The Oath

by A. M. Linden

  “But what the Mistress could do would be to stay at the king’s lodge, which is just one valley over there.”

  “And the king’s lodge is an inn with the excellent accommodations of your own?”

  “No, the king’s lodge . . . well, it’s the king’s lodge.”

  Seeing Caelym’s puzzled expression, Gothreg began to wonder if the monk was a bit dull-witted in spite of his high-toned manner of speaking. Making his own words as simple as possible and speaking slowly, he explained, “It’s called the king’s lodge because it’s the lodge that belongs to the king—or did, when he was still alive. It was his hunting lodge, though it’s not hunted from anymore now he’s dead.”

  “Which king?”

  The first words that Annwr spoke since she agreed to his price for the rooms startled Gothreg a bit, but guessing she was sharper than the monk, he answered at a normal rate of speed.

  “The old king of Derthwald, Theobold—not the new one, Gilberth, who must own the place, as he inherited everything from his uncle, but has never been there, so far as I’ve ever heard. What I’m trying to say is that the old king’s lodge is still kept up by the old king’s servants, sent there to live out their days when the new king came to the throne and wanted new servants around him.”

  Speaking in an oddly distant-sounding voice, Annwr murmured, “I knew one of those servants once. Her name was Millicent, and she was the nurse to the little princess. You wouldn’t have heard of her being there?”

  “Why, yes she is—or was, the last I heard.”

  While Gothreg’s inn was well inside the boundaries of Atheldom, his wife was from Derthwald, and would be there still if her father hadn’t been one of the royal guards who had been expelled from the palace when Gilberth took the throne. His in-laws remained intensely loyal to the old king’s memory, and they were bitter to this day that they had been sent off “before Theobold was cold in the ground!”

  Nothing Gothreg could say about its making sense that the new king would want his own guards who were loyal to him made any difference to his wife. Instead, it just set her off on a bitter tirade in which he was compared unfavorably with the faithful servants of the old king who kept up his beloved hunting lodge “as if he were still alive and going to ride up to the front door with his banners flying and horns blowing like in the old days.”

  Gothreg had never been to the old king’s lodge or met any of its inhabitants but had heard so much about them he could name them off and describe each one as if he’d known them in person. Almost without any effort, he repeated the poignant story his mother-in-law told whenever she came to visit of how Millicent, who had been both maid to the queen and nurse to the princess, still kept all the royal gowns washed and ready for the day the princess might want them, even knowing she’d been put in a convent. It was a story that sounded better the first time it was told, and Gothreg could see that Mistress Columbina, who he’d taken for a cold, hard-hearted crone, was touched to the core, even though she said nothing more, except to ask that he tell them how to find the way there.

  While the innkeeper was drawing them a map on a sheet he tore from his accounting ledger, Annwr looked past him and out through the inn’s open door.

  She hadn’t thought of Millicent in years and was surprised the name had jumped out of her lips so quickly. She was surprised, too, by how clearly she could picture the old woman she’d seen only once in her life—rushing around in the palace nursery, desperately trying to show her where Aleswina’s things were and, no doubt, heartbroken at being torn away from the little girl she dressed and cared for so lovingly. To think that for all these years, she’d held on to the hope of someday seeing the child that she, like Annwr, had come to love as her own!

  “Mistress Columbina!” Caelym said softly. “It is time we take our bags to the rooms this kind innkeeper has given us for the night and go meet my helper and your grandsons at the fair, as we promised we would.” He put a gentle hand under her elbow, helped her to her feet, and handed her his satchel, before carrying the rest of their bags, with the innkeeper’s help, into their rooms.

  Chapter 59

  Brave Horse

  After Annwr sent them off, Arddwn and Lliem dashed away, with Aleswina running after them. Pulled by the calls of peddlers hawking their wares, the clamor of competing musicians, and the smells of every kind of savory food imaginable, they rushed past players acting scenes from the bible and into the fun part of the fair.

  By midafternoon they’d seen acrobats leaping so high they seemed to be flying. They’d watched the puppet show twice, laughing until their sides ached. They’d eaten ginger-spiced cakes and buttery fried bread and fruit tarts soaked with honey. But in all the fun and excitement, they still hadn’t decided which toy they would choose for themselves.

