He quickly determined that Auriane was bruised and exhausted, but had no great wounds of the flesh. As she opened her eyes and withdrew from him in the instinctive way of maltreated beasts, then he saw her wound—a mauled soul that would never again trust the world to be gentle and fair. He forgot himself for a moment and felt a sharp sadness for her. There was in her look that haunted grief he saw often in the faces of those who outlived all their children, watching every one fall victim to the Roman plague. The Fates shredded everyone’s peace soon enough, but they had gotten to her so young.
She struggled to sit up, but she did not crawl close to him for comfort as he wished. She was sealed in wary solitude, as if she stood alone on a citadel. While staring at the fire, she told him in a few toneless words of Hertha’s suicide, Arnwulf’s death and the outrage suffered by her mother.
Witgern knew then just how great a catastrophe this was. Many of the tribespeople and even some of his fellow Companions would see this as a sign Baldemar was no longer fit to lead them in battle; they might desert him for a younger man. A chief’s growing weakness was like the rotting center beam of a house—a thing to be anxiously watched. The plundering Hermundures might have given Wido his fondest wish—to lead the army alone. And Witgern was not certain even the sacred rite of vengeance could cleanse the stain of that blackest of curses, the voluntary death of a mother. The Holy Ones would doubtless require a lavish gift of appeasement from Baldemar, to be paid to Wodan through his priest.
Witgern even feared for his own life. Baldemar in his great grief might hold him partly accountable, simply because he had come too late. Such things happened among them—misfortune’s cause was sometimes held to be the curse of those who were near.
Witgern realized Auriane watched him gravely, readying herself to speak difficult words. “Witgern, look at me,” she said urgently. “Your mind is far off to the south.”
“You are easy enough to look upon!” Witgern smiled, anxious to tease her down from her citadel. Her solemnity made him feel something was required of him that he did not know how to give. He took her hand. “You are beauteous beyond sun and moon, even when you’ve rolled all day in the mud!”
“No pretty words on this day, Witgern. Please, I cannot bear it.”
Witgern suddenly felt uncomfortable. Now what problem was she going to present to him?
The soft gray eyes held him fast. “Witgern, I dare not wait—I must tell it now. I cannot marry you.”
At first Witgern felt nothing. “What is this?” he said softly. He looked round hurriedly once, fearful the others overheard, then dropped his voice to a taut whisper. “What monstrous thing are you saying?” Slowly, a creeping coldness came into his stomach. That will of hers, that rogue will, immovable as a standing stone—what could stand against it? It was Baldemar’s will, born again.
“What have I done that you should cast me off?” He released her hand. But he sensed Auriane felt his discomfort, and he knew remorse was undermining her. Very good. I’ll appeal to that kindliness.
“Nothing.” She looked restively down. “It…it is not my wish to be cruel. Please, I beg you, do not think ill of me.”
“How could I think ill of you?” he whispered, while inside, suddenly he hated her. Two fellow Companions heard sharp whispered words and turned to look at them. Witgern warned them away with a scowl.
“As the gods live, if I could marry, I would marry you.”
“Just tell me what I’ve done!”
“Witgern, it has nothing to do with you. It is because of my mother.”
“Curses on Hel. I thought Athelinda liked me.”
“Not that.” She turned away, her face flushed scarlet in the heat, her eyes glistening. “My mother married and was happy. She thought she could raise children in…in a slaughtering pen. And look what became of her and her children…over there, you can still see what is left of her loom. Witgern, hear me please! I cannot farm and bear children on a battlefield. I can’t stay here trussed like kine, never knowing the day of slaughter. I…I must go to the gate and meet the slaughterer—”
“Poor child. Of course you think so now—”
“You know me little, Witgern. If you will not heed my heart, perhaps you’ll listen to the judgment of the gods. As the raid began, I fell into my fate.” She recounted the tale of the Ash Grove slaying, finding it easier to tell than she expected—all fear of Hylda’s oracle had been burned away in the fire. “I am meant to be ‘a living shield’….What is that but a shield maiden, consecrated to unmarried life in the service of the god? What I will, Witgern, is what the gods intend. So it was said, too, of Baldemar in his youth. The sign of a shield maiden, all say, is that she cannot sleep on settled land. It is the truth, Witgern…. There is a fatal restiveness in the heart….”
