Hill of Bones

by The Medieval Murderers

  Caradoc found a fallen branch along the bank and, using his knife, sawed off a section. He secured one end of the boatman’s rope to the piece of wood. Cynric sat and stared with his head on one side, baffled by his master’s actions. The boatman watched with almost as much interest, stroking his chin with one hand and grasping the long paddle on his knees with the other. At one point his gaze wandered casually towards Geraint, then flicked away again – too quickly, Geraint thought. Clouds of midges hovered in the half-light.

  Brennus was suddenly struck with a fresh idea. ‘Come to think of it, my little craft will not carry three at once. I will take one of you over and come back for the other. Out of goodness of heart, and seeing as you are to join the fight against the Saxon horde – our common enemy – I will do two journeys for the price of one, and in any order you please.’

  Geraint was about to protest at their separation but stopped himself. It would sound feeble and unmanly. This Brennus was quite old and withered, for all his sinewy arms. The brothers were young and strong.

  If Caradoc had any doubts he did not show them. He nodded. ‘Very well. But you will not be paid until we are both standing on the far bank.’

  ‘Step in,’ said the boatman, ‘but carefully now.’

  Geraint nodded at his brother as if to say, you go first. Brennus shuffled backwards as Caradoc, holding the coiled rope, stepped into the boat and sat down at the near end. Cynric quivered on the edge of the reedy bank, uncertain of the next stage in this game. The boatman shoved off with his paddle. When they had pushed out a little way, he indicated that Caradoc should throw out the rope. The stick-end landed on the mud and Cynric snatched it up in his jaws, floundered out into the water and began paddling as if he was born to it.

  Geraint heard the old boatman instructing Caradoc to keep the rope slack so that the dog’s struggles would not drag the boat down. He watched as the boat cleared the reeds and shallows and bobbed out into the clearer stretch of the Abona, the black head of the dog just visible. At once he felt very alone. Suppose the boat overturned and his brother was drowned? It did not look very stable, more like an oversized platter thrown onto the water. Suppose that, once they reached the other side, the ferryman refused to return? But then he would not be paid. Geraint did not believe that Brennus would be able to overpower Caradoc, his older, stronger brother, equipped with knife and sword. He breathed deeply, taking in cool draughts of evening air. He gazed back at the willows and poplars that fringed the shore.

  By the time he looked again across the river it was to see Caradoc clambering out of the little boat on the far bank, followed a few moments later by Cynric. Geraint sensed rather than saw the dog shaking itself violently, sending spray everywhere. Then the boat, paddled by Brennus, was making progress back over the water. With one hand Geraint grasped his sword hilt, while the other kept firm hold on the pouch attached to his belt. Inside was his tribute, intended for some purpose that he did not yet know. He was tempted for an instant to unfasten the pouch, to unwrap the precious item, examine it once more in the twilight. But, hearing the splash of the paddle as the boat pushed through the outermost reeds on this side, he resisted the temptation. He glanced at the ground and noticed the white, blood-speckled front of the dead rabbit. Caradoc had forgotten his contribution to the supper that they hoped to get on arrival. Geraint picked up the dead animal by its stiff hind legs. Carrying it somehow distracted attention from the contents of the pouch.

  Brennus grounded the boat once more in the mud of the shore.

  ‘Come on, sir,’ he said. ‘No time to waste. We must get across before nightfall.’

  Geraint stepped in the boat and sat down clumsily as Caradoc had done.

  For the second time, the boatman used the paddle to push them off the bank and the craft bobbled its way out into the open.

  The river seemed immense once you were in the middle of it and the willow frame and stretched skin of the boat offered very thin protection. The current carried them at an angle, but Brennus was familiar with its twists and turns for, with a slight touch or stroke of the paddle, he aimed for the point at which Geraint could see his brother standing with the dog. The rushing of the water threatened to swamp the boat but it was more stable than it looked and, after a time, Geraint started to relax and study Brennus, helped by the fact that the boatman’s face was half averted. He wondered what the man did for a living. Ferrying travellers across the Abona? Fishing? Certainly a strong, disagreeable odour of fish came off him now that he was at close quarters.

