Time of the Wolf (5 page)

Throwing off her cloak, the Queen beckoned to Redwald and pointed to the long table where he should lay the casket. As he put the box down, a booming voice rang through the hall: “More old bones?”

Redwald beamed as Edith's brother, Harold Godwinson, strode across the room; a stablehand had once suggested to him that Harold never walked slowly anywhere. Powerfully built, with a strong jaw and a handsome face, his jet-black hair gleaming in the firelight, the Earl of Wessex flipped open the lid of the box to reveal a yellowing tibia. “As I thought. What is it this time?”

Redwald hung on the older man's words. Harold was everything he dreamed of being: confident, wealthy, powerful, charismatic; safe.

“The shankbone of St. John the Baptist, brought from far Byzantium by a good Christian merchant,” the Queen replied, clapping her hands together with excitement. “It is said it can bring a dead man back to life.”

“And you are winning?”

“Of course. Do I not always? My husband's search for relics stutters and starts. When his abbey is consecrated, it will be Edith of Wessex who will fill it with the glory of God, and it will be the name of Godwin that will be on all lips.” She flashed her brother a sly smile.

The earl laughed. “What do you say, Redwald? The Queen is a playful sprite. She loves her mischief.”

“As do we all,” the young man replied. They all laughed.

Harold clapped a hand on Redwald's shoulder. “And what do you say now, Edith? I told you this lad was reliable. I see great things ahead for him.”

“He has served me well, where others failed. Perhaps you should take him into your employ.”

“Perhaps I should.”

Redwald felt a swell of pride; to escape the miseries, the doubts, the fears, and the insecurity of his life was all he wanted. In Harold's employ, he would be privy to great things; he would be a part of something that mattered.

While Edith examined her relic with hungry fingers, the earl led Redwald away, Harold's mood darkening with each step into the shadows that clustered at the far end of the long hall. “I know you can be trusted,” he said, “and you have proved it to me in times past, but I have to take care. Plots and deceits whirl around the throne like the deep currents around the bridge across the Thames. I have to be sure.”

“I understand.”

“I know you do, which is why I have invested so much faith in you.” The earl fixed a sharp eye on the young man. “The King nears the end of his days, yet he has no appointed heir. That is a dangerous concoction. If we wish all that we have achieved in England to endure, we must work to ensure that the throne does not fall into the wrong hands.”

“I only wish to serve.”

“Very well. I will think on this matter more.” Harold took Redwald through an annex to the door of another room where men sat drinking from wooden cups along both sides of an oak table. Several slumped drunkenly in pools of ale. Staying out of sight by the door, the earl pointed to two men locked in quiet, intense conversation at the far end of the table. Redwald recognized the blonde-haired Edwin, Earl of Mercia, as handsome and vital as Harold but quieter, and the man's brother Morcar, almost the opposite of his kin, hollow-cheeked and long-faced like a horse, his hair already thinning.

“I do not trust those Mercians,” Harold whispered. “They are always plotting in dark corners, and I fear they know more than they let on. Watch them for me.”

Pleased to be given responsibility so soon, Redwald agreed.

When they returned to the hall, the younger man voiced the question that had been on his mind for some time. “Is there any news of Hereward?”

Harold shook his head sadly. “I know he is your brother in all but name, but you must put him out of your head. He is both traitor and murderer. He will never be allowed to return to London. With the blood of innocents on his hands, it is only a matter of time before his punishment catches up with him.”

Redwald nodded, but he couldn't put the blood out of his mind, and the woman's body lying within it, her eyes wide and accusing. The picture haunted him, in his sleep, in the quiet moments when he was going about his chores. “I would not see harm come to him.”

Harold turned his piercing gaze on the lad for a long moment and then nodded. “Understood. You have grown up alongside him, friends beneath the same roof. Your loyalty is impressive. Now, go. Try to give some comfort to Asketil. His life has been made miserable over the years by his son's violent and wayward behavior, but since Hereward brought slaughter to the Palace of Westminster it is as though the thegn is drowning in deep water.”