Witgern dropped his head into his hands. “You cannot do this to me!”
As he spoke the words, he realized she very well could. They had not yet taken the oath and shared the horn. The cursed marriage she could wriggle out of, without violating ancient law. And as for Baldemar, when had he ever denied her what she wanted? It was not so much that he indulged this daughter who for so long was his only child; it was that uncanny complicity between them—what one wanted always somehow seemed to echo what the other had already planned. She was his heir in far more than name.
Nor did it surprise him as much as it might; her family tended to produce warlike women. A maternal aunt, Serihilde of the Swift Spear, lived as a shield maiden, having dedicated her life to vengeance after the Romans massacred all her children.
But he knew he must mount a vigorous fight or he would despise himself as a weakling. “You shame me and you bring grave insult to my family. For certain, Baldemar will not allow me to be used so. I warn you, I mean to bring a complaint before him.”
He knew at once he made a grave mistake. In her eyes an iron gate clanged shut.
“I thought better of you, Witgern. I am not a dog to be threatened with a stick. And should anyone force me, in your family or mine, I will take my own life.”
Witgern’s insides were a swamp of misery. He was stripped of everything—the eminence of her mother’s mothers and her father’s fathers, their rich wealth in fields and cattle, the glow that would be about his name should he win such a wife—and he was left only with the shame, the throbbing shame. In that moment he would have welcomed the death sentence of Baldemar.
“Very well, then,” he said, getting stiffly to his feet. “I will be humiliated before the Companions. I will become ‘the wretch Baldemar’s daughter spurned.’ Make me a thing of sport. What is to you?”
“I would be no fit wife! I would be a madwoman. But you do not care overmuch, do you? As long as I appeared to be a fit wife? As long as your praises are sung when the feast is done? I praise this disaster, then, if only because it brought forth your true nature before I bound myself to you.”
“Curses on you and on all life.”
Witgern spun round, kicking up a spray of dirt and stones, and strode off into the tall firs. Auriane watched his retreating back, feeling suddenly isolated in winter cold while insidious doubt crept in, beckoning, beckoning with the promise of a life of harvest feasts, warmth overflowing, fellowship about the loom. But the promise of warmth is a cruel sham, she reminded herself. There is no settled ground. Who loves me must love what I love, honor and freedom, freedom from…the dark armed menace beyond the pines.
Another young Companion, the amiable red-bearded Thorgild, helped her rise, and the whole party of them accompanied her to the village, leaving Witgern to his mortification and rage. They were sharply curious about this rift between Witgern and the daughter of their chief, but custom demanded they ask no questions.
Witgern paused beneath the gently swaying body of the Companion who had hanged himself.
No one must know she has done this to me, no one must know….
He considered taking his own life then, regarding the dead man with horror mingl
ed with envy. Shivering, he cut his own horse’s reins, knotted them and threw them over a branch. No. I cannot. I’ve lived well, I deserve a better death.
He clung to the corpse’s ankles and cried bitterly. After a time one of the half-wild spotted dogs approached, challenging him with threatening barks. And Witgern was seized with an idea, borne off passionately by what seemed the one solution to his dilemma.
There are injuries that disqualify a man forever from making a noble marriage. If I could manage it so all men thought I suffered some accident, and that it was the Fates who spurned me, not Baldemar’s daughter….
Blindness. But in only one eye. No priestess or priest would join a maid of rank to a man half blind—it was too ill-omened. The bride and groom must be whole at the time of their union, or the match would breed only disaster. Yes. I’ll say to Maragin, Thorgild, Coniaric and the others that one of the dogs attacked me.
He lured the spotted dog close with a ration of dried venison. When the beast came close enough he slashed at it with his sword and finally cut its throat. There. This would confirm the truth of his story.