  Arddwn would have picked a real-looking wooden sword, but Aleswina stood unexpectedly firm, repeating, “Nothing sharp or dangerous,” in a close approximation of Annwr’s voice.

  Lliem would have chosen a patchwork horse at a stand of cloth dolls and animals if Arddwn hadn’t scoffed, “Those are for babies!”

  Half-way through saying, “I’m not a baby,” Lliem saw a tub of stick horses with leather heads and yarn manes at the far end of the stall. He dashed up to it, his eyes fixed on a spotted black and white one with a long, thick white mane.

  “That one!” he squealed, adding, “Please, please, please!” as he jumped up and down.

  The extremely plump woman selling the toys put down her knitting, got up from her stool, and lumbered over to the barrel. In the next moment, Lliem had his pony in his hands and was crooning, “Brave Horse, I’ll call you Brave Horse,” in its ear.

  Arddwn was too old for stick horses. While Ethelwen was paying for Lliem’s toy, he kept looking around for something he wanted that wasn’t sharp or dangerous.

  Not far from the toy stand, a crowd gathered around a show that was making them clap and cheer.

  Dodging his way through the throng, Arddwn came out in the front row to see a juggler tossing brightly colored balls through the air in loops and figures of eight, dipping down to add one more and one more and one more again from a basket by his feet as the onlookers applauded at each new addition, until he had twelve balls in the air at once and his hands were a blur of motion. Then, far too soon for Arddwn, the juggler, Trombert, dropped off one ball after another back into the basket, until he was back to three. Keeping those going, he walked around the edge of a circle, calling for donations and offering to sell his balls for a pening each.

  The crowd thinned as the act came to the end, leaving Arddwn still enthralled.

  Hoping he’d had a paying customer for a change, Trombert lowered his offer to sell three balls for a single pening and include a juggling lesson in the bargain.

  “They aren’t sharp or dangerous!” Arddwn’s response made no sense to Trombert but did to Aleswina, and she wanted to say yes only she took Annwr’s directions literally and sighed, “But An—I mean, your grandmother—said you could buy just one toy.”

  “I’ll sell you one for a pening,” Trombert said quickly, “and will give you other two for free.”

  Aleswina was persuaded, and Arddwn got to pick his balls, which, along with his juggling lesson, took long enough that Lliem, who was anxious to ride his new pony, climbed over the stone wall behind the food stands, mounted onto Brave Horse and rode off across the open field towards a stand of trees on the other side. Caught up in his game, he danced and pranced through the grass, unaware of how far he’d gone or that he was now completely alone except for a single figure cloaked in black who’d been passing by and who left the road to follow him.

  Chapter 60

  Father Wulfric

  Father Wulfric was on his way to Lindisfarne to ask his bishop to help pray for the safe return of the novice who’d vanished without a trace from the convent in Derthwald. Although he was in a hurry, there wasn’t another village to stop at before dark, so he had taken his usual
bed at Ealfrid’s Inn and gone out to spread the word of the mystery to the fairgoers and call on them to join their prayers with his and those of the nuns of Saint Edeth.

  Having done everything he could for the moment, he was wandering around the edge of the fairgrounds when he saw Lliem dancing through the grass, the sun on his red hair and his face alight with the joy of his game.

  Putting together the boy’s thin, undernourished stature with his brand-new outfit and expensive toy, Wulfric had a bad feeling about what that meant.

  Of the evils men did, the most abhorrent to Wulfric was the use of innocent children for an array of vile purposes unimaginable to anyone who hadn’t been hearing confessions for the past forty years.

  There were other possible explanations, but Wulfric was suspicious. Furthermore, he was certain that he had never baptized this boy—and as the only priest serving every village from Girdlestone to the mountain ridge that marked the northernmost edge of the Christian Saxon lands, if he hadn’t baptized a child, no one had.

  That settled it. Determined that this was one little soul he would save, Wulfric set out to take the boy into his care and—if it turned out his dark suspicions were correct—take him to grow up consecrated to God in the monastery where he had himself been dedicated by the earthly parents he no longer remembered.