  Then the boat came to a halt or, rather, began to spin about in a slow circular motion as if they were trapped on the edge of a whirlpool. Geraint found himself looking at the bank they’d left behind. Brennus withdrew his paddle from the water and laid it, dripping, across his bony knees. He reached over and stroked the fur of the rabbit, which Geraint was holding. The young man suddenly felt foolish for bringing this insignificant dead tribute.

  ‘I’ve changed my mind, sir,’ said Brennus. His voice grew higher, more disagreeable and grating. ‘The coin your brother is offering is only enough for one passage. I need something more before I take you to the other side.’

  ‘I haven’t got anything,’ said Geraint, somehow unsurprised by this new demand. He had not trusted Brennus from the instant the boatman slid out of the reeds. He indicated the rabbit that nestled in his lap. ‘Nothing except this cony. You are welcome to it.’

  ‘I want more than a dead thing,’ said Brennus. ‘You have got something else on your very person. I saw the way your hand went towards your belt on the bank earlier. I see the way you’re gripping that pouch on your belt even now.’

  It was true. Geraint was holding on to the leather pouch even more tightly than he was using his other hand to cling to the side of the boat. He had his short sword, but it was tucked awkwardly down by his side and would be slow to draw. Besides, he had never used it in anger, scarcely knew how to wield it.

  ‘Can you swim?’ said the boatman.

  ‘Yes,’ said Geraint promptly.

  ‘You’re a liar, and a bad one at that. Whatever you say, you have got something in that pouch of yours and, whatever else you say, you cannot swim. Not one in a hundred men can swim. I’ll turn the boat over and you’ll sink like a stone.’

  ‘Then you lose whatever I’m carrying. You lose your boat.’

  ‘Boats float,’ said Brennus. ‘And you will lose rather more when you’re at the bottom of the river.’

  Geraint sensed that Brennus was enjoying this: the teasing, the control of what was happening on his boat. He looked towards the far bank where Caradoc and Cynric were standing expectantly. He thought of shouting out, but what could his brother do? Then he noticed that although they were still spinning round, the figure of his brother was growing larger. The current was gradually pushing them to the other shore while the boatman, intent on his threats, was neglecting to use the paddle to keep them in the centre of the stream. If he could only manage to distract Brennus for a little longer . . .

  ‘So you are able to swim?’ he said.

  ‘Like a fish. Come on now, just open up your pouch and hand whatever’s inside it to me. I’ll take it in exchange for a safe landing. A blind bargain on my side, can’t say fairer than that.’

  ‘It is a keepsake from my mother,’ said Geraint.

  This was a lie too, more or less, but one the boatman seemed eager to accept.

  ‘Then she’d be pleased if you handed it over to save yourself from death by water.’

  ‘She is dead now, my mother,’ said Geraint, his eyes growing moist as he said the words but still seeing the outline of Caradoc, standing rigid on the bank. From his posture, Geraint’s brother knew something was wrong.

  ‘I don’t care what she is,’ said the boatman, tiring of his chat. ‘Give me what you’re carrying or you’ll be dead alongside her.’

  ‘Here you are then,’ said Geraint, angry now. He made to open the leather pouch. Instead he seized the
rabbit by the hind legs and swung it straight at Brennus’s face. It connected with a satisfying thwack. The dead cony was no club but the shock of the blow was enough to surprise and distract the boatman, who jerked back and put up his hands to protect himself. Geraint rose to his feet, the boat swaying wildly beneath him, and before he should lose his balance altogether he pressed down against the side of the shallow craft and made to leap into a clump of feathery reeds, one of several outcrops not so far from the bank. He felt something holding him and realised that Brennus had made a grab at the region of his waist. There was a tearing sound and Geraint toppled rather than jumped into the water.

