The Circle of Stone: The Darkest Age

by A. J. Lake

  ‘Leave us now,’ Eolande instructed them, as the men laid Reinhard under a group of stunted trees. She knelt at his head, with Wyn beside her. ‘Cluaran – if he wakes, we’ll need a dressing for the wound in his chest.’ Elspeth looked back as Cluaran led them away: the Fay woman was bending over the young man, her hands cupping his head, murmuring something too quiet to hear.

  Cluaran asked Elspeth and Cathbar to fetch more water, while he and the young woman, Sigrid, went further downhill to look for medicinal herbs. They dared not light a fire for fear of alerting their enemies, and when Cluaran returned with yarrow leaves, moss and bark, there were no utensils but his cooking pan and a stone to use as a pestle.

  ‘How did your mother get her skill at healing?’ Elspeth asked, as Cluaran showed her how to shred leaves and bark into the pan. ‘I thought the Fay were never ill.’

  ‘That’s as may be,’ Cluaran answered. ‘But my father was not Fay, and nor am I . . . no more than half. Her knowledge of herbs, which she gave to me – she learnt that from the women of Hibernia, where I was born.’ He began to pound at the mixture in the pan. ‘This will be no use to him unless she can find his spirit and coax it to return to his body. That’s a much rarer skill.’

  ‘And may she succeed,’ said Cathbar. He was standing nearby, sharpening his sword. ‘But come sunset, Cluaran, we must leave her here, and go after Edmund.’

  ‘I’m coming too,’ Elspeth put in, as Cluaran nodded. She glanced over at Wulf, who was playing one of his interminable games with pebbles, watched by Sigrid. Maybe they could leave the child here as well. They might only have the one chance to rescue Edmund. Suddenly it seemed unbearable to be sitting here while her friend was still in danger. ‘How far is the camp from here?’

  ‘Close,’ Cathbar promised her. ‘Over the next ridge.’

  They did not have to wait until sunset for Cluaran’s mother to finish with Reinhard. The sun was still visible over the southern ridge when Eolande came up the slope, her steps slow and her face white and drained. Elspeth stared at her, suddenly cold – but when she saw them, the Fay woman smiled.

  ‘He’s awake,’ she said.

  Cathbar and Cluaran carried him back to the shelter of the hawthorns. The young man was too weak to talk, but there was colour in his face, and Elspeth saw him smiling at his mother and Sigrid as they dressed his wound with the poultice Cluaran had made.

  Wyn rose from her son’s side to take Eolande by the hand. ‘Is there anything I can do to repay you?’

  ‘Nothing, thank you,’ Eolande told her. ‘Only take care of your son.’

  Wyn nodded, but did not release Eolande’s hand. ‘Mistress,’ she said, a little uncertainly, ‘may I ask your name? I’d have my son know who it was who saved him.’

  The Fay woman hesitated a moment. ‘It’s Eolande,’ she said. ‘But if I have saved him, it was in part-payment of a debt that I owe. You are not beholden to me.’

  The woman shook her head. ‘I shall never forget you, Eolande,’ she said. ‘May our friendship always go with you.’

  They crouched on the ridge, looking down on a landscape of rough pasture dotted with woodland, with the road a hazy line over to the east.

  ‘Their camp is behind that hill,’ said Cathbar, pointing. ‘There are sixty or more of them – and they’ve posted guards all around, so go carefully, and don’t speak. Understand, Wulf?’ he said to the child, who nodded. He had refused to stay behind with Wyn and Sigrid – as Elspeth had known he would.

  The journey down was faster than the way up, even with the need for caution. Cathbar led them down a gully to the west of the camp, which would shield them from the sight of any watcher below.

  ‘The tents are all close under the cliff,’ he told them. ‘They have sentries on the hill, and what looks like a sheer drop on the side nearest the camp. The road’s to the east, with trees between it and the camp: they’ve sentries in the trees as well. To the south and west it’s all open fields. They patrol the edges, but we could slip past in the dark.’

  They hid in a tiny copse, one field away from the camp. Elspeth could see the closest tents and the faint light of cooking fires. She strained her eyes, but she could catch no sight of Edmund: only heavy-set men in dark cloaks, turning spits or unrolling packs. Above them, on the hill, she could see the little figure on look-out duty, and in the fields before the camp, two sentries patrolled, crossing and recrossing. The scene was brilliantly lit by the low sun.

