The Dream Weavers

by Barbara Erskine

  The serf was dragged away and immediately executed.

  And Eadburh was still sitting in her litter, waiting, under guard. Wigfrith, standing implacably nearby, arms folded, holding the baying mob from the king’s hall back with just the ferocious look in his eyes until they had calmed. At last he turned to the queen.

  ‘That boy must have added poison to my husband’s drink,’ she said coldly. ‘Why would I have wanted him dead? I’m leaving. He was nothing to me.’

  No liquid remained from the poisoned goblet for them to test. The larger cup had fallen to the ground. Tasters were forced to drink the last dregs, left as it had rolled away but they did not die. Eadburh smiled. Their fate would be slow and probably unnoticed.

  And still she waited. The summary court of her husband’s ealdormen could find no proof. Wigfrith raised his hands at last in furious frustration and pronounced their verdict.

  ‘As no proof of her culpability can be found, it is our decision that the queen,’ the word was heavy with sarcasm, ‘shall continue on her journey out of Wessex forthwith. You will never return, madam. But the Witan of Wessex decrees that you be escorted not to Mercia, whose king is our friend and ally, and who will never countenance a murderer at his court. To ensure you are kept at a safe distance I am commanding your escort to take you to our coast where you will board a ship at Hamwic and make sail for the kingdom of the Franks. No doubt they will know what to do with you. The king’s child,’ he turned to the escort that had clustered round the litter containing Eadburh’s daughter and her nurse, ‘will remain in Wessex.’

  ‘No!’ Eadburh screamed. ‘No, you cannot take her away from me.’

  ‘Why, madam? She belongs here with her father’s loyal kin.’ He did not wait to hear any more protests. Already the little girl’s litter had been taken out of the procession and the leader of the queen’s escort had spurred his horse forward.

  The travellers were no longer heading north towards Mercia and Powys, they were on the road south towards the sea.

  Bea was with her in the confines of the litter, feeling the thick fur of the rugs tucked around her, the bumpy motion of what was little more than a large chair inside a wooden frame, cushioned by coarsely stuffed bolsters. She watched Eadburh’s face. Were those tears for her child genuine? She had never seemed to pay her much attention, seeing too much of her father in the child’s features. In turn the little girl’s affection had all been for her nurses and her playmates and already Eadburh’s tears had dried and were replaced by a calculated narrowing of the eyes. Her royal fortune was still there in her baggage train; Wigfrith had not dared confiscate her dowry and marriage portion. She was a rich woman, bound for the court of the Emperor Charlemagne, the most powerful ruler in the known world. The child would be safe, well cared for in Wessex, as the king’s daughter. Almost at once, as she tried to make herself comfortable in the dusty confines of the royal litter, she had resigned herself to leaving the little girl behind. Once she had established herself at the emperor’s court, she would persuade him to send for Eathswith. Until then the child would be perfectly happy where she was. She lay back against the cushions. All in all, it had not worked out badly.

  But what happened to Nesta?

  Bea put down the stone with calm deliberation and sat for a while in the peaceful candlelight. Eadburh had not seen her watching this time; her protective circle had kept her safe and invisible. No one in that terrifying horde of angry men had noticed her. She shivered in spite of herself, remembering the barely restrained hatred of the pressing crowds, the noise, the nervousness of the horses, the placid indifference of the oxen harnessed to the baggage carts, Wigfrith’s strength and authority. Did he become king next, she wondered. Simon would know. And through it all Eadburh had sat there with an expression of haughty indifference. Was she scared, under it all? Was she genuinely shocked that her plan had misfired so badly, too stunned by the sudden reversal of events to react? Bea thought not, but the scene had gone, closed down, once more locked in the distant past. She scrambled to her feet and went to stand at the window, looking out into the night. As the carts rumbled down the winding roads towards the port of Southampton only one heart-rending cry had escaped Eadburh’s lips as the full realisation of where she was going finally dawned on her.

  ‘Elise!’

  30

  The chantry priest was there in the corner of the chapel. It was early, morning prayer not long finished, and the cathedral was quiet, the great windows dimmed by the blanket of sullen cloud and veils of rain that hung over the city, the aisles and rows of wooden pews shadowy, only a few lights on as yet.

