Time of the Wolf

by James Wilde

  Hereward hung his head. “I know my failings. You are right to chastise me. I was a weak child, and I gave in to my devils too easily.”

  “Blame it on the Devil, but it is you.” Asketil strode forward, bunching his bony hands into fists. “You are black to the core, and you will never be anything else.”

  Hereward knew he could have knocked the man to the ground with a single blow, taken his life with one strike, but still he stepped back. “You killed Mother and you blamed her death on an accident.” The words came out blunter than he had intended, but Asketil appeared to be untouched by them. “That night has left a wound in me that I fear will never heal.”

  The thegn snorted. “And if not for you, she too would still live.”

  The warrior’s chest tightened. Some deep part of him believed every accusation his father made. “How so?”

  Unafraid, Asketil pushed his cold face into Hereward’s. “She tried to protect you. You went too far, as you always have, as you still do. You defied my word—”

  “I was barely a child,” Hereward protested.

  “Black to the core, from the very beginning,” the older man roared. “I saw it in you when you were born. It is your nature.”

  The warrior wiped a shaking hand across his mouth. He felt a child once more, waiting for the inevitable. “We should not have these years of loathing lying between us any longer. There is no gain. We must start afresh.”

  “And that is why you have come here?” Asketil sneered.

  “We are joined by blood—”

  The thegn slowly shook his head. “You are not my son. I scarce believe you have any of my blood within you.” He made no attempt to mask his contempt. “Your mother was a whore. Who knows who truly sired you? Some wild beast?”

  Hereward felt a rush of anger. His hand fell to the hilt of his sword.

  Asketil advanced, unbowed. “I will do all I can to aid the Normans in ridding this world of you.”

  “Even after Beric’s death?”

  “Because of his death! In the memory of my good son, betrayed by you. If I still had my sword, I would drive it through your heart and make this world a better place. God would forgive me.” Asketil struck the warrior across the cheek with all his strength. Hereward let his hand fall from his sword and turned his face toward his father again. The thegn struck once more.

  Hereward swallowed, searching his father’s hate-filled gaze. He could see now that whatever he had hoped for from their meeting would never be. The past could not be laid to rest. The pain could never go away. They both were what they were, and they would always be that way. For a moment he bowed his head, and then he walked to the door.

  “Run,” Asketil called after him, “as you always have. You show your cowardly nature in everything you do. Run, for I go to the Normans now and I will stand beside them as they hunt you down.”

  When the warrior stepped out into the cold night, he saw a shadow waiting along the track. It was the monk. “What did you hear?” he snarled.

  “N … nothing,” Alric stuttered.

  Hereward felt sure his companion was lying. But a turmoil whirled inside him and he thrust the monk to one side and ran away from his father, away from his past, knowing he could escape neither.

  CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN

  THE RAISED SWORD BURNED LIKE A BRAND IN THE RED RAYS of the rising sun. Beneath the potent symbol, the mounted Norman knight grinned at the ten English men standing in a semicircle in front of him. Their faces were sullen and sleepy-eyed, but they watched him with unmistakable loathing. He cared little. Power resided with the conqueror. Nothing else mattered, Aldous Wyvill thought.

  Cawing rooks broke the misty stillness of the morning. At the gateway to the ramshackle enclosure surrounding the thegn’s former hall, seven other Norman knights stood like sentinels. Their polished helmets were aglow, the finely woven woolen cloaks as black as night. The contrast between the imposing smartness of the military apparel and the worn, mud-flecked tunics of the ragtag peasants could not have been greater, Aldous noted.

  “Work hard,” he ordered in a clear voice, his English only slightly inflected with his Norman tongue, “and you will be allowed to return to your farms in good time. You will be given bread and ale once the job is done. Dissent, or laziness, will be dealt with harshly.” He glanced up at the rotting head of the thegn’s son to illustrate his point. “Begin.” The sword slashed down to his side.