  ‘If we go in from the west,’ Cluaran murmured, ‘we don’t have to wait till dark.’

  They made their move as the sun was setting. They had agreed that Eolande and the boy would stay behind, and as the other three removed their furs and took out the blankets from their packs, the Fay woman took firm hold of Wulf’s arms. She paled a little as the child wriggled and protested, but did not let go. Then, as the sinking sun emerged from the clouds to send streaks of gold across the field, and into the eyes of the man on watch, Cluaran stepped forward.

  ‘Go as soon as he comes after me,’ he whispered, and as soon as the man raised his hand to shield his eyes, the minstrel slipped from the trees and moved silent as a shadow around the edge of the field. In the next field, sheep were grazing, and as Elspeth and Cathbar waited, sword at the ready, they heard a commotion from the animals: a chorus of bleats and a ragged pounding as the flock bolted. The man on top of the rise peered in the direction of the noise and started towards it, calling to his companions.

  ‘Now!’ whispered Cathbar, and he and Elspeth darted over the rough grass to the bushes at the base of the hill.

  On the other side of the camp they could hear running feet and curses mixing with frightened bleating. They moved cautiously around the bushes, but there was no sound of alarm from the camp. Then Elspeth gasped as branches were pushed aside behind her and a hand was laid on her arm.

  It was Cluaran – bright-eyed, and not even breathless. ‘Waiting for me?’ he murmured. ‘Better move now: they’ll be coming back.’

  They reached the edge of the camp, and lay in the long grass peering in. The first of the men were indeed returning, a little shamefaced as they told their companions that they had found nothing but skittish sheep.

  ‘Wait here,’ Cathbar muttered. ‘I’ll find where Edmund is and come back.’

  He wrapped his blanket around himself in imitation of the men’s dark cloaks, leapt to his feet and strolled into the camp. As soon as he was a few paces away, he was almost indistinguishable from the other men milling about: not only in build and colouring, but in the assurance of his walk, as if he belonged there. Only the watchers saw how he avoided looking anyone in the face. He headed straight for the row of tents against the cliff, and disappeared among them.

  Elspeth peered through the grass stems, seizing on every slight movement and wishing she had Edmund’s Ripente sight, to look inside the tents. Then Cathbar was striding back, ducking down quickly as he reached them.

  ‘He’s in that one,’ he said, pointing at a tent at the end of the row. ‘Not bound, and only two men with him. Come on!’

  Cluaran and Elspeth wrapped themselves in their blankets, and they walked the twenty paces with Elspeth between the two men, not stopping to see if anyone glanced at them. No one had challenged them when they reached the tent. Cathbar ripped up one of the pegs in a single movement, and they burst in, swords drawn.

  Edmund looked up in astonishment. He was sitting on a stool with a wooden cup in his hand, dressed in unfamiliar clothes, and looking a great deal neater and cleaner than Elspeth had seen him since their arrival in the Snowlands. One of the men with him had just filled his own cup from a pewter jug of wine. The other was seated by Edmund, a tall, bearded man with fierce blue eyes and thick yellow hair.

  The blond man leapt to his feet, his hand on his sword hilt. Edmund jumped up too, and stayed his arm. ‘There’s no danger, Father!’ he cried. ‘These are my friends!’ He turned to them, his eyes shining.

  ‘This is my fath
er,’ he said. ‘Heored, King of Sussex.’

  They were quickly made welcome, seated in the king’s tent and offered food and shelter as honoured guests while Cluaran fetched his mother and Wulf. Elspeth was given a seat by the entrance, apart from the others. After a courteous greeting, Heored had ignored her, addressing himself almost entirely to Cathbar.

  Edmund came to sit by her. ‘I was going to send men to find you tomorrow. I should have known you’d get here first!’ he said. Elspeth was touched by his obvious pleasure at seeing her, as well as his pride in his father. But there was something else at the edge of his smile: an anxiety which she could not explain. He bent to fill her cup, and as his face came near to hers he whispered to her, quick and fierce.

  ‘Say nothing of Ripente!’

