But for us there was just the wide flood plain and the muddy track which led to Aix-la-Chapelle. The afternoon threatened rain so we took oiled skins for the journey, rolling them and tying them to the horses’ backs along with our brynjas and weapons and some food. Egfrith had grudgingly agreed to leave behind the gospel book of Saint Jerome, for we could not risk the emperor’s simply taking it, or thieves robbing us. He secreted it away in Serpent’s hold and seemed somehow withered without it. We mounted amidst bellows of ‘Óðin’s luck!’
‘Make us rich!’ and ‘Raven rides like a sack of rocks on a goat!’
Bjorn smiled like a young boy. ‘Raven, tell the king of the Franks that Bjorn and Bjarni of Harald’s Fjord want a brown-haired beauty and a barrel of wine each,’ he said, and then his face hardened. ‘If he brings them to us and pays his respects we might consider trading with him.’
With the sound of laughter in our ears we set off to meet an emperor.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
THE CLOUD WAS LOW AND GREY. A COOL NORTHERLY PUSHED THE heavy mass overhead, then on across the flood plain towards the southern horizon. Clouds of rooks tumbled out of the grey down to a ploughed field west of the oak woods, their toneless kaaing reaching us across the flat ground. To the east, tight knots of jackdaws approached a clump of alders already dark with roosting birds. I watched them jink sideways and up as though surmounting an invisible wall, then they seemed still for a heartbeat before dropping with perfect aim, each to a branch or twig amongst their brothers.
For the sake of appearances Sigurd had given Ealdred the best horse. After all, he was our lord now. It was a black stallion and spirited, the kind of horse that considers itself equal to, if not better than, the man on its back. I rode a broken old mare and the other beasts were not much better, which meant that Ealdred might have been tempted to make a break for it, despite Sigurd’s threat. So Floki, Penda and I rode close to the ealdorman, close enough to count the fleas on his stallion’s rump, and Floki had brought a pair of throwing axes with which he was a deadly aim. One kick of Ealdred’s heels would see one of Floki’s axes embedded between his shoulder blades.
‘Aix-la-Chapelle used to be called Aquisgranum,’ Egfrith chirped after a while, breaking the silence that had grown as each of us imagined the weave of our wyrds. ‘In Roman times, of course. I think the name came from a Celtic god of water and health for it is said hot water erupts from the earth there and men bathe in these pools. Though I find it hard to believe the Celts went anywhere near them, whatever their heathen god’s name, as they were a filthy people and still are. They say the emperor bathes in these hot springs every day. His skin must be as clean as his soul.’
‘Maybe the emperor will let us wash our arses in his precious water, hey, horse?’ Penda suggested, rubbing his chestnut palfrey’s ears.
‘And taint the blessed pools till Judgement Day?’ Egfrith exclaimed. ‘Karolus will not have you filthy beasts anywhere near the springs, as God is my witness. But perhaps Cynethryth and I will have the honour. Ealdred too as a Christian lord.’
‘When your White Christ turns the water into wine, monk, then I’ll be interested,’ I said, dropping back a little to escape the man’s prattle. But in this welcome calm a fresh and troubling matter bobbed up to the surface to trouble me. Why had Egfrith agreed to help us sell the gospel book of Saint Jerome? I had once heard him say that such a holy treasure was not to be bought or sold, even to the likes of the Emperor Karolus. Yet here he was coming along to help grease the trade. But I soon buried these thoughts deep in my mind’s journey chest. My fathom rope was not long enough to test the motives of a man who served a god who let his only son be tortured and hung on a cross to die. For all I knew, Egfrith had curdled his own brains with prayers and nonsense and the White Christ’s belly-warming blood.
Leaving the flood plain, the track wound through ancient woods, at the heart of which stood countless giant ash trees, silent and eternal, and we looked up at them in awe because their highest branches seemed to disappear into the sky. They were the kind of trees that would defy Njörd’s fiercest winds.
‘They’d make good spears,’ Penda said appreciatively. ‘Straight as a shaft of sunlight.’
