Brothers of the Wild North Sea (47 page)

Chapter Twenty-One

In the dead of winter, a king came to Fara. The first Cai knew of it, he was standing in Cai’s study, a puzzled frown quirking his fair brows. Cai rubbed his eyes. He glanced down at the
Gospel of Science
spread out upon his desk. The candles had burned low. A sudden dark had come down.

Mortification touched Cai. He hadn’t seen the change from afternoon to twilight. Fen was standing by his chair, a reassuring hand upon his shoulder. Cai had been preparing his brethren’s lesson for that night. He’d fallen fast asleep over a treatise on how rainbows came out of white light. “Fen…I’m sorry.”

“You need your rest. This is King Ecgbert of Bernicia, who’s come a great distance to see you. Your Majesty, this is Abbot Caius of Fara.”

Perhaps Cai was dreaming. He could see prisms and bands of coloured light in water still. Fen’s quiet courtesy was perfect, all the more so for the uncompromising fire that lay beneath it, but Cai couldn’t get used to his own title. And other than a dream, there was no explanation for the golden-haired vision in front of him. He took the best breath he could and stood up. Fen knew better than to aid him unless he asked, but his warmth was at Cai’s shoulder, a kind of exterior strength held in trust. He rested his hands on the desk. “I’m honoured by your visit, sire. And at a great loss to account for it. But please, sit by the fire. Have you been offered food and drink?”

“Your assistant has asked for hot mead to be brought. Will you come and sit also? I wish to speak to you.”

Cai could make the walk from his desk to the circle of chairs round the fire. The room wasn’t large, nothing like Fara’s old scriptorium, and different in its function. Cai called it his study, but all were welcome here. It was a kind of roundhouse, built in half-Celtic, half-Dane Lands style. A fire burned in the centre, and Cai taught his brethren and the villagers in the nimbus of its comfortable warmth. It had risen in the space of a week, to the sound of conflicting Saxon and
vikingr
work songs.

The king had taken a seat, his coronet glimmering, blue and scarlet garments exotic in the firelight. Cai settled near to him, careful not to wince, smiling at Fen to come and sit at his side.

“I had thought to have audience with you alone, Abbot Caius.”

Cai shrugged. The assumptions of men—even kings—were so much dust to him now, cobwebs in the wind. “This is Fenrisulfr. You may speak as freely before him as to myself.”

Ecgbert raised one eyebrow. “He is Alexander too?”

Yes, except that this Hephaistion could never have been spared to rule in Asia on his own.
Cai remembered Theo’s stories, and how the younger monks would weep at the tales of their separation.

Fen came and sat, his face composed, eyes glimmering with amusement. Ecgbert looked them over, plainly trying to work them out. Fen was in his cassock—every inch a monk, and yet somehow every inch a splendid Viking too.

“He is my friend and companion—my most valued helpmeet. Now, tell me what has brought a king to this lonely place.”

“I have been here once before, you know.”

“Yes. I remember.”

“I was on board ship, and I saw you—you and your companion—on the shore.”

“You came to fetch Addy. Forgive me—Aedar of Fara.”

“Yes. And it’s news of Aedar that brings me back now.” The young king spread his palms and looked into them as if searching for words. “This is difficult. He spoke very often of you, especially when he was… I know he was your friend.”

Fen leaned forwards. “I will tell, if it is better.”

“Yes, then. If you would.”

Fen reached for Cai’s hand. Cai returned his grasp on instinct, as if they had been alone. Many fireside hours had passed for Cai thus, hours when the feel of drowning inside his own lungs had put him past thought or speech, and that grip had been a lifeline. “What’s happened, Fen?”

“Addy’s dead,” Fen said simply. He laced his fingers through Cai’s. “He was a good bishop, but his heart was here. And when he knew his days were drawing to a close, he asked King Ecgbert to bring his remains back to Fara.”

“Fara? To his island, or…?”

“No. To Fara monastery. He asked that his body be placed in your keeping.”

Cai gazed into the fire. “When did he die?”

But here even Fen faltered. “It was four weeks ago,” Ecgbert supplied. “He was well cared for and peaceful to the end.”

