The Dream Weavers

by Barbara Erskine

  Whoever had knocked with such desperate force was gone.

  Turning back, she looked around the room. She had been asleep, dreaming, and her protection, she realised with horror, was no longer in place. The knocking had left the energies around her fractured and the echoes had become jagged, her dream still with her with vivid clarity. She played back the scene in her head: the noisy hall with its smells of cooking and woodsmoke and crowded humanity, the ride across the meadows, the confrontation of the Saxon girl and the Welsh prince. All of it so sharply focused, so intense, it had been almost more than real. And every part of it had been somehow relevant to this house. But it was gone. With a sigh she set about gathering the scattered pages of Simon’s manuscript off the floor, the manuscript that held the clues she sought. The strange jump from intense noisy emotion to numb emptiness was a new experience, as was that moment of fear she had felt outside on the terrace. Even when she had confronted the violent poltergeist she hadn’t been gripped by fear like that.

  Setting the pile of paper down on the table, she was acutely aware that part of her wanted to go back into the dream to find out what happened next. She glanced round the room. It was growing more shadowy now that the sun had moved round. She ought to go home, but if she did, what was she going to say to Simon, or to Chris for that matter? She hadn’t been able to interact with the woman in the garden, much less ask her to move on, and they expected answers. And she wanted answers. What, if anything, had Offa’s feast and the young handsome prince to do with this cottage? Beyond the name.

  This was Offa’s Ridge. He must have been here at some point. Or perhaps not. She had never really thought about it. Offa was famous. Perhaps because his name was so easy to remember compared with some of the Welsh names of the villages roundabout, he was everywhere. There were Offa’s cafés, Offa’s giftshops selling Offa’s fudge in the villages round about. And of course the Offa’s Dyke footpath that wandered backwards and forwards more or less following the length of the actual dyke and then on from sea to sea, as described by Asser and quoted in Simon’s manuscript, the footpath that ran almost past the door of this cottage.

  Did the answer lie in the dream world? She glanced back at the manuscript. Was that the woman in the garden’s way of communicating her story? Was it Simon’s imagination that had triggered this sudden ghostly visitation, as they had joked. This hadn’t happened to her before, but then every case she had dealt with had been different. She pictured the young and beautiful princess with her cornflower blue eyes and tried to match the figure to the shadow in the garden. No. That didn’t seem to fit, but was that somehow where the answer lay?

  ‘Bea?’

  The voice from the terrace made her jump.

  ‘Simon?’ she hurried over to the door. ‘I didn’t hear your car.’

  ‘That surprises me. The poor thing groans in mortal agony every time I drive up the hill in a cloud of smoke.’ He stepped inside and she saw him glance round. ‘So, have you sorted it?’

  ‘I heard the voice calling. And I felt something,’ she hesitated. ‘Cold. Fear. Very powerful emotions.’

  He gave her a sharp look. ‘Did you manage to make it go away?’ Reaching into his pocket, he pulled out a box of matches and headed towards the hearth. ‘I’ll light the fire if you’re cold.’

  She saw him look over at his manuscript on the table as he squatted down before the hearth.

  ‘I was reading the bit you marked.’

  He waited a moment while the flame caught then he straightened. ‘I felt it might be relevant. I had read my way through more than half the book without any problem, then every time I began to rework the chapter about the dyke in Herefordshire and the first time we hear of Offa at his palace near Hereford, the knocking started. And that sad, desperate voice.’ He grinned cheerfully. ‘Was it a figment of my imagination?’

  ‘No, I don’t think it’s your imagination.’

  He raised an eyebrow. ‘So, who is Elise?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ She sat down on the edge of one of the two chairs, wondering how to explain to him what had happened. ‘I didn’t realise King Offa had a palace near Hereford,’ she said at last, focusing on something she assumed he would be able to answer. ‘Do you know where it was?’

