Last Tales of Mercia 1040- 1058 AD (Book 2)

by Jayden Woods

  “No, Godric, wait.”

  Godric was already turning around. Sigurd reached out and grabbed his hand desperately. Godric looked up with surprise. Sigurd couldn’t tell whether he looked more pleased or annoyed. With Godric, who could ever say?

  Sigurd released his hand. He realized his heart was pounding at a ridiculous pace. His mouth felt dry but he managed to form a few more words, nonetheless. “Listen, my home is a mess. Give me just a moment to clean up, won’t you?”

  Godric hesitated, his eye peering curiously through the cracked door. Then he nodded.

  With a breath of relief, Sigurd closed the door and turned to face the sad state of his cabin.

  He tried his best to fold his fabrics and put them back in place, to stand up his figurines and straighten the precious pages of his personal poetry. Then he splashed his hands and face in a bowl of water, already dirty from the day before. He dressed in a relatively clean tunic and attempted to tame his short blond hair with his fingers. Most of all, he tried desperately to find his normal spirits amidst his suffocating mood of depression. He opened the window shutters and dusted off a candelabra to set on his table. Then he took a deep breath and returned to the door.

  With a bright smile on his face, he swept open the door and said, “Do come in.”

  Perhaps he overdid it. Godric frowned as he entered, his eye searching Sigurd’s home for some clue to Sigurd’s temperament as he made his way inside.

  “Please, have a seat at my table! It’s so rare I get a friendly visit from you, Godric—other than your annual visit with Edric of course. I really am pleased you came. Can I give you something to eat or drink? I’m afraid I’m fresh out of my famous celery and cheese, but—”

  Godric turned and stared at him. Sigurd gulped. Despite everything they had been through together, he could not help but be a little intimidated by the fierce blue eye of the Kingslayer when he was unhappy. “What’s going on, Sigurd?”

  “N-nothing.”

  “Why were you so unhappy to see me? Have I done something wrong?”

  Sigurd found Godric’s self-consciousness touching. But he shook his head. “Of course not. I admit, er, I was a little worried you might be coming to collect rent, and it seemed a little early for that. But otherwise ...”

  “Would that have been a problem? Are you low on money?”

  “Well … well … well yes.” Sigurd hated to admit it. But he also felt a flare of anger deep in his gut, and for a moment he didn’t know why. “I will get you the rent, don’t you worry about that.”

  “I’m not worried about that. I’m worried about you.”

  “Oh really?” Sigurd gave him sardonic smile. “I don’t know whether to be flattered or embarrassed.”

  “Sigurd ...” Godric seemed to realize that he had done something to hurt Sigurd’s feelings, but he couldn’t figure out what. Even Sigurd didn’t know what, at first. Not until he stood there watching the concern distort Godric’s normally stalwart face and realized it came far too late.

  “If you’re so worried about me, why don’t you visit more often?” Like many words today, the question seemed to burst unbidden from his mouth. But once it was out in the open, he decided not to regret it. He had waited too long to ask such a question. He had hoped too long for Godric to take some sort of initiative and his patience had been rewarded with nothing but disappointment. “I am going to ask you again, and I want you to answer more honestly. Why did you come to visit today?”

  “I … I just felt like seeing you.”

  “Why did you feel like seeing me?”

  Godric’s face darkened. “Why does it matter?” A growl of anger encroached on his voice. For some reason, Sigurd was glad. He was glad he could arouse Godric to feel something. “I didn’t have many chores to do. Osgifu and Edric went to town on an errand. So … I was bored.”

  “You were bored.” Sigurd laughed dryly.

  “If you are lonely, then you should get a wife.”

  Sigurd scoffed.

  Godric’s frown deepened. His fist clenched, bunching the muscles of his arm. “Anyway, you visit me all the time. I thought you wouldn’t mind if I visited you.”

  Sigurd straightened and pushed back his hair with a flourish of his long fingers. “And you hoped that I might entertain you.”

  “You’re not acting like yourself, Sigurd.” Godric gnashed his jaws. “I don’t know what you want from me.”

  “I don’t know what I want from you either.” Sigurd sighed wearily, his sardonic grin waning. He did know what he wanted from Godric. He also knew he was foolish for thinking he might ever obtain it. “I don’t know what I must have expected, moving here with you.”