  Grudgingly, the peasants plucked up their spades and set to work digging the deep ramparts and replacing the palisade with fresh wood, taller and cut to a point at the top. Soon they would be building a castle here, but for now the hall needed to be fortified, Aldous knew. There had been little resistance in this part of the fens, but it would come.

  His legs bound with linen strips in the criss-cross style that signified his high status, the knight urged his horse back under the gateway into the enclosure. He breathed deeply of the aroma of damp leaves and the woodsmoke from the morning’s hearthfire. Though a long way from his home in Hauteville, there was some peace here, now that the fighting was over, he decided. But the English were an odd breed, and he wondered if he would ever understand them. Their government and their art, their trade and their financial system, were jealously eyed by all Europe, but the people themselves were an unruly, intemperate lot, given to drunkenness, fighting, coarse humor, and moods that swung between raucous high spirits and maudlin introspection. They would not take orders, even if refusal brought them harm. They would do everything in their power to cause delays, distraction, and minor irritations, and they seemed to find pleasure in the slightest disruption they engendered. But they would learn, in time. The Normans were the mighty ocean waves pounding any rock-like resistance into meaningless granules of sand.

  “Sire.”

  Aldous glanced back to see a young knight striding from the gate.

  “Sire. You have a visitor. The old thegn, Asketil.”

  With a sigh, the Norman commander looked to the gateway where a gray wisp of a man rested against a gnarled staff. Aldous removed his helmet and rubbed a hand through his close-cropped hair. His nose was long and sharp, ending at a moustache that curved down to his chin. “Is he begging for food again?”

  “He wishes to tell you about a coming rebellion.”

  “Oh?” Aldous raised his eyebrows. “Bring him into the hall. He may find the surroundings familiar and comfortable.”

  The two men laughed.

  The Norman commander dismounted and marched into the warm hall. Ornately embroidered tapestries hung on the walls, and gold plate and bowls glinted in the firelight. He had made no changes to the opulent surroundings since he had become the lord. Indeed, he barely recognized them. Their only value was to mark his power, he thought. With three quick strides, he bounded onto the low dais and took the old wooden chair where Asketil had once sat, and his father before him. Aldous felt only contempt for the old thegn. A weak man, pathetic in his whinings, who still came to bow and scrape before the men who had killed his son. Aldous would have attacked the murderers single-handedly with his sword and died with honor in failing.

  The gray-haired Englishman shuffled in and stood uneasily in the doorway, looking around his former home.

  “Draw closer, Asketil. Welcome to my home,” the Norman commander boomed, making no attempt to hide his smirk.

  “I am here to warn you,” the thegn began, his croaking voice almost lost in the hall’s vault, “of a sword raised against you.”

  “And who would dare to challenge me, old man?”

  “His name is Hereward, and he is my son.”

  Aldous’s eyes narrowed. He had heard the name before. A great warrior whose fearsome exploits had gained the attention of Baldwin of Flanders. Bear-Killer, the mercenaries had called him when they had joined the invading Norman force, to a man fearing that they would face this Hereward on the field of battle in England. Was this the same warrior? If it were, he would need to send word to the court in
London. More supplies, more mercenaries. The fens would need special attention.

  “Why would you warn me about your own son?” the Norman commander asked.

  “Because he is a black-hearted outlaw who has brought shame to his kin.”

  It had been the right decision after all to keep the old thegn alive, the commander thought. With the information he supplied, they could set a fine trap to catch the English rebel before even a weapon was raised. Aldous smiled. “Tell me more.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-EIGHT

  ICY BLACK WATER SWILLED AROUND ALRIC’S NECK. PANIC surged through him. He thrashed his arms to find the narrow causeway, but it was lost in the impenetrable night and his activity only dragged him down further. Kicking his leather shoes in the muddy depths, he fought to stay afloat. The swamp water sluiced into his mouth, stinking of rotting leaves. He gulped, choked, threw his head back, and cried out, although he knew there was no one within miles to hear. The weight of his habit dragged him down. Alric passed from the black of the moonless night to a deeper black as the water closed over his head. Silent prayers gave way to sheer terror. Pressure filled his mouth, his nose, his lungs burned, and down he went, and down.