  ‘You read that bit?’ He glanced at the typescript again. ‘As I say in there, it was probably four or five miles away from Hereford itself, near an ancient hillfort they call Sutton Walls, Sutton being the Saxon for South Tun, tun meaning town. It would have been Offa’s southernmost base in Mercia. They think he may have had a hunting lodge in what is now Hereford as well, but the evidence is all so scant. Archaeologists used to think the hillfort itself was the site of his stronghold, then they did a series of excavations in or near various villages nearby and they’ve found more signs of Saxon building there. There’s nothing to see now above ground, as far as I know, but it’s obviously an area with quite a bit of relevance. I’m going follow up forensic studies they’ve undertaken lately and see if they’ve reached any conclusions, so my book can include the latest discoveries. We do need to know where he was based.’ He perched on the armchair opposite her. ‘Sorry. I’m getting carried away. Back to the point in hand.’

  She was watching the cold blue flames run up the kindling and spread to the logs. This was when she should say no. Tell him that it was awkward because of Mark’s job and direct him to someone else. But she knew she couldn’t. She was far too intrigued already by her dream and the echoes it had left in her head.

  ‘Contacting your visitor wasn’t quite as easy as I thought it would be,’ she said cautiously.

  ‘Ah. I sense there’s a no coming. Couldn’t you do it?’

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘I’m too sceptical for you?’

  ‘No. You can’t be entirely sceptical or I wouldn’t be here.’

  ‘OK. Let’s compromise. Let’s say I’m a pragmatist. I’m prepared cautiously to suspend disbelief in the interests of scientific research. So, where are we so far?’

  Sensing that he wanted to spar with her, she responded with a gentle reprimand: ‘Scientific and research are dirty words to people like me.’

  ‘Maybe.’ He inclined his head. ‘I withdraw them. I asked Christine for help, so it would be churlish to dismiss the help she provides.’ The fire was already beginning to throw out some heat and he eased his jacket off his shoulders. ‘Go on, tell me what you have found out.’

  ‘Normally I find this sort of challenge intriguing and generally it’s relatively simple to diagnose the situation. But here …’ She paused, suddenly serious again. ‘I haven’t managed to see the woman as anything other than a shadow, but I heard her clearly and I heard the strange echo to her voice, as you described it. Then,’ she stared into the flames, replaying it in her mind, ‘you came back and the moment was lost and I failed to make contact with her.’ She fell silent again. ‘There is something about this that unsettles me.’

  ‘Bloody hell!’ he gave a hollow laugh. ‘If it unsettles you, what do you think it does to me?’

  She looked up at him sharply. ‘Are you afraid to stay here alone?’

  ‘No. Certainly not.’ He stood up abruptly. ‘No so-called ghost is going to chase me away. I don’t like being constantly interrupted, that’s all.’

  ‘But you’re a scientist, being pragmatic,’ she reminded him with a grin. ‘You shouldn’t be distracted by this. You should be thinking in terms of logical explanations.’

  ‘Hang on a minute!’ He raised his hands in mock surrender. ‘What’s this about me being a scientist? I am a historian.’

  ‘But one who draws on archaeology and, as you said, forensic studies.’ She leaned back in her chair and closed her eyes. ‘Sorry. I’m being over-defensive. But it was you who mentioned the words scientific research.’

  There was a brief pause. ‘Has anyone investigated you?’

  Her eyes flew open. ‘No! No, they haven’t. They’re usually happy that I have got r
id of whatever it was.’

  ‘Which brings us full circle. All I asked was that you get rid of my wretched visitor.’

  ‘And I will, but I have to confront your ghost. If she doesn’t want to appear to me, I need to find out the full story so I can work out how to approach this.’ She levered herself to her feet. ‘Leave it with me. When can I come again?’

  ‘Whenever you like. But preferably soon. I have a tight schedule. I need to be able to concentrate.’

  ‘Tomorrow then. I’ll ring you first.’

  As she made her way across the terrace and down the steps towards her car, she paused, her eye caught by a stone lying almost at her feet. It hadn’t been there before or she would have noticed it, she was sure.

  She stared down at it thoughtfully, then she bent to pick it up. It was about the size of a hen’s egg and fitted neatly into the palm of her hand. The colour of dried blood, streaked with grey and smooth as crystal, it had a gentle warmth to it. She wiped some clinging smears of soil off it carefully and studied it for a few seconds. This was one of those moments she had learned to trust, an intuition, something Simon would never understand. In days gone by it would have been considered a message from the gods. There was something special about the stone; she didn’t know what yet, but it had appeared as she was looking for answers.

