by Alys Clare
He wasn’t certain where the king was residing and he might equally well be in Gloucester, Winchester, or any of a dozen other places as at Windsor. But Windsor was nearest, and if Rollo’s luck was out and the king wasn’t there, then at least somebody would be able to tell him where to go.
For, although Rollo’s first duty was to seek out his king and paymaster and make his long, detailed report, there was something else he had to do. As the sometimes endless-seeming journey had finally stumbled towards its conclusion, this other task had steadily grown in importance in his mind, taking over his thoughts, so that it was with a strange and untypical reluctance that he contemplated his forthcoming meeting with King William. And it was this task – second in the order of its achievement but first in Rollo’s mind and heart – that made him pray as he rode that he would find the king at Windsor.
Because after he had seen the king, and the king had thought up and asked every last question concerning his spy’s mission, Rollo was going to ride as swiftly as he could to the fens.
I woke to an empty house. It was very early, and the light was faint, misty and soft. As soon as I was conscious, all the events of the previous night came rushing into my mind. Fear swept through me, and I had a sudden, bitter sense of disappointment. Surely Jack had promised to keep me safe? Where was he, then? Had he set out on some important errand, leaving me alone in this empty, unpopulated place?
I must have made a sound – of distress, no doubt – because the door flew open and I saw Jack outside. He was wrapped in a heavy cloak and he had a sword in his hand. A hefty, knobbly ended staff stood against the door frame. He looked pale with cold. Feeling very guilty, I realized that, far from deserting me and leaving me to face unknown dangers alone, he’d been on guard outside.
He stared at me for a moment. Then he looked away. ‘There’s hot food ready.’ He indicated the blackened iron pot suspended over the hearth. ‘But eat quickly. We need to be on our way.’
He turned away and the door closed behind him.
Oh.
It looked, I thought as I helped myself to porridge, as if his way of dealing with what had happened late last night was to pretend it hadn’t. Very well. I was prepared to accept that for now – we did, after all, have more important things on our minds – but I wasn’t going to for ever.
I ate quickly, then rinsed out the pot and bowl, tidied the bed, kicked ashes on the embers of the fire, slung my satchel over my shoulder and wrapped myself up in my shawl. I went out to join Jack, saying no more than, ‘I’m ready.’
He nodded. He closed and fastened the door, then led the way through the deserted village and out on to the road. There was nobody about. The track to the fens branched off on this side of the river, but we didn’t take it. Instead, as we crossed the bridge, Jack said, ‘We have to see Walter. I must tell him of the deaths of the magician and his pupil.’
While I was desperately eager to get away and off into the relative safety of the open countryside, all the same I was glad that those two brutalized bodies weren’t just going to be left till somebody else stumbled across them. I didn’t know what orders Jack would give Walter. The important thing was for the sheriff and his officers to be told, as soon as possible, that the Night Wanderer had now killed six people.
I waited outside the tavern while Jack went in. He was very quick and, shortly afterwards, we were returning across the Great Bridge and setting out on the track to the fens. It was still too early for anyone to be about, and I was all but certain nobody saw us leaving. We had gone perhaps half a mile when he turned off the track along a path running between well-tended fields, largely pasture. There was a long, low building ahead, set in two wings around a central courtyard, and several horses had put their heads out of their stalls to have a look at the newcomers.
The horse at the near end was a grey with a smooth, silky mane and intelligent dark eyes. I smiled involuntarily, for I remembered Jack’s gelding Pegasus.
Jack went through the door into the room at the end of the stalls and I heard the mutter of brief conversation. Then he emerged again with saddle and bridle in his arms, and shortly after he led Pegasus out and off up the path, and I fell into step behind.
Jack stopped when we reached the road. ‘You ride first,’ he said, busy with the girths and not meeting my eyes, ‘because I feel—’
Annoyance flared into anger, and, before giving myself time to think, I burst out, ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake, Jack, we can share the horse! It was just a kiss, and I enjoyed it as much as you evidently did, and I don’t think for one single moment that you were abusing my trust, or assaulting me, or taking advantage of my weakness after such a fright, and I really wish you’d stop treating me as if you’ve got to maintain a distance of several feet at all times and totally avoid looking at me!’