  At the far end of the nave someone coughed, the sound echoing up into the vaults of the roof.

  Bea was wearing a thick jacket against the early chill of the morning. She sat in her usual place, hidden in the corner of the chapel. There were no candles today and a thick rope had been hooked in place, dividing the altar from the body of the chapel, separating her from the old man on his chair. ‘Should I tell them to take Emma away, back to London?’ she whispered. ‘Would that be best for her?’

  His head was bent in prayer and he did not respond.

  ‘Please, tell me what to do!’ She spoke more loudly than she intended and was shocked to hear her words echo slightly off the stone walls and back down from the fan tracery above her head.

  ‘That is your decision to make.’

  ‘I need advice. Please.’

  But he had gone.

  Outside the chapel footsteps approached, echoing off the stone flags. They drew near and stopped.

  ‘Please. I need you.’

  But his corner was empty.

  She sat for several minutes more, deep in thought, then she stood up and headed towards the entrance with a sigh.

  Sandra had been attending morning prayer. When she saw Bea entering the chantry chapel she had felt a shiver of unease. Creeping close to the entrance she listened, holding her breath. There was someone in there with her. She could hear Bea’s whispered voice echoing in the confined space. Stepping back she waited in the shadows for Bea to leave the chapel, reach the main door and disappear out into the cold morning then she tiptoed forward, stood in the chapel doorway, peering in. It was empty and cold. There was no one there. So who had Beatrice been talking to? Who was she addressing when she had begged to be told what to do? It hadn’t sounded like a prayer. It had been far too peremptory. She had been giving orders.

  Sandra shuddered and stepped back. The atmosphere in the tiny chapel had turned suddenly sour. It was scary; evil. She tried to steady her breathing. Beatrice had taken something nasty in there with her; a demon. An evil spirit. She was sure of it.

  What should she do? Who could she go to for help? She had spoken to the dean, she had spoken to Mark, but neither of them had seemed to take her seriously enough to do anything about it. There was only the bishop left and if he failed her it would be up to her.

  She had to wait for a lull in visitors much later before she managed to speak to Heather Fawcett, who had been run off her feet in the cathedral shop. They carried their cups of coffee to the far side of the Chapter House garden and sat down out of the wind on one of the benches. The rain had stopped and sunlight was warming the garden.

  ‘What do you think I should do?’ Sandra leant forward anxiously after she had told Heather her story. Though she didn’t know Heather well, she regarded her as a friend.

  Heather took a thoughtful sip from her cup. ‘Do you have to do anything?’ she enquired mildly.

  ‘Of course I do.’

  ‘You said you had been to see the dean.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sandra, dear, what else can you do? You have to leave it up to him. He probably knows Beatrice far better than you do and if he isn’t worried, I don’t think you should be either.’

  ‘But she was talking to an evil spirit! Here in the cathedral!’ Sandra picked up her cup, gestured randomly with it, slopping coffee on the grass, and dro
pped it back down on the saucer. ‘I can’t stand by and watch. You know what she is, don’t you?’ She pulled the newspaper cuttings out of her bag. ‘Look at this! I’ve always thought there was something odd about her.’ She lowered her voice, leaning forward slightly. ‘She’s a strange woman. I can’t think what a lovely man like the canon sees in her.’

  Heather scanned the cuttings swiftly, then went back to contemplating the display of flowers in the border near their seats. ‘If that’s true, and to be honest I don’t see what makes you think that’s Bea in the photos, she seems to know what she is doing, so there would be nothing to worry about.’

  ‘But I do worry. That’s why I brought these with me. As the dean isn’t interested, I thought I would speak to the bishop. Show them to him.’

  Heather sighed. ‘Can I suggest you leave it for now? And please, don’t bother the bishop with this. You probably wouldn’t get past his chaplain anyway. Don’t do anything. It would be truly terrible to mention this to anyone when you don’t really have anything to go on.’

  ‘But the evil spirit—’

  ‘I doubt there is an evil spirit anywhere in this cathedral, Sandra,’ Heather cut her off sternly. ‘This is a holy place.’