‘Yggdrasil, the World-Tree, is such as those,’ Black Floki said, ‘but that is even more enormous. Its limbs hold up the nine worlds.’ His eyes were dark and serious as I translated for the others. ‘It was in that tree that Óðin All-Father hung himself for nine nights to gain wisdom. He was speared too. Here, I think.’ Floki touched his right side halfway up his ribcage. Even as I turned the words into English I saw the cloud settled on Egfrith’s face, which proved too strong a temptation for me.
‘Christ was hung on the tree of pain, wasn’t he, monk?’ I asked.
‘Yes, young man, our Lord and saviour suffered on the cross for our sins.’
‘And a soldier, a Roman I think, speared him as he hung there?’
‘It is true,’ Egfrith admitted, ‘though perhaps that young soldier was trying to end the dear Lord’s suffering.’
‘And is it true that Christ cried out before he died?’
‘He did,’ Egfrith said with a solemn nod. Then he looked across at me, his eyes narrowing. ‘But so would any man, I suppose.’
‘True,’ I admitted. ‘Because Óðin cried out before he died. That must have been some sound. Then, of course, he came back to life. Did Christ come back to life, Father?’ Cynethryth scorched me with a look.
‘You know that He did,’ Egfrith said indignantly.
‘Floki says that Óðin also made an immense feast from some bread and a bucket full of fish,’ I said. Floki had said no such thing but Egfrith did not know that. ‘It seems to me that you Christians stole all your stories from Norse skalds.’ Penda was grinning, but Ealdred’s lip was curled as though someone had smeared dog shit beneath his nose.
‘And it seems to me that you, Raven, are a dark and twisted young man who is closer to the bottomless pit than you realize,’ Egfrith said, shaking his head sadly. ‘And it is your people who steal their stories, not us.’
‘Stop teasing Father Egfrith, Raven,’ Cynethryth said. ‘Take no notice of him, Father. Sometimes I wonder if there isn’t a simple-minded child inside that big, dirty body.’
The monk was still frowning when we came to a clearing where the ash and oak had been taken years before. Stands of tall, straight silver birch burst from clumps of elder whose black berries the birds had eaten some weeks before. Cynethryth had taken the opportunity to relieve herself beyond a thicket of holly when Egfrith spotted a broken cart amongst a tangle of bracken and thorns. Perhaps once used to carry felled trees, it appeared to have lain there for years and looked a crude thing not worth repairing, which probably explained why the owner had left it to rot when its right wheel had broken.
‘The Lord often finds a use for the meanest of His creations,’ the monk said. Having dismounted, he was stuffing something into his sack but I ignored him because Ealdred needed to empty his bowels and it fell to me to go with him to make sure he did not run even if his bowels did.
We soon mounted and continued and even Winigis appeared excited when we broke from the woods and, by the blood-red light of dusk, saw the imperial city of Aix-la-Chapelle standing before us. We crossed an ancient boundary ditch, which was so shallow now that the biggest problem we had in crossing it was that the horses liked the look of the uncropped grass that grew in it and we had to kick our heels and cajole them up the far bank. Before us, three good bow-shots away, a stone wall the height of three men enclosed the city, cast in shadow now that the sun had slipped below the oak woods behind us. A fog lay across the pasture so that the grazing cattle appeared as legless shapes, and the tightly packed timber houses outside the city, which added their hearth smoke to the shifting cloud, leaked flamelight and looked snug and inviting. The fog even rolled up the city walls and curled back from their summit like spray from an ocean wave. Countless mud tracks led to and fro
m the city gates along which shrouded shapes made their way, some leading animals to safety within the walls, for the mist would encourage wolves to come for their sheep, which the Franks’ hounds must have known because they barked incessantly. The air smelled damp and green and the woodsmoke that wove amongst the fog smelled sweet and tempting.
‘This place makes Paris look like a cesspit,’ Penda said. The city stood on a slope and beyond the wall at the high northern end of that slope an enormous stone building dominated the view.
‘Paris is a cesspit,’ I said, trying to nettle Egfrith who seemed to think Paris was the light shining from his god’s arsehole. ‘Look at that place,’ I said, gesturing at the long stone structure, which was the only building we could see clearly because of its position at the top of the hill. I asked Black Floki if on his travels he had ever seen its like. The Norseman shook his head, making his crow-black plaits dance.