My voice had risen to a shout, and I listened with fast-growing embarrassment to the dying echo of my words. I could feel the hot blood rise in my face.
Jack stared at me. Then his lips began to twitch, and his mouth spread in a broad smile. ‘Actually,’ he said mildly, ‘all I was going to say was that I feel the need for some hard exercise, so I’d rather walk for a few miles.’
‘Oh.’
My face felt red-hot. Without another word, I stuck my foot in the stirrup, hauled myself up on to Pegasus’s back and touched my heels to his sides. Eagerly he set off, and I urged him to a brisk trot.
If Jack felt like hard exercise, he could damned well have it.
I thought that Jack would remain with me at Aelf Fen. I imagined us together in the deep rural peace of my little village, with the time to talk, to walk by the fen edge at the end of the day when work is done, to open up our diffident hearts and begin to reveal to each other how we felt.
But it was just a lovely daydream. As soon as we had reached my aunt Edild’s little house, and he had seen me over the threshold and handed me, as it were, into her keeping, he gave me a long, hard look and said, ‘Be on your guard, for it may be that your whereabouts can be guessed.’ Then he nodded a curt farewell to Edild – who was seated by the hearth and picking over a large basket of fungi, watching us closely – and without a single word or gesture in my direction, turned and hurried back down the path.
I ran out after him. I called out, ‘Jack! Jack!’, and the hot words rushed up, fighting to be spoken. You’re leaving me here? When will you come back? Do you want me to return to you? How will I know when it’s safe? How will I be sure you are safe?
I said nothing. I watched him swing up into the saddle, mutter a word to Pegasus, jerk at the reins to turn the horse’s handsome head, and then ride away.
I went back inside and closed the door. Edild looked at me, her face expressionless. Something in her eyes – a hint of compassion, perhaps – suggested, however, that she hadn’t missed one nuance of the little scene that had just been enacted on her doorstep.
All she said was, ‘Since you’re here, Lassair, I would very much like some help with these mushrooms.’
The day seemed endless. In the early evening I went along to my parents’ house, where my mother was busy preparing food and my father just in the act of removing his wet boots after a hard day out on the fen. They greeted me with pleased surprise. ‘We weren’t expecting you back so soon,’ said my mother, shoving me out of the way as she reached for a string of onions.
‘I’m not staying,’ I replied quickly. Wasn’t I? I only wished I knew.
‘Oh,’ my father said. Then, recovering, he added, ‘Well, we’ll just have to make the most of you while you are here. Stay and eat with us.’
I accepted; I’d been sure they’d suggest it, and Edild wasn’t expecting me back till bedtime. I slipped into the habits of home as if I’d never been away, anticipating my mother’s needs as she cooked food and set out bowls and mugs, murmuring responses to her flow of comments about the rest of the family, all the time looking out for the small, bright-eyed shade of my Granny Cordeilla, hovering in the corner
where her little cot used to stand. She’s been dead these two years, but she’s still watching over us. Sometimes I hear her voice. I treasure those moments.
My younger brother Squeak came bursting in, arriving as usual just as the food was being put on the board, and accompanied by the youngest child of the family, little Leir. Not so little now, I thought, for at six years old, he was leaving plumpness behind and growing straight and tall.
It seems always to be the way of family members returning to the fold that after one or two cursory enquiries as to what you’ve been doing, everyone rapidly loses interest and reverts to talking about their own concerns. Thus it is with my kin, too, and, after a few moments of hot resentment that nobody seemed very interested in my life in the city, I sat back and let my sore soul be bathed by the comfortable familiarity of home.
I didn’t, of course, say a word about the Night Wanderer.
