by Martin Lake
Finally, when it seemed that he would squeeze the last drop of air from Leif he let go and lifted his head. ‘My brother has returned,’ he bellowed. ‘Leif has returned from the Saxons.’ His cry was so loud it must have carried throughout the city.
Aebbe put her mouth close to Leif’s ear. ‘I thought you were dead,’ she whispered. ‘We all did.’
‘The Saxons treated me well,’ he said. ‘At least after a time. We were honoured guests of King Æthelred and his brother.’
‘And they let you go?’
Leif shook his head. ‘We escaped.’
‘But why? If you were honoured guests?’
‘Guests who had overstayed our welcome.’
Leif pulled her to him and kissed her fiercely. She tasted good, like berries new picked from the bush.
Two figures came running, leaping with pleasure; Thorvald and Asgrim, their faces bright with joy. Leif gulped in surprise. He had not realised how much he meant to them.
‘You are right welcome,’ Thorvald said fervently. ‘Sigurd has been like a bear with a sore arse since the day you were taken.’
‘And Ivar has been almost as bad,’ Asgrim said.
‘Ivar?’ Leif said in surprise.
‘He missed his Skald,’ Asgrim explained. ‘It’s been a long, bleak, bloody winter.’
‘But not for you, I see,’ said Thorvald, prodding Leif in the stomach. ‘You’re as fat and as sleek as a jarl’s daughter.’
‘I am a friend of the Saxon king,’ Leif said, tapping himself on the chest. ‘I had all the food and drink I desired.’
‘And women?’ Aebbe asked, her voice quiet and shy.
‘What woman would have him?’ Kolga said. ‘He’s spent the whole time pining for you.’
Leif gave her a grateful smile. She grinned back and punched Higbald on the shoulder, sending him sprawling in the dust. Aebbe would be spared the pain of hearing about Leif’s coupling with Kolga, it seemed.
He turned to Aebbe once more. ‘The babies?’ he asked.
But as he did so he detected a change in his friends. A terrible change. The words died on his lips.
Aebbe’s closed her eyes, her face tight with pain and sorrow.
‘Something’s happened to them?’ he asked, although he feared to hear the answer.
‘To Godgyth,’ she answered. ‘To our daughter.’
‘What? What happened?’
Aebbe turned away, tears welling from her eyes.
Leif felt Sigurd’s iron grip upon my arm. ‘Godgyth died,’ he said. ‘A few months ago.’
Leif stared at his brother in disbelief, not sure what he was saying.
‘Died?’ he mumbled at last. ‘How did she die?’
Nobody answered.
‘How?’ Leif demanded.
Asgrim took a deep breath. ‘She was killed,’ he said.
‘And the killer paid the price,’ Thorvald said, hurriedly. ‘Guthrum made sure of that.’
Leif stared at him in silence. His world was reeling. ‘Guthrum?’ he mumbled.
Thorvald nodded.
Leif shook his head, blankly, and then Aebbe reached out and took his hand. ‘Let’s not talk of it here. Not on the street in front of our neighbours.’
Leif followed her in a daze. Godgyth dead? He couldn’t make sense of it. Surely it was some cruel jest?
He found himself in their little house. Tears were coursing down his brother’s face. The sight of it made him feel weak and dizzy.
‘Where’s Nefi?’ he asked.
‘With Nerienda,’ Aebbe said. ‘She has a puppy and he loves to play with it.’
He slumped onto a stool and Aebbe sat beside him.
‘How?’ he asked. ‘How did Godgyth die?’
Aebbe started to answer but could say no more than a few mumbled words. She glanced up at Sigurd who started to speak but then shook his head.
‘It was Eohric,’ Thorvald said quietly. ‘He had been drinking heavily, more heavily than usual.’
‘But that does not excuse it,’ Asgrim said.
‘I did not say that,’ Thorvald continued. ‘But it shows us something about him.’
‘Tell me?’ Leif whispered. ‘Tell me what happened?’
‘He came to your house,’ Thorvald said slowly. ‘He had conceived a great lust for Aebbe and sought to take advantage of your absence.’
