by James Wilde
Alric hung his head. “I am not free. If Harald Redteeth does not return with my head, another will come in his place, and another after that, until this matter is done.” His eyes flickered in the direction of Gedley. “I will never be free.”
“I have business in Eoferwic … grim business,” Hereward said, searching the other’s face for even the barest hint that betrayal lay ahead, “and I cannot risk becoming food for the wolves.”
The monk’s eyes narrowed. “What manner of business?”
Hereward hesitated. How could he tell the younger man that it involved murder, conspiracy, and the security of the very throne of England itself when he had no idea who could be trusted or how far the plot reached?” There are lives at stake,” he said. “More, perhaps, than died in Gedley.”
“You butcher without thought for God’s work. Why would you be concerned with saving lives?”
“We all wrestle with our devils, monk. Can any man truly say he is wholly saint or wholly sinner?”
Alric’s eyes brightened as if he had alighted on some great notion. Waving a finger, he said, “And you would have me accompany you?”
“If I can be sure you will not pass judgment on me on the road, as it seems in your nature to do.” He could feel his legs growing weaker by the moment. They would need to find new shelter and a chance to recover. “These wounds drag me down. You are right: I will never reach Eoferwic on my own.”
The monk pondered.
“I will pay you well,” the warrior added, jangling the pouch at his hip.
“Very well,” Alric said, setting his jaw. “You need me now, and I, God help me, need you for protection, at least until we reach Eoferwic.”
Hereward clapped a weak hand on his companion’s shoulder. “You are a whining little shit, monk, with a miserable disposition that makes for poor company. But if we can survive the hardships of this wild land, I will shoulder the burden.”
While Alric cast one tormented backward glance at the Viking balancing on the block, Hereward felt the weight of the secret he carried with him. With a heavy heart, he peered among the clustering oaks and ash trees, but saw no sign of the pursuit that had dogged him for so long. Perhaps there was some hope after all, he thought.
As Hereward lurched away with Alric supporting him, Redteeth roared his defiance: “This is not an ending!”
If Hereward had searched the depths of the Viking’s eyes at that moment, he would have seen that Redteeth was right. It was not an ending. The red-bearded Northman would not give in to death.
He was Death.
CHAPTER SEVEN
“HARALD REDTEETH IS DEAD. WHY DO YOU WASTE SO MUCH time watching for pursuers?” Alric struggled to keep the crack out of his voice, but he felt irritable from exhaustion and hunger and the bitter wind burrowing deep into his bones.
Hereward crouched on the granite outcropping, one hand shielding his eyes from the midday sun. Now that his wounds had healed, the sinewy warrior showed no sign of feeling the cold as he searched the bleak white landscape tumbling away from the foot of the hillside below them. There were times when the young monk thought his companion more beast than man, at home in the wild countryside, perceiving scents that Alric could never smell on the knife-sharp wind, identifying spoor, detecting the merest hint of movement a day’s march away or more, hearing notes of warning in the cawing of the rooks, and, for all he knew, the voice of God in the soughing in the branches.
“Men are moving through the forest below.” The warrior rose onto the balls of his feet, and for a moment the monk lost him in the glare from the thick snow lying across the hillside. “Five, I think. Tracking us or collecting wood?”
The monk narrowed his eyes in suspicion. “Do you fear that they are hunting me … or you?”
Hereward laughed. “Would you wait and ask them yourself?” Bounding down from the rock, he scanned the way ahead over the windswept hilltops. “If we are caught out here in the open, we will soon be enjoying the sleep of the sword.”
Alric had watched the warrior’s mood improve by the day as they neared Eoferwic. At times a robust humor had emerged, almost as if the Mercian sensed an opportunity to slough off whatever burden weighed him down, the monk mused. He saw learning in that face, most surely, and even some warmth. He had to accept that his wild-eyed companion was more of a puzzle than he had first believed. “It would be a blessed relief. I get little other sleep these days,” he muttered.
“You are free to leave at any time.”
“Then who would pray for your black soul? I am all that prevents the Devil from rising up to offer you a throne beside him.”