When we had finished the food and talk was giving way to yawns, I stood up and announced I’d better be going back to Edild’s house. As he always does, my father got up to escort me. Sometimes I protest that there is no need, although this is always to spare him if he’s looking tired, for those all too short walks through the night-quiet village are pretty much the only moments that I get my beloved father to myself, and they are very, very precious.
Tonight I didn’t even think of trying to deter him.
We walked quite slowly, arm in arm. He said quietly, ‘Is everything all right, child?’
‘Yes!’ I said, far too quickly.
Apart from my anxieties about Jack and my deep fear at the presence of a killer on the loose in Cambridge, there was something else that stood between my father and me. Although he had no idea what it was, I knew that he sensed it. I was very afraid that he felt I had distanced myself from him, and it broke my heart.
I had found out something about his past. I knew that his father was not who he believed him to be: the quiet, unassuming man who had been married to my Granny Cordeilla and fathered her other children. My paternal grandfather was an Icelander known as the Silver Dragon, and his real name was Thorfinn.
When last I had seen my grandfather, I had yelled at him that it was neither right nor fair not to reveal the truth to my father. I longed to tell him myself, but it wasn’t my secret. I loved my father profoundly, no matter whose son he was, but I hated having to hide from him something so vital.
I squeezed his hand, leaning close against him. ‘I love you, Father,’ I whispered.
He chuckled. ‘I know that, child,’ he said. ‘What’s brought this on?’
I hesitated. ‘Oh – just that I wouldn’t want you to feel that I don’t think about you, and miss you, when I’m away,’ I said eventually. ‘I – I worry sometimes that perhaps you think I’m growing away from you’ – I fought back the tears that threatened – ‘and I want you to know that could never be true.’
It was his turn for a thoughtful pause. Then he said, ‘Lassair, you’re a young woman now, hard-working, learning a good occupation, and it’s true that at times recently I’ve sensed a withdrawal in you.’
‘I don’t—’ I began hotly.
But he hushed me. ‘It’s only natural, my dear heart, for you to make your own way in the world, and I would never stand in your way.’ He paused. ‘Just as long as you remember to come back now and again,’ he finished.
I nodded, unable for a moment to speak. So he had sensed something. I very nearly blurted it out, there and then, never mind whose secret it was.
But then, loud and clear inside my head, I heard Granny Cordeilla say, Not yet, child.
I held my peace. Not yet, she’d said. Oh, but that was encouraging: it sounded as if the time might be near when the pain of keeping quiet would be over. Very well, I said to her. But make it soon!
My father and I walked on. Just as we reached the end of the path up to Edild’s house, I stopped, reached up to kiss him and said, ‘I’ll always come back.’
I stood in the doorway and watched him stride away. While I was happy that we’d spoken words of such care and love to each other, all the same I was still cross with my grandfather, and with everyone and everything to do with the secret I had unwittingly discovered and had to keep.
And unfortunately one of the people involved in that suppression of the truth was sitting by the hearth beside my aunt.
‘What are you doing here?’ I said rudely to Hrype. Edild frowned at me, but I didn’t feel like apologizing. ‘I’m very tired,’ I went on, ‘it’s been a long day, and I want to go to bed.’
That was even ruder, since I could hardly hope to roll out my bed and slide into it with Hrype sitting by the hearth. Now Edild did speak: eyes sparkling her anger, she said, ‘Hrype is here at my invitation, Lassair, and you will show courtesy to my guest.’
I very nearly yelled at her. I almost shouted, He’s not a guest, he’s your lover, and don’t pretend otherwise when you’re fully aware I know!
But I have too much respect for her. I bowed my head, stomped through to the little storeroom and muttered, ‘I’ll finish sorting those mushrooms. Let me know when he’s gone.’
I closed the door behind me, leaning against it and broiling with anger. Too much had happened; I just wanted to close my eyes and try to shut it all out.
After a while, I heard a soft tap. ‘It’s me,’ said Hrype’s voice. ‘I want to talk to you.’
‘Well, I don’t want to talk to you.’ There was a short silence. Then he pushed the door open and came into the storeroom. He shut it again, and we stood looking at each other.