  I am a fool, he thought, his last thought.

  And then, through the mad whirl in his head, he felt his descent arrested. Water tore at his face and hair as he was dragged rapidly up and out into the chill night. Vomiting swamp juice, he sucked in a huge gulp of breath. The dark enveloped him. He couldn’t see what was happening, or where he was, but then he became aware of hands grabbing the shoulders of his tunic. Roughly thrown to one side, he crashed on to a hard surface. The flint shards of the causeway ground into his cheek. He lay there for a moment, recovering, and then rolled onto his back. A dark figure loomed over him.

  “You are a fool, monk.” It was Hereward’s voice, as if he had read Alric’s mind. “Why would you try to make your way through the bog with no torch to light your way and no fenlander to guide you?”

  “Because you abandoned me,” Alric spluttered, realizing how pathetic his response sounded. He let his head fall back and closed his eyes, drinking in the joy of living. He had let his desperation get the better of him, he understood that now. But when Hereward had raced off into the night after leaving his father’s house, the worst had seemed a distinct possibility. Alric had overheard the bitter conversation between the two men and now understood his friend’s inner darkness in a way he could never have grasped before. The pain was still raw. But was it a pain so acute that Hereward would take his own life?

  Though Alric had raced in pursuit, Hereward had outpaced him, and soon he had been left alone on the old straight track. He was filthy and exhausted, and there were no friends to offer him a bed. A cold night passed in fitful sleep under a willow, waking repeatedly, afraid of wolves. By dawn, his bones ached and his stomach growled. He had retraced his steps to the boatwright, but the snowy-haired man only treated him with suspicion, and, if he knew where Hereward might have gone, he wasn’t saying. And so the monk had spent the day searching and calling. At some point he had wandered off the track and found himself lost in the unforgiving waterlands, surrounded by endless pools and bogs and copses and scattered islands with no landmarks or clear path to find his way back to the village. And then night had fallen, and he had started to believe that Hereward had killed himself. His despair had turned to panic and he had foolishly started to jog, then to run as fast as his weary legs could carry him. Halfway along the narrow causeway, he had wrong-footed himself and pitched into the water.

  “Here is a rule for you,” Hereward said. Alric could see the silhouette of his friend squatting further along the causeway. “No man born outside the fens can find his way across these treacherous bogs and keep his life. This time God watched over you, or I did. Next time you may not be so fortunate. Do not attempt such a risky journey again. Do you understand?”

  “Oh, yes. I plan to dance across this stinking hell every night,” the monk snapped. “How long have you been watching me? Could you have spared me this misery? If you tell me you could have, I will not be responsible for my actions.”

  Hereward laughed softly. Alric found it a strange sound, devoid of humor. Something had changed in his friend.

  “I thought you had returned to Flanders. Or worse, lost your life,” the monk explained.

  “There is work to do here first.”

  It was an unsettling reply, mainly because Alric didn’t know to which part of his statement Hereward was responding.

  The warrior hauled the sodden monk to his feet. “Come. There is a warm campfire waiting. Once you are dry and full, your spirits will rise.”

  He led the way back along the causeway, on a winding path beside a bog, and across a second causeway to a thickly wooded island. Pushing through the dense vegetation, Alric realized they were following a path that only Hereward could see. The monk could smell smoke on the breeze, but could see no light ahead.

  When he had struggled up the steep incline until the breath burned his chest, his friend suddenly disappeared from view. Baffled, Alric caught an ash branch to pull himself up and found himself standing on the lip of a broad hollow lit by a flickering campfire. The meaty aroma of cooked fowl hung in the air. White willow and ash continued across the dip, but some saplings had been newly cleared, by Hereward, Alric guessed, and the hill continued up to the tree-shrouded summit on the far side.