Redwald said good-bye and hurried out into the night, his mood sobering as he neared his house. Inside, his vision adjusted slowly to the near-dark. Only a few embers glowed in the hearth. On a stool, Asketil stared into the remnants of the fire with heavy-lidded eyes, a cup of ale held loosely in his right hand. Redwald thought how old the thegn looked in the half-light, as if many years had eaten away at his skin and grayed his hair in the short time since Hereward had fled.

“You're back,” Asketil slurred, his gaze wavering toward the young man.

“Yes. It was a long journey from Winchester in the snow.”

Asketil beckoned Redwald to draw nearer, leaning forward to scrutinize the young man's face with his bleary eyes. “I wish you had been my son,” he said finally. “You were always a good boy, even in those days after they brought you to me when your mother and father died.”

“Do not think badly of Hereward.”

“Do not think badly? He murdered a gentle woman who held only love in her heart for him. He has destroyed this family with the shame he has heaped upon us. Look what he has done to me.” The thegn slurped the last of his ale, then threw the cup into the corner of the room. Redwald was surprised to see Hereward's younger brother Beric slumped in the shadows there, his arms wrapped around his knees. The boy stared at the boards as if no one else was present. He had not spoken since he had learned of the murder and the accusations against his brother. Redwald recalled the girls in the kitchen whispering to him, “Beric is broken.”

Broken.
A terrible legacy had indeed been left by the blood spilled that night.

“Since we took you in, you have always been loyal to Hereward,” Asketil continued. “And that does you credit.”

“He was … he
is
… my friend.”

“He is, and always has been, unworthy of your friendship. Since his mother died when he was young, Hereward could never be tamed. In Mercia, his name is despised for the crimes he committed as boy and man. Robbery. Drunkenness. Violence against any who crossed his path. Willful destruction of the property of his neighbors. I did all I could to teach him how to be a man, and I failed.”

“Do not blame yourself … Father.” Redwald felt unworthy to use that word, even though he had lived in Asketil's home since he was a boy.

His eyes glistening, Asketil looked away. “My business with the King is done, for now; I go home as soon as the snows melt. You must stay here and work for Harold Godwinson, if he will have you. He is a great man. He … he should be king one day, and you will be well cared for, as you deserve.” He choked on his words for a moment. “It was Harold who asked the King to declare Hereward exile so we would not be forced to go before the Witan and make the case for all to hear and debate across the land.”

“And … and what of Hereward?” Redwald whispered.

Asketil glared into the embers. “He will be made to pay for his crime, and soon. He has betrayed me … you and Beric … his mother's name … and the King too. Only blood will set that right. And when he is finally gone, I will not mourn him.”

CHAPTER SIX

B
LACK GLASSY EYES GLISTENED IN THE GLOOM
. S
ILENT AND
watchful, the ravens brooded in the branches of the lightning-blasted oak, the darkly gleaming canopy of their wings mirroring the churning clouds above. Hereward felt unable to look at those solemn sentinels. Their gaze spoke to him of terrors long gone and worse yet to come. And as a deep-rooted dread chilled his bones to the core, he turned and ran along the track toward his father's hall. He was a man and yet he was also a boy, and there, waiting outside the door, was his mother. Shadows spun by the gathering storm fell across her face, but her golden hair shone beneath her white headdress. Behind her, just inside the hall, a figure loomed, silhouetted against the ruddy glow from the hearth. Hereward's heart began to pound.

What have you done? What have you done?
The words swirled around him, the ravens cawing their accusations.

His hands felt wet, but he dared not look down at them. “Do not worry,” he whispered, “Redwald will avenge us.”

The Mercian's eyes snapped open. Fingers of early morning light reached under the door. He lay on the thinly spread straw, his bones aching from the cold radiating through the beaten-mud floor. By the glowing embers in the hearth, the old woman snored under her filthy woolen blanket, but Alric was gone, probably to empty his bladder, the warrior guessed.

Redwald will avenge us,
he thought, as the last of the troubling dream drifted away.