“The Devil on one hand, and a monk whining and whimpering all day and all night on the other. A hard choice.” The warrior jumped down to the monk’s side, landing gracefully.
Alric shrugged and walked ahead. “The meek are blessed.”
“Dead. The meek are dead, because they leave their spears under their beds.”
“And blessed.” Alric ducked when he heard rapid movement at his back. A large stone flew over his head and crashed into a snowdrift. He whirled, jabbing a finger. “That could have staved in my skull.”
“I must practice my aim,” the warrior said, his tone wry. “But let us move on. There will be sharper stones in the valley.”
Grumbling, Alric stalked ahead. He cast one look down into the black woods and saw nothing, so he picked up his step, stumbling through the knee-deep snow. The two men slipped and skidded down the steep slope, sometimes turning head over heels so that their eyelashes and hair became crusted with ice. As his chest began to burn from his exertions, Alric asked, “You have kin?”
“Two brothers.” Hereward paused. “One I call brother, but he is not blood.”
“How so?”
“When I was a boy, my father took him in. Redwald.” The warrior’s eyes took on a faraway look. A hint of tenderness, Alric wondered? “His father was killed, by outlaws, I think. And his mother died too. The sickness.” He shrugged. “He was alone, and my father welcomed him to our hall and treated him like a son.”
“And does he share your love for blood?”
Hereward laughed quietly. “Redwald is the better man.” Tapping his head, he added, “He has sharp wits and cunning ways. He is wise beyond his years, and his plots and plans would make Harold Godwinson proud. Even as we speak, he will be putting all his skills to good use on my behalf.”
“And what plots and plans does he weave?” Alric spoke lightly, to draw out more of the warrior’s hidden side.
“Ones that lead to revenge.” The monk saw the hard look that flashed across the other man’s face. “Though we are not joined by blood, there is no more loyal brother than Redwald. He will take his time, and work hard, over days and weeks … years, if need be … and when the hour is right, he will destroy the one who wronged me. This is his vow.”
Alric was troubled by Hereward’s harsh tone, but also surprised by the first confidences he had heard in the ten days they had been traveling together. “You and your brother have a strong bond.”
The warrior looked to the far horizon as he remembered. “When I was old enough to skin a deer, my father gave me his knife, as fathers do to eldest sons, and as his own father did to him. It had a short blade, old even then, but kept sharp on the whetstone, and a handle of whalebone carved into the shape of an angel. Soon after, it disappeared. I knew that Redwald had stolen it. I could see it in the cast of his features and his quick glances. He felt guilt. And he knew that I knew. But I said naught.”
“Why?” The monk’s brow furrowed.
“Because he had nothing of his own. Not for him a knife handed down from his father, or land, or gold. And more … who we are”—the warrior pressed his right hand on his heart—“comes from the ones who forged us. When he lost his mother and father, Redwald lost the knowledge of who he was.”
Alric was touched. “So you allowed him to keep the gift your own father gave to you, because it was the
only thing he had in all the world.”
“And in that moment we were bound together as true brothers.”
Alric’s thoughts turned to the many friends who had died in Gedley, men and women who had trusted him, whom he had betrayed through his own weakness. And, above all, the one death that haunted him more than all the others. Tears burned his eyes. Redemption would come hard, he thought, if at all. Could he ever clear the stain on his soul?
Reluctantly, the monk lurched up the next hillside. He watched the broad shoulders of the man ahead of him, the erect back that defied the savage cold, and he imagined Hereward’s past. A fighting man who betrayed his thegn. A woodcutter’s son who killed in an argument over food, or a woman. From what depths did the inhuman brutality surface? What had driven the Mercian into this cold, inhospitable place in the cruel heart of winter? What business did he have in Eoferwic, and how could it prevent many deaths? His crime must have been terrible indeed. He had little faith in God, less in his fellow man. Alric was his final chance.
At the summit, the monk was blinded by the snow-glare. When his eyes cleared, he saw the sun flashing off two meandering rivers and, in the distance, trails of black smoke against the clear blue sky. He could discern the regular pattern of many houses against the white, and the tower of a great stone church.
“Eoferwic,” Hereward said.
