Chapter Thirty-six
The stench of death was heavy in the air.
The coppery smell of blood had intensified until she pushed open the door to the great hall, when it was replaced by the stench of putrefaction and rot.
All of Tormod’s men in the hall when she entered stopped what they were doing and waited out of respect as she looked around the hall.
Then they resumed chasing away the rats and moving bodies outside.
“You must burn the dead,” Aoife stated.
“Not bury them?” Tormod asked.
“No,” she said, after thinking about it. “It is too late for that. It would be better to burn the bodies. The rats are already here, and to bury so many in these circumstances… it’s not practical.”
Tormod looked closely at her. “If you are sure. The Church…”
“The Church, or the priest, is either amongst the dead or has run away. My mother was a Pict and they are not afraid to burn their dead. The people of this fort loved her; they would have carried out her wishes. It was only after Ula arrived that things changed. And now she is gone too.” Aoife peered around the courtyard.
“We have not found her body.”
“All the more reason to not consider what she would have done,” said Aoife, frowning. She blinked, then took a deep breath. “We will set the fort to rights, and then we must go to the king to see who will inherit.”
“You have no brothers?” Tormod asked.
“None that lived.”
“So, who would inherit the fort?”
She shrugged. “Perhaps if I had a son, I could petition the king for him to inherit. And my father had a brother. He died at Alt Clut and my cousin, Cenydd, and his mother returned to live with her family after that. Further south. Near the old wall and Car Luel. He would have a rightful claim, as well.”
“What of Lady Ula and your sisters?”
“Do you think they’re still alive?”
“Yes. I think they have escaped along with the priest.” Tormod took her hand and held it tight in his own. “Do you think there might have been something between Lady Ula and Bricius?”
Aoife snatched her hand away from him. Her mouth opened and shut like a fish. “He’s a priest. There are rules, basic decency…”
“The way you were treated was not very decent.”
“That was different,” she returned quickly, wondering why she was defending them. “They saw me as sinful. Cursed. They said they were trying to help me. To save my soul.”
It was what she had always been told. How the beatings and other punishments had always been justified, and yet…
The words rang hollow in her ears even as she said them.
How could she be guilty of something she did not control?
She looked into her husband’s face, unsure if he believed her or not.
He took her by the elbows and pulled her against him.
“They were wrong to do so,” he said, then kissed her. “You are not cursed. The gods made you the way you are. Who are they to deny you your gifts?”
For a moment, she looked at him, wanting to believe. Then she tried to pull back, shame sweeping through her. She shook her head. “The devil made me the way I am.”
“No,” Tormod said, his arms going around her. “You have helped us, saved us. You saved your family, and still they treated you badly. The Church treated you badly and perhaps it was because…”
“Because?”
“Did they say you were cursed when your mother was alive?”
“No, although I have always had dreams and visions,” Aoife replied. “But I was so young then, no one would have—”
“So, it was only once your stepmother was here?” Tormod asked. “And Father Bricius?”
“Yes. The two of them always sided against me. They were the ones who went most often to my father. It was Father Bricius who suggested they send me to the abbey after Alt Clut.”
“Did you ever see them together?”
“Ula and Bricius? Yes, but he was her priest, her confessor.”
“And your confessor, too?”
“Yes.” She gulped. She had been such a fool. She had told Bricius everything she feared and… Now lots of small memories flowed through her mind.
A sense of dread began to steal over her.
She closed her eyes. Fragments of overheard conversations, the way they had been so close sometimes when Aoife and the girls had entered the room, the way Father Bricius had looked at Ula.
Perhaps Tormod was right. Except that would mean…
She opened her eyes and looked at Tormod.
“Father Bricius came to Car Cadell with Ula,” she said. “You think they have been working together?”
He was silent for a long moment. “It’s a possibility. It’s always a possibility. I am sure she betrayed you, and the timing…” His gaze shifted off hers. “You said Lady Ula’s brother owns the land to the south? The one whose ships attacked us?”
“Lord Marcant. Yes.”
“Is it possible he was also responsible for this? That he wants this place for himself? And our village?”
“Lord Marcant is a greedy man,” Aoife said. “It would not surprise me if he was behind this.” Aoife looked around her and shuddered. “Who would want this place now? It’s cursed. The unconsecrated dead have lain here for days.”
Then she shuddered again, a sudden sensation of excruciating pain in every limb, her eyes, her ears.
She must have screamed, although she didn’t remember doing so, as when she came back to her senses, Tormod had a hand over her mouth.
One or two of the warriors had stopped to watch them, but at a signal from Tormod, they resumed their clearing-up duties.
“Shh, you are safe,” he said. “My men will think I am murdering you. Or worse, that someone else is.”
“I’m sorry. I felt them being tortured.” Aoife took a deep breath and pushed away from the comfort of her husband.
There was no reason to stand here. She sensed Tormod behind her and knew she was safe with him defending her.
She walked into the courtyard and then kept on walking towards the gates.
Away from the past, away from all the pain, fear, and death.
She made it all the way to the side of the loch before she had to stop and be sick.
She knelt down and retched more than once and was grateful when she felt Tormod’s arm around her and a cool cloth wipe her forehead and her mouth.