  Elspeth stared at him, startled. Now the anxiety was plain in his face, and his eyes pleaded with her not to give him away. She nodded, and Edmund’s face cleared.

  He told her how his father had come in pursuit of the raiders who had invaded his cousin’s lands; how Heored had learned of the attacks on the villages and tried to capture one of the attackers, and how Edmund had been captured by mistake.

  ‘I told him about the men whose tracks we saw: the ones who killed Menobert,’ he said. ‘He’s heard the same stories that we have: of a band of madmen who destroy everything in their path.’

  ‘They’re true!’ Elspeth cried, and told him of the devastated settlement they had passed, and their meeting with Wyn.

  ‘We must tell him that, too,’ said Edmund, looking at his father, who was still deep in conversation with Cathbar. ‘He held a war-council just before . . . before you arrived, and they’ve agreed to go in search of them, to defeat them once and for all.’

  Listening to him, Elspeth felt a growing unease.

  ‘They’re a significant band of men, if the stories are true,’ Edmund went on, ‘but they’ve never faced swordsmen before, only unarmed villagers, and we know they have no discipline, and no leader. We’ll be more than a match for them. If my father is right, we’ll be rid of the threat to his cousin – and we’ll free this land of the marauders.’

  Heored was having a similar conversation with Cathbar. ‘We expect to attack in no more than a day,’ the king said. ‘Our scouts are already finding the marauders’ location. We’d welcome another good man or two,’ he added invitingly.

  ‘You honour us,’ Cathbar said, ‘but I fear we must move on. We’re chasing a different quarry.

  ‘Yes,’ Heored said. ‘Edmund told me something of the sort.’ Every line of his face betrayed his displeasure. ‘Though I’d have thought that the men who’ve been wreaking havoc all around us – and attacking our own shores – would be a better target for your sword than a single warrior, however powerful. Well, captain, you know your own business, of course – but Edmund will stay here and fight with me.’

  ‘Edmund?’ whispered Elspeth, and to her horror, she saw that her friend was nodding.

  ‘I’m sorry, Elspeth,’ he said. ‘My place is with my father now. This is the duty I was born to.’

  Heored called an end to the meeting when he heard that one of his scouts had returned. Elspeth walked out of the tent not knowing where she was going. Of course Edmund has a right to stay with his father! But it felt like a betrayal, as though she had lost her only friend.

  She heard rapid footsteps, and looked around to see Edmund pounding after her. He stopped when he saw her face.

  ‘Do you really mean to leave us?’ she asked him.

  Edmund’s voice was not quite steady. ‘My father needs me here.’

  But I need you! Elspeth wanted to cry. How could she succeed in her task without him? She said nothing; only stared in silence at Edmund, who met her gaze defiantly. He had grown in the last weeks; he was taller than her now, and there was an authority in his face that she had never seen before. For so long now – throughout the long, uncertain journey – Edmund had been her loyal companion; the one who had never doubted her no matter what she did. Her friend. Now, for the first time, she saw him as something entirely different: a prince, and Heored’s son.

  ‘I know you have to find Loki,’ he said. ‘But I will be fighting him as well by stopping these men from burning more villages. They’ll continue to kill more people if they’re not stopped.’

  People like Wyn and her neighbours, Elspeth thought, nodding in spite of herself.

  ‘My father says I must start to learn kingship,’ Edmund added. ‘And what should a king do, if not this?’

  Elspeth nodded again, slowly. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘But if you’re going to fight with him, you should tell him about your skill. He needs to know you as you are.’

  ‘I’ll tell him, of course I will.’ Edmund dropped his gaze. ‘Just . . . not yet. He’s only just heard about Orgrim.’

  ‘You’re not your uncle!’ Elspeth burst out. ‘You have a gift, that’s all. If he thinks that makes you a traitor, he’s a fool!’

  Edmund flinched as if she had slapped him. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quickly. ‘But you told me your father has used Ripente before now. He must have trusted them.’

  ‘Used them,’ Edmund echoed, and there was a note of bitterness in his voice. ‘Not welcomed them to his court as his friends, or allies.’

  They had reached the edge of the camp, passing a pile of empty barrels and a straw target on a stand. Elspeth stared across the fields. Edmund was right. Wasn’t it better to do some immediate good than to go on wandering while all around them people burned along with their homes?