He paused and gestured to Sigurd and Asgrim. ‘The three of us were away, foraging in the east. He chose his time well.’
‘He raped me,’ Aebbe said. ‘He was a beast, a brute. In front of the children. They were alarmed at the violence, at what they saw happening to me. Nefi tried to stop him, babe though he was. Eohric kicked him to the floor. Godgyth screamed and screamed. So Eohric picked her up, smashed her head upon the wall and flung her...’ She pointed to the fire.
Leif stared at her. He wanted to reach out to her but he could not move. His body felt scraped clean and empty, his heart and mind suddenly frozen.
‘I tried to get her out,’ Abbe said, ‘but Eohric knocked me to the ground. And then he raped me again. While my baby burnt to death.’
She buried her head in her hands, weeping uncontrollably.
Leif looked at Sigurd who bent his head.
‘Sigurd tried to slay him,’ Thorvald said. ‘He tried to avenge you and Godgyth. But Ivar would have none of it, fearing a blood feud would spread like contagion. Nobody would believe Aebbe’s word against Eohric’s. He is the brother of a jarl while she is…’ He did not finish his sentence, did not say that nobody would believe the word of a slave such as her.
‘Several of your friends gave me money to support Aebbe,’ Sigurd said. ‘To my surprise Guthrum did so as well. I think, maybe he doubted his brother’s word.’
Leif did not answer for a long while. His mind was awash with images of Godgyth: when she was new-born, of her sucking on Aebbe’s breast, the first smile she gave.
But then, like shadows in the darkest night, he saw an image of Eohric slinking towards his home. Attacking Aebbe, raping her, smashing the little head of Godgyth and flinging her into the flames.
He sobbed but no tears came. Aebbe took his hand but he could barely feel it.
He began to shake as if he’d lain all night in the deepest snow-drift. He stumbled to his feet and heard the stool fall backwards, clattering on the floor. He tried to speak but no words came. He had lost all use of his tongue.
He went out to the street. A large crowd had gathered but he could not recognise their faces. He marched along the street towards Guthrum’s hall. To Eohric.
Guthrum saw him approach and stepped in front of him to block his path. ‘Don’t be a fool,’ he said. ‘The wergild has been paid and accepted.’
‘Not by me,’ Leif cried, finding a strangled voice at last.
Guthrum grabbed him by the shoulders. He was huge and immensely strong. Leif pushed against him but it was like trying to move a hill.
‘Don’t do something you’ll regret,’ Guthrum whispered. ‘There’ll be a blood-feud. And Ivar won’t condone it.’
‘And in this feud?’ Leif cried. ‘Where will you stand?’
‘Eohric is my brother.’
‘And Aebbe is my wife and Godgyth was my daughter.’
Guthrum stared searchingly into Leif’s eyes and then let him go.
‘You are no warrior, Leif,’ he said, ‘but Eohric is. You are a man renowned for your wisdom. Don’t throw that away.’
Leif looked at him, wondering what he meant and how he should respond.
Then he saw him. Eohric had sauntered out of the hall and was standing twenty paces away.
Leif’s vision, until now hazy and unclear, became clear and sharp. He saw the sneer upon Eohric’s face, the harsh set of his thin, cruel mouth. And then he laughed, a cold, mocking laugh, and spat at Leif.
‘Looking for your brat, are you, Leif Ormson? Well you won’t find her. Nor will you find Aebbe as loving a woman as when you left. You’d no sooner disappea
red than she pleaded with me to mount her.’
Leif leapt at him.
Eohric moved aside at the last moment but Leif managed to swing at him, catching him on the temple. He staggered and came back, fists clenched, spitting fury. Leif turned swiftly and faced him, his rage building with every breath.
Eohric feinted, left and right, Leif dodged and ducked his sudden flurry of fists but as Guthrum had said, he was no fighter and every punch he aimed, missed. Eohric moved closer, then danced away, seeking for a weakness.
Suddenly, with a cry of rage, Leif leapt upon him. Eohric’s fists hammered on his head but he felt no pain. All Leif wanted was to kill him.
