He didn’t dare say a word to Gunnvor.
Ednoth was still engrossed with Ketil.
‘Straw for packing?’ he heard Ednoth ask, and ‘Moss is best,’ Ketil replied. It was an elaborate game that the boy was playing. Wulfgar wondered what Ketil would say when he learned that Ednoth had no intention of following through with this deal.
He counted his heartbeats.
‘Where are you going, Wuffa?’ Ronan bellowed. ‘I’ve just got this wretched lump of bog-oak tuned!’
‘Skitter-house,’ he said.
‘Men use the stable,’ said Heremod, ‘ladies the byre.’
Traitor. Turncoat. Wulfgar squeezed his way through the crowd.
The courtyard was dark now, and quiet. The mounds of provisions had been packed into Ketil’s carts, and the cobbles stood bare under the moon. There was no sign of Orm Ormsson. Wulfgar took another few steps and the hall door swung to behind him, cutting off the cheerful roar within.
‘Where’s your money, Englishman?’
He had heard nothing, but Orm was at his back, breath warm in Wulfgar’s ear, his sweet musky odour mingling with the smells of the stable. Wulfgar tried to turn and found himself seized by the left elbow, a cold blade at the right side of his throat.
‘Don’t move,’ the voice said behind him. ‘Where’s your money?’
‘I haven’t any.’
The blade pressed closer.
‘Don’t lie.’
‘I’m not.’ He almost shook his head, stopped just in time. Cutting your own throat, how foolish would that look? ‘Search me, if you like. But I’ve nothing on me. You’ll need me alive if you want money for the relics.’
A quick, intimate hand, groping and patting his armpits, waist, groin. A sigh, and the knife was taken away.
‘How unfortunate.’ Orm moved round to stand in front of him. ‘It was worth a try, though.’
‘Indeed. Now, St Oswald.’
‘The stable.’
Orm led the way sure-footed in the dark and Wulfgar stumbled after him. A heap of straw, a pile of bags, the smell of malted grain, the rustling and squeaking of rats, a pale rectangle of moonlight in the doorway.
‘Here.’ A bulky leather bag in Orm’s hands. He stepped into the moonlight. ‘Look.’
Wulfgar knelt and opened the neck of the bag. Long bones, small bones, ribs, those strange winged elements of the pelvis, footbones like dice … everything seemed to be there. His fingers danced along a femur: he knew that strange, polished sheen. He bent his head.
‘My Lord. My King. Pray for us.’
Orm was restless in the doorway, his knife still drawn. He held his hand flat, palm down, balancing the point on the back of his hand, catching it by the hilt when it toppled and fell, over and over.
‘So?’
‘Yes. The real thing.’ Wulfgar stood up. You unspeakable murdering filth, he thought. ‘How much?’
‘How much will you pay?’
‘I’ll have to take them to Gloucester to be verified,’ Wulfgar said, thinking on his feet. ‘You’d better come, too, and you can agree a price with the Lady, and the Bishop.’
‘Oh, no. No, no, no, no. Why should I sell them to the first bidder?’ Wulfgar could hear the smile in Orm’s sing-song voice. ‘Now I know you want them, I might try Winchester next. Canterbury. York. Chester-le-Street.’
Wulfgar breathed deep, keeping his anger at bay, though he could feel the hot blood mounting into his face. ‘That’s your privilege, Ormsson. Tell me one thing, though.’
‘What’s that, Englishman?’
‘Where did you get that silver ring you’re wearing on your neck?’
‘Ring?’
And Wulfgar leapt. He had drawn his belt-knife while he had been kneeling over the bag of relics, and now he stabbed wildly where Orm had been, but the other man had twisted and jumped, so like a fox, and was somewhere to one side, fending Wulfgar’s knife off with his forearm and stabbing in his turn.
‘Ednoth!’ Wulfgar found he was shouting. ‘Ronan! To me! To me!’ He hurled himself sideways like a battering ram and knocked Orm off his feet, but fell himself as he did so and sprawled awkwardly on his side, with Orm’s legs trapped beneath him, kicking and flailing. And then Orm was up, kneeing him in the belly and winding him, knocking the knife from his hand. He heard shouts, footsteps on the cobbles, and then Orm’s knife came down.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
‘WUFFA? WUFFA! OPEN your eyes! Is he dead?’