And then she felt it. A small flutter in her belly.
She ran her hands across her stomach and looked up at Tormod.
“The child,” she said, smiling at him. “I felt it move.”
“Even in this place of death, hope for the future is with us,” Tormod said, leaning close to her and kissing her forehead. “Come, I will take you to see your father’s body, see if Rhiannon is amongst the dead, and then we will leave this place. Forever. There is nothing for you here now.”
“No, there is not.” She put her hand out and cupped his face. “But there is everything for me with you.”
“Come, let us do that and leave.” Tormod smiled and kissed her. Then he took her hand.
After taking one last look over the loch and a deep breath to clear her mind and settle her stomach, she turned and walked hand in hand with him towards the fort.
“They have laid your father out on the table,” Arne informed them as they reached the doorway to the great hall.
Tormod’s hand tightened on her own and she steeled herself to see her father for the last time. She took another breath of fresh, clean air and stepped through the doorway.
The hall should have felt familiar—she had lived for almost twenty years going in and out of it on a daily basis—and yet it felt like a foreign place.
She breathed through her mouth, although nothing could stop the stench of death from reaching her.
Her attention was drawn immediately to the top table where a body lay, covered in a cloth.
The closer she got, the more her steps slowed.
But she didn’t stop. She needed to do this.
She needed to see with her own eyes and know for sure.
Blood pools, dark and sticky on the floor, indicated where bodies had already been taken away from around the table.
“The women are here,” Arne said, gesturing to a group of three bodies. Aoife steeled herself and looked at them, breathing out a relieved breath when none of them were Rhiannon. Then she turned back to the body on the table.
“Where was my father found?” she asked.
Tormod looked at Arne, who indicated a spot close by.
Aoife nodded. That was where he had fallen in her vision.
She gripped the edges of the cloth covering her father’s face.
She was prepared for what she would see beneath it, and for the first time she prayed the sight would trigger a vision.
Something to tell her how and why this had happened.
A vision that would settle the future for her.
She pulled back the cloth, a loud sob escaping her throat as her father was revealed.
She wasn’t sure what she had expected. His face almost looked peaceful.
She went to pull the cloth further down, but Tormod stepped forward and stopped her.
Her eyes were filled with tears, and she allowed them to fall.
A second later, her prayers were answered. She leaned against her husband, closed her eyes, and let the vision slide over her.
Car Cadell. Twilight. Four nights previously. Her father sat at the top table, Lady Ula beside him and her brother on his other side. Father Bricius was also present. A messenger arrived.
“My lords, there are sightings of the Norsemen. The guard towers in the north have seen them. You must send a war party to stop them,” the messenger reported in great, gulping breaths.
“You heard the man,” Cadell yelled at Rhydderch. “Send a war party. Our fastest riders. Take them by surprise. I knew they could not be trusted.”
Rhydderch stood and bowed to Cadell. Aoife saw the glance he exchanged with Lord Marcant and her fists clenched. Her father had been betrayed not just by his wife, but by his priest and his steward. What chance did he have against all of them?
Then she was aloft, a bird flying over Car Cadell. The war party was about to ride out. On the other side of the wall, a large group of soldiers lay in wait. And the gate didn’t close behind the war party.
Back inside the hall, Ula and her daughters were walking out of the room as the guests attacked their hosts. Father Bricius moved towards her father.
Her eyes flew open. There was no need to see any more. She could fill in any remaining gaps. But the vision would not let her go.
She closed her eyes again, gripping tightly to Tormod as she tried to push the vision away, to no avail. Slowly, she realised the details were different.
Once more, she flew high above Car Cadell.
This time there were soldiers still outside the fort walls.
Not Norse warriors. Britons, moving in from the south.
Already she could see the aftermath of battle, the bloodstains in the courtyard, just as it had looked a short while ago.
With a sickening realisation, she spotted the longships pulled up on the shore just to the north and there…
there were Ulf and his men on the shore.
Her heart pounded. It was daylight in this vision. This was not four nights ago. This was now. Her eyes shot open. “It’s a trap! They’re here!”
Aoife wasn’t sure what she expected her husband’s reaction to be, but a small grin was not it. She looked around. There were a few men in the great hall.
“Come,” he said, taking her hand. “We have a family matter to clear up.”
They stepped out into the courtyard. From there, they faced the gateway. A small group of soldiers, Britons, approached. Aoife recognised one or two as her father’s men and clenched her fists at the thought of their treachery.
“Don’t worry. We are ready to fight,” Tormod whispered to her, then kissed her. “Come.”
They watched the soldiers enter. The men split into two groups, each moving to one side of the courtyard. Four riders came in and paused side by side, facing them.
Aoife stared at them, anger soon replacing surprise.
“Lady Ula, my condolences on your recent loss. I hope those responsible will be punished appropriately,” Tormod said.
Ula glared at him and said nothing. Beside her, Father Bricius and Steward Rhydderch shifted nervously in their saddles.
Tormod turned his attention to the fourth rider.
“Lord Marcant, I presume. I am acquainted with some of your men, I believe. Not, however, with yourself. What a shame you did not arrive in time to prevent this slaughter.”