Stonehenge

by Bernard Cornwell

  “Because he will attack Cathallo,” Saban said. “We have arrived in time to see a war.”

  They walked back to the settlement. Small boys were driving pigs out of the woods to a patch of land near Slaol’s old temple where the beasts were being butchered. Women and children slashed the flesh from the bones while dogs crouched and prowled, hoping for offal, but it was being pounded in mortars, mixed with barley and stuffed into the pigs’ intestines, which would be baked in hot ashes. The squeals of the dying animals were constant and the pungent blood sufficient to trickle down the slope in small bright rivulets that were lapped by the hungry dogs. Inside the settlement the stench was worse for there women were mixing pots of the glutinous poison that would coat the warriors’ spears for their attack on Cathallo. Other women were readying for the night’s feast. Swans were being plucked, pork roasted and grain pulverized on quern stones. The tannin pits, filled with dung and urine, added their smell. Men tied flint arrowheads to shafts and beat the edge of spear blades to make them sharp.

  Aurenna went to Galeth’s hut to feed the children while Saban wandered about the settlement in search of old friends. At Arryn and Mai’s temple, where he marveled at the lightning-riven post that was split and blackened, he met Geil, his father’s oldest widow, who was laying a little bunch of feathery willow herbs at the temple’s entrance, and she embraced Saban, and then began to cry. “You should not have returned,” she sobbed, “for he kills everything he does not like.”

  “It was worth coming back,” Saban said, “just to see you.”

  “I won’t last this next winter,” the old woman said, dabbing her tears with the ends of her white hair. “Your father was a good man.” She stared at the flowers she had laid by the entrance markers. “And all our sons die,” she added sadly, then sniffed and hobbled away toward her hut.

  Saban walked into the temple and laid his forehead against a post that he and Galeth had raised many years before. He had not even been a man then. He closed his eyes and had a sudden vision of Derrewyn coming from the stream naked and with water dripping from her hair. Had Mai the river goddess sent that vision? And what did it mean? He prayed to Mai that she would keep his family safe, then rapped on the post to draw the goddess’s attention to that prayer when a shout made him turn round. “Saban!” It was Lengar’s voice. “Saban!”

  Lengar was striding through the huts with two spearmen who were evidently his guards. “Saban!” Lengar shouted again, then saw his brother in the temple and hurried toward him. The folk close to the shrine edged aside.

  Lengar was in a rage, his right hand resting on the wooden hilt of the bronze-bladed sword that hung at his waist. “Why did you not tell me that one of the stones was stolen in the night?” he demanded.

  Saban shrugged. “By men with black-fledged arrows,” he said. “Why should I tell you what you already know?”

  Lengar seemed taken aback. “Are you saying -”

  “You know what I’m saying,” Saban interrupted.

  Lengar shouted him down. “I have an agreement with Sarmennyn!” he bellowed. “And the agreement was that they should bring me a temple. Not part of one!”

  “It was your men who took the stone,” Saban said accusingly.

  “My men!” Lengar sneered. “My men did nothing! You lost the stone!” He punched Saban’s chest. “You lost it, Saban!”

  The two spearmen watched Saban warily in case he responded to his brother’s anger with a rage of his own, but Saban just shook his head wearily. “You think you’ve been cheated because one stone is missing?” he asked. “One stone from so many?”

  “If I chop off your prick, brother, will you miss it? Yet it is such a little scrap of flesh,” Lengar spat. “Tell me, when these men attacked you with black-fledged arrows, did you kill one? Did you take a prisoner?”

  “No.”

  “So how do you know who they were?”

  “I don’t,” Saban confessed, but only Ratharryn used black-fledged arrows. Cathallo mixed the blue feathers of jays with their raven black while Drewenna tipped their arrows with a mix of black and white.

  “You don’t know,” Lengar jeered, “because you didn’t fight them, did you?” He plucked aside the upper hem of Saban’s tunic. “Just two scars, Saban? Still a coward?”

  “One scar is for Jegar,” Saban said defiantly, “and he did not find me a coward.”

  But Lengar did not rise to that bait. Instead he had found the nutshell on its leather thong and, before Saban could stop him, he had pulled it out from under the tunic. “Cathallo puts its spells inside hazel shells,” he said in a dangerously soft voice. He lifted his gaze to look into Saban’s eyes. “What charm is this?”

