Chapter Nine #3
had a moment to reflect on the strangeness of that—as far as the
poor Viking was concerned, this flight was in the wrong direction.
But there he was, a shadow, then a force that took substance and
shot right past him, far faster than Cai could hope to run, and so
it was that Eyulf tumbled down into the most unlikely salvation of
all—the arms of a Viking, who went down quite gracefully beneath
his weight and rolled them both out of danger, shielding the
howling lad’s body with his own from the last few plummeting
rocks.
Coming to a halt, Cai let the
laughter building in him surface. The danger was over, and Eyulf
clearly didn’t appreciate his rescuer—had recoiled from him as soon
as Fen had let him go, and now they were both on their feet, was
circling him, face contracted in the hideous scowl that
meant Viking. Cai went and stopped the boy, brushing dust out of his
robes. Eyulf stood on tiptoe in his agitation, attempting to
reproduce Fen’s height and prowling walk, pointing frantically at
him over Cai’s shoulder, as if Cai hadn’t noticed he was
there.
“I know,” Cai said. “It
seems odd to me too. But he’s…” He paused, long enough to meet
Fen’s eyes. “A good Viking. Sometimes.”
“It was instinct,” Fen
growled. “Next time I will let him fall. Cai, you idiot—we’ve
missed our chance.”
Cai whipped round. All his surviving
brethren were standing in the sunlight, staring at him as if he and
not Eyulf had just dropped down from the sky. Wilf the goatherd was
in the front line. A handful of others were still emerging from the
church, among them Oslaf, pale as death, supported between Gareth
and Demetrios.
Cai spread his hands. “What’s wrong?”
Still Wilfrid just gawped. “Where is Aelfric? Has he got you all
here to listen to more of his ranting? Gareth—that boy should be in
bed. Who made you bring him down here?”
“He wanted to come,” Wilf
answered at last. “No one made us. The storm, Cai—we thought it had
taken you. And Fenrir went after you—the only one who dared. We
thought you were both lost to us. We came here to pray for your
souls.”
Cai pushed his fringe back. He
couldn’t take this in. Not so many faces breaking into astonished
grins, not for such a reason. “And… And Aelfric allowed
you?”
“No. But he couldn’t stop
us. He can’t, can he…?” Wilf paused, as if realising this for the
first time. “Not if it’s all of us.” He stepped forwards and
suddenly enveloped Cai in a painful embrace, redolent of the
barnyard and warm goat. “You came home.”
The brethren crowded round him. Cai
resisted for a moment, trying to step back, but then he saw that
the circle of chattering, smiling men had absorbed Fen into its
boundary too. Fen was wide-eyed, attempting to look haughty. Cai
doubted he had ever been clapped on the back by a man half his
size, or told—as old Martin was telling him, beaming at him
toothlessly all the while—that he wasn’t so bad after all, for a
murdering infidel pig. Brother Cedric, who had lain so deadly ill
in the infirmary after the first raid, came jostling up to grab Cai
in his arms, and the small, unruly sea began to bear him and Fen
off.
Cai extricated himself far enough to
get to Oslaf. Gareth stepped aside for him, allowing him to give
the stumbling boy his arm. “Oslaf. Forgive me for leaving you.
Benedict—”
“Don’t, Cai. I can’t hear
his name.”
“I should have stayed and
looked after you.”
Oslaf shook his head. His face was
calm, but Cai had seen that deadly serenity before, in men tried
beyond their strength, their passions poured out into a well that
knew no filling. “He loved you,” Oslaf said. “I do too, and I
prayed so hard for you to be safe. Nobody can look after me now,
though. Do you understand?”
Cai understood with painful clarity.
To deny the boy’s despair would have been a further outrage, and he
didn’t argue—just put an arm around his waist and led him on
gently. “All right. Where is he?”
“Aelfric wants him buried
on the north side of the church. He hasn’t done it yet—Gareth and
Wilf and Hengist have been watching over him.”
“In the crypt?”
“Yes. But I don’t know how
long they can keep watching. They’re afraid.”
Cai had heard of north-side burials.
The need to place the dead in earliest morning sunlight to the east
was older by far than Church doctrine, and doctrine rode easily on
those beliefs to assign the north to winter, darkness, a fit place
for suicides and lost souls. Theo had done his best to blow away
the cobwebs of such superstition, but they clung, always the
stronger in dark times. “The north side is sacred too. All earth is
holy.”
“But how will he know where
to rise on the last day? And…he’ll be all alone.”
“Oh, Oslaf.” Cai tightened
his grip. “I don’t believe that’s how it works. We’ll have him
buried with his brothers, though—I swear it. Where is
Aelfric?”