  Until now, she had never doubted that she would find Loki – that he was only a little way ahead of them, growing closer all the time. The faint voice of the sword had come to her, enough to urge her forward; reassuring her that when the time came, she would find the means to defeat him. Now . . . she glanced at her right hand, feeling its emptiness. There was no voice in her head now: not so much as an echo. When had she last heard it? And how far could she go without the sword, and without Edmund?

  Some of her despair must have shown on her face. ‘Stay with us, Elspeth!’ Edmund begged. ‘You and the others. You can help us in the fight. I’ll convince my father – he’ll soon see you’re a better fighter than I am. And you can search for Loki just as well from our camp.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Elspeth said. She could not imagine being able to continue her search from the camp, but she could see how much Edmund wanted her to stay. ‘I will think about it,’ she promised.

  She let him take her back to the tent that had been set up for the visitors. Two or three men saluted him respectfully as they passed, while shooting looks of curiosity at Elspeth.

  In the tent set up for the visitors, the others had already settled down for the night. Elspeth stepped over a snoring Cathbar and found a space between Eolande and Wulf, who grumbled sleepily as she squeezed in beside him. She lay very still, trying not to disturb the others. It would never work, she told herself sadly. She must leave Edmund with his own people, and pursue her search without him. She was sure that Cluaran and Cathbar would go with her.

  But where would she lead them?

  Tired though she was, it was a long time before she could sleep.

  Chapter Eleven

  Edmund did not sleep at all that night.

  He walked back to his tent feeling uncomfortable, as if he had said something disloyal about his father to Elspeth. But he had only told her that Heored did not trust the Ripente – and why should he? He was a king: he knew the dangers of treachery better than others. Elspeth could not be expected to understand.

  His father was poring over the campaign map, laid out on a chest. He looked up as Edmund entered the tent. ‘Your friends are all settled? Good. Come and look at this.’

  The map was crudely sketched on a single sheet of vellum. ‘It’s not accurate,’ Heored warned. ‘Look – he’s drawn the road far too close to the hills. I should have brought a draughtsman with us. But it gives us a fair idea of the terrain.
’

  ‘Where is the enemy’s camp?’ Edmund asked, bending over the map.

  ‘Our scout says it’s here, by the road.’ Heored jabbed at the vellum, leaning forward in the smoky yellow lamplight until his head was next to Edmund’s. ‘Where the forest starts up again – see? So we wait for them here, in the trees, and send some men around behind them, to flush them towards us.’

  Warmed by his father’s closeness and his confidence in him, Edmund nodded as Heored went on.

  ‘My other two scouts are going in closer to see what preparations they’re making – but the word is that they’ve already been attacking and plundering villages. There are two at least that they could reach from there.’ He stabbed at the map again. ‘If they’re like most bandits, they’ll make a foray, then retreat to their camp. And if we can catch them as they return...’

  ‘No!’ Edmund cried. ‘We can’t just stand by while they’re killing more people!’

  Heored frowned, plainly unused to being interrupted.

  ‘Please, Father,’ Edmund insisted. ‘If we come on them when they’re attacking a settlement, we’ll defend it, won’t we?’

  ‘You’ve a sense of responsibility, boy,’ Heored said. ‘That’s good: a king should protect the innocent. If we can help the villagers without foolish risk, we will. One way or another, we’ll have battle before too long.’ He looked down at the new sword which Edmund now wore at his side. ‘How does the blade handle?’

  ‘Very well,’ Edmund said quickly. In fact it felt heavy and unwieldy to him after Cluaran’s bow, but he put his hand to the hilt and tried to look confident.

  ‘Show me what you can do with it!’ Heored ordered. He strode outside the tent, and Edmund followed, dreading that he would disappoint his father so soon after he had shown his trust in him.

  Most of the king’s men were in their tents by now, but the embers of a dozen cooking fires gave enough light to see by, and the men on guard watched curiously as Edmund drew his new sword and showed his father the moves he recalled from his old life in Sussex. It seemed impossibly long ago, like a life recalled in a dream, but Edmund remembered the thrusts and slashes well enough, and managed to parry when Heored drew his own sword to fence with him.