  His body sank through the reeds into the murk. His mouth filled with choking water and his feet flailed for the bottom. Through his mind flashed the image he’d glimpsed on the villa floor, the sea with the strange beasts that lived there, and he wondered whether his final moments had come. He could not swim, that was no lie. Then his feet came to rest on something that was neither hard nor soft, perhaps a submerged clump of vegetation, and it gave him enough purchase to push himself above the surface of the water. Gasping for air, he scrabbled about among the reeds, pulling himself forward, kicking out with his legs and feeling his wool clothes growing heavier by the second.

  He touched bottom but, far from giving him support, the mud of the river-bed grabbed at his boots as if it wanted to tear them from his feet. His head was above the surface but he could not keep upright. Something struck him in the face and he heard shouting. At first he thought it was the boatman, but then he recognised his brother. He was calling out, ‘Take hold! Take hold!’ Caradoc was too far off to reach Geraint but he had tossed out the boatman’s rope to which was still fastened the stick the dog had used. Geraint grabbed it and, half by dint of his own struggling, half by being tugged in on the rope, found himself drawn up onto the bank, the last few feet in his brother’s hands.

  He lay on his front, a landed fish, water pouring from his hair, his eyes, his garments. The black shape of Cynric panted above him while his brother stood off a distance to allow him to recover. Geraint sat up. He wiped his eyes and looked out across the Abona. He glanced at the bank on either side of him. He half expected to see the treacherous boatman emerging from the river, dripping wet and vengeful. It was only then that he realised, in the struggle, the pouch had been torn away from his belt. It was lost, presumably at the bottom of the river. Or in the watery grasp of the boatman.

  He felt more angry than he could remember feeling in his life. He would have attacked the boatman with his bare hands if he had appeared onshore. But of Brennus there was no sign, not an arm or head visible in the twilight above the swirling current. Then he caught sight of the man’s upturned boat, like a giant’s hat in midstream. Boats float. But he prayed that Brennus had gone to the bottom.

  ‘What in God’s name was going on out there?’ said Caradoc. He sounded more irritated than relieved.

  ‘He tried to rob me,’ said Geraint. ‘He said the coin you’d promised him wasn’t enough. He thought I was carrying something of value.’

  Caradoc looked curiously at his brother. He made to say something but stopped himself. Geraint stood up. His clothes clung to him. The anger had gone and now he was cold and shivery.

  ‘At least you have saved yourself a silver coin.’ The bitterness of losing his pouch and its contents was like a bad taste in Geraint’s mouth. He said nothing of the loss to his brother.

  ‘And I have got the man’s rope,’ said Caradoc, rolling it up into a coil.

  ‘We should use it to hang him with if we find him again.’

  ‘I see there’s some spark in you after all, brother. Save it for the Saxons. Come on.’

  They tramped across the fields to the nearest encampment, marked by fires and makeshift shelters. They struck lucky almost straight away. Caradoc did not give the name of their village or steading – a place-name that few were likely to know or remember among the occupants of so many villages that had flocked to Aquae Sulis – but he spoke instead of a very tall man with reddish hair by the name of Aelric. The second person to whom he mentioned Aelric indicated a dilapidated farm building in the twilight next to a cluster of willows. Approaching, Geraint and Caradoc saw a cluster of men sprawled about a fire by the entrance. Hobbled horses champed the grass close by. Redheaded Aelric seemed surprised to see them but grudgingly welcomed the young brothers to the circle. Geraint was ribbed about his wet clothes but allowed to get close to the fire.

  It was only later, after the food and drink and the talk, that Geraint, now lying at a little distance from the cooking fire, finally began to think of what he had lost or had been snatched from him. The pouch that hung from his belt and the precious object that he had been carrying for three days on his journey from the south. Although he had been guarding it for longer than that.

  II

  It was on his third and last visit to the old woman that Geraint was presented with the gift. She lived inside one of the hollowed-out mounds that dotted a flat area of ground not far from the village. The field, with its tussocky hummocks, was a place that the villagers avoided because it was believed to hold the dead. Not their dead, the recent ones, but the dead of long ago. At least, that was what was suggested by the things that had been discovered (and allowed to remain undisturbed) within the hummocks: the remains of skeletons and scraps of old leather and potsherds; even knives and axe-heads fashioned from stone.