  “Maybe ... I can help.” The hope in Godric’s voice sounded forced. He also seemed desperate to hasten away from whatever confession Sigurd had been close to making. “If you’re having a problem with your garden, I might be able to fix it. Remember, I know a few things about gardening.”

  “More than how to poison a man with a flower?” Sigurd regretted his sour attempt at humor as soon as he saw Godric’s face darken. “I’m sorry, you’re right. You probably can help. I don’t know why I didn’t say so as soon as you arrived,” he lied.

  So they walked out to Sigurd’s garden, and Godric inspected the problem from every possible angle. To Sigurd’s surprise, he walked far past the orchard into the field to find the source of the bugs.

  “Capsids,” said Godric, and pointed to some old logs and weeds in the field. “They often hatch out of sticks and hedges. We need to keep the field around your garden a bit cleaner.” Without further ado, Godric reached down and picked up one of the rotting logs and slung it over his shoulder. “We’ll burn this, if we can,” he said. “If there are still any eggs or babies inside, the fire will kill them. We’ll build a fire of all the debris we find near the garden. If I’m right, the smoke will also help agitate the bugs and bring them out in the open.” Then he walked off with the log in tow.

  Sigurd scrambled to keep up with him, selecting a few smaller sticks to dispose of. After that they pulled out weeds and creeping hedges, which were also an attraction to the loathsome creatures.

  Together they cleaned the field, then built a fire downwind of the orchard. Sigurd felt completely disgusting by then, for he had watched many of the little bugs—some of them red and brownish—scurry out of the wood and a few times onto his skin. Even after he had flapped his clothes violently, he still imagined them crawling all over his body.

  Once the smoke drifted over the plants, more of the capsids flew and jumped about. Sigurd could hardly believe the thickness of the swarm that revealed itself.

  “I suppose a lot of the eggs were on your plants themselves,” said Godric. “You might want to wash more of the stems during the winter to keep this from happening next time.”

  Sigurd glowered. While he appreciated Godric’s help, he felt increasingly mortified by his own lack of knowledge about gardening. He had considered himself a decent gardener after a few years of scraping by successfully, but perhaps he had mostly gotten lucky. Godric, on the other hand, had been trained as a boy by monks in orchards much bigger than this one.

  He saw Godric peeling off his tunic and throwing the cloth to the ground. Godric pulled out his ruby-hilted knife and held it with a firm grip before him. Delight gleamed in his eye as a sneer pulled up his lips. “Let’s kill those fucking capsids,” he snarled, and dashed forward.

  “Don’t hurt my plants!” cried Sigurd, running after him.

  Yesterday, he had felt disgusted and even guilty every time he crushed one of the bugs to death. With Godric, he couldn’t help but take delight in the chase. Every death of the little green capsids felt like a tiny victory. Through the haze of drifting smoke and the blurring swarm of insects, he imagined he was in the thick of a battle. And it was a great deal more fun than real battle might have been.

  “Got you!” cried Godric, plunging his dagger into the soil before him. Sigur
d turned to see whether Godric had actually managed to impale one of the bugs on his blade. Crouched and shirtless, his light brown hair scattered about his shoulders, Godric looked positively feral.

  A moment later, a green bug flew from the soil and away from Godric’s dagger.

  “What!” Godric was shocked. “I had the bastard!”

  Unable to help himself, Sigurd burst out laughing.

  “Something funny?” Godric snarled, revealing a flash of white teeth.

  “Oh Godric, you know you can’t aim at anything to save your own life.”

  For a moment, he worried he had hurt Godric’s feelings. Then the Kingslayer smiled and let out a chuckle despite himself. The two of them laughed freely into the bug-infested smoke.

  Together they killed capsids and burned old logs until late in the afternoon. Then they realized that the sky had darkened more than they noticed from within the smoke and firelight. They stood by the dying embers of the fire and looked at the sad remains of Sigurd’s withered garden.

  “I’m sorry if I damaged a few of your plants,” said Godric guiltily.

  “Never mind.” Sigurd sighed and turned away from the sorry sight. “Let’s go inside and get you some food.”