‘There is nothing like that anywhere in Norway,’ he said. ‘It could be Bilskírnir.’
‘Lightning crack?’ I said and he nodded solemnly.
‘Bilskírnir is Thór’s own hall.’
‘Then we should be glad that it is not Bilskírnir, Floki,’ I said, reining my mount around a glistening pile of sheep’s droppings. ‘I’d wager the Thunderer could not give so much as a fart for Egfrith’s White Christ book.’ Floki curled his lip and spat and we joined a track leading to a gateway in the city wall where two stone towers, often repaired by the look of them, loomed from the fog. A spearman at the top of one of the towers called down to someone inside the city and six soldiers armed with spears and swords and toughened leather armour came out to meet us.
‘Peace be upon you, my sons,’ Egfrith said, signing the cross in the air. Then he gestured to Ealdred, who looked down his long nose at the Franks. ‘My lord Ealdred, Ealdorman of Wessex, has come from England to pay his respects to the great Emperor Karolus,’ Egfrith said. ‘These are Ealdred’s men,’ he flicked a hand at us, ‘and this is Lady Cynethryth, the ealdorman’s daughter.’ A wolf howled somewhere out in the fog-shrouded land and the chilling sound was answered by the grating chorus of rooks and their flapping wings as they took to the darkening sky. A rhythmic squeaking announced another Frank, who appeared at the gate pushing a handcart.
‘No weapons are allowed past these walls,’ the soldier with the finest helmet and sword said, not in the least impressed by Ealdred’s title. His language was not quite English but it was close enough for us to understand him. ‘The emperor’s palace is at the top of the hill, but he won’t see the likes of you,’ he went on as the newly arrived man took the weapons we offered him and dropped them carelessly on to his cart. Floki and Penda shared a grimace at seeing their swords being treated badly, but both held their tongues. ‘They say the Pope himself has to wait halfway to Judgement Day to see the emperor,’ the guard said, grinning with rotten teeth. Then he closed his hand into a fist. ‘But then the Pope does not hold half the world by its balls.’
‘Patience is a gift from God and I am certain His Holiness Pope Leo has been blessed with it by the cartload,’ Egfrith said, nodding at the pile of weapons being wheeled away, which included the fine sword that Sigurd had given to Ealdred to make him look the part.
‘Feels like I’ve lost a bloody arm,’ Penda grumbled, and I knew how he felt.
‘Bring this back when you leave and you’ll get your blades,’ the guard said, handing a small wooden disc to Ealdred.
‘Ah, Saint Gregory of Tours,’ Egfrith said, reading the engraving on the disc. ‘Each disc must bear a different saint. How wonderful!’ The guard shrugged.
‘I’ll look after that, my lord,’ Penda said, taking the disc from Ealdred. With that the guards stood aside and we walked our mounts through the gate and into the city.
Aix-la-Chapelle did not stink of shit like Paris, but it had its own stench and it was the stench of White Christ worshippers. They were everywhere: monks, priests, bare-footed pilgrims with beards down to their knees and ashen-faced miserable-looking nuns. Even the cats and dogs skulked around the place with the sorry faces of creatures that know that their souls are damned till the arse end of time. Even Ealdred, who was a Christian, curled his lip at the sight of so many Christ followers. There were soldiers too, some of them wearing mail and all armed with spears and swords, but what made them stand out and marked them as the emperor’s men were their clothes. They all wore impossibly white tunics of fine linen and bright red breeks embroidered with golden thread. From below the knee to the ankle they had wound scarlet linen wraps and their boots were of fine leather, the thongs tied in a crisscross fashion over the scarlet wraps. They had thick cloaks that reached to their boots and these were either blue or bright white depending, according to Egfrith, on the man’s rank. Even their sword scabbards were covered with highly waxed white linen.
‘Frisian cloaks,’ Penda said enviously. ‘They are the best you can get.’
‘Aye, keep you warm in a Fimbulvetr,’ Floki agreed when I told him what Penda had his eye on. Fimbul-winter would be three of the harshest, most ball-cracking winters rolled into one with no other seasons between them, and when that came we would know that Ragnarök was beginning.
I had never seen such a thing, men dressed to look the same. ‘A clever way of making sure you don’t kill your friends in a fight, hey, Floki,’ I said in Norse.