‘Where’s Gurdyman?’ I demanded in a hiss.
He raised his eyebrows in surprise. ‘Gurdyman? I have no idea.’
‘He’s not at his house,’ I said, still keeping my voice low. ‘He disappeared two days ago.’
Hrype looked at me. ‘And why should you imagine I know where he is?’
‘I know you were there in his house because I found the message you left for me.’ I took the rune stone out from the purse at my belt and held it out to him.
Briefly he glanced at it, in the palm of my hand with my fingers curved around it. There was a sort of lurch in the air: I knew, without understanding how I knew, that he burned to touch it, to take it from me.
He managed to control himself. He raised his eyes to mine and gave a shrug. ‘It’s just a stone,’ he said dismissively.
He was so convincing that I very nearly believed him. Was I wrong? Was it just a stray piece of green stone with a strange gold mark that had lain there beneath the floorboard in the attic room for many, many years?
But I caught him looking back at the rune stone. Just for the blink of an eye, the naked desire was clear in his face.
‘Take it.’ I gave it to him. ‘If you persist in pretending you don’t recognize it, then have it anyway. It’s sufficiently like your own jade rune stones to act as a replacement if you ever lose one.’
His hand closed on the stone. ‘Thank you,’ he said very softly.
And I wondered why I was being so hard on him. He had left the rune stone for me to find, and we both knew it. For reasons of his own, he was now denying it, but it had been a kindly gesture. Following that awful night when Jack and I witnessed the murder of the young priest and then I discovered Gurdyman had gone, subsequently finding Hrype’s stone was the only thing that comforted me, making me believe, as it did, that Gurdyman hadn’t been spirited away by some brutal, vicious murderer but was safe with Hrype.
‘Thank you,’ I replied. I managed a smile. I indicated the rune stone. ‘It achieved its purpose.’
He turned away. ‘You can go to bed now,’ he said as he went back into the main room. ‘I’m leaving.’
I gave him and my aunt a few private moments to say goodnight, then, when I heard the door close after him, went in to Edild. With barely a word to each other, we made our preparations for the night and settled down.
As I lay in the darkness, watching the last embers of the fire,
I thought back over my exchange with Hrype. I had very much wanted to tell him that I saw him down in the crypt, with Gurdyman and that shadowy third figure, in that strange flash of vision. But something had held me back.
Hrype was keeping secrets from me; that was perfectly obvious. He did know where Gurdyman was, and I was sure of it. He’d probably taken him away to whatever safe refuge he now inhabited, possibly with that third person, who was perhaps a friend to one or the other of them. So why had he chosen not to tell me? Surely he knew I was trustworthy; he must be aware of how fond I was of Gurdyman; how close to him.
There was a reason, and it was staring me in the face. I didn’t want to acknowledge it, but I realized I must: Hrype didn’t tell me where Gurdyman was in hiding not because he didn’t trust me but because he didn’t trust Jack.
I turned on my side, away from the swiftly dying light. I was unhappy and anxious about far too many things, and the best thing, it seemed, was to try to sleep and hope the outlook would appear rosier in the morning.
TWELVE
The house was isolated. It stood on a small area of ground that was very nearly an island; joined to the shore by a mere neck of land some two or three paces wide – in places less – and perhaps twenty long. At times of even modest high water, the patch of ground became a true island. Then it was only reachable by boat. Not that its sole habitual inhabitant would use a boat – nor even possessed one – for solitude was the desired state.
The house was a simple dwelling, with walls of wattle and daub and a roof of reed thatch. It had one main room for eating and sleeping, and, separate from it but linked by a covered way, a second, larger workroom out of which led a tidily arranged store whose shelves and hiding places were crammed tight with a variety of materials. A wooden workbench stretched the length of the room, its surface scarred with scratches, pale rings where wet or hot vessels had been carelessly put down, and rather a lot of dark and sinister burns. It had been wise to set the workroom away from the house, for quite often the fierce and uncontrollable demons of fire raged there.