Alric’s stomach complained at the fading memory of their last meal, two days gone. “And will we stay until the feasting at Christmastime?”
The warrior chuckled. “If your fellow churchmen can endure your whining voice, you can stay until Judgment Day.” The monk flashed a questioning glance. “In Eoferwic, we go our separate ways.”
Alric felt wrong-footed, just at the point where he had started to entertain hope. “These last ten nights, you would have frozen to death in the woods if not for me,” he floundered.
“True. A small gift of food and a place next to the fire on a cold night are more readily given to a churchman.” The warrior looked baffled by the other man’s hesitancy. “What ails you now? Since we left Gedley, you have been cursing every moment you have spent with me. Now you wish to be friends?”
“I wish …” Alric shook his head, the words dying. What did he wish?
“Besides, we are even. Two nights ago, when we took shelter at the farm, our host crept in, to harm you, I think. I imagine he still prays to the old gods and feared you would discover it and bring the wrath of your fellow Christians around his ears. I sent him away with the flat of my blade.”
“I do not want you to save my life,” Alric said sharply. “I am here to save you.” And there it was, he realized. But Hereward merely laughed, a rich, full sound rolling over the snowy waste.
For the rest of the day, they walked on down the hillside and across the wind-blasted plain. Alric struggled through the deep drifts, his face and fingers numb, but his nimble mind turning with a precise gyre.
The warrior followed the trail of a raven across the sky, the one point of black in the entire vista. “The night I was born, there was a great storm,” he said, speaking almost to himself, “and the lightning cleaved in two the great old oak tree beside the hall. My mother said it was a prophecy; of what, I was never sure. But from that night on, I was told, all the ravens would gather there, filling the dead branches, like black leaves.” He watched the bird disappear, and then bowed his head in thought as he trudged on.
As the sun slid down toward the western hills, the sky ignited in pink and gold. The mournful honking of geese echoed across the plain, and wintering swans rose in one white cloud, the beating of their wings like thunder. The snow seethed with sinuous shadows. Though the ground was frozen hard, treacherous pools lurked among the long yellow grass rising out of the white covering, their glassy surfaces ready to shatter at the first footfall, pulling the unwary traveler beneath the ice. Hereward appeared to have an almost mystical sense of their location, and picked a path through the increasingly dangerous terrain with ease.
“I am a son of the fens,” he explained. “To foreign eyes, my home appears green and pleasant, but it conceals hidden bogs and watercourses that can steal a life in the blink of an eye. As children we are taught to respect the land and to watch and listen for the secret signs. Those who learn the lessons live. Those who do not are lost to the black waters.”
Soon the monk could smell woodsmoke on the wind, and behind it the fruity stink of human waste. Eoferwic lowered at the confluence of the two gray rivers, a dark smudge under the winter sky. Beyond the defensive ditches, Alric could see the line of the tall palisade that had been stained by so much blood during the waves of attacks that had made the city such a dangerous place over the years.
“Surely your pursuers will find you here? If they have tracked you across England, what safety is there anywhere?” Unable to feel his feet, the monk stumbled onto the rutted track leading to the gate.
Hereward’s hand fell to the hilt of his sword. “I carry my safety with me.”
“And how long do you think you can keep killing before death catches up with you?”
“I have learned my lessons well, monk. Life is hard. No one can be trusted, not even those joined to you by blood. The only truth in life is the edge of my blade. It cuts through all lies.”
“This winter chill has reached into your heart.”
“You are too soft, monk. You find comfort in your prayers, but traps lurk all around, and they will kill you eventually.” He clapped a friendly hand on Alric’s shoulder. “If you learn one thing from our time together, it should be that. I would not see you throw your life away.”
The two men stepped cautiously onto the wooden bridge leading across the defenses. Wide enough for one cart, the timber gleamed with ice. The first ditch was empty. The second was filled with frozen stagnant water, smelling of rotting vegetation. Helmets gleamed in the dying sunlight along the fence, and Alric could feel hard eyes scrutinizing him.
“Speak your God-words at the gate,” Hereward whispered. “They will more easily admit us.”
“Why should I, when you are to abandon me the moment we step within?”
“Then stay out here for the night.”