  ‘But there was no one else in the chantry.’ Sandra wasn’t going to give up that easily. ‘I told you! And when I went in there, there was the strangest atmosphere. You know when you walk into a room where two people have just had a row and you can sense it? Like that. It was electric.’

  Heather brought her attention back to Sandra’s face. ‘It sounds to me as if you have magic powers yourself. Are you sure you’re not the one who is practising mediumistic arts?’

  Sandra stared at her, appalled. ‘Don’t even joke about it!’

  ‘I wasn’t joking. Most people don’t sense things like that, dear.’

  ‘But I don’t. I’m not. I can’t be!’ Sandra looked as though she was about to cry.’

  ‘I know you think you’ve seen and heard things which at first glance seem strange, but they may not be.’ Heather put in firmly. ‘And it’s not really our business, is it, to interfere with other people’s affairs and perhaps beliefs. All you saw was the canon’s wife praying. And if she spoke to God out loud, so do we all sometimes when we’re upset and anxious. After all, that’s what He’s there for! And you should not have been listening.’ She fixed Sandra with a fierce gaze.

  Sandra coloured slightly. ‘Perhaps you’re right,’ she said reluctantly.

  Heather stood up. ‘I know I’m right. Now, I must get back to the shop. We are very busy at the moment.’

  Sandra watched her thread her way between the tables and disappear through the door. She had thought Heather would be a staunch ally. She turned her attention to the flower bed beside her and watched a bee foraging amongst the blooms. Perhaps Heather was right and she should leave it, but then, what was that adage: the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing. Or women. It was going to be up to her to sort this out.

  Bea had spent the morning with Emma; a brief lesson on chakras and energy points had given way to a trip into town to visit the shops. Bea had taken on board the extent of Emma’s attention span, plus the need to go slowly with her lessons. She had also ascertained that Emma was no longer worrying about the ghost of King Ethelbert. ‘No,’ she had said airily when Bea enquired if he had appeared to her again. ‘He belongs in his church. I know what to do now if he appears again, but he won’t. Not to me. Eadburh doesn’t even know he exists.’

  Bea froze. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘In my dream, we were carefree, young. Full of hopes. Father hadn’t even thought about a husband for Alfrida!’ The coquettish gleam in her eye filled Bea with misgivings. Was that Emma or someone else lurking in there?

  ‘This is when you went to the little church to wait for him?’

  Emma nodded, then she sighed. ‘I’m talking rubbish, aren’t I?’

  ‘No, but you must be careful to keep a grip on reality.’

  Emma giggled. ‘Says you!’ She was herself again.

  Bea laughed. ‘Point taken. So, we need some grounding. What about lunch?’

  They agreed that Mark would drop Emma back at the cottage in the early afternoon on his way to visit the ailing priest in his hospice. Emma would practise all she had learnt so far and they would resume lessons the following day.

  The moment they left, Bea went upstairs.

  Nesta’s herbs, still carefully stored, were lying on the shelf in her room where she had left them and she shook them out of their paper bags. They were wilting badly now. Still careful not to touch them, she reached for her touchstone and dropped it gently onto the pile. ‘Where are you, Nesta?’ she whispered. ‘You and I must talk.’

  For a long time nothing happened, then at last she sensed a change in the room, a slight movement of the air around her and in the distance she heard the deep echoing croak of a raven.

  Nesta was sitting on a fallen tree on the edge of the forest. She was wrapped in a dark woollen cloak, the hood pulled up over her hair, and at her feet there was a bundle. At her girdle Bea could see the silver chain with the little crystal ball and the small sharp knife, a tiny leather wallet and a silver box suspended from a ring; the tools of her trade, all half hidden in the deep folds of her skirt.

  ‘Did Eadburh not think to give you her protection and take you with her?’ Bea asked.

  The other woman smiled bleakly. ‘She gave me not a second thought, nor did I expect her to. It was never in her nature to be generous. She would have been happy to let me die as the poisoner in her stead. I had the measure of that woman long ago and I was gone before the bane ever entered the mouth of the king.’

  ‘You knew she would kill him?’