He knew that voice. Ednoth.
He opened his eyes obediently.
‘No. I’m all right.’
Wulfgar put his hand to the back of his head. He had whacked it hard when he fell, but it was an earthen floor, thick with straw and muck. No lasting harm done.
‘Don’t sit up! That knife—’
Knife? He squinted down at his chest. Why wasn’t he dead? Orm’s knife appeared to be embedded in his heart. He shifted his shoulder-blades, breathed deeply. Pain, but not the sort you would expect. Was he dead? He reached out and tried the handle of the knife, but the angle was awkward.
‘Pull it out.’
‘You need to be careful, lad.’ Deeper. Father Ronan’s voice. ‘Pull it out, do more harm than good. It must be stuck in a rib. Stay where you are for the moment.’
‘No,’ he said. Why couldn’t he explain? His head swam.
‘Oh my dear God.’ Ronan was bending over him. ‘Sweet Lord and Saviour. St Oswald, Luck of the English, pray for us. If you survive, Wuffa, they’ll be calling you Luck of the English.’
‘What happened?’ Ednoth sounded peevish.
There were more footsteps, more voices.
‘The knife’s not in me,’ Wulfgar said. ‘Pull it out.’
Ronan knelt at his side, and palpated his chest. ‘Ah.’ He gave a tug. ‘What have you got under there? Ring-mail?’
‘St John. And St Oswald.’
‘What?’
‘Who were you fighting?’ Ednoth sounded on the verge of tears.
‘Give me a hand up.’ Wulfgar brushed the straw and dung from his tunic and leggings. When he was steady on his feet, he said, ‘It was Orm Ormsson. He killed the little girl. And Leoba.’
‘What?’ Ednoth and Ronan in unison.
‘He had her ring, that’s how I guessed. And he had the relics. Where is he?’
‘Ormsson? Damn.’ Father Ronan gusted a sigh. ‘I never thought of that.’
‘Where is he?’
‘Leading the hunt for your attacker, or so he told us.’ Father Ronan shook his head. ‘We came running in here, to find you on the floor and Ormsson scrambling onto his horse, or someone’s horse, shouting that he was after the man who’d killed you.’
‘He’s gone,’ Ednoth said. ‘God damn his filthy soul. He’s out through the gates and a mile away by now.’
Gunnvor stood in the doorway, silvered by the faint moonlight.
‘I’ll find him,’ she said. Her tone sent a shiver down Wulfgar’s backbone.
Father Ronan pushed at the stiff wool of Wulfgar’s tunic.
‘Nasty rip you’ve got there. But you’re right. There’s no blood.’ He pulled out the bag that held the gospel book, and that tiny toe-bone that Wulfgar had found abandoned with Leoba’s pannier. The little volume’s already-battered binding was now further defaced by a long score that had ripped across the leather and dislodged a silver boss.
‘And that’s what turned Ormsson’s blade.’ He opened the book. ‘How long have you been carrying this? St John, beloved disciple—’
‘Pray for us,’ Wulfgar joined in. He took the little book and the bag gently from Father Ronan’s hand and pressed them to his lips.
‘What’s this?’ Ednoth stood by the stable door, holding a bag. ‘It’s – is this what I think it is?’
‘He left the relics.’ Wulfgar felt a great fountain of joy burst through him. Only his exhaustion stopped him from leaping to his feet and squealing like a child. ‘He left the saint.’
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
HE HAD CONFESSED his sins, all the way back up the road in Lincoln, and Father Ronan had absolved him. But as Wulfgar rode down to Gloucester shortly before noon on Tuesday, the little imps of pride were at it again. Tell us, they murmured, how are you going to do this?
Will you seek a private audience with the Bishop, tell him the whole story, keep him in suspense until the last minute, then produce the relics at the very end, to be embraced and wept over?
Why not go straight to the Lady, say nothing, throw yourself at her feet and hold up the bag of bones? Think of her face when she opens it!
Or ride through the streets of Gloucester, shouting, ‘A miracle! A miracle’, get the crowd following you, all the way back out to Kingsholm, go to the Lord’s bedside – ‘I bring all the medicine the Lord of the Mercians needs.’