“But that can’t be. I saw…” Cai trailed off. Reluctantly he let go of Fen’s hand, and the two sat in silence, gaze locked on gaze. What
had
they seen? Cai had fallen sick that night, worn out by his long ride, and Addy and Danan had flickered through his fever dreams until memory had merged with delirium. “Did you do it? Did you bring his body here?”

“Yes, just as he asked. His casket is on his funeral bier, under supervision by my personal guard. I have come to ask permission to place him in the crypt of your church.”

“Granted. Granted, of course. I will come and see it’s done at once.” Cai ran his hands over his hair. He had met old Addy only twice, but still a bitter grief knifed through him.
You said we would meet one more time. The world is darker for your death.
“This land is unsettled and dangerous, Your Majesty. I have never known a king come so far on such a mission, even for one of his bishops. Why?”

Ecgbert sighed. He looked as if he would have liked to pull off his gold coronet and scratch in bewilderment. “This too is hard for me. I’m a man of Christian faith, but I have also striven to educate myself. And yet now I have seen things that…” He shook his head. “Yes, I am rational. But Aedar’s body hasn’t decomposed. He lay in state for three days in Hexham crypt, and we have taken two weeks on our journey here. I travelled with his casket because I had to see for myself. But it is true.”

The scientist in Cai awoke. He too had seen things that had challenged his bright, plain view of the world, part of his inheritance from Broc. But dead men soon faded, reaching out to meet the earth halfway. “I’m a physician,” he said. “Tell me—was the crypt in Hexham cold? You’ve had a cold journey of it up here, I know.”

“Aye, we have. But this is different, Abbot. He looks as if he’s sleeping.”

“Was there rigor mortis?”

“His attending doctors argued over that. If so, it was quick, and now…”

Cai gestured him impatiently to silence. King or no king, if some idiotic, beautiful mistake had been made… “These attending doctors did make quite sure he was dead?”

“There’s no breath, no pulse.”

“I will come and see. There may be a catalepsy or some hypothermic state. All men rot, Your Majesty.”

He set off well enough. Pain and hope were sparking in his blood, a stimulating mix. He knew he should have paused at the door, let Ecgbert precede him, but to hell with that—he marched out into the dark and made it halfway down the hill to the torchlit church before the breath scraped in his lungs. Fen was there instantly. Oh, not a second too soon—catching him, restraining the stumble that would have dropped him to his knees. Speaking to him gently, too low for Ecgbert to hear. “Cai, slow down.”

“I have to get there.”

“Will you let me help you, then?”

“Yes, love. Thank you. Just…please don’t let him see.”

It was too late—Ecgbert had caught up with them. He looked them over with the pity Cai had struggled so hard to avoid. With Fen’s aid, he had managed—kept his faintness and battles for air out of sight of his brethren, a feat that grew harder every day, his determination hardening with it.

“I fear you don’t have your health, Abbot Cai.”

“It’s nothing. A pleurisy.” He moved on, Fen’s arm around him. Fen had learned an unobtrusive hold that kept him on his feet. He had promised to use it until Cai told him to stop, until his failing body took the choice from him. He kept it in place until they were on the frosty path to the church, and then let him go so he could make the final stretch on his own.

Cai was glad of it. News of the arrival had spread, and brought not only as many of the brethren as could be spared from their tasks down to see, but half the population of the villages as well. Quite a crowd was shifting about, the flames of the cressets lighting up faces of wonder, cynicism, blank incomprehension. As Cai approached, all turned to him, the cluster of bodies parting. Did they think he had answers for them? Well, perhaps he did. Ecgbert was a man of faith, but it was not the same faith as Cai’s. Perhaps only the pure faith of a Saxon king could keep dead flesh incorruptible. What would happen when a man who had read Theo’s
Gospel of Science
looked inside?

The bier had been lifted from its cart and carried inside the church. Around it, the king’s honour guard stood at attention. They were clad in royal livery and well-enough armed to deter any attention their rich attire brought down, but they too had had a long trek through the dark. They were looking disdainfully at the farmers, women and children milling about in what once had been—as it should be still, Cai knew, by ecclesiastical law—an enclave of holy men.