  Slipping it into her pocket, she glanced back at the front door. It was closed. Simon had not waited to wave her off.

  Standing quietly in the shadows of the hedge, Nesta, daughter of the forest, herb-wife and sorceress, smiled to herself. She had recognised this woman at once as a kindred spirit, a seeker of truth, a follower of the stars. In picking up the stone, the woman had accepted the challenge, and so was bound now to follow the story to its end.

  Mark was in his study when Bea returned home. She paused outside his door. His room had once been the formal dining room of the house, overlooking the Close with its ancient lime trees and the huge squat shape of the cathedral itself filling the view from the windows, and it made a pleasant study with more than enough space for his desk and his books and chairs for when he needed to use it for private meetings. All was silent behind the door. She turned away to tiptoe upstairs without disturbing him.

  While he had been a parish priest they had grown used to living in what they liked to call tied cottages, the last, a small modern house built in the corner of a rapidly expanding rural village, a typical new rectory to replace the long-ago-sold Old Rectory. Since they had moved into the Close, however, home had been this wonderful piece of history. It was one of several houses upgraded for the senior clergy in the early nineteenth century from a range of far older buildings. It had the best of both worlds – the back rooms still felt medieval, the front were late Georgian. Bea loved it.

  It was on the attic floor at the back, high under the hipped slate roof, that Bea had made her own sanctuary in a room overlooking their small garden. It was her private domain. She called it her study. This was where she felt safe, where she studied the world that meant so much to her, the world with which she didn’t want to embarrass her husband.

  Going in, she quietly closed the door and leaned against it. Up here she kept her books, her notes, her meditation space. There was a large cushion on the floor, candles, framed hand-coloured Arthur Rackham prints, and pictures of sacred landscapes on the walls. She stood staring out of the window across the walled garden towards the huddled roofs of the old town beyond it for a few long minutes then turned back into the room. She needed to think, and by think she meant meditate and pray. Now she was safely home, on her own ground, she wanted to analyse what had happened.

  What should have been a routine visit, a gentle exploration of a situation, a reassuring encounter with a lost soul who needed guidance and love to send him or her on their way, had turned into an unsettling and frightening experience, over almost before it had happened, followed by something that seemed to be a dream but was so lucid and meaningful that it had to be a part of some message from the past.

  She pulled the stone out of her pocket. Seeing it suddenly there in front of her outside the cottage, she had subliminally recognised it as a signpost into the narrative into which she had been led by Simon’s book. It was part of the story. She didn’t know how yet, but she had sensed it strongly.

  Lighting a candle, she sat down on the cushion, the stone between her hands. On one of the courses she had been on they had made a study of psychometry, the science – she smiled to herself at the word Simon would have balked at – of conjuring the past through the touch of the fingers, by connecting to something tangible, holding an artefact – a piece of jewellery, a comb, a lock of hair – and using it to focus the mind on the person or place to whom the artefact was linked. This was something she had practised instinctively as a child, not realising then that what she did was anything more than her imagination, that the ability was a reality and a very precious gift. She had tried it before with stones from castles and ancient sites, from gardens and ruins, always conscientiously returning them when she had finished with their story. With this stone perhaps she could link to the past of the cottage, safely, here at home without a sceptical historian looming over her. Stones had always been there; stones were brilliant witnesses. They were as old as the ground around them and perhaps if she had found the right one it would provide the link she needed to whatever had so frightened the woman at Simon’s house. If she had been guided to the link, she owed it to that lost soul to find out what had happened.

  Slowly Bea began to compose herself as she heard the cathedral clock chime the hour.

  A nest of vipers.

  The phrase leapt out of nowhere. And then,

  But that is not how it was.