Complaining under his breath, Alric strode forward to speak to the men at the gate. Cold and keen to close the barrier for the night so they could return to their fires, they nodded distractedly at his lies. The monk was to meet the archbishop at the church, and he had hired the warrior to protect him on the journey through the lawless countryside. With a grunt and the wave of a spearpoint, Alric and Hereward were admitted.
Eoferwic still echoed with the sounds of the day’s business. The thatched, timber-framed wattle-and-daub houses were set gable end to the rutted street, each one upon a regular, narrow, tightly packed plot. Through the open doors, Alric saw that the floors were bare earth, scattered with discarded rubbish that had been trodden in by the inhabitants. At the backs of the rows were yards where stinking cesspits and piles of rotting rubbish stood beside the wells where the people drew up their water.
Noisy workshops hummed with the activity of craftsmen, or rang with the hammers of metalworkers. Despite the chill, many worked in the open air in front of their places of business, out of the smoke and the reek. Alric had heard that ten thousand souls lived here now; and if that were true, it would be amazing, for could there be any more in all of England?
When the wind changed direction, he inhaled the dank odors of the wharves along the Fosse, which were filled with the creak of wood and the slap of sailcloth from the great vessels moored along the frozen banks. At Jarrow, he had heard of the wonders that were brought to Eoferwic by the trade ships: silk from Byzantium and fine gold jewelry from the Low Countries, colorful seashells from the hot lands far to the south, soapstone from the Northlands, and wine and pottery from the Frankish kingdoms.
After so long in the wilderness, Alric was happy to see the men and women bustling along the street, and the children running at play. The chat
ter and the shouts sounded like music to his ears. He breathed deeply of the comforting woodsmoke and wished he could live in a city all his days, where life was easier and learning and discourse thrived. Emerging from his reverie, he realized the warrior was striding off along the street.
“Wait,” he called, hurrying alongside. “Where do you go?”
Hereward stopped and turned, his pale eyes catching the fiery gleam of the setting sun. “Our time together is done. I saved your life, but I do not own it.”
“I paid you back in kind. Your journey here would have been harder without me.”
“I give thanks for the aid you gave me, but now I travel alone.” Pausing, he looked to the crimson horizon. “In my dreams, I see the path ahead littered with corpses. I must cross rivers of blood beneath a sky lit by fire. No peace for me, churchman, and peace is all your kind speak of. Our ways lead in different directions. I go to the setting sun, where the dead wait. You face the dawn. Understand?”
“No man should walk through life alone.”
Hereward leaned in, his stare unwavering. “Are you listening? Death waits for any who walk by my side. I did not save your life only to see it wasted on some godly whim. I can only offer you hell. Go now, or I will take my sword to you.” He held the monk’s gaze for a moment longer and then turned and marched away without a backward glance.
Alric took a deep breath to steady himself. God had offered this warrior to him. Saving Hereward was the reason he had been placed upon this earth, he had decided, and he could not allow himself to be deterred so easily. Yet he knew he would not sway the warrior with words alone. He watched him walk away into the twilight and then he followed, keeping close to the houses where the men gossiped away from the worst of the wind and he would not easily be seen. Hereward strode on, pausing every now and then to exchange a few words with passers-by, perhaps asking for directions.
A small crowd of men and women had gathered outside a metalworker’s hut where the drifting acrid smoke caught the back of the throat. Perched on a pile of logs, a man with only one eye and one hand complained in a loud voice and shook his good right fist in the air. Caught up in the speaker’s passion, the attentive audience shouted words of encouragement. Distracted, Alric heard only snippets, enough to know that the group was unhappy about someone or something. He was watching Hereward, who had stepped aside to avoid five wild-bearded Viking warriors brandishing spears who stormed into the crowd, barking demands that the listeners go home. Clearly afraid, the men and women scattered. By the time the last one had gone, the one-eyed man was nowhere to be seen, and the gruff warriors were roaming among the huts, searching for him. The leader of the group paused to study Alric. A jagged scar ran from above his left eye across his nose to his right cheek. His stare was cold and unwavering, the look of a man who saw enemies everywhere.