  Skidding down the bank, Alric followed Hereward toward the campfire, only to come up sharp when he saw another man hunched on a fallen branch, gnawing on a bone. Big as an ox, with shaggy brown hair and beard, the man let his flickering gaze drift over the new arrival and then returned to his meal. “We feast on fowl, but now you bring me a drowned rat,” he muttered. By his size and his wry tone, Alric was reminded of a younger Vadir.

  “Guthrinc,” Hereward said by way of introduction. “This is the monk I told you about.”

  “Monk,” Guthrinc said with a nod.

  “Who are you?” Alric asked, his eyes flickering toward the carcass resting on a flat stone in the ashes. Hereward tore off a leg and tossed it to him.

  The large man shrugged. “This and that.” He eyed Alric up and down. “God has not looked kindly on you. What have you done to offend him?”

  “Leave him be,” Hereward said. “He has had a fright in Dedman’s bog.”

  Tossing his bone to one side, Guthrinc wiped his hands on his tunic and said, “I’ll keep watch.” He hauled himself to his feet and disappeared into the dark toward the lip of the hollow.

  Shaking from the cold and the shock of his brush with death, Alric almost leaped onto the branch next to the fire. “You trust him?” he said, warming his hands.

  “We ran together when we were youths. He likes his ale and his meat and his women, but in any fight he is like a wolf at your side.”

  Alric chewed on his bone for a moment, then said, “You plan to fight?”

  “The Normans are a blight on all England. They must be driven out, like rats from the grain store.” The warrior’s voice hardened, his face becoming thunderous. “Their blood must turn the rivers red and their bodies pile up like stones on the beach as they flee to their ships.”

  The monk considered the newfound vehemence in his friend’s tone, trying to make sense of this sudden rebellion. “And this great victory will be accomplished by two of you?”

  Hereward’s eyes narrowed. “Three, I would hope.”

  “Three, then. But what can three men do against an army? The Normans have crushed any resistance. Destroyed whole villages.”

  “Three is only the start. As word spreads of the resistance we mount here in the fens, Englishmen will rush to take up arms alongside us.” The warrior stared into the middle distance, imagining the picture his words conjured up. “They will come in their tens, their hundreds, their thousands, and we shall rise up, with one voice, one weapon, and smite our enemy. We will crush the ones who make our lives a misery, who steal our freed
om, our dreams, our hope. And then, when we are one family once more, peace will reign in England and our future will be assured.”

  The passion he heard in the warrior’s voice frightened Alric. Yet in the fire flickering in Hereward’s eyes, the monk saw hints of a deeper truth. Though terrifying in number and strength, the Normans were an enemy the warrior felt he could defeat, whereas a gray-haired, beaten man remained invincible. “Take care,” he whispered, “that you do not win the battle but lose your soul in the process.”

  Hereward laughed. “Always you worry. We have all the time we need to raise our forces and to plan. William the Bastard’s men still slumber, unaware that we are here. The battle in the fens will be over before the Normans know what hit them. And then we will take it to all England.”

  CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

  25 October 1067

  FAT WHITE CANDLES FLICKERED AROUND THE HIGH ALTAR. Shadows swooped across the stained-glass window and the dressed stone wall above it to the vaulted roof, as deep and dark as the black robes of the abbot kneeling in prayer. Only the soft muttering of the Latin devotion disturbed the peace.

  Abbot Brand breathed in wisps of sweetly aromatic incense and opened his eyes. He was a gaunt man, as hard as a cold flagstone, with piercing black eyes and thin lips that appeared to be sneering at comfort. Rising to his feet, he crossed himself, and only then did he hear the soft click of a closing door and the echo of feet padding along the nave.

  Alric watched the man turn, gauging the abbot’s nature from the intensity of his stare and every line in his face. Suspicious at first, the man absorbed the monkish robes of the new arrival and said in an iron voice, “What is the meaning of this interruption?”

  “Father, I waited until you had finished your prayers, but there is an important matter which needs your attention.”