  “A life.”

  “Whose?”

  “It is the bone of someone’s bone,” Saban said, “and flesh of their flesh.”

  Lengar paused, considering that answer, then gave the leather thong a sharp tug, jerking Saban forward, but succeeding in breaking the nut free. “I asked whose life it is,” he said.

  “Yours, brother,” Saban said.

  Lengar smiled. “Did you think, little brother, that this nutshell would keep your woman safe?”

  “Slaol will keep Aurenna safe.”

  “But this charm, little brother,” Lengar said, holding the shell in front of Saban’s eyes, “is not of Slaol. It is of Lahanna. Did you crawl back to Derrewyn?”

  “I did not crawl to her,” Saban said. “I went to her with a gift.”

  “A gift to my enemy?”

  “I gave her Jegar’s head,” Saban said. He knew it was dangerous to provoke Lengar, especially as he had no weapon, but he could not help himself.

  Lengar stepped back and shouted for Neel, the high priest. “Neel! Come here! Neel!”

  The priest ducked from his hut. He limped because of the arrow that had pierced his thigh on the night that Lengar had killed Hengall. His hair was spiked with dried mud, a ringlet of bones circled his neck and his belt was hung with pouches in which he kept his herbs and charms. He bobbed in front of Lengar, who gave him the nutshell. “This is a charm on my life,” Lengar said, “a thing of Derrewyn’s. Tell me how it is done.”

  Neel glanced nervously at Saban, then took a small flint blade from a pouch and cut the sinews which bound the nut. He split the two halves, then sniffed the contents. He made a face at the stench, then poked at the tiny bone with a finger. “It must be from Derrewyn’s child,” he decided.

  “My child, too,” Lengar said.

  “She killed it,” Neel said, “and used its bones and flesh to curse you.”

  “A curse of Lahanna’s?”

  “She would use no other god,” Neel confirmed.

  Lengar took the shell back and carefully placed its two halves together. “Will it work?” he asked the priest.

  Neel hesitated. “Lahanna has no power here,” he said nervously.

  “So you constantly assure me,” Lengar said. “Now we can test your belief.” He looked at Saban. “To kill me, little brother, what did you have to do? Crush it?”

  Saban said nothing. Lengar laughed. “One day I shall feed your flesh to the pigs and use your skull as a pisspot.” His words were defiant, but there was nervousness on his face as he placed the nut between the heels of his hands and slowly applied pressure. He paused, evidently wondering whether his defiance of the goddess was sensible, but Lengar had not made Ratharryn feared by being cautious. A man must take risks if he was to achieve greatness and Lengar was willing to wager his life if the reward were large enough, and so he squeezed again. It took more strength than he expected, but at last the shell gave way and the charm was crushed. He held the sticky scraps between his hands and held his breath, waiting. Nothing happened.

  He laughed softly, then carefully scooped the remnants of the charm onto one palm. He gave the scraps to Neel. “Put them in the closest fire,” he ordered, then watched as the priest went obediently to the nearest cooking fire and tossed the charm into the flam
es. There was a small burst of brighter fire and a hiss of fat, and still Lengar lived.

  “Why should I care for Lahanna’s curse?” Lengar demanded loudly. “I live in her temple, and she does nothing. We are Slaol’s people! Kenn’s people!” He shouted this, making folk stare at him nervously as he brushed his hands together. “So much for Derrewyn’s curse,” he said to Saban. “Or am I dead?”

  Neel laughed at this jest. “You are not dead!” the high priest cried.

  Lengar patted his body. “I seem to be alive!”

  “You are alive!” the priest cackled.

  “But Derrewyn is hurting, yes?” Lengar asked the priest.

  “Oh, yes,” Neel said, “yes! She is hurting!” He writhed to show the pain that would be racking Derrewyn. “She hurts!”

  “And Saban is disappointed,” Lengar said pityingly, then gave his brother a stare so chilling that Saban expected the sword to be drawn and buried in his belly. Instead, surprisingly, Lengar smiled. “I shall make you an offer, little brother. I have cause to kill you, but what merit is there in slaughtering a coward? So you can crawl back to Sarmennyn, but if I ever see your face again I shall cut it off.”