Then, after an awful moment of hesitation, he pierced his right eye. The blood was rich and warm. His eye was full of fire. He sank to his knees, stifling a cry. But the agony was small, he thought, beside the shame he would have felt at being publicly cast off by Baldemar’s daughter.
In every village and grove across their lands, the people cried out for vengeance. By the time Witgern and his party returned to the southern camp of the Chattian army, the warriors gathered there were like a half-broken horse ready to bolt at the barest touch of the whip. Why did Baldemar not mount the attack while the blood of their kinsmen was still fresh on the ground? Four days had elapsed since the raid, and still their most powerful war-leader remained mysteriously quiet, keeping to his tent, making no move to lead them against the raiders. The camp turned many anxious glances toward the great black tent of aurochs hides that was Baldemar’s. How could he remain passive in the face of this monstrous attack on himself? Perhaps age eroded the sharpness of his mind—Baldemar was seven harsh winters older than Wido. Or perhaps grief had hamstrung his will to fight.
The Chattian army was camped on the wind-protected slope of Sheepshead Hill, a site uncomfortably close to the Roman border. Because they expected war at once, none dispersed after the last campaign; rather, the camp was swollen with new arrivals. Whole families crowded in; geese, pigs, goats and sturdy blond children darted among the haphazardly spaced tents. The Chattian army, though more disciplined than most tribal hordes, still would hardly have been termed an army by Roman reckoning; it was too disorderly in its habits and too impetuous in its aims. They were more a loose collection of warriors grouped by kinship bond, each seeking individual glory. They marched and camped in no order, some sleeping under the sky, others living under lean-tos made of their cloaks, men temporarily melted into one in time of need by the fire of a Baldemar or the promises of quick wealth of a Wido. When the summer raiding was done and the spoil divided, they retreated to their farms and their festivals, feasting, and brawling. They had one feature, however, for which the Romans praised them— the Chattians alone possessed an organized system of food supply. A train of provisions carts followed the army on the march; these were stocked, managed and defended by a party of battle-trained women from one group of families who inherited this duty from their mothers and grandmothers. A woman called Romilda was chief over them now. Other tribal armies foraged and looted as they marched and were forced to retreat when the food supply dwindled. The Chattians’ grain supply, coupled with their readiness to give strict obedience to their chiefs—another habit rare in the north—made them a formidable foe to Roman and barbarian alike.
On his first day Witgern wasted no time in crossing the path of Geisar, first priest of Wodan, who officiated at important marriages. Witgern now wore over his eye a fine-looking black patch covered with silken cloth. As he expected, Geisar promptly declared him unfit for marriage to Baldemar’s daughter because he was not physically whole. Witgern listened to this with hushed sadness, all the while despising himself for his playacting.
Witgern expected in spite of everything that Baldemar would summon him at once, for he had been among the first to come upon the burning hall. He thought Baldemar would be eager to question him. When he did not, Witgern began to imagine Baldemar did hold him to account. By the second day Witgern had convinced himself Baldemar meant to condemn him to death. He was isolated with his accumulating fears and only dimly aware of the increasing chaos all about him.
When seven days passed, the whole of the camp began to raise the driving chant to the sky: “Give us vengeance! Baldemar, lead us out!” as they milled about, shaking polished weapons above their heads, colliding with the roaming children and animals. By late afternoon Witgern saw an alarming sight—Wido mounted one of the provisions carts and began haranguing the throng, intending to take advantage of Baldemar’s inactivity. Witgern watched dispiritedly from the back of the crowd, close enough to see Wido’s crone’s chin jutting out and the energetic chopping gestures of his hands. Some of Wido’s words reached Witgern’s ears.
“The gods know a man’s end before he knows it himself and they send us signs. When Wodan takes a man’s mother and takes also his son…” Witgern heard before Wido’s voice was obscured by a new outburst of chanting.