  There must have been some powerful magic preventing the villagers from using these places for shelter or storage, since they were dry and warm in winter, as well as cool in summer. Perhaps it was not only the partial skeletons but the presence of the woman that frightened people. She had flowing white hair and a face through which the bones showed as if she was more than half-way towards joining her underground companions for ever. She was so tall that, when she stood, she had to stoop within the quite generous confines of the burial chambers. At first, Geraint had not realised she was blind. There was a little light by the outer parts of the old woman’s lair because during the day she was in the habit of sitting near the entrance, which was made out of two stone uprights and a crosspiece. Geraint thought she sat there because she wanted to see who was coming, before he realised that there was no sight in her large, glazed eyes. And then he understood that she did not need to see in order to know who was coming. She had, after all, greeted him by name on his first visit.

  Geraint was not frightened. He did not see why he should be frightened. Unlike the other villagers – unlike his brother, Caradoc, for example – he did not question why the woman – she had no name, she was simply the woman – should not live there in the place of the dead, by herself. If she really was alone. Once or twice during their conversations, Geraint had caught the tremor and sound of movement further back in the chamber, not some animal but human, he thought. Who it was he never discovered.

  But the woman already knew much about Geraint. Knew that his mother was ill and must shortly die, knew that his father had been killed in a skirmish with the Saxons when Geraint was little, knew that he regarded his only surviving brother with a mixture of respect and love and resentment. Above all, she knew of his waking dreams, of those moments when something seemed to slide between him and the reality surrounding him. When he first began to experience these, around the time of his father’s death, Geraint had been truly frightened. He told no one and suffered in silence.

  In one vision he saw two men tussling on the bank of a nearby river. One fell in, or was pushed, and the other stumbled after him. He recognised the two men. Geraint was actually within sight of the river but by the time he plucked up the courage to go closer, they had disappeared. The death by drowning – which occurred a few days later – was accounted an accident but Geraint had seen in his vision the way in which Deri’s opponent, who desired Deri’s wife, had held his rival’s head underwater. Perhaps he did not intend to get rid of Deri but had taken the opportunity as it arose. The man who held the
other underwater was redheaded Aelric, the head of the village. Later Geraint heard Aelric describe to the other villagers how he had been several fields away when Deri drowned, and this seemed to allay any suspicions they might have. Geraint said nothing to contradict him but, afterwards, he was more wary and frightened of Aelric than ever.

  On another occasion during the winter Geraint dreamed several times of a sunless summer of cloud and constant rain, and how the village went hungry when the crops failed. Sure enough, it happened and the village sent petitioners to Cadwys for help.

  When, on his second visit to the burial ground, he started to tell the woman who lived there of these things – and he had never mentioned them to anyone before – she merely nodded and grasped his arm with her claw-like hand. She reassured Geraint, telling him he was possessed by a gift, not a curse. All men and women could see with their eyes, she said, save those few unfortunates like herself who lacked sight. And everyone, even the blind, was able to see backwards in time thanks to the gift of memory. A few, a lucky few, had the ability also to see forwards in time.

  ‘What can I do with it, this gift?’ said Geraint. ‘I should have warned Deri that his neighbour was going to kill him.’

  ‘You would not have been believed.’

  ‘I could have told the others that the crops would fail.’

  ‘You would not have been believed.’

  ‘So what use is it?’

  ‘Everything has a place,’ she said, ‘but not everything has a use.’

  The third time he visited the burial place the woman told Geraint that he would soon be leaving the village where he had been born; he and most of the other able-bodied men. Geraint was pleased to be thought a man. It put him on the same level as his brother, Caradoc. A great crisis was coming, the woman said. They would be summoned away to face it. Geraint knew nothing of this but accepted the truth of her words without question. He wanted to ask if he and the others would ever return but he was afraid of the answer. The woman sensed his mood and said that it was a time of danger but also of hope. Geraint would experience grief but gladness as well. There is no victory without tears, she said.