  “I want nothing more than to go to Sarmennyn,” Saban said.

  “But you shall go without your wife,” Lengar said. “Lest you be disappointed, brother, I shall buy her from you. Her price is the cost of Jegar’s life.”

  “Aurenna is not for sale,” Saban said, “and her people are Sarmennyn’s people. You think they will let her go to slake your appetite?”

  Lengar sneered at that question. “I think, little brother, that by tonight your wife will be mine, and that you will bring her to me.” He prodded Saban with a finger. “You hear that? You will bring her to me. You forget, Saban, that this is Ratharryn where I rule and where the gods love me.” He half turned away, then twisted back, smiling. “Or you could rule? All you have to do is kill me.” He waited a heartbeat, as if expecting Saban to attack him, then reached out and patted Saban’s cheek before leading his grinning spearmen away.

  And Saban ran to find Aurenna and was relieved to find her safe. “We must go,” he told her, but Aurenna scoffed at his terror.

  “I am supposed to be here,” she said. “Erek wants me here. We are here to do a great thing.”

  The nutshell had failed, Aurenna was lost in her dream of the sun god and Saban was trapped.

  That night Lengar gave a great feast for the men of Sarmennyn. It was a lavish feast of oysters, swan, trout, pork and venison. His slaves served it in the feasting hall and Lengar supplied generous pots of intoxicating liquor.

  Lengar’s own men, like the warriors from Drewenna, feasted outside, for there was not room inside the feasting hall for so many and, besides, the men outside prepared themselves for battle and so had gathered first at Slaol’s old temple where they sacrificed a heifer and dedicated themselves to slaughter, then they took their liquor pots and drank deep for they believed the fiery drink gave a man courage. The women gathered at Arryn and Mai’s temple where they prayed for the men.

  Aurenna and Saban ate with Kereval and his men. Scathel complained that a woman should be in a feasting hall, but Kereval soothed the querulous priest. “She is one of ours,” he said, “one of ours, and it is only for this night. Besides,” he added, “is not Aurenna’s fate bound up with the treasures’ return?”

  Lengar came to the hall after dark. The cavernous building was lit by two great fires that sent their smoke up to the skulls that shimmered red in the flame-light. Smoke looped and curled about the skulls before gusting out of the hole in the roof’s peak. The food had been plentiful, the liquor potent and Kereval’s men were in a fine mood when Lengar arrived escorted by six spearmen. Ratharryn’s chief was dressed for battle, with bronze glinting on his tunic and eagle feathers hanging from his spear blade. He beat the spear shaft against the hut’s door post for silence.

  “Men of Sarmennyn!” he shouted, using the Outfolk tongue. “You have come here for your gold! For your treasures! And I have them!”

  There were murmurs of appreciation. Lengar let the murmurs go on, then smiled. “But I only agreed to return the treasures when you had brought me a temple.”

  “We have brought it!” Scathel shouted.

  “You have brought most of it,” Lengar said, “but one stone is missing. One stone was stolen from you.”

  The murmurs turned angry now, so angry that the spearmen behind Lengar moved to protect their chief, but Lengar waved them back. “Will the temple have power if one stone is missing?” Lengar asked. “When we bury an enemy’s corpse we chop off a hand, or remove the foot, so it is incomplete. Why? So the dead man’s spirit will not have power. And now my temple is incomplete. Perhaps Erek will not recognize it?”

  “He will know it!” Scathel insisted. The gaunt priest was standing, taut with anger. “He has watched us move it! He has seen our work!”

  “But suppose he is angry because a stone is missing?” Lengar suggested, then shook his head sadly. “I have thought deeply on this and I have talked with my priests and together we have found an answer that will allow you take the gold back to your country. Is that not why you came? To take the gold home and to be happy there?”

  He paused. Scathel was puzzled and said nothing, so Kereval stood. “What is your answer?” the chief asked courteously.