That viper tongue wags as always, Witgern thought. But on this day the people seemed to be listening closely to him, as if Wido were not a cattle thief with the bones of murdered guests beneath his hall. Normally Wido attracted a miserable collection of malcontents. But now a good half of the army—a mixture of the poor, swordless farmers, the wealthier men with longswords at their sides, and even some of Baldemar’s Companions—pressed close, eyes intent upon Wido.
Lust for vengeance, Witgern concluded, has robbed them of their wits.
Witgern fought his way closer and saw a thing that alarmed him more. In the short time he had been in the camp, Wido seemed to have attracted a good hundred or so new men to his own force of Companions. They were arrayed behind him now, dressed similarly in dark brown tunics and marten skin cloaks. Among them he saw some with faces marked in woad-blue with the Chaucian tribal sign, some with the torques of the Bructeres, others with hair pulled tightly into Suebian knots—men lured from neighboring tribes. Where did Wido get the silver to pay them all? The only honorable way was through raiding, and Wido was too slothful to organize frequent forays—he was more the carrion creature, picking at the kills of others.
And still throughout this day, Baldemar summoned none of his Companions. The great black tent on the hilltop was not without its visitors, however. Witgern saw a steady stream of thralls, poor farmers, foreign traders, brigands and wanderers ushered inside for questioning. But what did Baldemar need to know, Witgern wondered angrily, other than that the raiders were Hermundures?
Baldemar, you are making a mortal mistake, Witgern thought. Do you not hear them crying out for you? You will lose them forever.
“Every moment we delay shames us more!” Wido’s voice rose to an ecstatic screech.
“Hail Wido, greatest of chiefs!” Wido’s Companions bellowed in response.
Witgern slept fitfully that night, trying to stop his ears. The shouting and chanting had become feasting and celebration. He wondered if the common lot of people were half mad already, just awaiting the coming of someone a little madder than themselves to ignite them to frenzy. He expected by dawn to hear Wido proclaimed a living god.
But just as the night sky turned leaden gray, the summons finally came. Witgern was to report to Baldemar’s tent at once.
It is death. I am certain of it.
He arrayed himself in his finest war gear, splashed well water on his face and tried not to let his mind clutch at life. He told himself the shuddering of his hands was due to the sharp cold of dawn.
Perhaps my ghost can serve his dead mother and murdered child.
He saw that Wido had resumed his fevered shouting along with the first cocks’ crows. The rascal must have slept in that cart, Witgern thought.
I pray Baldemar does not speak of Auriane—but, of course, he will. Will he guess I put out my own eye? Remember that wretched saying, “Where you see but a footprint, Baldemar sees the whole man.” Somehow, he’ll know. Curses on Hel.
As Witgern made his way along the irregular avenue between the common tents, his gaze on that great forbidding tent atop the hill, a hairy hand reached from behind a deerhide lean-to, snapped round his arm and pulled him to a halt.
“Hail, friend! If you’re still anyone’s friend. You’ve abandoned everyone. And how come he’s summoned you and none of us?”
“Sigwulf, you mead-soaked mountebank, let me be.” The very sight of Sigwulf was a taunt. He has his pick of the wellborn daughters. His hall will crawl with children, his casks will teem with mead while mine will be empty.
Sigwulf was coarsely built with muscular features, a great irregular nose that looked like some clay model partly smashed with a fist, and toughened skin that seemed to have weathered as many storms as the hide of his tent. His tangled black beard threatened to break any comb not fashioned of iron. The bones of some small bird he recently consumed clung to it now. Those black eyes always simmered at low heat, ready to shoot into flame at the barest insult. All said his courage approached madness. He was a creature of impulse rather than reflection, and for this reason Witgern rarely had much to say to him.
Sigwulf squinted at Witgern. “By the paps of Hel, Witgern, I don’t know whether to clap you on the back or sacrifice a horse to you!” His too-broad grin begged Witgern to acknowledge his cleverness.
Witgern greeted the remark with a bored glare. In the last days he had heard too many tepid witticisms likening his face to that of Wodan, the one-eyed god of their people. “If you have words for me,” Witgern said sourly, “say them.”
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