  Slowly Nesta nodded. ‘She did not mean that to happen, but she was a dealer in death. That was their destiny, hers to kill, his to die at her hand.’

  ‘And you. Where did you go?’

  ‘To Powys of course.’

  Bea felt her attention sharpen. ‘Why?’

  ‘Was that not the seat of all her fears and woes and the place she left her heart? A man there turned her into a killer and I was curious to know how.’

  ‘Surely it was her father who turned her into a killer. And her mother.’

  Nesta raised her face to the sunlight as it began to filter through the boughs of the trees above her head and smiled. ‘Whether it was in her blood or in her destiny, she learned her lesson well.’

  ‘And when you reached Powys, did you find Elise alive?’ Bea leaned forward eagerly. ‘Did you tell him about her?’

  Nesta closed her eyes against the sun and smiled. ‘It was a long way to the kingdom of Powys. I had my own destiny to fulfil and first I had to avoid the men hunting me through the forests of Wessex and then on into the Forest of Dean between the Wye and the Severn rivers where I saw for the first time Offa’s great dyke looming on the hilltops as I fled like a hind into the shadows of my friends the trees.’

  ‘And you managed to escape,’ Bea whispered confidently. ‘You were a survivor.’

  Nesta smiled. ‘I had friends in the woods, I told you. The plants and trees, the elves and goblins, the fairies and sprites; I knew where to hide, I knew where to find shelter and warmth by the fires of the charcoal burners and the forest dwellers, I knew how to spin myself a cloak of green as I headed north following the star paths in the sky.’

  ‘And you knew how to see me.’

  Nesta glanced across at her. ‘Were you trying to hide?’

  ‘From Eadburh, yes.’

  ‘But you failed. Your magic is faulty, full of holes. And she is powerful. You should beware.’

  ‘Can you show me how to hide as I watch her.’

  Nesta was thoughtful for a long moment. ‘Why do you want to watch her?’

  Bea hesitated. ‘Her spirit is wandering the hillsides where she was happy with her prince. She calls for him endlessly, her voice echoing lonely a
nd desolate, and I don’t know how to help her.’

  ‘Why should you be the one to help her?’

  ‘Because that’s my job. Because I can see the people others can’t, the people who are trapped on this earth. Because I have always wanted to give peace to unhappy souls.’

  ‘And that is why you live with a man of God and yet you hide from him and swathe the longings of your soul in dark cloaks of deception.’

  Bea sat up, shocked. ‘No!’

  ‘No?’

  Dark cloaks of deception. Bea recoiled at the words.

  ‘People call you witch.’ Nesta gave a rueful smile. ‘That word I think implies evil and brings fear as much to your time as to mine.’

  ‘So you know we are from different times.’

  This time Nesta laughed out loud. ‘My dear, I am from the place between time and eternity.’

  ‘And you could help me. For the sake of Eadburh and for that young woman, Emma, up on the ridge where Eadburh and her prince made love. Please. Was it Emma’s destiny to be drawn into this story? I think not. I need to teach her, and I don’t know if I’m strong enough.’

  ‘All you need is courage.’ Nesta stood up slowly and bent to pick up her bundle. ‘I am not a teacher, I thread my way between the stars. I will tell you if I found y Tywysog Elisedd when the time is right. God speed.’ Bea watched her turn towards the shadows between the trees and in a few seconds she had disappeared. In the place where she had been sitting there was no trace of her, the grasses weren’t flattened, there were no footprints in the dew.

  When Bea awoke, someone had covered her with a rug. She lay still, unable to collect her thoughts. Then slowly it came back. She had gone into a meditation with the scattered plants from Nesta’s basket. The woman had talked with her, a rational, informative dialogue, and then she had walked away into the forest.

  She had fallen asleep on her cushion and dreamt, and Mark must have come up to look for her after his visit to the hospice. Slowly she sat up. It was still daylight outside the window. She scrambled to her feet and walked over to look out, still a little dazed. Her touchstone lay on the sill in a patch of warm sunlight. She looked down at it warily and then turned to look at the low table. The plants had gone, the empty paper bags lying where she had left them.