“I don’t know. He came down
to the church—he didn’t want us all together like this, praying for
you. But Wilf said we had to, and then one of his own
men—Laban—came and joined us.”
“Did he?” Glancing back,
Cai saw a black-robed figure being borne along with the rest,
looking mortally embarrassed but not displeased with himself.
“We’re making strange friends, aren’t we?”
“You made the strangest of
all. And yet your Viking shamed us with his courage, and when he
didn’t return, we grieved for him too. Look, Aelfric is there, down
by the…” Oslaf stopped dead. He would have fallen without Cai’s
embrace. His eyes opened wide. “Oh, God. No.”
An odd group had gathered by the
monastery gate. On one side of the drystone wall—nominal barrier
between the sacred and profane worlds, easily scaled by the
smallest errand boys but in general respected—Aelfric was standing,
flanked by his clerics. They looked like four burned larch trees,
black and bare of ornament, stiffly upright. On the gate’s far
side, gaudy and chaotic by contrast, a stout old woman had planted
herself, fists bunched tight on her hips. She was dressed in bright
north-village weaves, holding a donkey on a long, frayed rein. At
her shoulder, a young man in shepherd’s breeches and waistcoat was
casting a shadow to match his formidable height. She was red in the
face, expostulating loudly with Aelfric. As Cai watched, she
unclenched one strong hand and poked a finger at his chest to
emphasise her words.
“Oslaf, what is it? Do you
know them?”
“Yes, but it must be a
dream. My grandmother, Hilde. My brother Bertwald. What are they
doing here? Oh, no. He’ll hurt them. He’ll—”
Cai cut him off. “I know what they’re
doing here. They made good time. And nobody else is going to get
hurt.” He transferred Oslaf’s weight—not much, just grief-stripped
bones and a cassock—to Fen, who was at his shoulder, waiting. Cai
didn’t have to look. He knew the Viking would be there, would make
the catch and follow him. Striding ahead of the group, he made his
way across the tussocky ground. He felt as if native Saxon sunlight
were springing back at him from the buttercups, dazzling flakes of
release and relief in the yarrow. Aelfric had put out the lights in
Oslaf’s life, and now his family had come, nature reasserting
herself, rushing to fill the gap. “Aelfric!”
The abbot turned. He caught his heel
on the hem of his robe and almost fell over, arms flailing to save
himself. Something had changed, shifted—not one of the obsequious
Canterbury clerics put out a hand. “You,” he snarled, when he’d
regained his balance. “I might have known. Not even the ocean could
swallow your disobedience and pride.”
“That’s right,” Cai called
cheerfully into the breeze. “She spat me out, and here I am.
Welcome, hlaefdige. You must have travelled all night.”
The old lady stopped in her diatribe
at hearing a word of respect in her own language. Aelfric looked
from her to Cai. “You know this woman?”
“No, but I invited her
here. She’s come to take Oslaf home.”
“So she says. I tell her—and you
listen too, you serpent, striking at the faith that has fed you and
sheltered you here—no man leaves. Tu es sacerdos—”
“Sacerdos in
aeternum!”
the old woman snapped, to Cai’s surprise. She didn’t look as if her
grasp of Latin was broad, but Cai guessed she might have heard the
phrase a few times since beginning her confrontation with Aelfric.
“A priest forever!”
“Yes. The truth of it
penetrates even to these vulgar ears. Those vows once taken, no
man’s soul escapes the service of God. No matter where his body
lies—and I forbid any member of this community to take one step
beyond its boundaries—his spirit belongs to the priesthood.” He
threw out one hand in a gesture of banishment. “Be off. The boy
belongs to me.”
“Sacerdos in
aeternum…”
Now that Hilde had a good hold on the words, she rolled them round
with a kind of disgusted relish in her mouth. “He wasn’t
anybody’s sacerdos when his mother squeezed him out of her belly and into my
hands, wet and red and raw.” Aelfric blanched, but she ploughed on.
“And in my hands he’d have stayed, if the wench hadn’t kittened off
three more and died and left them to starve. I sent him here to get
learning and his dinners. Why does a child bring me a message to
fetch him home, if I care for his life? Where is my
boy?”
Bertwald the shepherd suddenly came to
life. He seized Hilde’s shoulder. “Grandmother. Oslaf is
there!”
Shielding her eyes, Hilde searched the
group of men on the hillside. She emitted a shriek. “That skeleton?
No!” She tried to seize the gate out of Aelfric’s hand, and when
that failed, dodged aside and started scrambling over the wall.
Bertwald gave her an assisting shove from behind, and Cai, seeing
that nothing would prevent her from barrelling down the other side,
darted to catch her. Bertwald followed her, and the two ran off
upslope.
Cai was left standing with Aelfric.
Alone? No, not quite, although the abbot seemed suddenly deserted,