Wulfgar sighed. They were all attractive prospects, but the last, he thought, was the most appealing.
He was riding alone but for the swaddled and, mercifully, sleeping baby in his pannier. He had insisted on keeping the child with him: it went a tiny way towards assuaging the guilt and pain he felt over the deaths of Thorvald, and Leoba, and the baby’s older sister.
Ednoth, to Wulfgar’s astonishment, had said he was going to stay on in Ketil’s train for a little. Wulfgar had blinked, his hand frozen on his horse’s girth.
‘But there’ll be a big ceremony when we get to Gloucester, celebrations, everyone will want to hear what happened. You’ll be the centre of attention. Surely you’d like—’
Ednoth had shaken his head.
‘I’ll come on behind you, in a day or so,’ he’d said. ‘Less, even. You need to hurry, I know that. But there are a few things I have to sort out here first.’
A sickening, leaden dread had seized Wulfgar’s guts.
‘You – you’re not doing what Heremod did, are you? Swearing allegiance to Ketil?’ It was too appalling to contemplate.
Ednoth had laughed, and, then, at the look on Wulfgar’s face, he had stopped laughing and seized him by the elbows.
‘Wuffa, look at me!’ His brown eyes had been round and serious. ‘Never, never, never. After what the Lady did about our land? What I’m staying for –’ he had looked at his feet then and Wulfgar had seen a red flush creep up the lad’s neck ‘– well, it’s my secret. But there’s no shame in it, and it won’t be a secret for long, not if all goes well. All right? Trust me? And I won’t be long behind you. The party will probably still be going on.’ He had smiled, his cheeks still flushed. ‘On your horse!’ He had clapped Wulfgar on the shoulder and gone back into the hall.
Wulfgar had frowned, still unable to make anything of Ednoth’s words. What could there possibly be, to keep him the wrong side of Watling Street? A girl? His mind had darted to Gunnvor in a jealous flash but his more rational side knew he could dismiss that idea without further thought. No love lost between those two.
And what right would he have had to feel jealous, anyway? He would never see Gunnvor again.
She hadn’t even said goodbye. The last he had seen of her was in Heremod’s stable, just before the confused crowd had come pushing in, demanding to know what all the shouting was about.
But, he’d thought, she still owns me. Legally I’m her slave, and the five øre she paid Eirik the Spider is the least of what I owe her. He’d shaken his head. There would be a hefty bill coming in one of these days.
And he would be proud to pay it.
Now here he was, a world away from her, riding down to the silvery branching Severn, looking at Gloucester spread before him. Hardly a city at all, yet, for all the Lord and Lady’s lofty talk of a new capital for Mercia to replace the lost citadels of Tamworth and Repton – just the patched-up ruins of the Roman walls, and market gardens, and churches. The ancient stone minster of St Peter was furthest away, to its right the tall timber church of St Mary Lode, and closest to him the bright white plastered tower of the Lord and Lady’s new church, as yet unhallowed and unnamed, all standing proud of the low, thatched roofs of the huts and farm buildings.
Much closer to him, outside the walls, he could see the splendid carved and gilded shingles of the roof of the royal palace. Kingsholm, his destination.
What difference would the relics of St Oswald make to the future of Gloucester, and Mercia?
He smoothed an anxious hand over his shaggy hair, still feeling for the absent comfort of his tonsure. His clothes were creased and grimy, with a long, three-cornered tear in the breast of his tunic, and despite his best efforts he was blood-stained still. He was bone-weary, having ridden the long miles from Wappenbury hard, with many silent apologies to his borrowed horse – something else for which he would have to repay Gunnvor. But he couldn’t repress his sense of bubbling triumph, here, so close to the end of his journey, the saint riding pillion with him.
Since saying goodbye to his friends at Wappenbury he had kept the parcel of St Oswald’s bones tucked inside his tunic in a sling, close against the skin of his chest. A dull ache in his neck and right shoulder paid testimony to his faithfulness. Ten days ago the saint had been little more than a misty presence to him, a name in an old song. Now he was his bosom friend. And his protector. They had not been waylaid over the last three days, not by Orm Ormsson, nor by Garmund, nor by Eirik the Spider, though all three had been haunting his dreams.