‘And a sure way of getting close enough to the emperor to cut his throat,’ he said, one dark eyebrow arched. And he was right. All you would need was the clothes from one of these soldiers and you would be taken for an imperial guard.
‘This is wonderful,’ Cynethryth said and I hoped she did not mean the hordes of Christians but rather something I had not noticed, or perhaps the buildings around us, which were impressive I had to admit. Most of the houses were timber, but many were stone with thatch roofs or even thin fish scale type stones to keep out the rain, which Egfrith said were called tiles and were used in the old world even before the time of the Romans.
Merchants crowed about their goods, traders argued over prices, richly dressed women poked and sniffed at fruits and vegetables, meat sizzled on skillets, cauldrons bubbled, forges rang, horses neighed, children cried, and Christians prayed. The place was dizzying.
We said farewell to Winigis, who was itching to be off with the silver he had earned, and I thought the fisherman must have been happy enough with his catch. Then we gave the horses to a couple of muddy-faced stable boys and walked along the wide wooden gangway that cut through the middle of the city and led all the way to the great building at the top of the slope which must have been one hundred and fifty paces long. Smoke from a thousand hearth fires thickened the air and every sniff brought the half-taste of a different meal being prepared. Somewhere onions sizzled. Somewhere else mackerel, and above another hearth snails bubbled in garlic and butter.
‘What makes you think the emperor will see us, monk?’ I asked, assuming that we were heading for the imperial palace. ‘You heard what that guard said. We’ll grow beards long enough to keep our feet warm standing at the door of the man’s hall waiting for him to finish his prayers.’
‘The heathen is right, Egfrith,’ Ealdred said, taking in his surroundings as he walked. ‘I’m an ealdorman, not John the Baptist.’
Egfrith’s teeth flashed yellow and all that was missing were the rat’s whiskers.
‘We are not going to the palace,’ he said above the sharp sound of stone being cut and the thump of rivets being struck, for everywhere buildings were being raised. It was as though a new city of stone was rising from the old one of wood.
‘Then where, Father?’ Penda asked, frowning.
But Egfrith did not say. I thought about twisting his head until he squawked, but then I was distracted by a stick-thin man around whom a crowd had gathered like flies around a dog’s turd. The man seemed to be bleeding from the palms of his hands and from his bare feet. Some of those around him had dropped to their knees and others were mak
ing the sign of the cross, and the poor man himself seemed to be accepting his fate with an eerie calm.
‘Father, did you see that man?’ Cynethryth asked, tugging at the monk’s sleeve, her green eyes wide.
‘You must prepare yourself to see such things, my dear, even miracles, in the city where the golden prince of Christendom has set his banner,’ Egfrith said without breaking stride. We marched up the hill through smoke so porridge-thick it stung my eyes and made us cough, all the while shrugging off blind beggars, ragged children, and hawkers thrusting their goods at us, though there were no whores, Penda noticed unhappily. Then suddenly there were no more houses. We had come to a wide space where the smoke was blown thin, revealing the most amazing sight I had ever seen. A long passageway built from a hundred smooth stone pillars stretched before us, its floor made of flat stones, all identical in size and shape. On one side of this passageway stood a great area of grass which looked as though no man nor beast had ever trodden on it. In the middle of that green space stood a huge stone dish that could have been a giant’s drinking bowl, and an enchanted one at that, for water spurted continuously from its centre even though there was no stream or water nearby. Egfrith told us it was called a fountain, even though he had never seen one before. The water shooting into the air and cascading over the lip of the giant’s bowl sparkled and looked clean and fresh and I instinctively touched the Óðin amulet that was tucked inside my tunic, for I did not understand how a stone dish could create water. Nor could I believe that no one seemed in the least concerned with collecting it. Other than a few monks sweeping along the colonnade and a group of men laying stones at the far edge of the grass the place was strangely quiet.
‘Christian seidr,’ Black Floki hissed at me in Norse. But I was no longer looking at the fountain. My eyes were full of a sight I have since conjured many times when imagining the buildings of Asgard in which the gods live. And yet the wonder now before me had been built by Christians, not gods.
Raven: Sons of Thunder Page 19