  Sigurd served a meager dinner of cabbage, carrots, and leek stew. He got out some fine wine he had been saving and hoped this helped make up for the meal’s blandness. He lit the candelabra in the middle of the table and briefly felt proud of his humble abode.

  Godric was very hungry. He ate and drank quickly, as if he had forgotten about doing anything else. Sigurd watched him in a state of helpless fascination. It felt so strange to have Godric sitting alone at his table, eating his food and sharing Sigurd’s company—especially with no shirt on. It seemed very unreal, like something out of a dream, and Sigurd wanted to enjoy every moment of it. He appreciated Godric’s absorption in the meal, for that kept Godric from noticing Sigurd’s growing discomfort.

  As Godric finished eating, Sigurd hastened to avoid an awkward silence, even though his own food sat unfinished. “You have dirt all over you,” Sigurd pointed out. “Let me wash some of it off.”

  He stood and made his way over to a bucket of water. This was fresh water, saved for drinking, but Sigurd decided to use some of it anyway. It wouldn’t do to use dirty water on an occasion like this. He grabbed a bowl and a rag and made his way to Godric, afraid to look him in the eye. Godric sat very still, one hand gripping the edge of the table. He looked rather tense considering all the wine he had imbibed.

  Sigurd dipped the rag in water and wrung it out. His hand trembled as he brought the wet rag to Godric’s neck. Perhaps he was being foolish. Perhaps he was going too far. But he also knew he would regret it later if he did not take advantage of such a rare chance as this one.

  Godric flinched as the cold cloth touched his skin.

  “Sorry,” murmured Sigurd. Then he resumed brushing the rag down Godric’s throat. Drops of water spilled from the rag and rolled down his chest, collecting dirt and leaving trails of clean rivulets. As Sigurd watched, he realized that Godric seemed to stop breathing. The rag had lingered far too long on Godric’s neck.

  Godric reached up and grabbed Sigurd’s wrist. The rag fell from Sigurd’s hand and squelched against the floor. Godric stood and turned to face him. Sigurd winced from the tightness of his grip, but dared not pull away. He looked up and met Godric’s stare, even though doing so made his heart pound with terror. He wondered if he had ever seen Godric look at him so intently before.

  “Sigurd, I ...” Godric took a deep breath, his face distorting with uncertainty.

  “Yes?”

  “I should go.” He released Sigurd’s hand and turned to gather his tunic. He faced away from Sigurd as he pulled it back over his shoulders.

  “Godric, it’s dark out.” His disappointment fought with his anger. “If you didn’t intend to stay the night, why didn’t you go home sooner?”

  “Sigurd. Don’t be a fool!”

  The word cut Sigurd to his core. His breath stopped as Godric stormed from the cabin and slammed the door behind him. He crumbled to the floor and remained there, the wet rag cold against his fingers. He wondered if a fool was all he really was, and all he ever would be.

  *

  Lord Alfric possessed the nicest estate Sigurd had visited in a very long while. The town and surrounding fields of Wenlock were astonishingly beautiful, full of gnarled old trees that whispered in the breeze, bright purple flowers that glowed in the sunlight, and silvery limestone rocks that formed an escarpment along the road. On the lands of Alfric’s manor, long stretches of golden or green fields could be seen wherever one looked, save for a wild forest that flanked the buildings of the manor. Far in the distance one could spot the large hill called the Wrekin. Amidst such a long stretch of plains, the large hill looked somehow god-like, as if some important force of nature had put it there for a divine purpose. Sigurd smiled to himself, thinking of a story that might entertain Lord Alfric.

  The manor itself boasted a lavish dining hall, full of beautiful tapestries, freshly strewn rushes, sparkling candelabras, and a sweet fire of burning cherry wood. Alfric had not been lying about a feast, either. Sigurd could not remember the last time he saw so much food on a table, save for his last visit to the Lundenburg palace. He tried to keep himself from drooling at the bowls of plums and cherries, platters of fowl and roasted pig, honeyed bread and even a bowl of salt. What further surprised him was that he and Alfric were the only two people around to eat it.

  “I must admit,” said Sigurd. “When you said you would prepare a feast, I expected a lot more participants!”

  Alfric smiled as he took a seat at the head of the table. He motioned for Sigurd to take the chair just next to him. “Now that would be foolish of me,” said the lord, “to hire a minstrel for a large audience when I had not yet seen his performance.”