  Knowing from experience that outlaws’ children, whether born, bought, or stolen, were close to feral, Father Wulfric approached his quarry carefully and silently until he was near enough to catch hold of him if he should run off.

  “What a nice horse you have,” he said when he was within arm’s length. “May I pet him?”

  The gentle, friendly opening put Lliem at ease. Nodding proudly, he trotted over and lifted Brave Horse’s nose up to meet Wulfric’s outstretched hand.

  Tucking a firm finger around the stick pony’s reins, Wulfric asked, “Who bought him for you?”

  “Ethel—I mean, Codric did.”

  Suddenly remembering what Annwr told him about staying with Ethelwen and speaking only to her, Lliem whispered, “I’m not supposed to talk to anyone else.”

  Wulfric squatted down, looked Lliem straight in the eyes, and whispered back, “But you can talk to me—I’m Father Wulfric!”

  Having had one father suddenly appear, Lliem supposed it was possible he had two, but thought it was better to make sure.

  “Are you Arddwn’s father too?”

  “Of course, I am! I am father to all children who love Jesus!”

  Here Lliem was disappointed because he liked having one father and would have been happy to have another one, only—

  “But we don’t like Jesus.” He sighed, shrugged, and would have trotted off, but Father Wulfric didn’t let go of Brave Horse’s reins.

  Like a fish suddenly aware that the worm it had just bitten into had something sharp inside it, Lliem edged backward and tried to pull Brave Horse with him.

  Like a skilled fisherman with a fish not yet securely hooked, Wulfric straightened up, keeping a grip on the pony’s head, “But all little children must learn to love Jesus, so if your mother and father haven’t told you about Him, I will tell you now.”

  Tempted because his father told such good stories, Lliem hesitated a moment too long, and in a quick move, Wulfric dropped his hold on the pony’s rein and grasped hold of Lliem’s hand.

  In the same moment that Wulfric knew he had his little fish safety caught, Lliem realized he was trapped.

  Wulfric smiled. “So, now we will go back and find out who you belong to . . .”

  The rest of what the well-meaning priest had to say was lost in Lliem’s terror that he was going to be taken back to Barnard. Panicked, he looked around for Arddwn or Ethelwen. What he saw was a towering oak—the twin of the tree he’d chosen to be his friend in the forest.

  Instead of struggling to break free, Lliem went still. And as he did, a bird in its upper branches let out a long, piping call reminding him that he had a magic whistle, so he unclenched his hands and let Brave Horse drop to the ground.

  Pleased to see the child was now at ease, Wulfric relaxed his own grip and smiled at the little boy’s transformed upward gaze, touched to see the innocent child’s free hand move spontaneously towards his breast has if guided by a divine touch to make an untutored sign of the cross.

  But what Lliem was reaching for was his magic whistle and the minute he had it in his grasp, he pulled his other hand free and ran. If he’d dashed across the open field, Father Wulfric would have caught him, but instead he ran to his tree, blowing his whistle with all his might and keeping the tree’s broad trunk between him and his pursuer.

  Wulfric was fast and strong for a man his age, but not quick enough to catch hold of an agile five-year-old darting first one way then the other around the tree. It was, however, just a matter of time before Lliem would eventually dodge the wrong way and be caught again.

  Lliem was getting tired from blowing his whistle while he was dodging back and forth, just managing to keep the tree between them, but then, when he was almost completely out of breath, four good things happened at once:

  Ethelwen appeared out of nowhere, picked him up, and carried him away.

  Annwr circled around behind them, yelling “You leave that child alone!”

  His father—his real, only father—rushed past to tell the pretend father to go away.

  And Arddwn ran to save Brave Horse.

  Chapter 61

  Back to Ealfrid’s Inn

  Caelym and Annwr were on their way to the toy stalls when they heard Lliem’s whistle. Pushing through the crowd, they caught sight of Aleswina and Arddwn climbing over the fence and dashing across the field. Charging after them, they caught up midway to the tree where Lliem was barely staying out of Wulfric’s reach.

