their wives.’
The king set his jaw. Then he took something else from the bag, something small enough to fit into his fist. He held out his clenched hand.
‘What do you think I have in here?’
‘I am a low man and would not like to guess the minds of kings,’ said Leshii.
‘A good answer. Mine is better. Would you like to hear it?’
‘If it pleases you.’
‘I have your death, merchant.’
Leshii swallowed. He had thought, in the safety of the clearing with the lady, that he had lived a long life and would not mind leaving it for the chance of riches. Now his life seemed very short indeed. Strange thoughts came into h
is head. I haven’t done anything, he thought. I haven’t lived. He had walked the silk trails with a camel, gone to the frozen shores of the north, seen the Holy Roman Empire and the southern olive groves, but, facing his own death, he saw the reality of his life. He had done all these things alone. He thought of his mother. She was the last person he had really loved, been willing to die for. That, he realised, was what he meant when he told himself, I haven’t done anything. He had never replaced that love – with that of a friend, a woman, a child. Trade had been everything to him, and now here he was in his last deal, trying to bargain for his life.
The king came over to where Leshii was standing and opened his hand. In it were two fine lady’s finger rings, one with the single lily of the Margrave of Neustria on it, the sign that would announce the wearer as a high-born woman, a descendant of Robert the Strong. The Vikings had suffered at his hands and eventually killed him, so they knew his crest very well.
‘Taken in payment for silk, my lord. Who has made a story from some tresses and a few baubles here?’ He glanced at Saerda.
The king seemed to think for a second.
‘Where was this trade made?’
‘Just the other night, lord. A strange fellow brought these things, tall and clad in a wolfskin. I did not like him much but he seemed willing to pay a good price for—’
The king held up his hand. ‘We will see,’ he said. ‘Your boy will be back before the night is out and we’ll see what tales he has to tell.’