  Sigurd blushed self-consciously as he sat. He had not meant to sound presumptuous. But when he saw the kind smile on Alfric’s face, he realized the lord was just toying with him.

  “Would you like me to play something now, my lord?”

  “Please, no need for that yet. Have something to eat first.”

  Sigurd gladly helped himself to the food, but grew impatient for his inevitable performance as a minstrel. In truth, he both feared and looked forward to it. He didn’t know whether he would be so out of practice that he’d make a fool of himself, or whether all of his old habits would come back to him naturally and make him feel like his old self again. More than anything, he just wanted to get it all over with.

  He also felt rather intimidated by the largeness of the hall and its relative lack of activity. Save for one servant who walked in and out of the room to refill their goblets, not another person was in sight. The only sounds to be heard were the crackling of the fire and the chink of the two men’s dishware.

  “Does your family live here with you?”

  “My only family is my brothers, sisters, and ancestors,” said Alfric. “So … no.”

  “I see.” Sigurd studied him curiously. “And you said you are of the Cild family. Should I take that to mean you are a relative of Eadric Streona?”

  Alfric stiffened. Considering that Eadric Streona was remembered as the grandest traitor of the century, this could hardly be taken as a compliment. “He was my uncle. What of it?”

  “Please, I will not hold it against you.” Sigurd laughed despite himself. “It so happens that my own dearest friend is the bastard son of Eadric Streona. Thegn Godric. I am surprised you two don’t know each other.”

  “I know of him.” Alfric frowned. “I do not care for the rumors about him. I heard from Goodwin himself that Godric helped kill Harold Harefoot, so I know that much is true. A nasty business, all of it.”

  “Yes, very nasty.” Sigurd could not help but be amused by Alfric’s reaction. The handsome lord had a perfect home, a pristine appearance, and a flawless array of food. No doubt he liked everyth
ing in his life to be nice and orderly. The way his lip curled at the thought of a murder made him somewhat less intimidating and a little bit adorable.

  For the second time, Sigurd allowed himself to admire Alfric’s simultaneously masculine and beautiful appearance. He wore a tunic that opened low beneath his neck, revealing a soft flush of golden hairs across his chest. The short sleeves allowed a generous view of his arms, sloping from his broad shoulders to the table. Unlike Godric, this man’s skin was pure and free of imperfections such as scars. His muscles were softer, elegantly curved from his forearms to his hands. He had exceptional hands, thick and robust, the sharp edges decorated with flowing veins as if with fine embroidery.

  Sigurd looked back up and noticed Alfric staring back at him. The knowing smile he returned sent Sigurd’s heart fluttering.

  “I, uh … I wonder if you’ve heard the story of the Wrekin?” asked Sigurd quickly. “That lovely hill, just beyond your doorstep?”

  “Well, I suppose I haven’t heard your version of it.” Alfric bit down on a juicy cherry.

  “Then I must certainly enlighten you,” said Sigurd. “For you may not know this, but in Wales, amongst the towering mountains and jagged cliffs, there lives a particularly mean race of giants.”

  “Oh does there?” Alfric leaned back in his chair and folded his hands before him, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

  “There does indeed,” said Sigurd. “The reeve of Shrewsbury many years ago did not know about the giants of Wales, either. This reeve was a greedy man who seized lands and riches wherever he could, and when he ran out of opportunities in his local country, he decided to venture into Wales for some plundering.”

  “Sounds a bit like my own uncle, Eadric Streona,” chuckled Alfric.

  “Certainly, the two were not unlike. In fact, I wonder if this reeve was one of Eadric’s own ancestors. In any case, the reeve ventured far enough into Wales that he ran into one of the great mountain giants. The giant guarded a great treasure, but while he was sleeping, the reeve of Shrewsbury stole away with it! When the giant awoke he was furious. He chased the reeve and his men a short way but lost track of them in the thick of the forests. For a time he was despondent and didn’t know what to do without his treasure. So the giant turned to vengeance as a cure for his sadness. He took a great shovel and scooped out a big pile of earth with it. Then he made for Shrewsbury. He knew that Shrewsbury depended on the River Severn for its water, so the giant planned to dump the earth into the river and dam it up forever.