Hunger and cold did nothing to ease relations. Cai smiled and nodded at Hengist, who had been doing his best to bring some order to the crowd. He stopped in the doorway and clapped his hands. “Gentlemen,” he said into the ensuing silence, looking at the guards. “These people are my friends and my brethren, and much excited by the news you bring. Show patience to them. You must be in need of food and drink. Has anyone—”

“I have.” Hengist stepped forwards, flushed with eagerness. He had a real kitchen again—another work of Celtic and
vikingr
hands—and could barely contain his desire to refresh the royal visitors. “Mead and hot flatbreads. Gareth and Eyulf are fetching them now, and our evening broth is ready at your command.”

“My command…” Cai shook his head. Ecgbert would think he ran this place like a Roman fort. “Thank you, Hengist. Now, the rest of you…take orderly places around the church, just as when you come to prayers. This is a solemn occasion.”

Hard for him to say, when Godric’s rosy wife was standing before him, beaming from ear to ear, one laughing infant peering at him from her skirts, the baby in her arms flailing and crowing at the fun of it all. “Abbot Cai, they say he died in the odour of sanctity. Can it be so?”

“I don’t know.” Cai said that to them often—always disappointing them but increasing their respect for his answers when they came. Not knowing didn’t scare him as it once had. He didn’t know if he would last out these torchlit minutes, even with Fen’s warm presence at his back. His chest was tight, a coppery taste in his throat. “It’s a very wide world, Barda, isn’t it? I have come to see. Now, my friends, be mindful—we are in the presence of a king.”

Poor Ecgbert, for all his gold and brocade, had almost been forgotten. Now he stepped forwards, and Cai’s brethren and friends did him honour after their own fashion, ceasing to shuffle and murmur, touching fringes, bowing heads. Nobody knelt. Distractedly Cai wondered if their education was taking effect, and whether it would bring them in the end to liberty or destruction.

He had to open the coffin. That was what he had come here to do. Why was he suddenly reluctant? It was best, wasn’t it, to dispel any illusions beginning to gather around the old man’s death? He went and laid his hand upon the casket. It was a very plain one. Cai caressed the grain of the wood—Addy’s choice, he was sure, not the gorgeous Northumbrian king’s.

“My friend,” he said quietly. “I’m sorry you died so far from your seals and your birds. Forgive me for disturbing your rest.”

Footsteps pounded on the turf outside. Cai didn’t have to look to recognise Eyulf’s uneven, shambling gait. He turned in time to see the boy gallop into the church. Hengist had clearly sent him off like an arrow for supplies, and he was coming back the same way. His arms were piled high with wineskins and loaves wrapped in linen. He couldn’t possibly see.

The night had spread a fine, barely visible carpet of frost into the church. Eyulf tried to slow, and his feet shot out from under him. Before anybody could move or try to catch him, he had crashed to his backside on the flags. His loaves and flagons went flying. The next thing Cai heard was the deep hollow thud of his skull cracking off Addy’s bier.

Cai put a hand to his mouth. Fen crossed his arms—turned aside and hid his eyes. All around the church, jaws were dropping, the first snorts of laughter—echoes of the one Cai was still fighting to restrain—breaking out.

Cai bit his lip. “Hush,” he commanded, his voice unsteady. He strode over and knelt by the poor boy. So much for the solemn occasion. “For the love of God, Eyulf. Don’t you know that’s King Ecgbert over there?” Eyulf was flat on his back, staring up at the newly thatched roof. “Well, never mind. Are you hurt? Sit up and let me see.”

“Brother Cai?”

Eyulf hadn’t moved. His gaze was still fixed on the rafters, or some fascinating point beyond them. Cai hadn’t heard himself called
Brother
for such a long time. He smiled at the sound of it. And then he realised who had said the words. “Eyulf?”

Eyulf looked at him. Not through him, or past him, or with dim comprehension that someone was there. Not as a sheep or an ox. “Brother Cai,” he repeated, his voice rough but clear. “Caius.” He sat up, Cai putting a hand to his elbow in wonder and easing him upright. “It’s Caius, isn’t it? My friend.”