The weight and fury of his attack sent Eohric crashing to the ground. Leif yelled in triumph and threw himself on top of him. His hands reached for Eohric’s throat and began to squeeze.
Eohric kicked violently with his knees but Leif paid no heed. He increased the pressure on his enemy’s throat, squeezing relentlessly. Eohric grasped his wrists, trying to tear them away but to no avail. He scratched at Leif’s hands and arms, causing blood to flow from the gashes but doing nothing more.
Leif saw that he was choking the life from Eohric. His grip weakened, he gasped and coughed, his head shook back and forth, his tongue flicked like a snake’s.
Then, suddenly, he let go of Leif’s hands. Leif thought he had slain him.
But instead a pile of earth and stones ground into his eyes. He was blinded and reached up instinctively to brush it away.
Eohric seized his chance. He grabbed a second handful and forced it into Leif’s left eye. The pain was terrible, sharp stones pushing against the eyeball, the dry earth seeming to scour the socket.
Eohric yelled with exultation and ground the stones in still harder. Leif thought his head would explode. And then, he felt his eye give way to the onslaught, felt the soft, hot jelly dribble onto his chin. A woman screamed nearby.
Leif’s sight grew dim, then black. And still Eohric forced the stones and earth into his eye.
Leif fell back on the ground. The world was dark but he could see, though only just. He saw Guthrum drag Eohric to his feet. He assumed that he would drag Eohric away but instead he held him upright and smashed his fist into his face again and again and again.
Eohric shrieked with pain and fury but Guthrum continued until, even with his failing sight, Leif could see his face was a red and ragged mess. Then Guthrum gave him one last punch, into his throat, which sent him careering across the street.
Leif felt strong arms lift him up, Sigurd he guessed and by the sound of it, Thorvald. And then he knew no more.
ONE EYED
Leif knew little of the next few days. He remembered that a leech had come and placed unguents upon his eye-socket and then bound his eyes with fresh, clean linen. He thought it might have been Deor but was not sure.
The agony was terrible. It was as if a fire had been lit in his head and that a dragon was at large within it and gnawing at his face. If he’d had more courage and the means of finding a knife he might have slit his own throat.
He was badly bruised from the fight and Eohric had broken several fingers on his left hand when he’d tried to prise it loose from his throat. But they were as nothing compared to the torment of his eyes.
The only comfort he had was in the gentle touch and soothing words of Aebbe.
‘Nefi?’ he managed to say towards the end of the first day.
‘He’s staying with Sigurd and Nerienda,’ Aebbe answered. ‘We didn’t think he should see you like this.’
‘Is he —?’
‘He’s safe. Quite safe.’
She fell silent and Leif sensed that she was uncertain what to say next.
‘And Eohric’s in no shape to do us any harm,’ she said eventually. ‘He’s still coughing and retching from the fight and Guthrum has posted guards on his door to keep him there.’
Leif sighed with some small measure of relief, though he wondered if he’d survive long enough to see his son again.
But he did. He grew stronger day by day and was able to get out of bed, although he found it difficult to make his way around the cottage without banging into things. Higbald proved a great boon, guiding him around as if he were a baby taking his first steps, moving things out of his way and sometimes even catching him when he stumbled.
‘This will pass,’ Deor said. ‘You need time to adjust to having only one eye but you will.’
Deor spent many hours with Leif, changing his dressing and using one of Nerienda’s tweezers to pick out the fragments of stone and soil still in his eye-socket. It was the worst pain imaginable and Leif’s hands grew stiff from grasping the arm of the chair. But gradually he removed each particle and the pain began to ease.
Deor also spent much time talking with Leif, telling tales of heroes who had lost one eye, both eyes, their legs or arms, and yet still gone on to greater glory and fortune. Leif found his stories irritating and hopeful in equal measure but sat and listened to them without complaint.
More interesting was the news that Sigurd told him. The army had been in great dissent in the spring over whether to remain in Mercia or move on to one of the other kingdoms. Ivar was all for ravaging Mercia, Halfdan and Ubbe for attacking Wessex. In the end a revolt in Northumbria against their puppet Echberht had forced them to put aside their quarrel and travel north to secure their position there. Jorvic was too great a prize to lightly relinquish.