  Running faster than she’d ever run before, Aleswina reached Lliem first, scooped him up in her arms and fled with him clutched to her chest. Just steps behind her, Annwr paused long enough to wave her walking stick in Wulfric’s direction and shout at him before she rushed after them.

  Caelym would have turned to cover their retreat, except he saw Arddwn kept going on, risking capture himself to retrieve Lliem’s toy horse.

  It was too late to call him back.

  Prepared to fight to the death to save his son, Caelym reached for his dagger, but accidentally grabbed the silver cross that Annwr insisted he wear as part of his monk’s disguise instead. Hearing Herrwn’s words that the wise “contend with speech, not daggers” as clearly as if his teacher were there at his side, Caelym raised the cross up and proclaimed snatches of an incantation he’d learned from Aleswina.

  “Quid gloriaris in malitia qui potens es in iniquitate,” he cried out. “tota die iniustitiam cogitavit lingua tua sicut novacula acuta fecisti dolum. Dilexisti malitiam super benignitatem; iniquitatem magis quam loqui aequitatem. Dilexisti omnia verba praecipitationis in lingua dolosa. Propterea destruet te Deus in finem, evellet te et emigravit te de tabernaculo et radicem tuam de terra viventium. Quid gloriatur in malitia qui potens est iniquitate Tota die iniustitiam cogitavit lingua tua sicut novacula acuta fecisti dolum Dilexisti malitiam super benignitatem iniquitatem magis quam loqui aequitatem Dilexisti omnia verba praecipitationis linguam dolosam Propterea Deus destruet te in finem evellet te et emigrabit te de tabernaculo et radicem tuam de terra viventium,” infusing the words with sufficient force to make up for whatever feeble message they contained. Then—as he would recount in the stirring saga he would later compose about the event—his foe, presumably a high priest of the Christians’ god, knelt down in defeat.

  Caelym whirled around, triumphant, and bounded across the field. He caught up with Annwr, Aleswina, Arddwn, and Lliem as they slipped through the milling crowd and ducked into the alleyway that Caelym had found earlier that day. From there they made their way back to Ealfrid’s Inn and went straight to their room. In complete agreement about staying out of sight and leaving first thing in the morning, Caelym and Annwr walked t
he boys to and from the inn’s latrine before tucking them into the innkeeper’s broad bed.

  Working by candlelight, Annwr and Aleswina sorted out the packs while Caelym sat nearby with the Gothreg’s map spread next to Herrwn’s, looking from one to the other with a deeply perplexed expression.

  When she was satisfied that everything was in order, Annwr set the five packs in a row, neatly arranged by size. She put Caelym’s bow and harp next to the largest one and Lliem’s stick horse next to the smallest and got into bed next to Aleswina, leaving Caelym still awake and puzzling over his maps.

  At the other end of the inn’s hallway, Father Wulfric—deeply disturbed over his encounter with the boy in the woods—stayed up in intense prayer long after the friars sharing the room were asleep.

  Bewildered over how what had begun as a simple act of Christian charity had ended with his being confronted by a tall, dark monk hurling the words of the fifty-second psalm at him, calling him a sinner who gloried in malice, devised injustice, and wrought deceit, and warning him that God would pluck him out and destroy him, the shaken priest repeated, “Ne proicias me a facie tua et spiritum sanctum tuum ne auferas a me ne proicias me a facie tua et spiritum sanctum tuum ne auferas a me. Redde mihi laetitiam Iesu tui et spiritu potenti confirma me redde mihi laetitiam salutaris tui et spiritu principali confirma me,” over and over until, drained and exhausted, he got off his aching knees and climbed into his cot to fall into a strange dream of running across a field after the vanished novice, Sister Aleswina, who was dressed as a bride and riding on a stick horse.

  Chapter 62

  Keeping to the High Ground

  Annwr was the first to wake up the next morning. She laid out a breakfast of bread, cheese, and figs along with cups of well-diluted ale before she stroked Aleswina’s cheek and whispered, “It’s time, Dear Heart,” repeating, “It’s time” as she nudged Caelym and the boys.