Rising, he stretched. Though his wounds still ached, the witch's balm had stripped the edge off the pain, and his limbs felt stronger after the night's sound sleep. Would he be well enough to reach Eoferwic? The woods were rife with wolves, and outlaws stalked the old straight tracks, if they were even passable after the heavy snows. He fought back his doubts, knowing that the King's life, and his own, depended on his flight reaching its end.

Thoughts of the court reminded him of Tidhild, dead at his feet, her black eyes looking up at him, and in a surge of grief and guilt he swept out into the cold morning. The glare of the sun off the dense white snow blinded him. When his vision began to clear, a shape among the trees a stone's throw from the house coalesced into the form of the young monk. Yet the man was naked, Hereward saw with shock, with a noose round his neck, a gag across his mouth, and his hands tied behind his back. Precariously, Alric was balanced on the tips of his toes on a wobbling chopping block. His eyes were wide with fear. Another rope ran from the block across the frozen ground and into the trees.

Redteeth,
Hereward thought. A trap to lure him out into the open. He silently cursed himself: Brainbiter still lay on the straw where he had been sleeping. And then he cursed the monk for failing to keep his wits about him. “Kill him! I care not!” he shouted.

With a snap, the rope across the snow was yanked taut and the block flew out from beneath Alric's feet. He kicked and flailed as his full weight dragged the noose tight round his neck.

Defiance forgotten, Hereward raced from the house and flung his arms round the monk's waist, raising him up so the noose loosened. Supporting him with one arm, he tore the rope from Alric's neck, and together they collapsed into a drift. Hereward yanked away the monk's gag and bonds. “You are a fool,” he snapped.

“They took me unawares—” Alric's words died as the shadows fell across them.

Standing up, Hereward looked into the wind-lashed face of Harald Redteeth, the Viking's pupils so dilated that his eyes appeared all black. Wrapped in furs over their mail, bristling with axes and spears, the band of six warriors clustered around their leader.

“Stranger,” Redteeth said with a whimsical wave of his hand, “you have caused me no little trouble.”

“I have given you a taste of hell. There is more to come.”

Redteeth laughed without humor. “Your time is over.” He held Hereward's gaze for a long moment, sifting what he saw there, and then he nodded to his men.

While two Vikings grabbed an arm each and dragged Hereward back to the house, a third tossed Alric his clothes and bundled the monk along behind. The rest of the mercenaries drove the old woman outside at spearpoint. Her shrieked protests and curses rang out until Redteeth snatched a spear from the nearest warrior and drove the blade through her stomach. Alric cried out in horror. It was clear to Hereward that the young monk blamed himself for this death, as he did for all the ones in Gedley.

“Kill us and be done with it,” he said, in a voice cracking with passion.

Redteeth turned on him. “Your time will come, monk. I wish to savor your demise before we cut off your head and take it back to the man you have wronged.” To Hereward, he continued: “I would know your secrets, stranger. You are clearly a warrior of no little skill, yet you put your own life at risk for those you do not know. What gain is there for you in interfering in my business?”

Held tight between the two mercenaries, Hereward showed a cold face. “Lean closer. I will whisper it to you.”

Seeing the contempt in those eyes, Redteeth nodded to Ivar. Without warning, the second in command crashed a giant fist into Hereward's face, splitting his lip. Once the ringing in his head had cleared, the Mercian tasted iron on his tongue, and spat a mouthful of blood into the embers.

“Let us begin with questions you can answer easily. What is your name?” Redteeth asked.

Hereward did not respond, and Redteeth nodded to Ivar once more. The second punch sent a jolt of pain through Hereward's head and neck.

“What is your name?” Redteeth repeated calmly.

Hereward said nothing. Savage blows rained down on him, but he took it as he had taken every beating in his life, and there had been many. His left eye swelled shut, his lips turned to pulp, blood streamed from his nose, and his left ear throbbed so much that he could hear nothing on that side. Redteeth asked again.

“Why do you not tell him your name?” Alric cried incredulously. “You told it to me in an instant. It is not a secret! You are only buying yourself more pain!”

“My name …” Hereward mumbled through his torn lips. “My name … is mine. It is what I have.”