Ivar showed then why he was a great commander. Within days he had defeated two rebel armies, slaughtering any man wounded or still defiant, and selling the rest as slaves. He insisted that they be sold to foreign merchants for he did not wish any to remain in their homeland and foment trouble.
He next sent his men on a spree of ruthless plunder to take the heart out of the country. By the end of summer Northumbria was like a hound whipped into submission by a man determined to prove who was master. It was bloodied, beaten and broken, and became the most craven of beasts.
The Viking warriors, even the lowliest of them, were as wealthy and feared as lords.
‘It’s a pity you missed it,’ Sigurd said, rubbing his hands with glee.
Leif wondered at his brother’s new-found enthusiasm. Hitherto he had been a dutiful follower of Ivar and no more. Now he appeared as fervent as any other man in the army and would hear no word against him.
Will he still feel that way when Ivar sits in judgement of me, Leif wondered.
Aebbe fashioned him a patch to wear over one eye to hide his disfigurement. He felt better when she’d done so for it meant that Nefi could be brought home. At first he was curious about what lay beneath the patch but Leif moved his prying hand away so often that he eventually gave up.
Leif made up stories to explain his absence to the boy. He had been captured by a dragon, he had tricked it into allowing him to go free, then had tamed it so that it became his servant. He rode around the world on his dragon, seeing strange and marvellous places where people had blue or green skin, where some were ten feet tall and others no bigger than a finger.
‘Where is Dragon?’ Nefi asked.
‘He’s gone to live with his family,’ Leif said. ‘Just as I have come back to live with you.’
After a week Leif was well enough to wander outside although he did not go far and one of his friends always went with him. They said it was because he was still liable to blunder into things, which was true. But he suspected it was more because they feared what Eohric might do if he caught him alone.
He gained a new companion in a young man by the name of Ketil. He was Thorvald’s son, about fifteen summers old, and very like his father in looks and temperament. He had come to Jorvic from their home village, keen to join his father who he thought the greatest man in the world. And keen to win glory and fame in battle.
The only way in which he differed from Thorvald was in his garrulousness. He was interested in anything and everything and assumed that everyone else would feel the same if only
they let him tell them. Leif did not mind. Ketil often accompanied him as he walked around the city and he enjoyed having an engaging companion with keen mind and sharp eyes.
At last came the day which Leif dreaded. The day when Ivar and his brothers would sit in judgement upon him.
He had attacked Eohric and this had led to the savage beating Guthrum had dealt out to him. For some, Eohric was the innocent man and Leif the guilty one.
The trial would not, could not, go easy for him.
Sigurd and Thorvald helped Leif to the assembly. He was still having difficulty focusing, still in danger of tripping over and banging into things. Sigurd pleaded with him not to but he wore the patch over his missing eye. He knew better than his brother the power of such a talisman.
The whole army had congregated in the open space in front of the fortress, sitting or squatting on the ground.
Ivar, Halfdan, Ubbe and the jarls and chieftains sat on stools on a small platform. To their left stood Eohric with his brother and friends. To their right stood Deor and Asgrim. Two stools stood beside them. Aebbe was sitting on one, the other was empty.
A gasp came from the assembled warriors when Leif appeared. He shuffled like an old, frail man, his broken fingers were tightly bound and the patch on his eye spoke eloquently of all he had suffered.
He could have, as his friends well knew, walked more swiftly and surely but he was determined to display his injuries to the utmost degree. He needed every ounce of sympathy he could get.
Ivar told him to take the seat next to Aebbe and then rose to address the army.
‘Fellow warriors,’ he cried. ‘We are gathered to hear judgement between Eohric, brother of Jarl Guthrum and Leif Ormson. There has been much dispute about the events, and rumour has run as fast as fire amongst us. But I have ascertained the true facts and present them here, without gloss or comment.’
He surveyed the assembly for a moment, making sure that all attention was on him before continuing.
‘These are the facts. Leif had been long a captive in Wessex along with Jarl Kolga. But they made their escape and returned to Jorvic after much tribulation. And here, Leif found out all that had transpired since he had gone.’