  6

  ‘You know Papa intends me to marry the son of the King of the Franks.’ Eadburh’s eldest sister, Ethelfled, looked up suddenly from her sewing. Taller than her sisters, she was a powerful young woman, clever and humourless. Her face wore a smug smile. Her sisters froze. They were all of an age where they knew marriage was their destiny and that their destiny was at present foremost in their ambitious father’s thoughts. Aggressive and relentlessly acquisitive, Offa of Mercia ruled with ruthless ambition what had become the most powerful of the kingdoms of Britain. Girls of marriageable age were valuable assets, and his three daughters perhaps the most valuable of all.

  ‘Did Mama tell you that?’ Eadburh frowned. ‘I thought Ecgfrith was going to marry one of King Charles’s daughters. He wouldn’t want you both over there, surely.’ Their only brother, a more powerful bargaining chip even than they were, was still in the mead hall across the courtyard with their father and his advisers. She reached into the basket on the centre of the table for a skein of silk. The sound of music drifted across the compound to the women’s bower, together with the rowdy shouts and laughter of the men.

  ‘Mama thinks King Charles is playing politics. He uses his children like pieces on a gaming board just as Papa does, and has no intention of marrying any of them to anyone at present,’ Alfrida, the middle sister, put in. She was the most thoughtful of the three girls, quieter and perhaps the cleverest.

  ‘It wasn’t Mama. I overheard two of the thanes’ wives gossiping.’ Ethelfled blushed.

  ‘Well, you can’t believe anything they say,’ Eadburh retorted. ‘He might have chosen any of us. Me, for instance. I may be the youngest, but I’m the prettiest!’

  Her sisters both laughed. ‘I think we can guess who he has in store for you.’ Alfrida fixed Eadburh with a mocking gaze. ‘He’s obviously got the puppy from Powys lined up for you.’

  Eadburh stared at her. ‘Who?’

  ‘Prince Elisedd.’ Alfrida giggled. ‘Why else would he send you off with him to stare at a line of wooden stakes and a thousand men carrying baskets of mud for his wretched rampart when he could have sent one of his surveyors. Marriage is the best way to ensure peace between the kingdoms. He’s told us so often enough.’

  ‘So, if you know so
much about it, who has he got in line for you?’ Ethelfled pushed back her stool and stood up suddenly. ‘Has he told you?’

  Alfrida shook her head. ‘He keeps very close counsel, as we all know.’

  ‘Who keeps close counsel?’ Their mother swept into the room, two of her handmaids trailing after her carrying baskets of newly picked herbs. Cynefryth, unlike her daughters who all took their colouring from their father, had dark hair and sallow skin. Her eyes were hazel, and at this moment narrowed as she sent a sharp glance at each of the girls in turn.

  ‘Papa.’ Alfrida met her mother’s eye defiantly. ‘We were discussing our marital fate.’ Her voice carried a touch of bitterness. ‘I presume that was why he allowed Eadburh to go riding with King Cadell’s son this afternoon. At least she gets to lay eyes on her intended husband.’

  ‘I don’t know where you get the idea that Offa intends anyone to marry that young man,’ their mother said curtly. ‘He has mentioned no such thing to me.’

  ‘Thank the Blessed Virgin for that!’ Eadburh said fervently. ‘Can I help you with your herbs, Mama. Sewing bores me.’ She threw down her work. ‘And no doubt if we are all to be queens like you, we don’t need to excel in that particular skill.’ She glared at Alfrida, who loved embroidery.

  Cynefryth suppressed a sigh of exasperation and walked back towards the door. ‘Come along then. These were picked this morning while the moon was still in the sky; I have to see to their steeping while they still hold the life force of the moonlight, and there are salves to make.’ She did not add that there were spells to add and charms to recite, known only to her, which was why she did not leave the task to a local herb-wife.

  In the king’s royal residence when he was in this part of Mercia there was a great hall, the huge oak beams resplendent with carved beasts, and a royal bedchamber and all the space and outbuildings that the king’s vast entourage required. The stillroom, a small reed-thatched building behind the infirmary, was overseen by a local woman, Nesta, not merely a herb-wife, but also a powerful sorceress and a force to be reckoned with, if local gossip was to be believed. Oblivious to Nesta’s haughty stare as she and Eadburh walked in, the queen sent her out of the hut as though she were no more than a servant to gather more plants from her list.