  Lengar smiled. “I must attract Erek to his temple. To a temple that is not complete. And how better to draw him to us than with his bride?” He pointed at Aurenna. “Give me that woman,” he said, “and I will give you your gold. I will give you more besides! I will send you back richer than you were before the gold was stolen from you – this night! I will give you the gold, but only if my brother brings me his bride.” He pointed his spear at Saban, smiling. “You must bring me Aurenna.”

  “No!” Saban shouted. He knew now why Lengar had sent men to steal the stone and he knew also that no one would believe his tale. “No!” he shouted again.

  “Send her to me,” Lengar said to Kereval, “and I will bring you the treasures,” and with that he went back outside, unhooking a leather curtain that dropped over the doorway.

  “No!” Saban shouted a third time.

  “Yes!” Scathel shouted even louder. “Yes! Why else did Erek spare her at the Sea Temple? No bride has ever been rejected, not once in all our tribe’s time! There was a purpose in that rejection and now we know the purpose.”

  “He doesn’t want her for Erek,” Saban shouted, “but for himself!” Lewydd was standing beside Saban now, adding his voice to the protest, and some of Lewydd’s paddlers, the men who had worked for five years to bring the stones across the sea and land, thumped the floor rushes in Saban’s support, but the warriors, the men who had come to escort the treasures home, were not looking at Saban, nor at Aurenna. They just stared at the floor.

  Scathel spat. “For five years,” he shouted, “we have enslaved ourselves to regain our treasures. We have spent blood and toil. We have done what most men said could not be done, and now we are to be denied our reward?” He pointed a bony finger at Saban. “Why did Erek spare her life? What was his purpose, if not for this moment?”

  “That is a good question,” Kereval said quietly.

  “This isn’t being done for Erek, but for my brother’s lust!” Saban shouted, but his protest was howled down by the warriors. It was the treasures that mattered to them, nothing else.

  Aurenna stood with Lallic cradled in one arm. She touched Saban’s hand. “It doesn’t matter,” she said softly, “look.” She gazed up, past the fire-tinged skulls to where the smoke vanished through the roof hole.

  “What of it?” Saban asked.

  Aurenna gave him one of her gentle smiles. “It is night,” she said softly, “and a curse of Lahanna’s will not work in the sun, will it?” She knew Lengar had destroyed Derrewyn’s charm and she had grimaced when she heard the tale. “It will go badly for him,” she had said quietly then, and now she tri
ed to reassure Saban. “He has risked the gods, and the gods do not like being defied.”

  “Drag her out!” Scathel shouted, impatient with the delay, and Kargan, the leader of Kereval’s spearmen, beckoned to his closest companions.

  “Leave her!” Kereval ordered.

  Aurenna still looked into Saban’s face. “All will be well,” she said, and she walked toward the hall’s doorway with Lallic in her arms. Lewydd picked up Leir as Saban caught up with Aurenna and took her arm and tried to haul her back. She frowned at him. “You cannot stop me now,” she said, pulling away from him.

  “I would rather kill you than give you to him,” Saban said. He had never forgiven himself for Derrewyn’s fate and now he was to let Aurenna just walk to his brother’s bed?

  “Erek wants me here,” Aurenna said.

  “Erek wants you raped?” Saban shouted.

  “I trust Erek,” Aurenna said placidly. “Is not my whole life his gift? So how can anything be bad? I won’t be raped. Erek will not permit it.”

  Kereval moved to intercept them, but the chief had nothing to say. He was fond of both Saban and Aurenna, but his tribe had made sacrifices to regain the gold and now they must sacrifice further. He wanted to say he was sorry, but the words would not come and so he just turned away. Scathel was right, the chief thought. Aurenna had always been supposed to die for Erek and she had gained years of life from her escape at the Sea Temple, so perhaps nothing was as tragic as it seemed. The god’s purpose had been hidden, even mysterious, but now it was made plain. Fate was inexorable.

  There was silence in the feasting hall as Aurenna lifted the curtain. She stooped under the leather and Lewydd and Saban followed her into the night to see Lengar waiting a few yards away. He was flanked by his bronze-hung warriors who ringed the feasting hut, spears and bows in hand. Some had flaming torches to light the moonless dark. They jeered drunkenly at Saban, who looked into the sky. “There’s no moon!” he said.

  “All will be well,” Aurenna said quietly. “I know it. Erek has not deserted me.”