But, for all his elation and relief, Wulfgar’s heart still had room to entertain a tiny, worm-like niggle of unease. Word on the road had been that the Lord of the Mercians was barely clinging on to life, and that he had been brought by barge downriver here to Gloucester, to die.
The same informant had told Wulfgar that the Atheling had gone back into Wessex, down to the nuns’ minster of Wimborne in Dorset, to pay his respects at his father’s grave. What that might signify, Wulfgar didn’t know, but he had been glad to hear it. It would be easier to tell the Lady about her cousin’s machinations if he wasn’t around in person. And it would further defer the moment when Wulfgar would have to tell the Atheling about Toli Silkbeard, and Hakon of Leicester being dead, and about him having given the message to Ketil Scar instead.
He rode up the broad track to Kingsholm, past the first outbuildings, under the great-timbered gate, and into the courtyard. His heart pounded, and his breath was quick and shallow. This was it, at last.
Home, and dry. Now for the hero’s welcome, the tears of joy, the story-telling …
Where was the Lady?
Where was everybody?
The stables stood empty, doors ajar. No clang of hammer from the smithy. No children playing knucklebones in a sunny corner. A solitary cat asleep in the sun on the steps up to the hall.
‘Hallo? Hallo!’
Silence.
He tugged his horse’s reins, circled him to look round the whole yard.
Deserted.
And suddenly he realised what must have happened.
The Lord had died.
Surely nothing else could have emptied the palace like this. The Lord of the Mercians had lost his last and hardest fight, and even now they must be burying him in one of the city’s churches. A chill hand clutched his heart. He slumped in the saddle, his eyes closed. Too late, said his heartbeat. Too late.
My Lady, he thought, I’m so very sorry.
She would be in despair. And he had failed. If he had done what the Atheling had claimed was possible, if he had brought the relics home in a week … Oh, Queen of Heaven forgive me. Her husband might have been saved. At the very least, St Oswald would have been a source of extraordinary comfort and hope.
Would have been …
As if in sympathy, a fretful whimper came from the pannier. Oh, don’t wake up, he begged the child silently. Please. Not now. Holy Mary, Mother of us all, what shall I do with this child?
‘Can I help you, master?’
He turned his head. A slave-woman stood at the door of the kitchen, drying her hands on her apron.
‘What�
�s going on? Where is everybody?’
‘Don’t you know, master?’
He shook his head, bracing himself to have his shock and grief confirmed.
‘The King of Wessex is coming into Gloucester. Bringing the relics of Holy Oswald.’
‘The King – St Oswald – what? Edward?’ Wulfgar stammered out in disbelief. The parcel of bones against his heart seemed to burn him.
‘Aye. And I’ve got to stay here and tend the hearth-fires, curse my luck.’ She looked at him strangely. ‘Word came, two, three days back. It’s a holiday, even for the slaves. Where’ve you been, master, that you don’t know that?’
‘Now, do you mean? He’s coming now?’
‘He’s here already.’ She looked up at the sun. ‘Noon at the Old Minster, they said. They’re meeting there and going round the bounds to the new church.’ She looked at him more closely. ‘Is that a baby you’ve got there?’
Electus chose that moment to whimper again, and then to bawl more loudly.
‘Thank you,’ Wulfgar said hastily. ‘I – I must go after them. Important business.’
‘And leave the poor little thing in that state? He sounds perished with hunger.’ She walked over to him, hands twisting the fabric of her apron. ‘Leave him with me, till your business is done?’ She looked up at his face, something unfathomable in her eyes. ‘I’ve lost my own. I’ll feed this one for you.’ She lifted Electus out of the pannier, not waiting for his answer. ‘Hungry, are we? You’re terribly thin, little heart. There, there.’
Wulfgar felt affronted. The child was rather cleaner than he was himself, and at least as well fed. But it seemed she was giving him no choice. He eyed her more closely. Well, she looked capable, and sober.
‘My name is Wulfgar. I’m the Lady’s secretary. Care for him well, and you will be rewarded.’
She gave him a long look, cradling the bundle of baby against her shoulder as she tugged at the neck of her dress.
The Bone Thief Page 31
